For this project, we had to create an artifact for a specific book of our choice. Artifacts that we could’ve created were a board game, a mock YouTube channel, a children’s book, a web page, or even a podcast. I chose to make a game. In this post, I will present to you a summary of the book and game instructions.
This book contains 4 short stories about different kinds of dragons. In the final story, Arctic was an Icewing who was forced by his mother, Queen Diamond, to marry a dragonet he didn’t like (Snowflake). Even though he knew Snowflake disliked him, he still felt obligated to obey his mother’s orders. There was a visiting delegation of Nightwing dragons to negotiate a truce between Icewings and Nightwings. One day, Arctic met this really nice Nightwing dragonet named Foeslayer while Snowflake and Arctic were out for a walk. Foeslayer was apparently a dragonet who was just a Nightwing passing through the Icewing Kingdom. They fell in love. (I hate that part). It was unfortunate for the Arctic that Queen Diamond would not allow him to marry a Nightwing because she was very nice to him, unlike Snowflake. Snowflake had this friend named Fox, who also despised Arctic. Soon after, Snowflake and Fox came up with an idea to kill Arctic. Arctic and Foeslayer decided to run away. When they did, the guards were angry and tried to stop them. The Arctic used its magic to freeze them. He stole some items and planned a get-away. Unfortunately, when one of his friends tried to stop him, he used magic and accidentally killed him and six other guards. Also, when Snowflake tried to stop him, he magnified Foeslayer’s fire breath and burned off her wing completely. He felt very bad about maiming Snowflake and killing all the guards, including his friend. Lastly, instead of running to a faraway island, he had to go to the Nightwing Kingdom, where he would be an outcast. In the end, I think he made a bad decision which he will regret. Love makes people do dumb things.
I thought it would be fun to make a board game based on moving around the Icewing Kingdom, fighting other dragons, stealing things, and trying to escape. I hope you like it as much as I enjoyed making it.
Dragon Escape
Instructions:
How to Win:
The objective is to win by either fulfilling your mission and getting to the Nightwing Lair or being the last dragon alive!
Set up:
Each dragon starts in a hallway. The youngest player is in hallway 1, and players clockwise will be in hallways 2-4. To see the location in the hallway, roll the die and start that many spaces away from the Great Hall. Each player picks a dragon card, a mission card, and a skill card.
Dragon Cards:
Each dragon card has attributes that inform their fighting, health, and movements. Health is how much damage you can survive on. Each attack from another dragon or an NPC (dragon guard) takes away your health. Keep track of your health with a piece of paper and a pencil. Defence is your shield. Whoever is attacking you needs to match or beat your defence with a die roll. For example, if your defense is 4, your opponent must roll a 4, 5, or 6 to successfully hit you. The attack is your modifier to your die roll for how much health you remove from your opponent. Speed is your modifier to your die roll for movements on the board. For example, if you have -1 and you roll a 4, move 3 spaces.
Mission cards:
Before you make your way to Nightwing Lair, you must go to a room to retrieve an object or fight someone for an object (your mission). Your mission card tells you what your mission is.
Skill cards:
Every dragon has a skill. A skill card will help you with fights or movement. Skill cards include:
- Fireball: This gives automatic damage of 6 without a die roll. Note that this can only be used once against each player.
- Spear attack: Can be used to attack another dragon from a range of 4 spaces. You can only have one successful hit per opponent.
- Freeze: This attack allows you to freeze your opponent for one turn (skipping their turn).
- Teleport: This move allows you to teleport 6 spaces away (you can’t go past a player or NPC and can only be used twice).
- Ice Shield: Can defend against any attack (can only be used once).
- Sweet talk NPC: An extra 2 attack points on an NPC (can be used until one successful hit).
Prize cards:
Prize cards can be achieved on your way towards the Nightwing lair! You can earn prize cards by stepping on purple spaces. Prize cards can grant you many benefits, such as increased health or the ability to pick up another skill card.
Some prize cards that I made were:
- Gain 5 health points
- Spear attack-allows you to attack a dragon up to 4 spaces away instead of 1. This can only be used once per opponent.
- Fly farther–add 2 spaces to your next die roll.
- Pick up another skill card.
How to fight:
A fight begins when you are in the same space as another player or are one space away from them. The last person to move starts the fight. You first roll to see if you can get past their defence, and if you do, you roll again to see how much damage you can inflict on them. If you have any modifiers on the attack, apply them after the role. If an attack is successful, the dragon that is attacked loses that much health. After one full round of fighting, you or your opponent can choose whether to continue fighting or flee. For example, if Foeslayer attacks Arctic, and Arctic responds, Foeslayer can leave or make a second attack. Then Arctic may leave or make his second attack, etc. Note that you cannot pass a dragon without at least one round of fighting.
NPC:
An NPC is a non-player character. These are guard dragons. If you have a die roll that takes you through an NPC, you must pause and make it through the NPC. Roll 2 dice—one for you and the other for the NPC. If you roll higher, continue with your original movement. If the NPC rolls higher, you lose that much health and roll again until either you die or you get past the NPC.
Here is a picture of my board game:
Reflection questions:
- Explain why you chose your specific artifact type to connect to your book
I chose to make a board game on my book since my book is an adventure story with fighting, magic, dragons and travel. I enjoy all kinds of games including sports, video games, card games and board games. I made this game to incorporate different parts of this story.
2. Explain why you chose the elements from your book that you included in your artifact
My book involves dragons so each character is a different dragon from the book. I added attributes such as speed, health, defense and attack to individualize each character and make the game more interesting. I added skill and prize cards to add more elements of the book such as fire breathing, freezing guards and throwing spears. Lastly, the objective of the book is to escape to the Nightwing Kingdom just like in the book.
3. Reflect upon what you would change if you were going through this process again
If I were to go through this process again, I would start writing the blog earlier and blog about my book along the way, and I would possibly read a sequel to the book because I am so interested in it.