Izzy Hodnett › Personal › Moonrakers Command

Moonrakers Command

A companion for a published board game: keep track of a game while it is being played, then look at how the group actually plays.

Web and phone Personal project
Who uses it
Eleven people, on the web and on Android. The Android app is in closed testing on Google Play, which means access is granted on request rather than published openly. Eleven is a small number and that is the honest figure — it counts people who use it, not downloads.
How long it took
Two weeks. It was the first thing I built, and it took the longest by a wide margin.
Still maintained
Stable, and left alone. It was released to strangers through the board game’s official Discord, so the people using it are not only people I know.
Where it runs
moonrakersapp.org

The problem it solves

Moonrakers is a board game with enough moving parts that a group loses track of what happened during a session — who did what, how a game turned. Keeping score on paper records the result and nothing else, so the questions people actually argue about afterwards have no answer.

How it works

  1. During a game, one person records what happens turn by turn on a phone or a laptop.
  2. Afterwards the same records are turned into summaries — how players compare, how a session went, which approaches tend to work for that group.
  3. Because each group signs in, a group sees its own history and not anyone else's.

What this is built with

Each part, and what it does, in plain terms.

Hosting
Where the site actually runs. These run on Cloudflare, the same service that carries traffic for a large share of the web, so pages load from whichever of its locations is nearest the reader.
A database
The filing cabinet where the information lives, so it is still there when you close the page. Anything someone types in and expects to find again is kept here.
Sign-in and accounts
The part that knows who someone is. It keeps each person's records separate, so people see their own group's data and not anyone else's.
A web page people use
The site itself, the screens people click through. It opens in an ordinary browser, so there is nothing for anyone to install.
A phone app
A version installed on a phone rather than opened in a browser. It is built for use at a table, in hand, while something is happening.
Charts and summaries
The pictures and tables built from the stored records. They turn a long list of entries into something you can read at a glance.

These apps are in closed testing, so they cannot simply be opened by anyone who wants a look. Every screen is here for that reason.

Setting up a game and the turn order
Setting up a game and the turn order
The command screen during a game
The command screen during a game
Scoring at the end of a game
Scoring at the end of a game
Choosing a scenario
Choosing a scenario
Replaying how a game unfolded
Replaying how a game unfolded
Player statistics across completed games
Player statistics across completed games
The analysis screens
The analysis screens
Comparing choices against outcomes
Comparing choices against outcomes
The archive of past games
The archive of past games

The publisher of the game is aware of this app and the site, and the work has been shared with them.

← All projects Android app on Google Play Open Moonrakers Command