In-Class Playtest 2

Jonathan's group enjoying the game

In-Class Playtest #2 was held on November 09, 2023 in the G Building with members of Jonathan's group, and features Iteration 1.2 of the game.

Within the same playtest, each research pair within our development team has different preferences for recording their study and observations. The section in this page are divided by how each pair records their study.

Previous Playtest: Internal Playtest #2

Next Playtest: In-Class Playtest #3

## Franciszek Ryt & Rajat Upadhayaya

### Objective

*For this playtest we wanted to make sure that the changes that we have made for the game are understandable. We wanted to see the balance that the new heroes would make in the game and how the new teams would be chosen. We wanted to see if new combos would arise and would be used by players in the game with what success level.*

Rules for the iteration:

* Rulebook V.2
* Almanac V.2

The playtest was conducted with four players from our class. All of the players have chosen a team with three Heroes each.

* Gustaf - Team 1: Fire fox, Lightning crane, Soul squirrel, 10pts
* Nea - Team 2: Wind panda, Lightning crane, Snow bunny, 20pts
* Teodor - Team 3: Lightning crane, Earth monkey, Wind panda, 15 pts
* Birk - Team 4: Water dog, Earth monkey, Fire fox, 13 pts

### Process

Notes from the playtest (Rajat):
The players chose multiple of the same heroes.

* The Hero picking part of the setup is confusing the players.
* Font is confusing to people, 6 and 8, 1 and 7
* Maybe the gradient tiles need to be defined in the rules or on board.
* “Share” for the Soul squirrel needs to be “mimic” or defined better.
* Player 4 felt their options were limited because the flags were far away from their spawn on the first turn.
* The players did consider friendly fire as a way to deal damage to others.
* “Give and Take” was confusing to Player 4. Need to clarify the grammar there as well.
* Player 2 scored the first points of the game via a minor flag.
* The gradient tiles need to belong to a certain Heaven, We need to define this.
* The players discuss how the initiative being high and low are affecting their playstyle.
* Players did not seem to notice the backside of the flag cards.
* Snow Bunny ability slowed the game down in terms of checking the rules, almanac.
* The bunny ability is still confusing the players.
* The wall is easy to understand.
* Players were strategizing on opponents' turns.
* Player 2 lost a character, this is the first character loss.
* Round 2 is over, they remove the old flags and place the new ones. They did not see the backside of the new flag cards. The flags ended up on one side of the board.
* Player 2 respawned their character.
* Players now actually read all the abilities and theorise on “killer teams”.
* Players describe Haru as a glass cannon, also that they can use on their own Heroes.
* Players are really now theorising teams for ideal strategies.
* Player 3 kills Player 1’s character with a wall.
* Players understood respawn.
* Player 4 attacked Player 2 in their spawn tile.  NEED TO CHANGE
* There is once again diplomacy to prevent points being scored for certain players. Alliances form.
* THEY NOTICE THE BACKSIDE OF THE FLAG CARDS NOW
* Need to clarify the part about moving inside to inside of the snowstorm.
* They thought the panda cannot hook onto friends.  It says “Enemy” on the character sheet?
* They are pretty passionate about the game.
* They realise Haru can swap HP of any 2 characters not only with Haru itself.
* The Soul Squirrel has been pretty useless this game. They discuss Squirrel roles with other Heroes.
* Players mention the region (Heaven) has no effect on the game. The position of where the Hero is.
* Board Layout in terms of moving the Heavens around is suggested.
* Haru's description on the character sheet is confusing - PLAYER FEEDBACK
* Luces - when does the soul binding end? - PLAYER FEEDBACK
* Soul binding is used for the first time in the game.
* We need to clarify who gets points when a soulbound Hero is killed.
* All walls are the same looking so it is confusing to know which character's wall. Same with snowstorms.
* Player in the middle of the board? Before the Final flag was spawned.
* The Final Flag is now placed on the board.
* Player 1 killed their own character to kill another one, they were soulbound.
* They thought the final flag gives 20 points in 10 increments in the final 2 rounds?
* Player 3 placed a wall on the final flag. Need to make modifications to this.
* Game is over. No one collected FInal Flag due to the wall

Notes from the playtest (Franciszek):

