This is feedback on Heirs of Sea and Shadow, a game by Tam H.
I chose the Demonsguard scenario and played through a scene to get a feel for the core mechanic.
What I liked: How dangerous fighting was, with negative Status Effects quickly building up to make future fight rolls even harder. I felt that this fitted in with the theme of the game very well: violence only making things worse. I liked the feel of the setting in general, with the emphasis on hope and redemption. I liked how the trade-off between overt and covert proficiency was inbuilt into the core sliders. I found it fairly easy to choose which core slider I should roll on: the definitions of each was clear and without overlap.
What was confusing: The scale’s current number sliding up or down following a failure. I wasn’t sure whether I should slide the scale in a way that would decrease the chances of success at the same roll (so failure and success would have opposing impacts) or if I could choose whether to raise or lower the score.
What needed work: I felt that one of the example skills that I picked (Warrior) had a large amount of overlap with the core slider Fight.
What might be good to expand on: A few examples of foes and obstacles that the player might come up against. Perhaps also some ideas about how to redeem or negotiate with a few of those foes. Maybe expand upon the scenarios by providing some scenes that could follow each of the beginnings, to give the player something idea of what to aim for when using the oracle. Providing a few example places, groups and important individuals in Never may be helpful as well. Perhaps some more guidance on acquiring new resources and how many Resources it is reasonable for the character to have at once, given how important re-rolling is as a mechanic.
Overall, I found the core mechanic of Heirs of Sea and Shadow to reflect the setting’s themes very well and be easy to use.
Thank you for play testing! I appreciate it muchly!!! My apologies that I didn't pick up on this right away, my google plus notifications have been weirdly inconsistent for the last few days.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad the combat felt dangerous; that's a big part of my design goal. I want the player to think "ouch, how did I just lose, damnit, I'm going to pull that lever again" until everything they've got is at stake, and if they die, well... hopefully they have a heir, haha.
It's your choice where you move the slider if you ultimately call it quits on a roll; if your hero would be angered and more likely to fight again, go more Fight, if he'd be afraid and more likely to flee next time, go more Flee!
That's a good point about the Skill overlap; I wasn't sure if too much overlap would make things less fun or harder to interpret!
I think you're dead on with Resources; as written I feel like they might be too accessible, too vague, and too easy to use. My idea was to wear them down as you fight, so you're forced to add new resources (mostly relationships and allies) as you play, but I'm not sure that's conveyed properly.
I will definitely take a hard look at that section and how it interacts with the rest of things. And I'm definitely going to add a bunch of scene starters with foes and obstacles, that's a great idea!