Do you consider learning a new game to be unpleasant work?

[hawkeyefan]

It seems to me that there are a couple of assumptions implied by many of the responses here. Or perhaps I'm just inferring these assumptions....that's totally possible.

The first is that a game needs to be complex. I don't think this needs to be the case, at all. And when I say this, I'm not saying that a game needs to be absolutely simple.....but I think that the most common RPGs that people have the most familiarity with are generally fairly complex, and so many people are assuming that a new game will take just as much time and effort to learn. I don't think that's the case.

The second seems to be that all learning needs to take place prior to the start of play. I would think that in most cases, actually playing the game is a big part of learning how to play.....and playing games is generally going to be fun, I think most people would agree. Sure, the game may stink, but as Morrus said in his OP, let's assume it's a quality game. Playing it is going to be fun.

Finally, I think many people have achieved a level of proficiency with their games of choice that has typically come with years (or decades, in some cases) of experience with those games, and so they're used to games running without interruptions to check rules and so forth. That such things will slow down play and make it less fun. But is that really the case? Most games I see still need to make pauses to reference the rules and exactly how things work. This relates to the first point because the more complex the game, the more likely this will be. But I think just about every game should expect some of this...and so, I don't know if it's really an obstacle so much as a perceived one.

My group recently played the Alien RPG. These are all experienced players, but like 95% of that experience is with one form of D&D or another. It took them one session to be comfortable enough with the rules and flow of play. It took me a few hours of reading ahead of the game to grasp the basics, and to print up a few reference pages. We still had to pause and reference rules here and there, and there were one or two areas that we just kind of handwaved (I'm looking at you, Supply) but the sessions we had were a lot of fun, and ran very smoothly overall. And it got better and smoother with each successive session.

Again, maybe these concerns aren't as common as I'm perceiving, but I don't think they're really all that significant as obstacles to learning and playing a new game.

 

[Thomas Shey]

The first is that a game needs to be complex. I don't think this needs to be the case, at all. And when I say this, I'm not saying that a game needs to be absolutely simple.....but I think that the most common RPGs that people have the most familiarity with are generally fairly complex, and so many people are assuming that a new game will take just as much time and effort to learn. I don't think that's the case.

They aren't generically, but when talking about me, in practice there's a fairly high floor to where I'm liable to find a game at all interesting, and those are relatively complex. To the point where when a game using "quick and easy" in its advertising I tend to assume it won't interest me right out of the gate.

 

[MarkB]

I find it interesting to learn a new ruleset, and satisfying if it turns out to be a good one. But it's not something I would do recreationally - I don't seek out new rulesets just for the pleasure of learning them, unless I'm strongly expecting to be actually playing them.

So I voted "work".

 

[Randomthoughts]

Work.

I've got some 30-odd years and dozens of game systems rolling around in my head. Attempting to add new ones are a pain. Most recent additions have been Equestrian Tales, 5E, Aliens, Forgotten Lands, Kids on Bikes, Luminal and Tales from the Loop. I gave up on Pathfinder 2E, and I'm struggling through Wrath & Glory and Starfinder.

<snip>

Too many systems, too little time, so many options to choose from for how to handle a game.

EDIT: Forgot to say why I quoted Stormonu lol - this is pretty much my position.

At this point in my life, I voted for work. I look at it this way: to me, playing is where the fun is at, and in order to get to that point, I have to learn the rules first. If I could skip that step, I would do it in a heart beat. So many games, so little time.

It wouldn't deter me from getting a game that uses "innovative mechanics!" But I would have to be convinced first that they are in fact innovative (which the majority of the time, they're not).

 

[cbwjm]

I find reading through and learning a new game to be a lot of fun and tend to approach learning a new rule system as a means of relaxation. Doesn't mean I'll necessarily play it but I enjoy learning new systems and seeing what I can steal for DnD.

 

[hawkeyefan]

They aren't generically, but when talking about me, in practice there's a fairly high floor to where I'm liable to find a game at all interesting, and those are relatively complex. To the point where when a game using "quick and easy" in its advertising I tend to assume it won't interest me right out of the gate.

So that’s interesting. Why do you think that is?

Do you think a game must be complex to have depth?

The immediate thing that jumps to my mind would be a complex board game like Twilight Imperium compared to something like Chess or Go.

 

[der_kluge]

Work.

I'm really, really lazy. I think this is a big reason why I don't like published modules, and mostly don't use them (although, I'm getting better at this). It's because I hate reading the entire thing in order to know whether or not I can use it in my game or not. I like "cliff's notes", I guess. Most modules don't come with that.

It's also one of the chiefly annoying things about 5th edition. When I started running 5th edition, all the rules are actually just buried in paragraphs of texts. There's no simple synopsis of the rule itself. Adding your Dex modifier to damage for ranged attacks is a PERFECT example of this. Oh, there it is - buried in a small paragraph in the middle of pg. 177. That's it. That's where that rule lives. Not in the combat section, but under ability scores. Terrible.

 

[Thomas Shey]

So that’s interesting. Why do you think that is?

I'm not one of those people who want the rules to just "get out of the way"; I've found that in terms of the game play element, either that means large degree sameness to that layer, or throwing it to the GM to decide most decisions to a degree I don't find desirable.

Do you think a game must be complex to have depth?

The immediate thing that jumps to my mind would be a complex board game like Twilight Imperium compared to something like Chess or Go.

I don't think chess or go are really simple. It just happens to be that a lot of the complexity is in emergent elements, but its notable that books about chess still can go on quite a degree about various gambits and the like.

In an RPG this tends to translate into the emergent properties being heavily dependent on the capabilities of the GM involved, and to be blunt, I don't think most GMs are either willing to engage with it enough nor consistent enough to satisfy me in this area.

 

[delericho]

I quite enjoy learning a new game. What I don't like is reading a variant on an existing game that has loads of very tiny changes - the old World of Darkness games were particularly bad for that, where 95% of things were the same but that last 5% would trip you up - and wasn't spelled out clearly.

That said, even a new game has an uphill struggle to be worth my while now. The reality is that I'm only playing D&D and extremely unlikely to play any other game for a next several years. Coupled with extremely limited free time, that means I'm much better off working with the game I know rather than learning a new game I'll probably not use.

 

[Raduin711]

I enjoy learning the rules for a game, because it is like an introduction to all of the different toys you can play with.

But when it comes to learning enough to be GM, it can be a bit of a chore because you need to anticipate the sort of questions and needs you might come across by playing.