Somerset Party Notes

I was sent into the heart of game design workshop, to snatch the fabled Jewel of Playtest. My mission was, partly successful. We never actually made it to the end. Which is where all the data I was supposed to collect is located, who won why, with how many points, and what strategies people used. Now that everyone knows how to play the game, we should get further than halfway through by the end, next week. Still, unless the group over there still going through round after round of playing Avalon wants to play a real real real real real quick game of Somerset, (I'm still at the board game night, though it's officially ended as of an hour 15 minutes ago,) I won't be able to do what I actually intended to do tonight.

I blame myself for the quest's failure; I waited till workshop's start to start making the needed adjustments to the cards and tiles (correcting item costs after the tiles were retooled,) figuring I guess that I'd receive some help in doing so and that it would go quickly- turns out that I'd receive no help, and that board gamers are introverted weenies, WHO THE AITCH KNEW. I also didn't really explain the scoring at the end, so my playtesters didn't know what to work toward- I'd deliberately left the endgame vague so that they'd make their way to it with unmetagamed strategy, but in retrospect this was a bonehead move because the players didn't have much of an idea what they were even doing, or how awesome spells are, or anything.

AND THE AVALON GROUP IS BEGINNING ANOTHER ROUND; DANGIT I THOUGHT THEY WERE WINDING DOWN. Maybe sometime at the beginning I would have had time to teach the rules to them and have them play a complete game, but it's too late for that now I guess. Oh well.

Playing what little game I did get in with board game designers as I did, I at least received notes questioning the mechanical reasoning behind a bunch of stuff. So I guess I have that to cough up, instead of the data that was really wanted. There are still some interesting points here, on the bright side, but if some of these were implemented, there's going to be a lot more playtesting even still, on the, dark side.

• First some questions on the artwork/tile layout:
• The government track- the colors are the same colors as the player markers. That's just misleading. Maybe make the government track black and white or something, they say.
• The image used to indicate casting a spell is a bit unclear; they had to work out that it's a pair of hands magicking. Maybe make the image a swirly magic thing, or a spell circle, or just improve the value contrast on the image, they say.
• The number of players (3+ etc) on the upper left corners of Camelot tiles is misleading. Camelot tiles have no cost. Maybe move the number of players being indicated to the back of the tile, they say.
• Why are we being incentivized to build our own country tiles next to other people's country tiles, anyway? It probably has something to do with wanting to expand out in a non-random direction, so that the board isn't laid out pell-mell in the end, but it's kind of a funny thing, they say.
• Is there any real incentive for building your spellbook early on? Why the heck would you want to buy a spell to put in your spellbook if you can't use it yet, especially if you can buy as many spells as you want in the building round anyway, they say.
• The movement rule is restrictive, they say. A knight "must" move two should be, like, the knight "may" move two "max," they say.
• (Here it should be pointed out that neither of the other two players knew that worker placement was its own genre, and the fact that there is such a thing was news to them.)
• What's the deal with roads? Why have them? Maybe it would make sense if there were more than one road missing from some/all tiles, making roadbuilding more necessary, but as it stands that rule doesn't even need to be in place, they say.

AND THE AVALON GROUP IS STARTING YET ANOTHER DANG GAME DANGIT.

Screw it, I'm going over there and chatting them up.

...

Dang, they are engrossed in that game. None of the games I've ever played of Avalon before are as hardcore as these guys are treating it.

Yeah, I guess I won't be getting in another round today. I... I could still join those Avalon guys for a round, but I really should be getting home and prepping for the morrow. For some reason I remember tomorrow's schedule being packed, but I can't really think of a single reason beyond homework that would make it so... I mean, there is a Mesoamerican quiz on Friday, classical and terminal classical non-Maya peoples (Teotihuacan et al,) but that wouldn't really take up the whole day doing... so I must look into that.

Oh, I guess I still have a point or two about Somerset.

• The first couple of rounds you can't build anything! It's not quite what the guy said, but I interpret the fix for that as being, start out with a resource or two of your choosing? I'm not sure how far off that would throw the balance of the rest of the game; I think the start was just slow because the rules were still being explained. But it is a thought.