D&D in all its editions has never worked well past level 15 or so. But at least the earlier editions morphed into domain rules…basically becoming a totally different game.
@@russellharrell2747 Agreed. I've been from level 1 to 20 several times, and once you get above 10 the cracks start to show; by the time you're 15+, gameplay is just a slog!
@@russellharrell2747 I managed to get to do a full level 1 to 20 campaign in 3.5e In 5e I haven't been higher than level 8 yet, but we only switched about 3 years ago. The math does matter to us. But we have several physics majors and one physics and maths PhD in the group.
Great video! I was thinking the same thing about math; this is more of a marketing suggestion rather than a strictly development or playtest suggestion, ie, whether talking about math will entice someone to play or publish your game. I immediately thought about Pathfinder, which has done a good job of marketing its math as a working contrast to 5e's broken math model. While I think in general math might not be a selling point to a lot of people, if they've had a bad math experience, it might work pretty well.
Cool video, rock-solid advice. The system is almost the least important thing. Call of Cthulhu is a great game with a trash system, Trail of Cthulhu way better system but just doesn't hit the same.
@@jaykaye594 So many folks get caught up in the details, rather than the story and experience! "Missing the forest for the trees", I believe is the saying!
@TalesFromElsewhereGames I feel validated watching this! I'm writing my first game and it's reassuring to hear what your saying is aligning with my approach. Great video :)
@@lorenmakesvideos There wonderful to hear, Loren! Is it your Tudor setting you're referring to? (Hope you release more videos about it on your channel!)
I'm so happy I found your channel and subscribed. Very valid points, harsh truths and camaraderie. At some point or another, I have done everything you advised against!🥳 My own tip would be to write your ideas down immediately. This cool idea that you had while commuting to work and daydreaming about your game? Yes! Write it down. You won't necessarily remember it after work. Speaking from experience 😝
@@GreekSoloRPG Thanks so much! And I agree about always writing everything down. Inspiration strikes at odd times, and you'll forget it if you don't commit it to the page!
For some annoying unknown reason I come up with a lot of my ideas while 1/2 asleep. Key for me has been having my phone and a note app handy (I use google keep, but anything with voice will do) I'll roll over, flick it on and dictate the ideas. Bonus: I actually get more & better sleep because my brain can stfu about it Pro tip: either manually or with an app, set your phone to near zero brightness for when you go to bed so the glare doesn't 1. shock your brain making it hard to fall back asleep, and 2. wake your spouse who may stab you.
Great advice. The only thing I'm kinda missing, was that you didn't follow up on your brilliant and provocative intro: "People do not care about your game …". As a fellow game designer I am very much interested in your approach, on how to ignite a spark of enthusiasm for your creation in your play-testers. Is it enough to let them read over a well worded quick-start page? How do you lure players into giving a sh*t about your game, setting, system etc.?
That's a very good question, my friend. I think when YOU are enthusiastic about a game it can help instill that in others. That passion can be contagious. A big part of getting the playtesters excited has been to cut out all the details and nitty gritty and just tell them about the cool stuff they can do in the game, the fun characters and brutal monsters. Then, when doing playtests, I put them right into the action - no "you all met at the tavern, now roleplay awkwardly". It's like, "You're on this train, and bandits are attacking you NOW".
Make an elevator speech, evoke that in your title, and deliver to your core audience. DnD: high fantasy crunchy combat and encounter sim. Mothership: survival sci-fi horror. Invisible Sun: surreal fantasy and magic that is truly magical. Tiny Dungeons: 3d6 rules-lite dungeon crawler. Thirsty Sword Lesbians: Love, Swords, and adventure. Each of these summaries gives you something to care about, and maybe a hint about game resolution, rules weight, or seriousness. You want to let potential players start building a world in their mind as soon as possible. Let them connect your story to something in their experience. Then they can care about the game because they've already written the character or world. Use the rules document to provide general guardrails for the world with some specifics. And deeper worldbuilding can be part of a starter adventure or appendix. The more they read, the more you can entice them to care.
