By The Stars — “Bring me the hyrdrospanners!” — Week Thirty-Eight

What did I do for By The Stars in the last week?

I playtested it with eight folks who had never heard of it before at Camp Nerdly in Triangle, Virginia. We had a wide gamut of experience with LARPs, gaming, and Star Wars.

How did that go?

Not as well as I was hoping, actually. I got a sense in my gut as I was explaining everything that the game has reached to point of too much. And several of my awesome, generous playtesters made comments to that effect–occasionally when they were trying to say something else, which lends a lot of credence. The Quest Cards barely got used. Betrayal cards got abused early (as I anticipated they would be). Every revision brings new problems.

Problems are fodder for progress. What’s the next step?

I’m not sure. It’s Wednesday and I’ve logged nearly 35 hours at work this week. May is always a very busy month. I haven’t had much time to wrap my head around the game. I design slowly, so not having any head-space is very limiting. I might have to cancel the May 20 playtest. I’ll try to make some time this weekend to ponder on what happened, what didn’t, and why.

I wish I had more to report. Work is killin’ me. But I’ll still be here next week. Same blog channel.