Revisions of review

We did a semi-blind playtest on Monday. I was there to answer direct questions but otherwise intended to be silent. As happens we also lost a player at the last minute so I also participated in the game which was regrettable.

They taught themselves the game from the rules, pretty much just reading it aloud in somewhat backwards order. This took roughly an hour. I can easily teach the game in under 15 minutes, but I also know it well. I’m a little unsurprised at the length involved as none of the players were prepared; they simply sat down, picked up the rules and attempted to learn the game from scratch A repeated complaint was the large number of forward and backward references in the rules. I’m not sure what, if anything to do about that. More distressing was that they did not use the introduction section to gain an overview of the game and thus provide context for the rest of the rules to fit into. Conversely I was pleased that there were no questions left unanswered by the rules and that all questions they did have were answered by the rules as written and roughly about where they thought that data would be.

The game also developed unusually. All initially claimed routes were adjacent in the initial exploration with many shared islands. Kahuna and a gift were purchased on the first turn of the game (first time ever for that). The game ended explosively with all players earning more than 30 prestige points in the last round. Final prestige scores ranged from ~56-75, which is a little ridiculous.

A few of the more specific complaints:

  • Calling exploration costs bids, while accurate, was confusing. They understood the costs as a bid towards turn order but felt that calling it a bid suggested an auction for the route explored. I’ve changed that language.
  • They missed the entire Game Start section (setting initial turn order and initial route explores). They suggested I either fold that into Setup or provide a link to Game Start (the immediately next section from the Setup section.
  • They missed the ability to trade VPs for resources ability. The text was there but they skipped over it for some reason. As a result they were confused over how anyone accumulated shells during the game. When I pointed this out the paragraph they’d missed there were no surprises as to where the text was or confusions over its contents.
  • Requests for simpler language in the (long) Delivery section. Done.
  • They noticed that the rules did not specify that delivery resources were taken from supply. Fixed.
  • Wayfinder was called out as a clearly visible antecedent design. They’re right. Added.
  • Kahuna were considered confusing and likely unnecessary.
  • Reciprocal giving caused an overly exponentially explosive end-game. This was considered a big problem. I agree. Reverted.
  • Playtime was over 3 hours. That’s far longer than any other recent playtest. I’m not clear on why.

On the reaction level the summary roughly summates to:

  • Very unclear what to do, what to head for, what to attempt from reading the rules
  • Mechanically simple, surprisingly mechanically simple
  • Too long
  • A (ver)y good game that still needs rough edges knocked off

Changelog for the new rules:

  • Bids are now costs
  • Corrected later/lowest language for turn order
  • One prestige for 3rd explore
  • Simplified delivery language
  • Specified that delivery payments are from the supply
  • Removed market colour game ending.
  • One prestige for an additional proa
  • Kahuna moved at cost on delivery
  • Added credit for Wayfinder
  • Moved Prestige multiplier boundaries
  • Reciprocal giving is gone (it was exponential in the end-game). Old-style gift/points are back.

I also reduced the prestige costs for extra explores and proas so as to make those choices more viable and interesting.