General Suggestions

[Schwarzbart]

1) Add a charsheet to the book

2) If you use acronym like d12 you have to declear what this means bevore or when you use it the first time.

3) The infos about the extra materials needed to play the gamebook need to mentioned at the start of the book or on the backside in my opinion.

4) In the Holfast Rules "Boon" is mentioned in the skills without letting the player know what effect it haves

5) You have a Skills as numeric value and 5 skills to pick. Maybe its bether to use i.e. the word Ability or Talent for the 5 skill choices to avoid confusion.

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Great feedback.

 

1) That's noted under Known Issues. There will be one (an Adventurer's Guild ID) included, not to worry.

2) Excellent point.

3) I think they planned to put it in the middle, but the back is a good suggestion, too.

4) Good point!

5) Hmmm, Talent does sound good. I'll bring it to the Team.

[Schwarzbart]

I didn't whant to make a other thread but

Introduction 5 and the Boon Table clearly need more info!

I think I have to roll 1d6 on the boon table without any bonus but even this is confusing because it no where says are this my own abilitys, some items that give me this bonus or something other.

When now looking at the Posible resoults there even more questions:

Whats this Prevent (4) if I get a 1 on the boon table?

The 1d4 Defense from 4 & 5 is this rolled right away and add to my Defense or something seperate?

What is meant with 6 +1 item? What kind of item do I get? Is it random and if so at what table do I roll for it and what dice do I use for this?

Past 9 it even get more confusing but as my roll is just 1d6 right now I don't care for this now.

 

 

Edit: Serious make the Combat easyer and more clearly understandable so that you only have to look into the Table with 1 or 2 dice rolled and have a very clear result what this means to the player Defense and to the oponent Defense everything that get beyond this have to be removed.

 

I stop here now as even the Introduction can't be handled by someone who have RPG expirience, how are you thinking people who just know i.e. The Lone Wolf can handle this?

 

Remember your not making a Pen&Paper RPG here your making a Gamebook what need to have simple and easy to understand rules where at best you not even have to leave the page where you curently are from the adventure even trough a encounter till the player make a decision to get to the next step.

The max you can ask from a player is that he turn to one different page trough a combat but not having to look first at the rules then at the table, then at the rules again and so on to just make a single fight.

 

Edit2: I personal think the best way to handle combats in gamebooks is to give the player and the oponent attack, defense, damage and Health as seperate values and make some simple rules without any table how to handle the combat like player attack +1d10 vs oponent defense and if hit the damage is removed from the oponent health.

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Sorry to hear you are having so much trouble! It is a little complex, but not too bad once you get the hang of it. In it's final form, with icons, it may be easier. Holdfast definitely requires more of a learning curve than Lone Wolf, though- it's much more tactical, and has a deeper rules set.

 

For your questions:

 

Boons can be used in three ways: Testing your Luck, to make a Skill roll Untrained and as an aid in Combat. All of these, though, are at your discretion. In my experience, however, Boons are very useful in Combat.

 

Prevent is a special Combat Effect, and is defined under Effects in the Combat section. It prevents a Claw result, in this case for 4 Rounds.

 

#4&5 are indeed added to your Defense immediately (in fact, this is a bug: it should read 'Heal', not Defense, great catch!)

 

+1 Item means that you can use an additional Item this Round. This should be defined under Effects, but isn't- thanks!

[Schwarzbart]

The problem is in Introduce 5 you just roll once on the boon Table but what effect do it have for you then?

There is no mention why you roll on this now and what to do with the resoult.

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Ah! You gain a Boon then (not Roll one.) That means that you have a d6 Boon available to you. When you want to roll it (Test your Luck, use a Skill Untrained or in Combat) you have a pool of all the Boons you've collected over the game. You grab as many as want to use, and roll them when you want to.

 

If that makes sense?

[Schwarzbart]

Ahh I see. Thats why this didn't make any sense.

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Yeah, we need to make that more explicit in the Rules- I'll give this feedback to the Team.

 

Thanks!

[Schwarzbart]

I think you have to make it more explicit when the player get it trough the Introduction 5

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Maybe something like:

 

"You have gained a d6 Boon. Note that on your ID and then go to Introduction 6"

 

...better?

[Schwarzbart]

Yes that sounds bether.

[Legate of Mineta]

Done!

[swang]

My 1-hour feedback... (didn't get to look at it for too long.)

 

A combat demo of a couple of rounds would be great.

 

At least in ACT I, there were some branches that did not have a meaningful decision. The branches would go from A->B->C or A->C directly, and B would not have anything in there other than more fluff text.

 

On the transitions, the player is allowed to choose any one of the branches that he is qualified for, correct?

[Legate of Mineta]

Jeff;

 

I think we're going to do a demo, possibly based on Adrian's in-progress example, great suggestion.

 

Some branches indeed get you from Point A to Point C in a lengthier fashion, with the difference being more of a role-playing or investigatory choice. If there's a particular place that you'd like us to review, though, let us know.

 

Correct, you can choose any transition you qualify for.

