prog: (zarf's werewolf)
prog ([personal profile] prog) wrote2006-06-27 12:00 am

Werewolf debriefing

The test was a great success. We played 17 games in a couple of hours, both large and small sizes. The game is a blast, even when I was playing only against remote players. ([livejournal.com profile] mrmorse was the only person to show up at HQ, about an hour into it.) There's a lot about playing online over a text-and-graphic interface that's different about playing in person, and it turns out that the differences are fun for their own reasons.

The QA aspect of it went quite well, too. Zarf ended up with a good-sized list of small improvements to pound in tomorrow, and I found myself with some more website bugs to squish.

I want to play more big games of werewolf, and am frustrated that the Volity Network isn't full of people get! Grr! We've gotta change this. (Well, yes.)

Other notes:

* Volity needs chat channels. In Werewolf, if you get killed you're forbidden to speak, and when your only interface to the world is a text chat this makes you completely invisible; kind of a bummer! Several people suggested a "graveyard" channel where the dead could kibitz out of earshot from the squabbling villagers.

* Gamut (not Volity) needs a "sticky-ready" control of some sort, for when you don't care how a game is configured, you just want to play it. When you're in sticky mode, a config change would not unready you. (In reality, the referee would send a "you've been unreadied" message to the player, but Gamut would immediately say "OK I'm ready!" back to the ref and not show anything to the user.)

[identity profile] dictator555.livejournal.com 2006-06-27 02:14 pm (UTC)(link)
Yay! It was fun. I can't believe you played 17 games, though. Whoa. Did the villagers ever win? I wish I'd been able to play longer (stupid west branch library has craptacular hours and I had a book on hold). So let me know if there's going to be another big gathering for werewolf, cause I'd totally love to play again. The end.

[identity profile] prog.livejournal.com 2006-06-27 02:38 pm (UTC)(link)
The villagers won a bunch of times later, and we tried some of the advanced roles too.

One problem with small groups is that you almost always must play with one werewolf, leading to a significant chance that the villagers will zap him as the very first move, immediately ending the game. You can get away with two wolves if you also have two slayers or some other silly setup, but in any case the game is over in a couple of moves.

Thanks for playing!