What makes a solid game demo/playtest session?

[ks13]

I am preparing to gather a small group of players to run a playtest of a game I have been designing. Because this will not be a regular gaming group that might more readily accept the not so smooth nature of a game in the midst of design, I wanted to make sure that I had a fun session prepared. It occurred to me that I should set up something along the lines of a demo. I see many advantages to this. It will be much more organized and focused, strive to have fun play elements and not simply "test this mechanic" sort of feel, it will show if the spirit of the game comes through. And ultimately it could be used as a standard demo for the game.

I will lay out the general details of what I am preping, and would appreciate any input on what works or doesn't for such a game demo/playtest, if I am on the right track or missing something critical, and what elements make for really good demos.

Right off the bat, I have decided to limit the setting and go with a very basic story element. The intent is to jump right into the action, and not overwhelm the players with lots of superfluous details and distractions.

Characters will be pre-generated, ensuring that each fits strongly into the game and will  have plenty of stuff to do. The character write-ups will be limited to what is important to the demo. I am thinking of 2-4 players (plus the GM), and have made up 6 characters from which they can choose. The extra characters can be used as NPCs. Each character is unique to offer a range of options, and I think that this should be a good number to allow the players to choose something that grabs their attention.

There is a few page write up to highlight the premise of the game and some important concepts. My question here is how much of the game mechanics should be covered at the start? Do I leave the explanations for the actual play and address them as they come up? Probably at least cover the basic resolution principles. I'm trying to balance between front loading too much, and having a very stop and go kind of game.

There is not much of a pre-scripted plot, since the idea is to have this evolve based on the input of the players. Each character is tied strongly to the starting situation, and has a lot of hooks to get the player involved. The game play is geared towards exploring situation and character. This being my first usage of a r-map, I might have gone a little heavy with the connections. Each PC has at least one blood/sex tie to another major NPC or PC, along with one or two "secondary" links (friendship, shared history, duty/obligation, etc.). The player would have to work quite hard in order to avoid getting involved! Since I can't be certain what direction each player will take, it is quite likely that some of these links might not come into play, so having several should ensure that at least one will have a major impact during the game.
What I'm struggling with, is how much of the r-map should be revealed to the players? Some of the connections are know to the characters, but some are not. Should the players be aware of these so they can play off of them as they see fit, or is it a bigger bang for the buck if they are revealed by the GM during play? For example, say a scenario involves the PCs escorting a wagon full of prisoners. One of the prisoners is blood kin of a player character (who does not know this). The old habits would have me keep this a secret to spring on the players at some point during the game (and for most of the players I will be gaming with, this is the standard method they are used to). But a part of me wants to let the player in on the 'secret', "what your character doesn't know, is that one of the prisoners is his brother", and let the player dictate how and when the 'secret' is revealed and brought into play. Not sure how the players would respond to that. I would like to hear how others have dealt with such an issue either as players or GMs, and how it affected the game.

And of course any other suggestions on ensuring a worthwhile demo or play test session are most welcomed.

-Al

EDIT: corrected cut-and-paste formatting issue

[MPOSullivan]

first off, just to make sure that this is emphasised, you have to make sure that you set up the session so that the playesr see what you consider to be the highlights of the game.  have a cool, innovative combat system?  then you'd better have a big ol' combat right up front.  Fun socializing mechanics?  cool, then i wanna have lots of character interaction that is pivitol to the story in there.  Interresting mechanics that measure humanity or morality?  then i want to see my character's humanity put into jeopardy every five minutes.  remember, the reason that you're making this game should be that it is different and engaging.  you'r going to want to put your best face forward.

along with that you'll probabyl want to employ some very aggresive scene framing.  don't be afraid to jump out of a scene as soon as the objective is reached within it.  remember, you're demoing.  you want to show as much of the game to the players as possible.  set up your story points, or bangs, and kill 'em.  

also, and i think this is really necessary for all demos, allow the players as much free will as they want.  do not puch them on to a storyline on rails.  if they see something cool off down the other hallway, let them go down there.  remember, you're trying to sell these guys on the game and it's a lot easier to draw flies with honey than with bitchy GMing.  

now, with the tennents out of the way...

you mention R-mapping in your post.  this is really good, as it allows the players to see exactly who they know and how they know them just by looking over a sheet.  i would suggest though that you only list the people that the character knows directly on their personal r-map.  "You're cellmates with this guy", "You fucked her one night a couple of years ago", what have you.  don't know them directly?  that's a person that can be brought up during gameplay then, if and when they become relevant.

