We had a fantastic weekend at Metatopia. It is a wonderful convention run by the great people at Double Exposure. The concept: Designers are the attendees with the players and other developers there to help them refine or present their product. It gave me a profound insight into the awesomeness of our gaming community as a whole. I am definitely plan to head back there again in the coming years.

The Playtests

I ran two playtests for Esper Genesis on Friday and learned a lot more on the desire for advanced ship combat rules. I also got a question regarding mass space combat, to which my only reply was “yes, but only after I create an actual mass combat system for D&D”. I had a great table both times on Friday and even though I was exhausted at the 10-Midnight session, it was a fun experience and was very cool to see the game come alive in person.

The Hi-Test (Developer’s Table)

All I can say is… Wow! I was trying my best not to show my level of nervousness while presenting the game itself. It was tough compressing a 4 hour adventure into a 2 hour time slot, but everyone at the table quickly turned it into a comfortable experience. My table included Rob Donoghue (Fate RPG), Jason Tocci, Cam Banks (Marvel RPG / Serenity RPG), and Warren Morrison. I received incredible feedback. Overall the design and rules got a thumbs up! There were some great suggestions regarding the new rules for movement and some of the balancing between the character archetypes. I am extremely grateful for their input, much of which I’m going to be incorporating into the Basic Rules set.