Solo Ruleset: Snow Tails

Version 1.1

NOTE: You can download a PDF (complete with illustrated examples) HERE.

The following rules are intended to run sleds that no human player controls. They can be used for a solo game proper, but also to fill out the roster of racers when fewer than five players are involved. Just roll the dice for every “bot” riding a sled, and enjoy!

• All regular rules apply: the bot rules function as a layer on top of the existing ruleset. Some exceptions do exist, and will be highlighted accordingly.
• No rule is modified for human players. Only cardboard opponents are afforded some leeway...

The Dice

Each bot is activated with a roll of two six-sided dice (2d6), in two different colors. One of them is the Movement die, the other the Control die.

• The Movement die indicates the bot’s Speed—how many spaces it will move.
• The delta between the two dice shows how many drifts must be performed during that move. If both dice are equal, no drift occurs: the sled is balanced! (And it does benefit from its movement bonus.)
• In some situations (see below), the Control die also indicates in what direction drifts will take place. In those cases, the bot will drift towards the outside of the track (in relation to the next curve) when the Control die is higher than the Movement die, and towards the inside of the track when the Control die is lower than the Movement die.

Movement

Move each bot-driven sled as far as possible within the confines of the game’s regular rules. Prioritize distance (towards the finish line) over angle inside a corner. This means that sometimes a bot will drive itself into a dead end rather than go for a better position for next turn; that’s ok. If two different destinations are valid, prioritize the one most on the inside of the track.

• A bot’s minimum Speed is always its position in the race. If you roll a speed that’s lower than a bot’s position, physically rotate the Movement die so that it shows the correct number. (So a bot in fourth place can roll 4, 5 or 6—if the Movement die shows any other result, rotate it so that the 4 is showing.)
• If the sled starts on a corner piece, apply drifts towards the inside of the corner.
• If the sled’s move would take it onto a corner piece (even if another sled blocks the intended path—imagine the track is empty for this visualization), apply drifts towards the inside of that next corner.
• If both situations apply, prioritize the next corner.
• In any other contradictory situation, prioritize the current corner.
• (You might see that rare occurrence with two consecutive but opposed corners, where going inside the current corner takes you to the next track piece, but moving towards the inside of the next corner would leave you on the current track piece.)
• Note that the above points also apply to obstacle pieces such as the Snow Drift. In that case, replace “inside of the corner” with “safe side of the track.”
• Otherwise, apply drifts according to the Control die (as explained above).
• Once a drift direction is determined, it remains the same for the entire turn.
• Delayed Drift: If a drift would take a sled outside the track, move it forward instead. (That drift becomes a forward movement.) Bots are not stopped by the sides of tracks.
• Should the sled then reach an opening that allows it to drift, resume drifting as prescribed by the dice roll.
• A bot that reaches a dead end must stop.
• If a sled starts its turn in a dead end and gets a balanced dice roll (both dice are equal), it’s allowed to drift 1 space towards the inside of the track and then keep going if that move freed the sled. (And still use its movement bonus if applicable!)
• That initial “free drift” doesn’t count as a direction change, and so the sled could conceivably start drifting in the other direction during its move. This is the only case in which a bot could be viewed as zigzagging.

Movement Exceptions

• Bots are not restrained by speed limits. (Those guys are fearless!)
• Bots never incur damage.
• Bots ignore trees in their path.
• Bots are not stopped by the side of a track, but are stopped by other sleds.

Difficulty Adjustments

The rules outlined above should provide plenty of challenge and chaos. Sometimes bots will roll great, sometimes poorly, but overall the resulting race should be fun and exciting.
However, should you desire to up the ante, you can pull one or more of the following levers.

• Instead of selecting your start position at random, place your sled in a higher number (not necessarily 5!).
• Give a +1 or +2 move boost to any bot that starts its turn behind your sled.
• Provide bots that start their turn in a dead end with 2 free drifts instead of 1.
  (Warning: this makes bots REALLY powerful.)

Design Notes

There’s not much to say here, except that I’ve always wanted a way to play Snow Tails with five sleds on the race track, no matter how many friends I have around the table.
I like that the 2d6 mechanic mimics the pull of the two dogs on the sled, like the card play does for human players. There’s nothing that duplicates the effect of brakes, though; but since bots don’t care for speed limits, they don’t need to slow down.
Also, because the minimum Speed of a sled is equal to its position in the race, it tends to force stragglers to swerve towards the inside of the track (which is, of course, the ideal move we all strive for). You will sometimes get an incompetent bot in 5th place who will manage to roll a 6 on the Control die and drift against the curve: enjoy those occasional blunders, because bot-operated sleds never stay behind for very long...




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Lucas Land: The Call

(Previous chapter: The Door)

I have previously recounted how I found myself whisked away to Tunisia on a quest for the original Star Wars shooting locations. It was on that trek that I met our intrepid guide, archaeologist Dr. David West Reynolds, who would take us through the looking glass and back, safe yet sated with blue milk and myriad intergalactic memories. 

And so it was on the road to Tatooine that Reynolds and I discovered that we had much more in common than an abnormal passion for Star Wars. Any unexpected twist in the conversation found us nodding our heads in agreement, exploding in shared excitement, or else grow solemn together in silent contemplation. For one thing, we realized we were both Back to the Future freaks, which gave us three more movies to obsess about together. (Did I mention Reynolds had just purchased a Delorean?) Despite a 10-year age gap that attempted to exert some distancing power over us, we grew surprisingly close over the course of our short two-week stay in that galaxy far, far away. So much so that, as our trip was winding down, I realized that what I imagined as the end of an incredible journey might in fact only be the beginning.