Great vid! I dont have that much experience creating a system (yet), but as someone how tries as many system as I can, I have some comments: 1) Tips 1 and 2 are greatly flashed out in Mausritter for me. Streamlined character creation and tense expectation anytime you have to roll the dice; 2) Tip 3: the vibe is indeed the best stuff. The first best pitch I had was Blades in the Dark: "Peaky Blinders meets Cthullhu and other Horrors" got me (red) hooked from the start 3) About Coaching, I see the refinement of the explanation process in the combat example video 4) "Nobody likes a lore dump!" I learned that the hard way hehehe. Again, I think John Harper's books does incredible, streamlined descriptions! I think it is a great example of what you leave for the players to develop on their own. I do agree that separating the lore from the rules is a great idea! Congratulations on another great video!
Hey there. I stumbled across your channel a couple weeks ago and I’m really liking what I am seeing. I haven’t been able to track down much information on the release of the game though. Any idea when it might come out? Are you going to be doing a kick starter?
Thanks for your interest! We're gearing up to release a free Demo Packet; it'll have quick start rules, pregen characters, and a demo adventure. Sometime next year we'll likely do a crowdfunding campaign to pay our wonderful artists to fill a hardcover rulebook with their works. Much of the rules will be provided to the community for free over that time!
I don't know that it really matters WHEN you write your lore. I mean you're right, you shouldn't be handing out 20 pages of world history to playtesters, but it doesn't actually hurt the design process to do the lore first. I'd actually say you might end up with a better product if you at least have all that stuff outlined before you get into game design. Your playtesters may never know, but it can function as a skeleton to build the game over, and make it feel less tacked on when you eventually do add some lore. Mostly though, it just doesn't hurt you at all if you want to write lore first, and do game design second. Some people need their stories to get inspired to do the rest.
All valid points! Nothing wrong with writing it for yourself to make sure you're getting the setting and worlbuilding right. I'm just a bit jaded from reading playtest documents where I have to read 5-10 pages of lore for a 2 hour test session haha 🤠
@@TalesFromElsewhereGamesoh, no. I'd be hesitant to even include flavour text until late in the playtest process. Lore has no place in a playtest document.
@@matthewparker9276 I feel you. If you'll be running a playtest campaign (several sessions), then providing a small amount of world building is helpful. But yeah - if you're sitting down strangers to help test the games in one sitting, just describe it to 'em in brief and then get right to the testing! :)
I've found a lot of players like to create their own worlds within a system, rather than use an established setting. I like to include setting info for those that want to use it, but don't make it a barrier to get to the rules themselves.
I have to admit, I'm a little mixed on that point. I've found that every setting-less system actually has an _implied_ setting (eg rules for magic imply that magic _exists_ and works a _certain_ way). I've found that the best systems are explicitly tied to the setting, and I think that tying the system to the setting is similar to the vid's point about "moments not mechanics". On the other hand, I absolutely understand making homebrew settings and using an established ruleset (even with the baggage that system's implied setting brings).
@@Mr.RobotHead That's a very good point. I think when a game's system is trying to evoke a certain feeling, a certain world and setting, the system itself will be more honed and effective.
@@Mr.RobotHead Normally I would agree. However, my rules system doesn't need a setting and works great for any kind of game world. I have yet to find anything else that works with everything though so I get your point.
There was some of this here already, but I just want to chime in for emphasis; the two things that get people to pick up and run a game are Vibe and Accessibility. You should have a person in mind who will look at your game and say "yes, this is 100% my shit", and you should remove as many barriers as possible from the moment they realize that and the moment they are able to run a session.
I wrote a similar thing in response to another comment! I think your second point is why so many books have intro adventures with pre-gen characters and GM screens. It gets folks to the first game faster and provides a suite of examples for how the system folds together.