* Players keep referencing the colour of heroes with heavens - they are confused about the colour Schemes of the Heroes, heavens, teams, etc. players want to have clear indication of what players are in their team (tint on the hero cards)
* Players have picked up on the idea with heavens having some sort of influence on the game mechanics
* It took them a little to actually understand how to choose their teams
* The flags spawned very closely to each other and the flags spawned in the same area again
* Multicoloured spots (points that are on the edges of the heavens) create spawn point confusion
* Explanation of the squirrel must be made more clear
* There was a lot of overinterpretation of the colours and the heavens
* The discussion broke out about the position of players at the end of the initiative and how they are in The worst place possible - they need to have abilities connected to big damage to actually stand a chance of getting flags, but on the other hand the initiative values encourage different playstyles
* The player are very eager to tell their opponents their possibilities and moves
* The player did not use the predictions of the flags in any way, they kept the minor flags in a single pile (as was written in the rules)
* Players did a lot of discussing the rules and possibilities of all of them, there was a lot of discussion Around what they could do and what they did and theorising about the tactics
* Haru - glass cannon (opinion)
* Panda+crane+bunny - displacing and snow storm
* Crane is always used as a speedster, gaining advantage in gaining the far positions
* Earth wall is used to hurt more than block
* Fire fox was sure to go on their own in some cases
* The spawn was performed correctly but it made the heroes lose a lot of the game
* Luces ability needs to be rewritten and specified who gets the points
* Using luces to prevent someone from attacking (if they do they will die)
* Killing your own character to kill another one - binded
* Wall is used to block flags from being scored by other players
* Maybe introduce the movement binding for the squirrel
* Both times the wall was blocking the 10 points
* Board needs to be revised -> black tiles can be used as counting the range?
* Haru puts their damage on someone for other hero to kill it

Player Feedback:

* Players liked the interactions of Heroes and combos with them
* Picking a team at the start with no information on how the game works can hurt the playstyle.
* The spawn flagging was all in 2 sectors pretty much.
* Player wanted the game to escalate since it is the same throughout the game.
* Font is hard to read.

### Results

We haven't got any big meeting between this playtest and the next one, so we only could do small, hot fixes between them. We also wanted to make sure we have more data and player's feedback concerning the graphics and the team pick before we decide to change that.

* Changing luces the squirrel ability
* Fia initiative change
* Changing flag selection
* Heaven abilities we moved for the next iteration - big one
* Wall fix

### Research notes:

The prevailing tactics were centered on the crane hero.

Player 4 opted for high damage dealers, and made their strategy around killing opponents. This did not pay off in big amount of points but it made them enjoy the game.

Player 3 opted for high movement and high health. The crane was the glass cannon who siezed the points and the panda and monkey were protecting it. The change in tactics came when the player started obstructing flags via Earthwall and phasing other Heroes from them. They felt the pnada could have been switched to something else in their team for it to be more effective.

Player 2 opted for a mix of high health and intresting abilities. They have used their Bunny to protect Crane from attacks and freeze immobilise any coming danger. Panda would serve a similar purpose. Pulling Heroes out of the Crane's way. The tactic was mianly to take smaller points, to be sure of gain and let the bigger points be fought over by the rest. They felt their team lacked a high damage dealer.

Player 1 opted for high initiative heroes. They wanted to make high damage team with a luces ability to link the damage to other heroes. They had to change it, because burst damage tactic could only work on one to two other Heroes and was not always enough to kill them. Player 1 understood thet initiative was not a good thing to have.

## Igor Sogorovecs & Stan Nguyen

### Previously, on Iteration 1.2...

Iteration 1.2 serves to address frustrating game system identified from the previous In-Class playtest in the following manners:

* Fia has been buffed due to her limiting ability use case.
* Haru, the Water Dog has been nerfed due to his prevalent success.
* The flag system will now generate as many flags as there are players, so that on average at least one flag can be captured by one player.
* The game duration has been reduced to simplify the turn and round order confusion. A turn tracker has also been added.
* An ultimate flag will now spawn at the end as a comeback chance for players behind on points.
* Respawn now no longer permits action on the same turn to reduce the frequency of player's clash.

### Aim

We wish to continue having the players pinpoint game systems, or lack thereof, which are inducive toward frustrations. We will also continue to monitor their behaviors, whether conscious or subconscious, as these behaviors carry psychological implications that survey response could not properly convey.

This playtest will also act as proof for the game as playable with 4 players.

### Methodologies

The methodologies employed is a replication from previous playtest with no changes.

### "Negative Remarks" Results

#### Player 1

A total of 13 negative remarks were recorded. Some example of which being:

* "23 ice?! What da shit?"
* "I don't need to win, I just want you to lose!"
* "How did you got there so fast? Crane is disgustingly fast!"
* "...In which case, you are going to die!"

#### Player 2

This player remained mostly quiet throughout the playthrough, with also limited non-verbal communications.

#### Player 3

A total of 8 negative remarks were recorded. Some example of which being:

* "Why is your team there? Go away!"
* "No you don't, fuck you!"
* "23 ice, who shuffled them?"

