\ /
\ /
0 /OO\ 0
//OO\\
///OO\\\
/// /\ \\\
/// / \ \\\
/// / \ \\\
/// / \ \\\
______| | | |______
|/O O\|
___________|/ \|___________
(In case it's unclear, that's someone tenting their fingers menacingly.)
Decept is a game similar to Stratego, but with the addition of spies and counterspies.
I wanted to create a game where uncertainty and deception play a major role in the strategy. Ideally, I wanted the players to always be questioning the information they have, wondering whether they are being deceived by the opponent.
The game is based on Stratego, a game where uncertainty plays a major role, because you cannot see the types of your opponent's pieces. In order to make deception a part of the game, I added the ability to spy on your opponent's pieces a certain number of times. However, I also added the ability to make a small sacrifice (decreasing a unit's strength by 1) in order to give your opponent's spies false information. This allows the player to "bluff" by, for example, disguising a 2 as a 9 so the opponent won't attack it, or to "bait" the opponent by disguising an 8 as a 1 so that they might attack it with a 5.
Many games have spies of some sort, but I'm not aware of any where your opponent can trick your spies into giving you false information.
The results seem to depend mainly on the personalities of the players. Some will ignore spies and just go for a gung-ho attack, in which case the game is just like regular Stratego. Others will devise elaborate schemes, such as running away with a unit disguised as a 9, to make the opponent think it's not really a 9, and attack it with an 8 - when in reality it is actually a 9 after all.
It is not at all clear what a good strategy for this game is, which is arguably a good thing, because it leaves the players free to devise their own strategies.
If the game were to be distributed, there are a number of improvements that would need to be made to the networking, such as allowing players to choose their opponents, rather than automatically pairing them as they come in. If I had more time, I would also include time limits on people's moves, so they can't waste their opponent's time. However, I think the game is a good proof of concept as it is.