This is really explaining why I've been dicking around with designing systems for 15+ years and not actually finishing anything. ...I mean, besides my procrastination, perfectionism, and laziness. I have run a lot of fun campaigns with those prototypes at least!
Haha I 100% feel you on this. I was in the exact same boat. It was only a few years ago that I really committed to buckling down and finishing a project. The first inklings of what would become Tales from Elsewhere started in like...2010ish? Fiddled with it, then left it behind for many years while "real life" took over and other interests caught my attention. 🤠 Never too late to dust off one of those ideas and take it across the finish line!
Hands down the best TTRPG builder video I've watched. Very respectful of everybody's different desires to building a game. Any other video of this kind when bringing up "lay off on the worldbuilding" would just say that nobody cares and that would be that. You twist that around into encouragement and advice into *managing* a large game world for lore dumpers like myself. Outstanding, motivating, and concise. I wish your channel and your TTRPG all the best ❤
Hey thanks for the kind words! I feel like there's so much negativity on the internet. I'm trying to focus on helping folks and encouragement, rather than telling people how to play or that their approaches to game design are wrong. "I'm not here to yuck your yum" is a funny way I've heard it phrased!
The math is important, it just isn't sexy. It's a bit like gear ratios in a car's transmission. Nobody gives a squat about gear ratios. Your average car buyer will be more impressed by the number of cup holders a car has than by its gear ratios. Until they drive it for a bit and find the experience herky-jerky and getting terrible gas mileage. They take it into a shop where the mechanic is pained to inform them that they bought a hunk of junk. The gear ratios are all wrong. In fact, everything under the hood looks like it was designed by morons who care more about cup holders than performance. That is when the math starts to matter.
Great video, I'm currently trying to create my own rpg and I'm using one chapter of Justin Alexander book "quick and dirty worldbuilding" (without the character creation) + 2 pages for the rules to create a playbook for the players, to playtest as soon as I can. It force me to be concise and to clarify what I want to explain without getting too much into the details.
That's very grounded advice, I can definitely see where previous projects I had suffered from ignoring some of those tips. I think what you say about defining moment first is crucial -- and I think it's really important to make sure that any mechanic you add to support it doesn't end-up accidentally abstracting it or making it happen outside the game. I.e. if your game is about puzzles, you probably don't want a puzzle solving skill. It's pretty obvious but I find that when I'm in mechanical design mode I can get into the mindset that mechanics = what can happen for real; and it's often pretty much the opposite.
Great video as always! I (as a forever GM) definitely agree with the point about world building/lore since regardless of system I always end up just making my own version/world - Frank
"nobody cares about the math in your game. I'm sure it's good but--" I'mma stop you right there chief, it aint good lolllllllll But in all seriousness, my gosh, 1,000% on the hard to read instructions. More than a few times have I considered the thought of starting a side gig of helping people write instructions for their ttrpgs that actually make sense. And in their defense, there is both an art and a skill to relaying information through pages that requires a lot of practice, and most people aren't in positions where they use those skills. And as you said, the system makes perfect sense to them so it's even harder to get that on a page.
Great vid! All useful advice! While it's true most people don't care about the math, there is a intricate connection between it and the game feel. Most players may not argue about the exact % of success and failure, but they may say that "it's unfair how my Barbarian was constantly failing in their Strength tasks". With that said, I'd like to see a video breaking down the math in your combat system.
I 100% agree. The "guts" of the game, the machine that makes it run, requires refinement and care. The players will definitely start caring if the math doesn't work! You're one of the only people have have said they'd be interested in a video on the math haha! I may just have to do it, because I know folks like you would appreciate that deep dive! 🤠
This was useful to me. Thank you. I invented a 2 page system that was already played by around 50 people of my larp group since 2020 (because of the C-Virus). And we never stopped playing it. Now I feel like this very simple game deserves a second edition and .. it's a lot of work.
