First Draft: Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries...

[Eric J. Boyd]

I've got a nearly complete draft of my pulp-genre entry available . I still have some examples and a rules summary to add, but I'd appreciate any comments, loopholes noticed, etc.

A question I've been mulling over this morning: How long do you think it will take to make characters, collaboratively create an exploration site and route, and bang around ideas for hazards and have each player make two lists of them? Is this enough for the first three-hour session, or will the players have time to get a round of play in too? Of course, playtesting will ultimately answer this question, but no time for that this week

Thanks in advance for looking it over.

[kenjib]

Hi Eric,

I've read through your game, though to be honest all of the kids running around my place here might have caused me to miss something, so keep that firmly in mind. Here are my comments:

1. daring, genius, instinct, charisma: Great choice of how to represent characters befitting the genre. I thought the requirement of having one descriptor in each attribute would dilute the character archetypes (i.e. it seemed like each attribute was best suited toward certain archetypes and you would end up having to pick descriptors not really suiting your character idea) until I saw your example. Perhaps some clarification in the description of the attributes could have prevented this impression. Maybe it's just me.

2. I really like the way that the adventure is constructed together as a group and hazards are generated by fellow players. I don't know how long it would take. There are a lot of hazards to create, but I really don't see it taking a full 3 hours. Perhaps half that? Something that really seems fitting of the genre is that each character could be introduced and make their grand entrance in some way that establishes the strengths and weaknesses of their character.

3. In terms of mechanics there seems little strategic positioning or resource allocation. In the determination of a winner it also seems that the random rolls are a larger influence than any choices that a player makes. Playtest might prove me completely wrong though. This is not necessarily a bad thing. I think that the result is that the game is geared more toward exploration of genre and the creation of an exciting story than it is overcoming challenges. I think it looks very effective at the former so I'm just bringing this up to see if this jives with your design goals.

4. What happens when a character's acclaim when their hazard results in being stymied?

5. If you frame a group hazard do you lose your turn (and thus potential acclaim)?

6. What is the disincentive for calling an unknown hazard with difficulty 1d10 every turn?

7. After you reach 3 dice, it seems that you will almost always want to spend an acclaim for 2 bonus dice, though playtesting may prove me wrong.

8. If the party is stymied, all characters are less effective and more likely to be stymied again. This could generate a death spiral where failure begets more failure as the game progresses.

9. if any player can continue from being stymied, this condition will almost always only result from a group hazard since a personal hazard will only have difficulty of 4d10, right? This make #4 happen less often - i.e. only when players actually want their fellow player to fail.

Overall these are just nitpicks. I love the genre you picked and I like the angle your game is taking toward it. This game has a high sheer fun/playability factor going for it that is a real asset. It's all about telling tall tales and boasting of deeds to win accolades from your peers. I think that kind of frame will really help to bring out exciting narratives from the players.

[Eric J. Boyd]

[Eric J. Boyd]