Get the most out of First Thoughts

[Adam Dray]

(I have consolidated the ideas in two threads at the request of Ron Edwards, the forum moderator.)

You are working on a new game. You're excited about it. You want to share your idea with others, get feedback on it, and make it better. That's why you're posting here. How do you make sure that you engage other designers and get the ideas flowing?

Post in the right forum. If you have a game that you think is more or less finished, you probably don't want to post in First Thoughts. Either post specific questions about publishing it in the Publishing forum or post actual play reports in the Playtesting forum. If you can't find playtesters, post in Connections to get help. Finally, if you have a seed of an idea, a mostly finished game with some loose ends, or something in between, post here in First Thoughts. If your game is ready for playtest, you may not post in First Thoughts (Ron will move your thread to Playtesting if you try).

Before you post, read the forum rules that are stickied at the top. They not only tell you the law of the land, but they also contain links to useful threads that discuss ways of thinking about design.

Make sure you know what result you want from posting. Why are you posting? The Forge First Thoughts forum is not an advertising board. It's not a place to take polls of what people like and hate. It's a place where people "working through early drafts and posing design questions about the fundamental concepts for new games," as Ron says in the stickied rules post.

Give your posts a catchy subject. Your subject doesn't give the reader any indication about the topic's material. For starters, consider using your game's name in the title. You have a cool name, "Intergalactic League of Brawlers," so that's a plus. One thing people do is put the game name in [square brackets] and then the topic afterwards: "[Intergalactic League of Brawlers] Handling techniques."

Focus on one thing at a time. It's tempting to drop a giant bolus of information here but we will choke on it. Determine a specific thing you want feedback on and limit your first post to the basics needed for people to help you address that thing. Err on the side of saying too little, as people need only ask specific questions to draw the extra information out. I'll say this again and again, but The Forge is a conversation, not a soapbox.

Break up your post into discrete topics. If you want to talk about attributes, resolution, and setting, use bolded subheadings within your post. You can even start several different threads with distinct subjects if each deserves love. People can quickly tell what your post is about and what you want them to address. If you create more than one thread, please summarize what your game is about or...

Link to your older posts. Don't assume that people have read about your game before. If they haven't, they probably aren't going to search for them. They might just assume they aren't your audience and stop reading. Either give them the information they need right there in the post, or give them a link to a post that has it. Make it easy for people to help you.

Ask questions. Be sure to tell people what problem you are working through. The Forge is a conversation, not a soapbox. You're posting because you want feedback, so be sure to help people know what feedback you want.

Write your post clearly and briefly. Make it easy for people to engage with you. To best engage us, start by telling us what your game is about, who the characters are and what kind of stuff they do in the game. We'll ask questions from there!

Don't reinvent the wheel. Or at least know you're doing it. At some point, we may tell you subtly or bluntly that you're reinventing the wheel. First of all, there's nothing wrong with following in the footsteps of giants (aka stealing great ideas). We all do it. Just realize it. Know what other people have done. Study the field. If your breadth of knowledge is only one or two games, or if you aren't aware of the territory explored by many of the games independently published since the 90's, you're likely designing with a very narrow set of assumptions. We'll challenge those! But that's why you're here.
     You're probably designing a new game because you played some other games and you felt something about them was lacking. Awesome. What if we were to tell you that someone has already written the exact game you want to play (and that you are designing) and have already solved these problems? Sometimes that is the case here. Sometimes people show up, tell us they're inventing a generic role-playing system with plug-in modules for settings, and they've never heard of GURPS or JAGS or Solar System or any of the other great systems that have already solved that problems. And we say, "Hey, go check these out." It's not to be dismissive. Maybe those games don't do what you are trying to do; but maybe they do. If you don't care and just want to design a game for the experience, just tell us that.

Know what's already been done. I suspect we frustrate novice game designers all the time by recommending they read this or that game. The hard truth is that there's little that is new under the sun. A quick way to put your own work in perspective is to go out and browse John Kim's list of free RPGs available on the web. This list should guide you, not discourage you. Analyze similar games and learn from them. Play them! Learn from their mistakes. Offer improvements and novelties. I am excited by a game that produces even one creative, new idea -- a game doesn't have to be 100% original to capture my attention!  Simon C has compiled a very short list of games he thinks are useful to new designers.

Make sure the foundation is solid. It's too easy to start asking questions about dice probabilities before explaining to us why you need dice at all. Start talking about your game by telling us what the game is about (setting, situation, and characters are a good start). We'll ask questions from there. Once you've gotten everyone to understand what you're trying to accomplish, we'll all be better equipped to answer nitty-gritty technical questions about dice pools.

Take your time. Think first, write second. Preview your posts before clicking "Post." Editing is disabled. Editing posts is overrated and promotes a lack of posting discipline. You only get one chance to get wording and formatting right, so slow down and double check things. Also, consider writing long posts in an external editor and then pasting the text in later. It sucks to lose your post because of a browser error or network burp.


What about the Power 19?

The Power 19 is a series of nineteen questions that Troy Costick designed to tease out a game's design. It was meant as a list of questions for people to ask people like you about their games. The idea was that we could ask you these questions one at a time as conversation starters. Over time, people have started using it as a questionnaire: "Go answer the Power 19." Sometimes people post their Power 19 answers as their initial First Thoughts post.

While the verdict is still out on the utility of the Power 19 pretty much every Forge veteran seems to agree that their eyes glaze over when people post that much text about their game. Sometimes people respond to those posts. Sometimes the long, long posts sit there for weeks without responses. More likely than not, a responder might find one thing in the post -- usually in one of the answers to the first two or three questions -- and hammer on that a bit, and it changes the original poster's answers to everything else (invalidating many of the original 19 answers).

In short, don't post 19 questions and answers. It's too much to read all at once. It puts people off. It's a long, one-way conversation that is too late to interrupt. Tell us what your game is about and who the characters are and what the characters do. That's a good start.


What about game mechanics?

You just came up with this cool game mechanic, like a way to roll dice or a new reward system. Can you tell us about it? Sure. But remember that game mechanics are integrally and intimately tied to specific games. That is, they are pretty meaningless out of context.

For example, "Which is better? 2d10 or 1d20?" Out of context, there's no good way to answer that question. If you are posting mechanics ideas outside of the context of a game design, expect us to ask you more about what you're trying to accomplish in the first place.


What about setting ideas?

Setting design is part of game design. We love good settings. As a First Thoughts post, though, we'd want to know if it's a setting for an existing game or for a new game. If it's for your D&D campaign, it probably doesn't even belong here (though we'd welcome a post about playing in it in the Actual Play forum, which is for games that are already published).

Follow the rules and all my advice for any other First Thoughts post. Post in the right forum. Read the rules. Know what you want from others. Write clearly. Write briefly. Don't reinvent the wheel.

Also tell us how you want the setting to be used. What are your goals? A setting design is best evaluated as part of a game design. If it's an existing game, tell us what the game is and how you're using it. If it's a new game, it's better to back off the long setting post until we've had a discussion about what the game is about and stuff. Setting will tie tightly to character and situation.

In general, you'll find that a lot of Forge veterans feel that giant books full of setting material don't necessarily produce fun play. Most of it goes unused during play. Focus your setting material on the stuff that players can (and will) readily use.

[Ron Edwards]

Do not post to this thread. The text is still undergoing revision.

Best, Ron