and lastly, it's always a good idea to include a handout that sumarizes the conflict resolution system and tells a player exactly what the numbers mean on their character sheet.  it should be one page absolute maximum, jsut to cut down on clutter, and should be brief and concise.  after handing out the rules sheet, do a brief run-down of the rules and do a couple of brief examples.  most gamers really like the feel of dice (cards, what have you) in their hands and prefer to be lead by example.  give them real brief "let's say some idiot is trying to punch you in the face, well, you roll this and this to dodge it" and let them roll.  show 'em what happens when they win or lose.  after that, answer a couple of questions and then just jump right into the game.  most importantly, this should be brief, like fifteen minutes or less brief.  the place where you are going to impress a player the most with a game is during gameplay, so get to it.  

if you have the time before you demo for these other guys, try running the session you have in mind for some other players, your regular group.  they'll be able to tell you where you're going right or wrong without hurting your feelings (hopefully) and give you some fun options for the game.

finally, don't write out an entire scenario.  start with some kickers written for your pregenned characters, set up a starting bang that works off of all of those kickers, write down one paragraph of opening dialogue or prose and then just wing it from there.  You already have an r-map and appropriate NPC stats, a couple of pregenned characters and system that you should know pretty damned well seeing as how you made it.  that's plenty of an advantage.

hope that bit of a ramble helped.  and i hope you kill it with your demo (or introductory session, etc.).  show those young turks what a good RPG like yours is all about.

laters,

[jdagna]

My first thought is that it's important to define whether this is really a demo session or a playtest session.  They're both pretty different.

In a demo, your goal is to quickly introduce people to a game in an effort to sell them on it (whether there's a monetary sale going on or not), and you should focus on highlighting key system areas (the one to three aspects that make your game different), quick action, clear goals and providing a taste of the system, not a full meal.  As a demo person, you want to be very helpful, offering lots of suggestions and advice and pushing the positive aspects at all times.

In a playtest, define what you're trying to test, whether it's a particular mechanic or how well people learn the system and like it when they do.  Build the scenario around the thing you're testing and focus the player's information and options around it.  In this case where it will be the players' first exposure, pick the core mechanics that make the game interesting and see how the players pick them up.  As a playtest leader, you'll want to give people time to ponder the implications of things, and avoid offering too much advice or help (since part of what you'll want to see if whether they can understand and use the mechanics from the text alone).  You also want to encourage criticisms and suggestions.

For either case, you want something that puts the character right onto the focus of the session.  This isn't necessarily railroading, just a pre-assigned launch into the action.  For example: "Three bank robbers come into the bank you're assigned to protect."  Players still have plenty of choices, but there's a clear conflict and a relatively narrow number of ways to deal with it.  

Many, many demos/playtests get screwed up by having too many conflicts - for example, one GM at GenCon did a session in which players had their ship sabotaged (so they knew one of their crew was evil), they'd landed on a planet full of hostile wildlife, and there was a crew of pirates out looking for them.  With three major conflicts and no real guidance on what to do, they never even left their crashed ship in four hours of play.  For a game that was supposed to highlight wildlife, that means they totally missed the point of play.

Providing a complex R-map may be a hindrance to you in a similar sense, though you mention a starting situation so you might be on the right track.  Still, I'd only offer lots of choices and places for player input if those choices and inputs are part of what you're highlighting.  If it's just an attempt to make things more interesting, I'd drop them.  They can get choices and inputs in any system - they need to see what's different about yours.

In the case of the secrets, my advice is to leave them out entirely, unless your game has a special rules mechanic for dealing with secrets that you want to highlight.  Otherwise, players can have secrets in any system and their presence will just distract people from the game itself.

One other bit of advice: demos benefit from brevity.  At GenCon, my standard introductory demo takes 5 minutes if the demonstrator is doing it right.  One of the things I've noticed is that people who get a 5-minute demo are more likely to buy the book than people who get a 25-minute demo (and one of my demonstrators kept going that long).  In demos, it's good to leave them wanting more - a taste, not a meal.  Even when I run full 2-4 hour events for groups, it's my goal to end early whenever possible.

Playtests obviously benefit from flexibility in time.  Give lots of time for discussion, exploring alternate paths, replaying sections with tweaked rules and the like.  Plan on at least 4 hours, with a few hours for spill-over because everything takes longer than you expect this way.

[ffilz]

One other bit of advice: demos benefit from brevity. At GenCon, my standard introductory demo takes 5 minutes if the demonstrator is doing it right. One of the things I've noticed is that people who get a 5-minute demo are more likely to buy the book than people who get a 25-minute demo (and one of my demonstrators kept going that long). In demos, it's good to leave them wanting more - a taste, not a meal. Even when I run full 2-4 hour events for groups, it's my goal to end early whenever possible.

As someone who bought The Riddle of Steel after a 5 minute demo, I have to say you're absolutely right. The demo jumped right into what was combat like and how did Spiritual Attributes come into play. Q&A and spiel told me about some of the other important bits (including sorcery - which didn't absolutely need it's own demo because the Spiritual Attributes are also critical to sorcery in TROS).

A also agree, a playtest and a demo are different things, but there is room for a playtest that is aimed at testing the waters (so it sounds like a demo).

Frank