[SIgnature 8.0] Need playtest groups(s)

[Palaskar]

Hi there, my name is Michael Mendoza, and I'm another one of those starry-eyed game designers fulfilling his dream of creating an RPG. In this case, it's "Signature" a rules-light generic RPG with a significant amount of options available. (I believe I counted something like 7 chargen options, and there are more for other sections.) Despite being extensively reviewed, the game has never been playtested, which is where you come in. I am looking for complete playtest groups to try out the game in one or more of the four setting available -- or, optionally, adapt it to a setting of your own desiring.

For more information, please contact me at: palaskar@yahoo.com

[Adam Dray]

Can you tell us what your game is about? What do the players do? What do the characters do?

[Palaskar]

Like I said, Signature is a generic game, so it varies by setting. So far I have:

Horus: A setting where ancient Egypt conquered half the world and became monotheistic at the start.
I Am Human: A setting where Neanderthals survived alongside humans, set to a 60s American civil rights vibe.
The Green Revolution: My interpretation of life in the 22nd century.
Satan Claus: A setting in the crowded cities of America of the mid-1800s, with magic.

I hope that helps.

[Spooky Fanboy]

Your blurb over at RPGNet asked the question: What would happen if you crossed RISUS with HERO? Apparently, that's what your game is about?

Interesting settings, BTW. But they raise the question: what makes your game better for those settings than some of the other "all-purpose" games out there, like RISUS, HERO, GURPS, etc.? That's what I'd like to know before I'd feel comfortable asking for the opportunity to playtest your game.

[Palaskar]

Well, to be honest, the only answer I can give is the Signature is less crunchy the HERO and GURPS but has more options than plain RISUS. Plus each setting comes with a "Wild Points Level" (how cinematic the setting is, and specific to Signature) and a Tone (a bonus to certain kinds of actions.)

More on Tone: The default Tone is Tactical, so the better tactics players have their characters employ, the larger bonuses those characters get to their actions. But go to another setting, and the Tone might be Funny (bonus for humorous actions) or Self-Sacrificing (bonus for selfless actions) or so on.

[Adam Dray]

If you want to get your game some more attention from potential playtesters, I strongly recommend posting your own report from one of your own playtests in the Actual Play forum. That will get people thinking about your game and, if it looks interesting, they may want to run it themselves.

[Palaskar]

*sigh* I think you missed a key point here, Adam. Signature has *never* been playtested. That's why I'm looking for playtesters. I can point you to my site: http://www.44productions.co.nr ,which has some blurbs on the game, and I can relay comments to you from reviewers, but that's it.

[darrick]

i know from experience that playing, especially running, the game you authored will be infinitely more valuable than the opinions of someone else's game.  you have to know your game is awesome first before you can proceed.  if you have a regular gaming group already, then put Signature on the agenda.  if you don't, then i'd suggest finding local people and then run the game for them.  after a couple sessions (and this will lead to a lot of revising - hopefully) you can have one of the guys who played in your game run a session.  after all that, you should be ready to seek out strangers for playtesting.

i did all that with Empire of Satanis, and it worked well for me.  convincing yourself that your game kicks ass will allow you to continue putting it out there after nearly everyone starts shitting on your dreams.  ;)

good luck, hoss.

Darrick
http://www.cultofcthulhu.net

[Palaskar]

Thanks a million, Darrick! It's been really hard convincing myself, sometimes, that my game really does kick ass. I really would like to playtest it myself, but 1) I don't have enough free time and 2) the people here are either a) not gamers or b) old-school crunchy gamers. I'd table the issue, but there are some things that can only be found out by playtesting. I actually have a playtester now, but his computer crashed -and- he has to translate Signature into German to play it before he can playtest.

But again, thanks Darrick. It's great to get an encouraging word.

Michael

[Adam Dray]

Generally, you want to run your first playtests. You'll find obvious glaring holes in your design and will need to fix stuff before having other people run it. Sign up on FindPlay to see if there are other gamers in your area who might be interested in giving it a go. If they play or want to play any Indie games (Dogs, Polaris, Sorcerer, Burning Wheel, My Life with Master, and Prime Time Adventures are some of the more common ones), then there's a good chance of convincing them to try a fellow Forge member's game, at least a one-shot playtest.

You might also just save your rules off as a PDF and drop it on the net for people to download and read. Ask some intelligent design questions in this forum and generate interest in your game. If it looks interesting, people will play it. It's just hard to get people to playtest when they don't know much about your game and how it works.

You can also play online using IRC and other Internet tools. Seriously look into that one if you can't cobble together a local group.

[Palaskar]

IRC! Why didn't think of that! RPG.net has a play-by-post feature that should work perfectly for this.

To be perfectly honest, I'd be nervous running a live gaming group, as I've only played four RPGs in my life (D&D, AD&D, Stormbringer, and Vampire) and never GM'ed. What I -have- done is play a lot of CRPGs and read a lot of other peoples' RPGs. I suppose you could call it "Armchair Role-Player Syndrome."

Michael

[Adam Dray]

It's like those insurance commercials, right? "I'm not actually a game designer, but I just saved 10% on my car insurance!"

[Palaskar]

Yeah, exactly.

[Palaskar]

I'm not sure if this still belongs here, or in "Actual Play", but I'm only able to find time to game once or twice a week -- if that -- due to the peculiarities of my schedule. Now I've just hopped over to rpg.net and read to the effect "if you are unable to post for several days...", implying that you should post every day or so. This seems impractical to me, since I figure that a post will take a half-hour to an hour, judging from my African-American literature class posts. This is time I do not really have on a day to day basis, or even on a every-other day basis.

Live gaming seems impractical as well, not merely for my inexperience, but for the amount of time -- roughly four hours per week, just for playing, judging by my college Vampire games. (The HERO games I sat in on were, of course, longer, but I attribute that to HERO's crunchy combat.) I figure I can spare roughly two, maybe three hours per week for play; and then there's research for the settings and editing the game itself.

Does anyone have any advice to cut down on my playtest time? D"oh...I remember now Adam suggested a one-shot playtest. How would that work, exactly? (I mean, how much time would it take, why would it take that much, what would I do?) I could probably get together a live group over the Christmas holidays for a one-shot, but I'd prefer something sooner.

[Adam Dray]

You can usually do a one- or two-hour demo of your game. It's not generally a great playtest except at the grossest level though. To do a good playtest, you want to work through at least one complete iteration of your reward cycle (at the largest level it exists). For example, to playtest D&D, you'd want to play through at least one "level up."

I have to ask, though, if you have time to design, don't you have time to play? A typical game session of any game takes 4-6 hours. It doesn't have to be every week. When things are good, I game twice a month. When things are not so good, I try to game once a month.