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Mr. Mask
2013-08-22, 03:18 PM
Let's have a discussion about playtesting, for tabletop RPGs specifically. Looking through the old Extra Credits episodes, the one about playtesting got me thinking.

What's different with playtesting a Tabletop RPG from video games?

Some are obvious... you need the players to learn a rule-set more complicated than most games'. Roleplaying around a table is also quite different from video games experiences, with few exceptions.

With that in mind... what are the other pitfalls to watch for? What does one need to do to get the best results? Making your rules legible is, I would say, a very important step.

Grinner
2013-08-22, 03:41 PM
With that in mind... what are the other pitfalls to watch for? What does one need to do to get the best results? Making your rules legible is, I would say, a very important step.

Yes. The wording needs to flow at least smoothly, if not also entertainingly. In no fashion should it read like legal text. It should spark the imagination, not instruct.

Other than wording, one guide I have read recommends "smoke testing", or testing to ensure the system at least works. This is done by making up at least a dozen or so unique characters and running them through a few different scenarios by yourself. If you can't come up with enough different characters, then there's a good chance your game is too narrow in focus. If any of the characters can't contribute somehow, then they may be severely unbalanced.

Cheers
2013-08-22, 04:22 PM
Like you said, these kinds of things are inherently a social activity. Which bring with them 2 additional layers of concerns in comparison to video games.

1) There will be many times a player won’t be doing anything, because it is either not his turn or because someone else is going through some skill roles.
You should always question whether it is possible to shorten the wait time before allowing the player to interact again or find ways to allow him to contribute.

2) Social experience can greatly colour our appreciation of things.
Always question whether your testers found a problem less so because they had a good laugh out of it or if they had a more negative experience due to social tensions.

And an additonal remark, always consider how certain mechanics increase or stimulate interaction and dialogue.

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-08-22, 07:14 PM
There are a few different types of testing that you need to be aware of. I say this as a professional tester (not of video games, alas...just health IT software).

Validation Testing: Running through the game to make sure that it just plain works as intended.

"Break It" Testing: Where you find testers who will powergame and bust up the system to the best of their ability. If it makes you go "cmon, no player would ever try that!", test it.

Stress Testing: Similar to the previous, but what you're doing is placing a tremendous load on the system, to see how it handles the extreme cases. If it makes you go "the numbers would never get that big!", it's a candidate for stress testing.

Usability Testing: Very, very, very frequently overlooked. Also the most difficult to do right. It's not as simple as asking the players "how'd it go?". There's a very particular methodology to it. Don't Make Me Think! (http://www.sensible.com/dmmt.html) is one of my favorite overviews of the concept of usability, and it goes into a little more depth on how to test it.

Among the important bits of usability testing...

You must remain an observer. In this case, you may not run nor play the game. (If that makes you nervous, your game is not usable and must be rewritten until you are comfortable handing it off to someone else.)

Don't help anyone. You need to see if players can find the answers on their own. If things are starting to hold up testing, you can give the answer and let people move on (whilst giving that portion a big black mark), but otherwise--no tips!

Observe and draw your own conclusions. Usability is not something we always consciously notice. Plus, we tend to underestimate the unusability of software or other objects, making excuses for it--and blaming ourselves for anything that goes wrong. (In reality, a lot of "human error" is really design error.)

Heuristic Evaluations aren't usability testing, but they cover a lot of similar ground and are way easier to conduct. They rely on Jakob Nielsen's usability heuristics (http://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/), which are ten standards of a good user interface. In a heuristic evaluation, you actually run the program/system/game, and somebody else watches. They rate how well the experience and the rules adhere to the heuristics.

So, I know that was a mouthful--but researching all that is a great way to start. There's a lot to testing, and gamers don't know a lot about it.

Endarire
2013-08-22, 11:31 PM
Regarding legalese in RPGs, you need to tell the readers what the abiliity does. Too much of D&D 3.x was left ambiguous. (I don't mean open-ended abilities like planar binding, but, for example, the feat Precocious Apprentice and its interaction with Mystic Theurge.)

Saying things in a newbie-friendly way helps, but also important is that you say all of it. If you don't say ability X works like "that" then it assumedly doesn't. You could also simply say that ability X simply doesn't work like that.

Mr. Mask
2013-08-23, 09:51 PM
One thing I wonder about, is what groups of people are best playtested? I figure a group who are unfamiliar with tabletop would be best for testing the complexity of it. But then, for the most part, the audience would be rather hardcore gamers, unless you're going fora rules lite system.

erikun
2013-08-24, 01:09 AM
Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that (beyond usability) playtesters will be interacting with pen-and-paper RPGs at a different level than video games. The player of a RPG will be mostly rolling some dice, doing some calculations, and determining a success/failure result. Conversely, they'll be deciding what that means to the character on their own. As such, your main concern (as a designer) will be presenting the rules of the game clearly, making the mechanics easy to navigate, and giving a sense of setting and accomplishment.

For a video game, the playtester will not be dealing with the mechanics at all. They'll be dealing with the interface, and with the appearance on the screen. Most of their interaction will be how the character responds to the inputs, and how the character interacts with other things in the game. They aren't concerned about the mechanics at all (unless they interfere with the game itself) but will be concerned with how their character acts, and how other objects in the game interact with the character.


One thing I wonder about, is what groups of people are best playtested? I figure a group who are unfamiliar with tabletop would be best for testing the complexity of it. But then, for the most part, the audience would be rather hardcore gamers, unless you're going fora rules lite system.
You're probably best with a mix of experienced players and new players. That way, you get an opinion on the game from people familiar with such things (and so have experience with important details to look for) and from people who are just seeing the game type for the first time (and so how new people will react to the product).