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Notes from Wellycon, applied more widely

A few weeks ago I took sketchnotes at a few of the talks at Wellycon, a boardgaming convention.

Summary of bits that apply to design more broadly

  • Have clear design goals, stick to them, test feedback against them
  • Remember to make a good first-time and early user experience
  • Keep good documentation, updated as you go along
  • Design so that failure is not game over
    • Give chances to correct mistakes
    • Take people down a different path
    • Allow achievement of partial outcomes
    • In particular, watch for Doom Spirals: where failure only leads to more failure and punishments
  • Don’t punish wanted behaviours, reward them!

My sketchnotes

Wellycon sketchnotes, page 1. Text description immediately follows this image.

Text version of Wellycon sketchnotes, page 1

Designing Games You Love – Jarrat Gray

  • Endeavor Deep Sea
    • Uncommon theme
    • hopeful
      • the game, the players
      • competitive, but sharing
  • For every published one, dozens of discarded prototypes
  • There’s not a lot of money in boardgames → Design games you love → You’ll play them a lot
  • Pitch it!
    • to many people, friends, family
  • Design Goals
    • Decide them, stick to them
      • Does feedback align?
  • Good early user experience
  • Design Philosophy
    • Theme
    • Mechanics
    • Story
    • Connectivity
  • Write the rules down, update constantly
  • Test the physical feeling, not the look, at the table

Wellycon sketchnotes, page 2. Text description immediately follows this image.

Text version of Wellycon sketchnotes, page 2

Designing Games You Love - Jarrat Gray (continued)

  • Playtesting
    • Sharks circling!
    • Balanced?
      • Hard choices
      • Imbalance can create story
    • Mechanics work? Together?
    • Blind playtesting, early
    • Fun?

Fail Forward Design: The Art of Rewarding Risk-taking (and Failure) – Chris Jacobs

  • Failure as an Opportunity to improve
  • Continuous Iteration, Experimentation
  • “Not playing the game is not fun!”
  • Lifeship (From Ikarangi Labs)
    • Fail states for missions
    • Multiple degrees of success/failure
  • Player Encouragement
    • Reward Mechanics
    • Punishment Mechanics
      • Often goes past the point of necessity
    • Failure mechanics
    • Lack of agency often intensifies the feeling
  • Players memorise dominant winning strategies
    • Alpha players

Wellycon sketchnotes, page 3. Text description immediately follows this image.

Text version of Wellycon sketchnotes, page 3

Fail Forward Design: The Art of Rewarding Risk-taking (and Failure) – Chris Jacobs (continued)

  • Watch for Doom Spirals
    • Failure only leads to more failure and punishments
  • What do we want players to do?
  • Competitive or Cooperative
  • Stakes! But allow for failure
    • Chances to correct mistakes
    • Narrative consequences
    • Unlocks
    • New role
  • Rewards for failure
    • Partial outcomes
  • Don’t punish wanted behaviours, reward them!
  • Failure without a Game Over