Hey all. While there's a useful FAQ discussing when a game is done enough to be play-testable, I was wondering if there's a formal dividing line between "This is a playtest game" and "This is an unpublished game which might still be tweaked but is, on the whole, done-ish."

More specifically, I know that there are some folks who want to try Synanthropes but who aren't able to make it to the playtest days for whatever reason, so I wanted to know how kosher it was to bring an in-progress game to the Thursday meetups.

I feel like it's in a close-to-finished state, and it's been successfully played in its current incarnation by a number of people, (and I'm certainly not planning to bring a draft that I'm still working on or anything) but it's nice to get some sort of confirmation about where we feel that line might lie, and do so here rather than bring it up at Phoenix and kick off a potentially awkward conversation.

Pardon the lateness of this reply, but I'm checking the message boards for the first time in a long while. So...

This is an issue I've struggled with personally as well. Several of our traditional "Thursday games" are unpublished, and some are even considered "beta" by the designers. Metro Finale, Temporally Excellent Adventures, and My Daughter Queen of France spring immediately to mind. Additionally, several games which are now published, like Microscope, Ribbon Drive, Serpent's Tooth and Kingdom, got play on Thursdays before their publication.

What makes this tricky is that the publication status of a game really has no bearing on whether or not it will produce good gameplay. I think we can all name a few published games that are terrible (list omitted here to prevent a flame-a-thon), as well as a few unpublished games that are fantastic. All this is to say that I don't think publication status should not be the dividing line between whether or not a game is pitchable on Thursdays.

I don't have an alternate "rule" to propose, nor do I think there should be one. What I do think it bears stating, however, is that every time someone pitches a game, they are effectively vouching for that design. This creates an informal system of credit. If someone pitches a bunk design, both the pitcher and the game lose credibility in the eyes of the group. Do this enough times, and people catch on. Insert natural selection here.

So, what I propose is that, before anyone pitches a game, they asks themselves: DO I VOUCH FOR THIS GAME?

If yes, pitch away, and take responsibility for the outcome.
If no...come to Playtest Tuesdays!!!

Even simpler rule of thumb for more marginal games: pitch things only if you are confident that people want to play them. Which generally means pitching them if they are requested.

The reason for having a restriction on playtesting games is that we don't want to inflict unfinished games on people who would rather play something polished. And since we have a pitch-exactly-enough system in place, pitching a game generally makes people feel obliged to play it. However, if there are enough people present at a meetup who say they want to play your game, pitching it isn't pressuring anyone to do anything.

Of course, my stance that we should play games we enjoy has been controversial in the past, so don't take my word for it.

The reason for having a restriction on playtesting games is that we don't want to inflict unfinished games on people who would rather play something polished. And since we have a pitch-exactly-enough system in place, pitching a game generally makes people feel obliged to play it.

How did it come to be this way? Is this partly the cause of the awkward silence part of Thursday evenings. People don't want to pitch a game and have people feel compelled to play it?

It's Ben's system, and it has been since before I got here. But yeah, it creates some awkwardness.

I forgot all about this! I asked Ed to start this thread when we talked at ECCC, specifically because I wanted to play Synanthropes but could never make the Tuesday playtest meetup.

How did it come to be this way? Is this partly the cause of the awkward silence part of Thursday evenings. People don't want to pitch a game and have people feel compelled to play it?

This is a different topic, but no, I don’t think that’s it. The “awkward silence” is usually because people a) aren’t up for facilitating that night or b) are letting other people speak up first so other people get a chance to facilitate. Both are perfectly good. When someone is excited to facilitate a game, they usually don’t hesitate. To wit, if there’s a lot of hesitation people wind up pitching old favorites not something new or radical.

But getting back to the actual topic of “when is a game ready for prime time”. We’ve relied on people’s judgment rather than setting hard rules, but I can see why some hard rules might be useful. So let’s talk about that. As Jerome said, “published” is not the yardstick. It has no relationship to quality. Someone could hammer out a game in an hour, PDF that thing and send it out to the internet and call it published.

There are actually two very different categories. One is pitching a game you wrote and the other is pitching a game someone else wrote.

When you’re bringing someone else's game, the rule is pretty simple: does it look like it would be fun for random strangers to play? Total judgment call. We won’t always get it right (as I demonstrated last week) but if we always try our best we should do okay.

But when it’s a game you’re working on, it’s much more complicated. You can’t look at your own game as objectively as something written by a stranger, no matter how hard you try. But there are objective criteria you can use:

1) You've played it X times already

2) You’ve played it with X different people

3) All the rules are written. If you handed the text to someone else, they could facilitate it, right now.

4) People who have never played it with you facilitated it (i.e. it got played straight from the text without you explaining anything or being at the table)

5) You’re not playing it for testing, you’re playing it for fun

There may be more I’m not thinking of. I’m not even mentioning whether you think it’s worth people’s time to play. That goes without saying. Even the playtest meetup has that as a prerequisite.

X is of course a mysterious and subjective value. I could tell you that I have never brought a game I designed to meetup before I played it 20 times (even more for Microscope) but I’m a freak. As the organizer of the group I try to err on the side of caution rather than abuse my position.

Should we think of any of these as hard rules? Not necessarily. Like I said, you should be thinking about 1 and 2 but they can vary. 4 is also a really good test. 3 and 5 feel the closest to being requirements.

Much like the very games we play, all these ideas presuppose good faith on everyone’s part. These might just be good ways we can ask ourselves whether our games are ready.

Ben, do you think having people present at the meetup who want to play the game is a relevant factor? If not, why not?

I assume you’re talking about a game someone designed themselves. The designer knows more about the state of the game, so they’re in the best position to judge if it’s ready, hence this discussion about how to gauge that objectively. If a game wasn’t ready (or was in the middle of being revamped or whatever), I would expect the designer to decline to pitch it even if requested. I’ve done that very thing.

But if a bunch of people want to play a game, even if it's totally raw, you don’t need the meetup. Just get together and play it.

So in regard to Ed's original question, it sounds like he should feel comfortable pitching Synanthropes :)

Also kudos to Ed for raising this discussion and being so patient!