Tempero Ludum — Skirmish

Tempero Ludum — Skirmish

Full Sail University | February 2026 | Systems Design

Introduction

Tempero Ludum was a month-long board game design project completed in February 2026 as part of the Systems Design course at Full Sail University. The assignment required designing an original two-player board game from scratch under strict constraints — a single printed page for rules, a single printed page for the board, only up to two six-sided dice for randomization, no cards or specialty components, and a design that favored skill over luck with a target playtime under thirty minutes. The game I designed is called Skirmish. It is played on an 8x20 grid where two players each control sixteen pieces spread across three starting rows. Players receive three dice rolls per turn which they can spend on movement or combat. The goal is simple — get one piece to the opponent's starting row first. The project followed a structured weekly iteration cycle across four weeks, with required playtesting, data tracking, probability analysis, and peer review at each stage.

What Went Right

1. The Core Mechanic Was Immediately Engaging

The fundamental design of Skirmish — three rolls per turn spent on movement or combat, with movement points scaling to the die value — produced a game that was immediately intuitive and fun. Playtesters from week one grasped the rules without difficulty and responded positively to the strategic depth and player agency the system created. The combat system in particular was highlighted as engaging, and the defender's choice mechanic — capturing the attacker's piece or reviving a lost ally — added meaningful decision-making to every combat interaction.

2. The Iteration Cycle Produced a Progressively Better Game

Each week's playtesting identified a concrete problem and each week's revision addressed it. The blitz exploit identified in week two was neutralized by week three through the addition of a staggered third row of pieces that created board friction and prevented a single piece from racing uncontested to the end zone. By week four the game was well-received by all playtesters and the exploit, while theoretically executable, now required deliberate misplay from the opponent to succeed. The game improved in a measurable and trackable way across the full four weeks.

3. Data Tracking Informed Design Decisions

A custom Google Sheets tracker was built and used across every playtest session to record attacks tried, attacks won, defends won, revives, kills, average rolls, multi-piece movement frequency, and game outcomes. This gave the iteration process an objective foundation rather than relying solely on

feel. The probability analysis in week three — identifying that the chance of moving more than one piece per roll is 50% and the chance of rolling all ones across three rolls is 0.46% — confirmed the action economy was sound and the game was not dependent on luck to a degree that would undermine the skill requirement.

4. Accessibility Across Player Types

The week two playtest with a non-gamer confirmed that Skirmish was genuinely accessible without sacrificing strategic depth. Explanations were minimized intentionally to test rule intuitiveness, and the mechanics were grasped without difficulty. The game worked both as a competitive experience for experienced players thinking critically about positioning and piece management, and as an accessible entry point for players with no strategy game background.

5. Experimental Testing Validated the Final Design

The week four experiments — reducing rolls from three to two, reducing attack cost to one roll, and introducing diagonal movement — all produced negative or unbalanced outcomes when tested. Reducing rolls crippled movement and made attacking too costly. Reducing attack cost reintroduced the blitz exploit. Diagonal movement was enjoyable but overpowered. The fact that none of the experiments improved on the existing design confirmed that the final iteration had reached a genuinely balanced state rather than one that simply had not been stress tested yet.

What Went Wrong

1. The Blitz Exploit Was Not Caught Before Playtesting

The most critical flaw in the initial design — that a single piece could be rushed across the board using only movement rolls, making the game winnable in a handful of turns — was not identified through solo analysis before the first playtest. It required live testing to surface. A more thorough pre-playtest analysis of dominant strategies and win conditions would have caught this during the design phase and saved a full week of iteration.

2. Rule Clarity Was a Recurring Problem

Ambiguity in the written rules was flagged across multiple weeks by multiple reviewers. How rolls generate movement points, how multi-piece movement costs are calculated, how backward movement interacts with roll values, and when attacks can be declared were all sources of confusion that required repeated revision. The rules fit the single-page requirement but sacrificed precision to do so, and that tradeoff cost playtesters clarity at the table.

3. Board Design Was Functional but Not Original Enough

The 8x20 grid with staggered starting rows communicated the game clearly and met the project requirements, but it did not push the creative boundaries of what a board design could be. The constraint was that the board had to be fixed and printable, but within that constraint there was more

room for originality in shape, zone design, or visual differentiation than what was delivered. The board serves the game but does not elevate it.

4. Self-Reported Procrastination Impacted Week One

The week one self-evaluation directly acknowledged that procrastination was a factor in how the first week was executed. The initial prototype went straight to a 10x10 grid with ten pieces before the design had been stress-tested on paper, which led to the board size and piece count needing immediate revision after the first playtest. More upfront design work before building the first prototype would have produced a stronger starting point.

5. Pacing Was Never Fully Resolved

While the target playtime was under thirty minutes, week three testing confirmed that game length varied significantly depending on player strategy. Aggressive players finished faster while defensive or methodical players could push sessions beyond the target window. No structural fix was implemented for this — the issue was noted and monitored but not solved. A time-based pressure mechanic or clearer turn limit contingency would have addressed this more definitively.

Conclusion

Skirmish was a successful first pass at designing a complete game system under tight constraints. The core mechanic was sound from the beginning, the iteration process worked as intended, and the final product was a balanced and genuinely enjoyable two-player game. The clearest lessons from what went wrong are the ones that show up everywhere — think through the dominant strategies before building, write rules with precision not just brevity, and don't procrastinate the first pass. The month-long structured cycle of design, test, analyze, and revise is the most valuable thing this project taught, and it is a process that applies directly to every design problem beyond it.