Call for Playtesters: GURPS Horror

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Þorkell

I'd say it is closer to 6 months to account for some time for the author, or authors, to make changes on the book based on feedback from the playtest. Having said that I think my estimate is a highly optimistic one.

For a long hardback, six months, minimum. Granted, though, Horror may change much less from playtest to final draft than CCoI, since Horror is less rule intensive.

[Exeter]

Cool. Six months. Gotcha.

One other question: for those of you who've seen the playtest version, is it still worthwhile to pick up previous editions of GURPS Horror?

[Crakkerjakk]

Originally Posted by Exeter

Cool. Six months. Gotcha.

At an absolute minimum.

[Pmandrekar]

Originally Posted by Fish

Never having playtested a published RPG before, I'm going to presume it's similar to beta-testing a computer game: all testers sign non-disclosure agreements and so forth.

I also presume the playtesters aren't allowed to gloat if they're chosen. :)

Never signed an NDA, but I think that the whole point of doing a Closed Playtest is to get the opinions of the well-informed players on the inside of a playtest, so, people posting Polls along the lines of "We're currently discussing this in the GURPS Cabaret Chicks on Ice" playtest, and everyone falls into Camp A or Camp B. What do you think? are ill advised.

I generally don't discuss my involvement on the project on these boards until I'm actually selected as a credited playtester, generally speaking.

I've been involved in the playtesting of a few GURPS things and am currently credited in GURPS Space, and GURPS Bio-Tech, so I've been involved in some of the playtesting in the past.

The key to playtesting is this: You're there to offer up as good a fact checking analysis as you can, and the good ones will always put way more time and energy into getting the playtest done than the cost of the free comp copy that comes at the end. In other words, if you thought that you were getting a free book for nothing, think again. You're better off spending 5 hours working at minimum wage to earn the money to buy a copy than you are spending dozens of hours (and in the case of a recent playtest, a lot, lot more!) looking up factoids, reading e-mails, discussing concepts with people, proposing new rules or rules variants etc.

I don't do it for the financial gain. I do it to be involved in the game design process. On an hourly basis, my day job pays a heck of a lot better!!

-P.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Exeter

One other question: for those of you who've seen the playtest version, is it still worthwhile to pick up previous editions of GURPS Horror?

Ken Hite's previous edition is a work of art and is certainly worthwhile reading as a guideline to horrific roleplaying.

The templates in it, though, will obviously be less useful, as they use 3e stats and would require tedious conversion.

[tg_ambro]

Originally Posted by Pmandrekar

The key to playtesting is this: You're there to offer up as good a fact checking analysis as you can, and the good ones will always put way more time and energy into getting the playtest done than the cost of the free comp copy that comes at the end. In other words, if you thought that you were getting a free book for nothing, think again. You're better off spending 5 hours working at minimum wage to earn the money to buy a copy than you are spending dozens of hours (and in the case of a recent playtest, a lot, lot more!) looking up factoids, reading e-mails, discussing concepts with people, proposing new rules or rules variants etc.

I don't do it for the financial gain. I do it to be involved in the game design process. On an hourly basis, my day job pays a heck of a lot better!!

-P.

I agree (altough I am new to playtesting) I really like the process so far, and have found it to be both challenging and rewarding. It's kind of funny, because before I came to GURPS I, like many others, started out nursing at the dry breast of DnD. I remember a complaint I saw on a fairly consistant basis was that DnD supplements were not playtested, by anyone, ever.
I'm not sure if this is true now, but it seemed so back then (about 3-4 years ago) as shown by the constant parade of misspelling, rules that didn't jive together (does anyone remember the three different rules for shape-shifting that were equally useless?), and stat mess ups that appeared every other page of every book (okay, that's a bit of exaggeration, but only a little).

This brings me to another, more off topic realization I came to, it concerns why I like Gurps so much. That would be the transparancy of both the rules (generally, everything in the books you could have done yourself, it's not at all arcane or obscure) and the creators ( Steve Jackson, Dr. Kromm, the many authors of supplemental works, penning such often brilliant and insightful work), and the fine community (that would be you, dear reader, and every other participant on this board).

These three things, to me, make Gurps seem much less like a product, where you are a passive customer that has to take whatever crud is shoveled out by the company, and more like a shared project where you are invited to participate, nay, encouraged to become a creatore yourself, be it as a GM, author, or just the best possible player you can be.

I hope this doesn't sounds like I'm blowing SJgames to much, but everything I have spoken, I swear is the truth, spoken from the heart.

[Ragitsu]

One question I didn't ask way back when: will GURPS Horror solely cover Cthulhu/cosmic being type stuff? I mean, it seems okay, but it also gets a lot of exposure as is...

Will we see rules and information for move "conventional" fantasy, modern day and sci-fi horror?

[Max Schreck]

GURPS Horror in all its editions has never covered only one horror genre, and the fourth will be no exception.

The fourth edition is an expanded update of GURPS Horror Third Edition, and is like its predecessor also written by Kenneth Hite, so if you have read the third edition, you will have a fair idea of what to expect.

I was playtester on the upcoming fourth edition, and there were numerous very insightful comments and discussions from all the playtesters on Hite's first draft, which was of very high quality to begin with, so any GURPS Horror fans out there should be excited.

Cheers,

Max

[Ragitsu]

I find it unsettling I have to know about a version of the book from an edition I do not play, nor intend to play.

[Crakkerjakk]

Originally Posted by Ragitsu

I find it unsettling I have to know about a version of the book from an edition I do not play, nor intend to play.

You don't have to. You see, there's this adcopy for 3E horror, or if you find even that too taxing, you can simply wait until 4E horror has a listing, and read that adcopy. Alternatively, you can simply assume that "Horror" is meant as broadly as possible, and that it will be roughly on par with other genre GURPS releases if you are familiar with those.