Review: Mr. Big's Right Hand

[kleenestar]

[kleenestar]

[Remi]

[Queex]

This is as I mailed- it was only afterwards that I read the 'Law' comment in this thread. It wouldn't have changed my numerical score, anyway.


1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 8

Feedback:
Although the ingredients and time scale weren't put up front, they were well-used. Team was not only a quantity to use, but was something to use to generate team play in an imaginative way. The idea of using Actor to be someone's agent was neat. I couldn't see any use of Steel as such. The 2-hour time limit suited the game well and lends an appropriate air of urgency to proceedings.


2) CLARITY (1-10): 7

Feedback:
The basic idea was well set out, although there were parts of the rules (particularly with the fiddly uses of dice and how the modifier stakes work in practice) that I thought could have been better explained. The nature of the informational stakes could use a little more explanation, and the sort of explanations for them.


3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 5

Feedback:
The text felt a little unpolished, and some of the rules would have been easier to digest if broken up a little. It would have been nice to have some inspirational material about how the game would progress, perhaps tied in with examples of play. Even something as simple as a big list of potential locations would help the game stand out. Improving clarity with more detailed explanations would help the completeness, too.


4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 4

Feedback:
Although the basic mechanics, and the way that players interact are well-fleshed out, there were two specific ways I thought the mechanics of the game might fall down. As it stands, there's never any reason to declare the use of anything other than your best two skills, meaning that the third and fourth skills are seldom used. The bonus dice and modifiers are likely to change skills, but I'm not sure it would be by enough to make a difference. A character need only emphasise two skills in order to be able to attack once and defend once each round. The second problem is the minimum requirement of information to be able to try to snatch the objective- if it takes three stakes to be able to attempt it, and it changes hands with only three potential conflicts left, then the game has effectively ended. There's missing text about when a round is considered to have ended, so I can't say for sure.


5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 8

Final Feedback:
I liked the concept, the setting, and much of the mechanics. With a little rethinking and some polish, this is definitely something I'd like to introduce at my games meetings.


TOTAL SCORE (add items 1 through 5, above): 32

[Remi]

[DevP]

Creative and Effective Incorporation of Rules: 6

The time limit felt right for this game: a short, 2-hour affair. The use of the Actor and Team ingredients clicked well - particularly the use of Team Points, which are central to the game - but I feel that Law was under-represented overall. A decent use of the ingredients.

Clarity: 4

The text isn't quite where it needs to be. The intro text could be slightly better at getting people into the mindset of the game - it turns out, a cinematic and competitive affair. Some of the rules could be broken down / moved around for more clarity. (For example, under "Creating Actors", there's no talk of creating characters until the second paragraph, and it's slightly confusing.) I needed to reread the Team Points and Bonus Dice parts a few times to understand what was going, and I also felt that I didn't really get an idea for the structure of play until I saw the Information Stakes (and other Stakes information) near the end. This is a pretty important structure of the game, and it help to think about the different rounds in those terms.

Completeness: 6

This game is largely complete. Besides rules clarifications as mentioned above, examples can always help, especially for setting the tone of the game. I would find it helpful to see more information about how to pick, select and especially negotiate the various different kinds of stakes in the game, and I'm not entirely sure that pure negotatiation of stakes would work in a competitive game. (Also: "stakes" is a somewhat dry word in this situation. Are there other ways to frame the different tasks that the players are attempting?)

Estimated Effectiveness in Play: 5

The basics are here for the game, but some of the details need to be worked out to ensure that the players can move through the rounds smoothly. Richer choices, beyond simply setting stakes, may be better for this game.

Swing Vote: 5

I like the concept of a short, competitive heist game for a few players, and this has a good start. However, there are some gaps in understanding how play of this should go, and what the compelling parts of its choices/narrative are going to be.

Final Vote: 26/50

[Adam Dray]

[saboor]

I'd like to thank Andy for all his work, my reviewers for being kind, Brand for telling me over and over to just relax and finish it and also to he and Gary Winchester for being so available for my crazy emergency playtest midway through the week of the contest. The game would have suffered very badly if it had gone without.