#### Player 4

A total of 12 negative remarks were recorded. Some example of which being:

* "So there's no way to just punch someone in the face? That's dumb!"
* "What I make sure is that you will end with 0 points!"
* "I will use every point of damage to fuck all of you."
* "I play like: fuck you guys!"

### Playtest Notes

#### Set-Ups

* The ordering of the rulebook asks them to read into future sections.
* Team color vs Hero color confusion.
* Some people don't read the char sheet.
* Heaven of the Soul??
* HP tracker is too thick.
* Almost triple the rule reading time of the last group so far...
* One player raised the confusion of movement wording: "adjacent"
* One player questioned why there were no ways to punch someone in the face.
* Violea looks hard to make out on what she is based on abstract design.
* Chinese alchemy??
* Need to indicate what "gradient tiles" mean in the rulebook.
* One player questioned if there exists a lore book.
* Haru's hero card has a typo error :"to the Taker" instead of "to be the Taker".
* Does dual color tile act as both heaven for Luces's abilities?
* Should there be tint on character sheet to differentiate between teams?

#### Playtime

* P4 strategizes really hard.
* Heaven and color confusion on starting team.
* In general, this group reads the almanac a lot more.
* Different turn order has different playstyles.
* Displacement methods were used to block people from scoring.
* This group is messing with the tokens...
* They interpret the dog's ability wrong: instead of moving to adjacent for the Giver, they think both targets are in 4 range.
* In general, they strategize team composition really hard.
* They did not read the Spawn Point clause (spawn makes you invulnerable)
* P4 just wants to kill other players.
* They realize at later stage of the game to predict future spawn zones using the backside of the lottery.
* They discuss the possibility of bonus for certain heroes when starting in certain Heaven. (e.g, Fire bonus for Howie)
* They discuss wanting more spawn points at the center of the game to escalate it.
* Question on Luces's ability durations.
* Question on who gets the point on self-takedown using Luces's soulbind.
* Regu's earth wall separate teams.
* They block flag points with the Earth Wall just fine.
* This was also used to block the 10 points.

### Interview Q&A

*What did you enjoy the most in the game?*

* Player 1: "When we were playing and discussing. Actual gameplay is fun, but the rules discussion were fun."
* Player 2: "Collecting points."
* Player 3: "Probably the uh the interaction between the different ability of the heroes and planning around that."
* Player 4: "Punching the bunny."

*One word feeling?*

* Player 1: "Chaotic."
* Player 2: "Fun."
* Player 3: "Scheming."
* Player 4: "Fun."

*What did you feel most frustrating in the game? If no then what do you think would give other players frustration?*

* Player 1: "Interpreting rules."
* Player 2: "Not being able to run around the fox with my bunny. And also, I was part of the first turn order, I can't affect what is happening after."
* Player 3: "I swear to God my pawn that moved out of position that I could have won the game with."
* Player 4: "There are visual and text that adds confusion to understanding when it comes to ability."

*If you can design this game, how would you make it fairer?*

* Player 1: "Cut down the rules a bit. I want more on the cards and less on the rules."
* Player 2: "Fixing turn order to give more chances to other turn orders."
* Player 3: "Probably trying to standardize and even out the scoring area more evenly or make it easier to reach from one end of the map to another. Join the melee faster from any range of the map."
* Player 4: "Add spawn points at a later stage in the game to move into the middle circle faster."

*How much time did you feel like you were playing?*

* Player 1: "About half an hour in actual game time. An hour when discussing and reading rules."
* Player 2: "More than an hour plus 15 minutes."
* Player 3: "It felt like a reasonable amount of time for that type of game, around an hour. Plus or minus 15 minutes. I know you timed it pretty well a little about halfway less than an hour. But felt like a reasonable amount of time."
* Player 4: "About an hour."

*Did you feel like you really hate what your opponent was doing?*

* Player 1: "No."
* Player 2: "No. It felt just a bit fun even when I was being spawn camped."
* Player 3: "No. Not really. I was more aware of what I was doing about fucking with the goal and generally bullying people."
* Player 4: "Not really no."

*What was your strategy?*

* Player 1: "It was shit. My going in strategy was doing burst damage. I ended up playing defensively and trying not to die. Waiting for points to come to me."
* Player 2: "Go for the low points. Trying not to be in range of someone else."
* Player 3: "My strategy became pushing people off points, and trying to push people around and blocking."
* Player 4: "Punching other people as much as possible."

*Did you feel like giving up at any point?*

* Player 1: "No."
* Player 2: "No. Feels like some champions are unequal to each other."
* Player 3: "No, I didn't feel like giving up."
* Player 4: "I knew I wouldn't win but I ran into a direction of just hoping to punch people as much as possible. So in a way I didn't give up on just messing with other people."

