Between a rock and a hard place: Accurate opinion?

[ForeverSlayer]

What I mean by the title is I feel like I am stuck between a rock and a hard place with regards to the playtest.

All I can make my assessments on are the rules that I have in front of me right now. As I make my judgement I also think to myself: "What would my judgement be if I new the rest of the rules?" I may hate one rule but end up loving when seeing it in conjunction with a rule that I haven't seen yet.

It's kind of like someone asking you to judge a painting that you can only see a part of.

I guess what I am trying to say is I feel like the feedback from this playtest may be a bit flawed and I want more in order to give a better assessment followed by better feedback.

Not sure if I am making sense.

 

[Ahnehnois]

It's true that it's hard to know whether the game will work knowing this little.

I do think it's possible to tell what some things are that flat-out don't work, and fix them early.

But the real playtest will be of a complete game. Then we'll be able to give real feedback.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

It's true that it's hard to know whether the game will work knowing this little.

I do think it's possible to tell what some things are that flat-out don't work, and fix them early.

But the real playtest will be of a complete game. Then we'll be able to give real feedback.

Agreed! There are those few things that are obvious but it's the not so obvious things that I worry about.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I am reserving judgments on anything I am not sure about.

That said, I would rather have an imperfect playtest process than none at all.

 

[Gold Roger]

Yeah, I wish wotc would explicitly state what parts of game are actively playtested in each package.

A lot of stuff in the current round feels like placeholder mechanics/elements to me (I'm as sure as I can be that monsters are, for example). It would really help to know which are.

 

[FireLance]

Yeah, I wish wotc would explicitly state what parts of game are actively playtested in each package.

They did - see the boxed text on page 2 of the Caves of Chaos adventure:

What Is This Adventure Testing?

The Caves of Chaos isn't meant to be a hard test of the play balance between player characters (PCs) and monsters. That process is a continuing one as we refine the rules for monsters, characters and encounter building. Although you should keep an eye on how elements of the rules interact, this adventure is intended to explore how well the rules support different styles of play.

...

Do the rules allow you the freedom to play the Dungeons and Dragons (r) game way you like? How about the adventure? What elements of it didn't work out? What things did you change to suit your taste?

 

[Gold Roger]

They did - see the boxed text on page 2 of the Caves of Chaos adventure:

Maybe, more explcit...er...lier?

I'm not going to huff of in a cloud of nerdrage, but that actualy isn't a very clear statement.


But maybe that's just me wanting more information on the actual internal playtest process. Maybe they value our feedback more if we don't know wether a specific rule is placeholder or genuinely considered.

 

[slobster]

I guess what I am trying to say is I feel like the feedback from this playtest may be a bit flawed and I want more in order to give a better assessment followed by better feedback.

The best we can do is give our responses to WotC on the rules they've given us to playtest, then hope that they take it into account, continue to develop the game, and come out with another playtest once more work is done.

I see this public playtest process as having the most utility if we get to go through multiple iterations of the rules, giving feedback the whole time.

That way they can see "hmm, people don't like the resting and healing rules. Let's fix that."

"Hmm, players didn't like how far we went to fix it either, maybe we should find a middle ground."

"All right! Goldilocks zone, everyone loved the healing mechanics!"

Note: that last one will never, ever happen. But it's nice to dream!

 

[OnlineDM]

Yeah, I don't have this problem. I'm going to test what I have so far, give my feedback, and then see what comes next. They're saying that we can expect more material to playtest in 5 weeks or so.

I'll form my opinion of the game as a whole once we're playtesting the game as a whole. Not before.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

First, with little modifications i would play that game. Seems like a good start.

All in all, rules seem to have a good balance between clear mechanics and nice normal language. Seems as if I could translate it and don´t have to use wonky words.
4e failed in this regard rather badly and maybe this is why the german distributer stopped translating and distributing.

So, back to topic.

They stated, that monsters and characters are not fully as to be expected. Especially hp amount seems still to be in flux.
Also the statement in caves of chaos is clear to what they intend. And I guess just playing and telling them what seems wonky is the best we can do.

If we are trying to be armchair designers, we just don´t do what we are supposed to do. And really, do you believe, we can really make better decisions in 5 mins than they can do over several month?