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benefactum-games1 day ago (1 edit) (+1)

Art: Beautiful map and cover illustration. Too bad the treatment of the text pages is basically just a Word doc, but I get the sense you were probably under time pressure.

Writing: I think I mostly understand how to play, but it's not the most organized set of rules I've ever read. Some sections read more like personal notes for testing a prototype than finished game rules, which I again imagine to be due to a deadline crunch.

Game Design: I'm kind of torn here. You're basically creating a board game within Mothership and I'm usually of the philosophy that we should let board games be board games and RPGs be RPGs, because each medium has distinct advantages, and trying to use one as the other is a bit like hammering nails with a screwdriver. On the other hand, you get a lot of marks for creativity. I'd say maybe just forego the character sheets and Mothership mechanics entirely (except for the mechanics established for this game) and just call it a Mothership-themed board game.

Theme: Full marks. Great idea to use John Henry as the myth and good ideas for adapting it to sci-fi. I guess I could complain that there's nothing that feels very horrifying here, but you know what, it's fine.

Layout: Adequate to the task. I imagine that it'll be improved after the jam along with throwing some graphical style on the text-heavy pages.

Utility: As someone who has had a few board games published, I know you can't possibly have playtested this thoroughly enough in the time available, as that's just not possible for an even moderately-complex game. Plus the rules are cursory enough in places I know I'd find ambiguities when trying to run it. So I'd want to do a full run-through on my own before bringing it to the table with players. I suspect some might decide they can just dive in and then have awkward pauses mid-session as they're scouring the rules trying to figure out how something works.

Favorability: If you explained your plan to me at the start of the jam I would have said the board game-like mechanics were a bad idea and to do something more narrative-driven with the same theme. But you know what, I like it. I worry that it might be a bit of a mess trying to play it, but I'm happy to have read it and that you did this, so full marks.

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LionHearth Games1 day ago (1 edit)

Thank you!

Yes was certainly rushing towards the end (hence the only 95% of a first draft haha) i’ve now got the graphic design in a much nicer state so as to not just look like a block of text.

Also the post jam version I plan to include downloadable handouts which would help the Players visualize what each System can do, and to keep track of moving power around the ship.

The intention was sort of like “This one shot is mostly a big combat encounter” but instead “this one shot is a big cooperative puzzle” Also i wanted to tackle the constant problem i see with “Ship” based missions which is the lack of moving around and mostly boiling down to “i’m gonna take the guns while you pilot” and instead i wanted to make something where you yes have to shoot, but also the things that come up force you towards different places all over the ship and different solutions as to how to properly attack the problems.

Regardless thanks for your review! I genuinely appreciate your feedback!

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benefactum-games1 day ago(+1)

That's kind of the intent of Project Sisyphus as well, or at least the second act. 

I think, when doing that kind of thing, if you want it to remain a role-playing game and not accidentally turn into a board game, you probably need to resist the urge to have explicit mechanics for everything. Here, you definitely want to have rules for some things, like powering systems and how long it takes to get around the ship. But if you don't want it to play like a board game, I would suggest leaving more room for the Warden to interact with the players, instead of both parties interacting with the game mechanics.

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LionHearth Games1 day ago

a very fair point. Not quite sure how i would adjust that but I’ll give it some consideration.

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benefactum-games1 day ago (1 edit)

In this case, having done all this work, you could also just lean into it and be like this is a board game you can play as a standalone or as an interlude in a more conventional campaign. Maybe even rejig the rules so it doesn't need a Warden. (Or, conversely, if you want to keep a Warden, give the Warden more direct control over the threats and make it a competitive one-versus-many game where the Warden is actually trying to defeat the players.)

The advice was more for if this isn't how you meant it to go, how to avoid that next time.

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