Micro-RPGs are awesome! They're perfect for pick-up games with low planning, and are great training exercises in game design as they force you to be very careful and precise with your rules writing!
@@consoya Great question! One page for lore/world building, then 5-10 pages for actual rules, at most. I prefer to use pregen characters for testing at first, as character creation rules are a whole thing that has to be developed and tested separately. If you're doing character creation tests, you'll likely need a lot more pages and rules! Keep the tests focused on specific mechanics, features, and ideas. You'll get better data and feedback if you're honing in on something specific 🤠
They may not "care" about the math, but if the math doesn't work, they will care.
People care that Level 15+ D&D campaigns basically don't work.
Definitely agreed. A system needs to be functional!
D&D in all its editions has never worked well past level 15 or so. But at least the earlier editions morphed into domain rules…basically becoming a totally different game.
@@russellharrell2747 Agreed. I've been from level 1 to 20 several times, and once you get above 10 the cracks start to show; by the time you're 15+, gameplay is just a slog!
@@russellharrell2747 I managed to get to do a full level 1 to 20 campaign in 3.5e
In 5e I haven't been higher than level 8 yet, but we only switched about 3 years ago.
The math does matter to us.
But we have several physics majors and one physics and maths PhD in the group.
Great video!
I was thinking the same thing about math; this is more of a marketing suggestion rather than a strictly development or playtest suggestion, ie, whether talking about math will entice someone to play or publish your game. I immediately thought about Pathfinder, which has done a good job of marketing its math as a working contrast to 5e's broken math model. While I think in general math might not be a selling point to a lot of people, if they've had a bad math experience, it might work pretty well.
How dare my players NOT care about all the cool systems i kickbashed for my game >:[
Friend, TOO REAL!
Cool video, rock-solid advice. The system is almost the least important thing. Call of Cthulhu is a great game with a trash system, Trail of Cthulhu way better system but just doesn't hit the same.
@@jaykaye594 So many folks get caught up in the details, rather than the story and experience!
"Missing the forest for the trees", I believe is the saying!
Very good and not often found tips ^^
Thanks! Was hoping to not cover ground that others have already gone over ad nauseam 🤠
@TalesFromElsewhereGames I feel validated watching this! I'm writing my first game and it's reassuring to hear what your saying is aligning with my approach. Great video :)
@@lorenmakesvideos There wonderful to hear, Loren! Is it your Tudor setting you're referring to? (Hope you release more videos about it on your channel!)
@TalesFromElsewhereGames funny enough I've just started writing the next scene, so a video should be out soon :)
Great video, very helpful tips! Sorry I missed the premier!
@@gnomebotstudios Thanks!! And all good my friend, still not sure if the premier functionality is worth it, but fun to try out 🤠
I'm so happy I found your channel and subscribed. Very valid points, harsh truths and camaraderie. At some point or another, I have done everything you advised against!🥳 My own tip would be to write your ideas down immediately. This cool idea that you had while commuting to work and daydreaming about your game? Yes! Write it down. You won't necessarily remember it after work. Speaking from experience 😝
@@GreekSoloRPG Thanks so much!
And I agree about always writing everything down. Inspiration strikes at odd times, and you'll forget it if you don't commit it to the page!
For some annoying unknown reason I come up with a lot of my ideas while 1/2 asleep. Key for me has been having my phone and a note app handy (I use google keep, but anything with voice will do) I'll roll over, flick it on and dictate the ideas.
Bonus: I actually get more & better sleep because my brain can stfu about it
Pro tip: either manually or with an app, set your phone to near zero brightness for when you go to bed so the glare doesn't 1. shock your brain making it hard to fall back asleep, and 2. wake your spouse who may stab you.
This is really helpful, thank you.
@@johnmcdevitt8002 My pleasure! Thanks for watching 🤠
Great advice.
The only thing I'm kinda missing, was that you didn't follow up on your brilliant and provocative intro: "People do not care about your game …".