 

Thanks!

[Schwarzbart]

Suggestion:

In Introduction 3

Add "You find the combat stats of Thumper and Thurvik at page XX in the item table. If you dont have combat cards best write this down to your char sheet."

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

Excellent, very important to show that specifically.

 

Thanks!

[Schwarzbart]

I jumped ahead to the Act II Hub.

In Phase 2 I should be able to by items but the complet basic forge items have no stats given under Mercants! But I suspect you general have to write the infos from Item Reference to Mercants also.

For Phase 5 I kind of miss where I have to look for the Structures I can build.

Also shouldn't there some effects from Leadership and other Talents in the Hub?

[Legate of Mineta]

Schwarzbart;

 

You're correct, for now you will have to reference the Items when you buy from the Merchants.

 

Structures are under Perks & Structures 1.0, but I immediately see the problem- no cost is given! I'll get a post up about that, but they are between 100-300 gold.

 

We thought about having some perks related to the Skills at the Hub, but ultimately we chose not to (otherwise some Skills become a bit too powerful.) It's a good thought, though!

[Adrian]

Legate, do you want spelling mistakes here too?

 

Beyond that, I've a favor to ask you and the team. Please. Please please please! When you point us to another part in the book, could you make it more than just a simple number? For whatever reason my Adobe reader goes crazy if I ask it to search for '3'. There are a lot of numbers in the book. So... I don't know... Go to 3 Figglesticks; Go to 5 Watermelon; Go to 8 Toffies. You can even add something that makes sense if you prefer. But make it so that we can search for what we are asked to go to please. In my search for '3' I had to scroll past 4 5 and 6 (probably 7 and others too) which for me caused me to doubt myself. I must have missed it! I thought. You fool! I thought. And when I search for 3.. as I said, it spases out like you wouldn't believe.

 

Another is Equipment effects. It may just be me who is stup- silly, but despite looking at ITEMs I never considered the possible actions to be referenced in EQUIPMENT effects. This might actually be a non-vailid point, if you include some form of tutorial or example in the finished product that leads the reader in this direction. But maybe another name?

 

 

And while on the subject of changing names: We go into a house and find a chest with paper in it. (god it sounds rather dull when it is put that way...), either way, as I read it, I imagine some old, trunk-like thing. Of solid wood, metal hinges, weighing a dwarf and a ton besides.... then I read that I bring it along and open it some blocks away Imagine my surprise! In Danish, I think it would have been 'et skrin' something that can contain jewelry mostly, or other valuables... or a box maybe, if it is larger. Though my English isn't that grand. I'm just asking if chest is the right word to use. - and if it is, if you shouldn't add some adjectives or something to make it appear light? ~ Pg 21 3.13 as I read it, but it may be mentioned several places.

[Legate of Mineta]

Adrian;

 

Sure, give us misspellings, please!

 

The number problem is likely to diminish somewhat, but probably not in Beta.

 

A fair point. We need to give some explanations on Items, too. Ultimately, I think they will be shown in a different category, anyway, so that may be of help.

 

Thanks!

[Adrian]

Added a small point about a chest sounding heavy, but it might be me (in the post above, sneak editing is dangerous in it's own way)

 

The only spelling I've come across so far is the "Street Tough" which, unless Tough is slang or a race, I think should be thug. page 17.

[Legate of Mineta]

Adrian;

 

A street 'tough' is indeed slang.

 

For the sneak edit:

 

"And while on the subject of changing names: We go into a house and find a chest with paper in it. (god it sounds rather dull when it is put that way...), either way, as I read it, I imagine some old, trunk-like thing. Of solid wood, metal hinges, weighing a dwarf and a ton besides.... then I read that I bring it along and open it some blocks away Imagine my surprise! In Danish, I think it would have been 'et skrin' something that can contain jewelry mostly, or other valuables... or a box maybe, if it is larger. Though my English isn't that grand. I'm just asking if chest is the right word to use. - and if it is, if you shouldn't add some adjectives or something to make it appear light? ~ Pg 21 3.13 as I read it, but it may be mentioned several places."

 

Fair enough, I'll send that to the Team to review the language.

 

Thanks!

[Adrian]

A question! I've actually gotten my friend convinced to give this a earnest go while the wine holds, but we've a question. As my friend pointed out it says "healing kits (5)" in ITEMs and there are actually two identical items for it. Are the 'a healing kit' that we started out with, the same as these? and does it contain 5 charges (as we suspect?).

 

Also, the effect of potion of healing is either 8(4) or 10(3) is it right to assume that this is a heal over time?

[Legate of Mineta]

Adrian;

 

There are two identical items, although one should be filtered out (it's because there are two sources.) The number is the number of Healing Kits available for purchase from that Merchant.

 

For Potions of Healing those (confusingly) are the number of doses. That's my bad, I was the one who put it in that format (originally it was a separate column.)

 

Great questions!

[Adrian]

Aww my poor Fiddleton, he's in for a rough time! haha. Thanks for the wonderfully fast answers, as always!