### Discussion

Based on the results of the "Negative Remarks" and our Interviews, we discovered that:

* Game systems that offer no chance of recovery from strategic errors can cause frustration. The players proposed having more spawn points closer to the middle of the board so that there is better recovery for heroes going into respawn to rejoin the fight earlier.
* Complicated rules with little ease of understanding makes it initially frustrating for players to pick up the game.
* Having to declare your strategy before everyone else (First-turn Order) cause frustration because they can't affect everything that comes after.
* Hero abilities that do not promote a strong sense of progression in the game cause frustrations as players feel let-down by a lack of agency to affect changes. This also ties in the previously identified imbalance between heroes and individual affordance budget. The identified heroes that feel lacking in this regard are Fia and Luces.

Iteration 1.3 will serve to address these design issues informed by our playtest - to alleviate frustrations in players.

## Emma Andersson & Sanna Helsing

*In this iteration, the playtest used character sheets with abstract animal portraits to represent the heroes. A new hero is added, the crane "Violea."*

*To collect data, we took notes while observing the players. After the game ended, we interviewed the players.*

### **Notes**

Rulebook contains parts from a previous iteration. Abstract character design. The rulebook needs to visually differentiate between character cards and team colour. Maybe write about the tokens after. Maybe distribute all 7 different hero cards for each player, so the players can look through the characters and choose one. The heavens seem to matter a lot to the players. Almanac confusing words?

The abstract symbols might be too abstract, players are confused on what animal the crane symbol is supposed to be, guesses include “turtle” and “mushroom”.

Some players seem to have chosen characters based on look, the monkey being the most popular choice amongst those players. They might have chosen characters based on looks due to confusion about how the game works so making a strategy is too overwhelming for now.

Takes the players a long time to read, could be condensed and aided visually. They figured out what the crane was after reading it in the almanac.

“I picked monkey because of monkey”

Players are expressing that they would want to know more about the narrative of the game. This could be aided visually through the arena and character design, as well as wording and rule design.

Players are thinking hard about strategies on round 1. They seem excited about combos. They seem to use the names of the characters instead of saying “element+animal”. If they knew about some of the abilities they might have chosen differently. One player tried to use a strategy that would swap the crane and another player's character from their attack point, not adjacent. Disappointment ensues.

Players seem to assume pronouns on the characters, even at an abstracted state.

The players expressed the need for the background of the character cards to match the team colours so it's easier to differentiate.

### **Interview Q&A**

“What made you choose these heroes?”

* P1: Picked fox because it was fire, picked dog because of blue and water pokémon, and monkey because of monkey
* P2: Saw the damage potential
* P3: liked the art and the colour, liked winter, and because ice matched the spawn point. also some mechanics.
* P4: crane because movement, monkey because of health, panda because of green and player was green.

“What did you think of the heroes' visuals?”

* P1: Some of them were clear some were not, did not pay much attention to them because the background was more detailed.
* P2: initialy pretty cool.
* P3: confusing and complicated
* P4: they were cute, tokens looked similar, the whole conversation about the crane

“What was most interesting about the characters you chose; its visuals or its mechanics?”

* P1: The mechanics and the interplay between them. Even though dog looks complicated.
* P2: The visuals of the hero cards. because the mechanics wee pretty standard.
* P3:at the start, didnt feel like she had time to read the mechanics, just chose because of the numbers and decided to just pick ones she liked.
* P4: mechanics 100%, but also haha monkey.

“What makes the heroes you chose most appealing?”

* P1: Fire water monkey.
* P2:-
* P3: Colours.
* P4:the art helps, just looked at the numbers, realized that skills are important later.

“Did you relate to the characters?”   ->   “If so, what made you relate to the characters?”

* P1: Not really. Related to fox because of mechanics.
* P2:No.
* P3: not really.
* P4: Meh.no.

"Did you feel like the characters had a personality?" -> "If so, visually, mechanically or both?"

* P1:Not really. Leading question. abstract head had no personality. Theres no room for personality.
* P2:No, they had playstyles. personality did not match mechanics or visuals.
* P3: No.
* P4: not that much.

"Do you feel like the visual design of each hero represents the mechanics?"

* P1: The visuals do not reflect the almanac
* P2: No. red deals damage, colourwise, yes.
* P3: not really. the colours felt more important to the mechanic.
* P4: rarely. the crane yes, its fast. Fox aggressive, sure. monkey and panda, no.

"Would you choose to play this game solely based on the visual design of the heroes?"

* P1: No. Has nothing to do with system.
* P2: Not the heroes alone, but the whole game. the characters are not interesting.
* P3:No. Very simple, boring.
* P4: No.cards were nice, tokens nice. just heroes, just icons.