As a fellow game designer I am very much interested in your approach, on how to ignite a spark of enthusiasm for your creation in your play-testers.
Is it enough to let them read over a well worded quick-start page? How do you lure players into giving a sh*t about your game, setting, system etc.?
That's a very good question, my friend.
I think when YOU are enthusiastic about a game it can help instill that in others. That passion can be contagious.
A big part of getting the playtesters excited has been to cut out all the details and nitty gritty and just tell them about the cool stuff they can do in the game, the fun characters and brutal monsters.
Then, when doing playtests, I put them right into the action - no "you all met at the tavern, now roleplay awkwardly". It's like, "You're on this train, and bandits are attacking you NOW".
Make an elevator speech, evoke that in your title, and deliver to your core audience.
DnD: high fantasy crunchy combat and encounter sim.
Mothership: survival sci-fi horror.
Invisible Sun: surreal fantasy and magic that is truly magical.
Tiny Dungeons: 3d6 rules-lite dungeon crawler.
Thirsty Sword Lesbians: Love, Swords, and adventure.
Each of these summaries gives you something to care about, and maybe a hint about game resolution, rules weight, or seriousness. You want to let potential players start building a world in their mind as soon as possible. Let them connect your story to something in their experience. Then they can care about the game because they've already written the character or world.
Use the rules document to provide general guardrails for the world with some specifics. And deeper worldbuilding can be part of a starter adventure or appendix. The more they read, the more you can entice them to care.
Great vid! I dont have that much experience creating a system (yet), but as someone how tries as many system as I can, I have some comments:
1) Tips 1 and 2 are greatly flashed out in Mausritter for me. Streamlined character creation and tense expectation anytime you have to roll the dice;
2) Tip 3: the vibe is indeed the best stuff. The first best pitch I had was Blades in the Dark: "Peaky Blinders meets Cthullhu and other Horrors" got me (red) hooked from the start
3) About Coaching, I see the refinement of the explanation process in the combat example video
4) "Nobody likes a lore dump!" I learned that the hard way hehehe. Again, I think John Harper's books does incredible, streamlined descriptions! I think it is a great example of what you leave for the players to develop on their own.
I do agree that separating the lore from the rules is a great idea!
Congratulations on another great video!
John Harper is the absolute master of design!!
Hey there. I stumbled across your channel a couple weeks ago and I’m really liking what I am seeing. I haven’t been able to track down much information on the release of the game though. Any idea when it might come out? Are you going to be doing a kick starter?
Thanks for your interest! We're gearing up to release a free Demo Packet; it'll have quick start rules, pregen characters, and a demo adventure.
Sometime next year we'll likely do a crowdfunding campaign to pay our wonderful artists to fill a hardcover rulebook with their works. Much of the rules will be provided to the community for free over that time!
I don't know that it really matters WHEN you write your lore. I mean you're right, you shouldn't be handing out 20 pages of world history to playtesters, but it doesn't actually hurt the design process to do the lore first.
I'd actually say you might end up with a better product if you at least have all that stuff outlined before you get into game design. Your playtesters may never know, but it can function as a skeleton to build the game over, and make it feel less tacked on when you eventually do add some lore.
Mostly though, it just doesn't hurt you at all if you want to write lore first, and do game design second. Some people need their stories to get inspired to do the rest.
All valid points! Nothing wrong with writing it for yourself to make sure you're getting the setting and worlbuilding right.
I'm just a bit jaded from reading playtest documents where I have to read 5-10 pages of lore for a 2 hour test session haha 🤠
@@TalesFromElsewhereGamesoh, no. I'd be hesitant to even include flavour text until late in the playtest process. Lore has no place in a playtest document.
@@matthewparker9276 I feel you. If you'll be running a playtest campaign (several sessions), then providing a small amount of world building is helpful. But yeah - if you're sitting down strangers to help test the games in one sitting, just describe it to 'em in brief and then get right to the testing! :)
I try not to put much lore into the actual game system. I make a set of rules that work with anything and then add lore.