A scant few months prior, Reynolds had landed a job as editor-in-chief of starwars.com, and had his office right in the middle of the fabled Skywalker Ranch, nested in the rolling hills of northern California. Unbeknownst to me, he had since been on the lookout for a right-hand man (or woman, as the case may be): someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of the Star Wars universe, a sense of adventure, a willingness to jump into a ocean of unknown perils and tumbling dangers—and who also happened to have the chops to serve as lead writer in the coolest place on earth.
Me? I had been writing magazine articles for a couple of years, and published in just enough venues to prove that I was worth my salt when it came to typing stuff. (Some years later, a colleague in Virginia would start calling me “wordsmith”—still one of the very best compliments I’ve ever been paid about my writing.)

So one night, as we were actually huddled around a fire—would you believe it— Reynolds turned to me with a glint in his eye and uttered a few chilling words: “You know, you’re exactly the kind of guy I’d need at the Ranch.” I must have looked too stunned to answer, or else Reynolds didn’t feel like waiting. “I believe I have the perfect job for you,” he continued, explaining that there was a ton of writing to get done in order to feed an official Star Wars website that was still in its infancy, and that finding the right person to accomplish that Herculean task felt like subbing for Sisyphus himself. But his quest might be at an end: if he could arrange it, would I consider a position as web writer at Lucasfilm?

To be honest, it sounded like a pipe dream. I was 23, still in college working on my Masters (literature/philosophy—talk to me about 18^th century thinkers one day), and I hadn’t held a real day job yet. What was this guy selling me?
Sure, it sounded like a position I would have killed for, but perhaps in a parallel universe. Because in order to hire me (a Canadian), Lucasfilm would have to unholster a fistful of lawyers and prove to the American government that nobody else in the U.S. of A. could do the job like I could. Fat chance. And yet, what if that Rube Goldberg machine ended up producing that unlikely result?

Upon our return from our mythological odyssey, Reynolds promised to keep in touch—and that he did. I never once imagined he and I would forget each other, being as we felt like long-lost brothers, but I have to admit that the prospect of a job in California quickly faded from my horizon. I was back from the dream, and reality was calling. Still, once in a while, I would receive an email from my faraway friend saying he was still working on the job description, that our “project” was still on, and that he couldn’t wait for me to get over there.

Time flew like an angry river, with my hanging onto classes and papers like I would a disintegrating raft. About a year down the line, late in the summer of 1997, my inbox chimed the arrival of a message from a Lucasfilm HR lady asking for a copy of my resume. Reynolds had told me two days prior to expect such a communication, but I was still dumbfounded. Could this thing really be happening? I promptly fired an email back, with my resume (groomed to death 48 hours earlier) in tow. I remember looking at the screen after the communication went through, wondering what kind of a rollercoaster I had just boarded.

Less than a week later—on a Monday—I got a call from Lucasfilm. Not an email: a bona fide phone call. That same HR lady was asking if I were available to interview for the position of web writer, at Skywalker Ranch in Nicasio, California. They would have a plane ticket with my name on it that very Thursday, and a car waiting for me at San Francisco Airport. That one Reynolds had not prepared me for. (He’d always had a sense for the dramatic, and I would soon discover he wasn’t done yet.)
I somehow managed to stutter that yes, I’d be delighted to go out and meet with them, and that Thursday was perfect. (At that moment I couldn’t recall what my calendar looked like for the near future, but I was pretty sure nothing held a candle to the offer I had just received.) “Great!” the lady exclaimed, as if mortals refused an invitation to Skywalker Ranch on a regular basis. “I’ll email you everything.”

Two minutes later, I had indeed been emailed everything. I would land in San Francisco on Thursday night, sleep at a hotel halfway between the airport and the Ranch, go through five interviews (FIVE?!) on Friday before spending the weekend in the Bay Area, and finally flying back home on Sunday night. Reynolds called me while I was still going through my travel arrangements, and I could hear the devilish smile in his voice, bright like a church bell ringing next door. “So, are we meeting on Friday?” he asked. I replied with a conspiratorial grin: “You bet your ass.”

Try as I might, I can’t remember the handful of days leading to my departure. I know it turned into a peculiar blur of hazy preparations and trying to think of something else (to no avail). I do recall sitting on the plane, en route to SFO for the first time in my life, and being asked by the elderly San Franciscan couple seated on my right where I was going. “Well, I’m going to interview for a job at Lucasfilm,” I replied after a beat, not quite believing it myself.
(Ever seen the movie Sleepless in Seattle? There’s this scene where 8-year-old Jonah, having flown to New York on his own, climbs aboard a cab to try to reach the woman he desperately wants his father to date. The driver asks him where he’s going, to which Jonah replies excitedly, “I’m going to meet my new mother!” I’m convinced I sounded just like him when I told that sweet couple where I was headed, and that for an instant I looked not a day older than that kid.)

The plane touched down a few minutes before midnight. My hotel was just on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge, so I had to drive through San Francisco at night (remember this is 1997: no smartphones to the rescue), cross the famous bridge with my mouth agape, make it to the hotel closer to dawn than dusk (yeah, I got lost), and then attempt to go to sleep. But Orpheus refused me for what felt like an eternity, and when my alarm clock started yelling in the morning, my face wasn’t sporting a single pillow crease.

Reynolds had suggested he come and pick me up, and he showed up right on time—behind the wheel of his Delorean, of course. As the gullwing door rose up and my friend started walking towards me, I couldn’t help but blurt out “Hey Doc!” Reynolds grabbed my trembling hand with one of his, put the other on my shoulder, and smiled like Doc Brown demonstrating his flux capacitor for the first time.
    “Hey Marty. Ready for the ride of your life?”

I knew he meant both the trip aboard the Delorean and my day at Skywalker Ranch.
But I couldn’t know how right he was.

 

(Next chapter: The Belly of the Beast)

(Full series here)

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