Machinations - Game Mechanics: Advanced Game Design - page 92

FIGURe 5.14
a trigger in Monopoly
enables the acquisition
of property by spend-
ing money.
acTivaTOrs
Activators connect two nodes. They activate or inhibit their target node based on the
state of their origin node and a specific condition. The activator's label specifies this
condition. Conditions are written as an arithmetic expression (for example, ==0, <3,
>=4, or !=2) or a range of values (for example, 3-6). If the state of the origin node
meets this condition, then the target node is activated (it can fire). When the condi-
tion is not met, the target node is inhibited (it cannot fire).
Activators are used to model many different game mechanics. For example, in the
board game Caylus , players place their laborers (a resource) at particular buildings on
the board to enable them to execute special actions associated with that building.
For example, a player might place a laborer at a gold mine to collect gold ( Figure
5.15 ). However, as indicated by the trigger in the figure, in Caylus every time a
player mines gold, the laborer then returns to the player's Workers pool.
FIGURe 5.15
Caylus