I've found a lot of players like to create their own worlds within a system, rather than use an established setting.
I like to include setting info for those that want to use it, but don't make it a barrier to get to the rules themselves.
@@TalesFromElsewhereGames Exactly
I have to admit, I'm a little mixed on that point. I've found that every setting-less system actually has an _implied_ setting (eg rules for magic imply that magic _exists_ and works a _certain_ way). I've found that the best systems are explicitly tied to the setting, and I think that tying the system to the setting is similar to the vid's point about "moments not mechanics".
On the other hand, I absolutely understand making homebrew settings and using an established ruleset (even with the baggage that system's implied setting brings).
@@Mr.RobotHead That's a very good point. I think when a game's system is trying to evoke a certain feeling, a certain world and setting, the system itself will be more honed and effective.
@@Mr.RobotHead Normally I would agree. However, my rules system doesn't need a setting and works great for any kind of game world. I have yet to find anything else that works with everything though so I get your point.
This is cool advice! Not sure if I'll ever make a TTRPG but I'll bear this video in mind and tell any one who needs it!
Thanks so much! Always appreciate your comments!🤠
@@TalesFromElsewhereGames you're very welcome!
Thank you, that makes me smile 😁!
There was some of this here already, but I just want to chime in for emphasis; the two things that get people to pick up and run a game are Vibe and Accessibility. You should have a person in mind who will look at your game and say "yes, this is 100% my shit", and you should remove as many barriers as possible from the moment they realize that and the moment they are able to run a session.
I wrote a similar thing in response to another comment! I think your second point is why so many books have intro adventures with pre-gen characters and GM screens. It gets folks to the first game faster and provides a suite of examples for how the system folds together.
This is really explaining why I've been dicking around with designing systems for 15+ years and not actually finishing anything.
...I mean, besides my procrastination, perfectionism, and laziness.
I have run a lot of fun campaigns with those prototypes at least!
Haha I 100% feel you on this. I was in the exact same boat. It was only a few years ago that I really committed to buckling down and finishing a project.
The first inklings of what would become Tales from Elsewhere started in like...2010ish? Fiddled with it, then left it behind for many years while "real life" took over and other interests caught my attention. 🤠
Never too late to dust off one of those ideas and take it across the finish line!
Hands down the best TTRPG builder video I've watched. Very respectful of everybody's different desires to building a game. Any other video of this kind when bringing up "lay off on the worldbuilding" would just say that nobody cares and that would be that. You twist that around into encouragement and advice into *managing* a large game world for lore dumpers like myself. Outstanding, motivating, and concise. I wish your channel and your TTRPG all the best ❤
Hey thanks for the kind words!
I feel like there's so much negativity on the internet. I'm trying to focus on helping folks and encouragement, rather than telling people how to play or that their approaches to game design are wrong.
"I'm not here to yuck your yum" is a funny way I've heard it phrased!
The math is important, it just isn't sexy.
It's a bit like gear ratios in a car's transmission. Nobody gives a squat about gear ratios. Your average car buyer will be more impressed by the number of cup holders a car has than by its gear ratios. Until they drive it for a bit and find the experience herky-jerky and getting terrible gas mileage.
They take it into a shop where the mechanic is pained to inform them that they bought a hunk of junk. The gear ratios are all wrong. In fact, everything under the hood looks like it was designed by morons who care more about cup holders than performance.
That is when the math starts to matter.
Extremely accurate analogy!
Great video, I'm currently trying to create my own rpg and I'm using one chapter of Justin Alexander book "quick and dirty worldbuilding" (without the character creation) + 2 pages for the rules to create a playbook for the players, to playtest as soon as I can. It force me to be concise and to clarify what I want to explain without getting too much into the details.
I haven't read that book, I'll have to track it down!
That's very grounded advice, I can definitely see where previous projects I had suffered from ignoring some of those tips.
