Board Game Designers Guild of Utah

Well, I've been a member of the Guild for about 6 months now. I've only made it down to SLC for 1 meeting. I find it hard to take trips on a student budget (especially when I've got my wife and 5 children to worry about, you know, home, food, clothing, etc.). Anyway, the Guild has an official logo that was in the works for a little while. Here it is:

Very, very cool! Ryan Laukat, a member of the Guild, designed it (here's a link to a little about Ryan). He's done work for a few games: Bridge Troll (designed by Alf Seegert, also a member of the Guild) and a few cards for Dominion.

There is a Yahoo Group for the Guild and also a website.

It's a lot of fun and very informative being a member of the Guild and being able to interact, if only through the Yahoo Group forum. I feel that I've been able to learn quite a bit already. I can't wait to be able to attend meetings more regularly. I know that that will be an even better learning experience. Anyway, Phil from the Guild proposed a game design competition to culminate in play-testing the results during the first April meeting. Those who choose to design a game have to keep within the following restrictions:
1) Player decks of cards (up to 30 per deck)
2) Must employ either square or hexagon shaped tiles (up to 40 squares or 30 hexagons)
3) No six-sided dice (unless they are used differently)
I started working on a game that would match these restrictions. I've found that it's a lot of fun having certain restrictions placed on the design process. When I first found out about restrictions that would be placed on me in this endeavor to design LDS/Mormon-themed games, I didn't really like it. But now, I find it a lot more enjoyable. It give me some boundaries and guidelines. Alf provided the Guild with a great article that he found online that relates directly to this: here.

In the game I'm working on, players take the role of a group of "-ites" during early parts of the Book of Mormon when the split happened that created the Nephite and Lamanite nations. The players seek to build the greatest army and the most righteous nation. They do this by getting control of the Sword of Laban and the Brass Plates. I'll write more when things are more put together.