I think what you say about defining moment first is crucial -- and I think it's really important to make sure that any mechanic you add to support it doesn't end-up accidentally abstracting it or making it happen outside the game.
I.e. if your game is about puzzles, you probably don't want a puzzle solving skill.
It's pretty obvious but I find that when I'm in mechanical design mode I can get into the mindset that mechanics = what can happen for real; and it's often pretty much the opposite.
@@JeanPhilippeBoucher That's a very good point!
Great video as always! I (as a forever GM) definitely agree with the point about world building/lore since regardless of system I always end up just making my own version/world - Frank
Thanks, Frank! And agreed - I like to make it my own, sometimes just taking a few maps and NPCs, but then going in my own direction.
I'm currently making my own TTRPG system and your videos have been really useful and reassuring. Thanks for the great content you're providing.
I'm so glad, and thank YOU for watching! 🤠
"nobody cares about the math in your game. I'm sure it's good but--"
I'mma stop you right there chief, it aint good lolllllllll
But in all seriousness, my gosh, 1,000% on the hard to read instructions. More than a few times have I considered the thought of starting a side gig of helping people write instructions for their ttrpgs that actually make sense. And in their defense, there is both an art and a skill to relaying information through pages that requires a lot of practice, and most people aren't in positions where they use those skills. And as you said, the system makes perfect sense to them so it's even harder to get that on a page.
Haha yep! That one was the hardest of these lessons for me, to not coach the players and let the rules speak for themselves. A bloody road! 🤠
The squirrel knows!
@@chameleondream 😎
I agree about not coaching them, and at the same time lament that I don't have more playtesters who will read rules that i send them
I feel your pain! I ran a big Playtest once (to take place over a few months) and all the players agreed to read the rules. Only half of em did : 😭
Your videos have so long been so helpful and informative. Thank you for sharing!
Really appreciate that, my friend! 🤠
😍
Oh this is some really good advice, at least for me lol. Thanks for the great content!
@@germanzenon5212 My pleasure, and thank YOU for checking out my video 🤠
Great tips!
Much appreciated! Hope they can help folks not follow in my (painful) footsteps haha 🤠
Great vid! All useful advice!
While it's true most people don't care about the math, there is a intricate connection between it and the game feel.
Most players may not argue about the exact % of success and failure, but they may say that "it's unfair how my Barbarian was constantly failing in their Strength tasks".
With that said, I'd like to see a video breaking down the math in your combat system.
I 100% agree. The "guts" of the game, the machine that makes it run, requires refinement and care. The players will definitely start caring if the math doesn't work!
You're one of the only people have have said they'd be interested in a video on the math haha! I may just have to do it, because I know folks like you would appreciate that deep dive! 🤠
This was useful to me. Thank you. I invented a 2 page system that was already played by around 50 people of my larp group since 2020 (because of the C-Virus). And we never stopped playing it. Now I feel like this very simple game deserves a second edition and .. it's a lot of work.
Micro-RPGs are awesome! They're perfect for pick-up games with low planning, and are great training exercises in game design as they force you to be very careful and precise with your rules writing!
Looking forward to playtest rules!
I'm workin' every night on 'em, hope to have 'em in everyone's hands before too long! 🤠
solid gold advice for upstart rpg designers (like me).
On your experience: about how long can the rules document be for playtesters to tolerate?
@@consoya Great question!
One page for lore/world building, then 5-10 pages for actual rules, at most. I prefer to use pregen characters for testing at first, as character creation rules are a whole thing that has to be developed and tested separately.
If you're doing character creation tests, you'll likely need a lot more pages and rules!
Keep the tests focused on specific mechanics, features, and ideas. You'll get better data and feedback if you're honing in on something specific 🤠
@@TalesFromElsewhereGames Thank you!
Good advice.
@@actortimmah42 Thanks!
Very realistic, pared down, tips ✏️🗒️