Ever read a game designer's notes on why they build a system in a  certain way, e.g. to do a certain thing, and gotten a new appreciation  of why a system works?
I'm interested in finding as many different sets of design notes as  possible to get more of an appreciation of why people have done stuff  they way they have. Any help appreciated.

So far I have:

FUDGE designer's notes:
http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/fud-des.html
(originally posted by John Morrow).

The Making of Savage Worlds:
www.peginc.com/freebies/SWcore/MakingofSW.pdf

Fuzion design (link not currently loading, though ).
http://knol.g.u.00rz.com/k/fuzion-rpg-design

Jonathan Tweet on additive in 3E:
http://www.jonathantweet.com/jotgamerunequest.html

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;545557Ever read a game designer's notes on why they build a system in a  certain way, e.g. to do a certain thing, and gotten a new appreciation  of why a system works?
I'm interested in finding as many different sets of design notes as  possible to get more of an appreciation of why people have done stuff  they way they have. Any help appreciated.

So far I have:

FUDGE designer's notes:
http://www.panix.com/~sos/rpg/fud-des.html
(originally posted by John Morrow).

The Making of Savage Worlds:
www.peginc.com/freebies/SWcore/MakingofSW.pdf

Fuzion design (link not currently loading, though ).
http://knol.g.u.00rz.com/k/fuzion-rpg-design

Jonathan Tweet on additive in 3E:
http://www.jonathantweet.com/jotgamerunequest.html

StarCluster 2 came with design notes, as did StarCluster 3 Designer's Edition. I'm not big on designer's notes.

-clash

Thanks Clash!

To the designer themselves, I guess notes are they're not unbelievably useful in the building process. To other designers' though you never know...I'm quite interested in seeing the in-depth, not-always-obvious reasoning behind seemingly capricious design decisions.


In some cases I think designer notes have a benefit to the designer themselves in the marketing side of things, however.  Burning Wheel for instance gets love from the masses because the designer managed to explain how/why he's done things in a way that makes those ideas seem like good ones, regardless of whether they were or how obvious they were. I haven't linked anything here for it, since I think the notes are primarily embedded in the text itself.

Or in Savage Worlds' above, the design notes are quite useful to the end user too, since its a bit weird in places, or has subtle features, and prospective GMs often want to monkey with it without realizing what things do.

Age of Heroes comes with 12 pages of Designer Notes in Appendix B. And 3 pages of it's history in Appendix C.

The first is because I'm a huge believer in Designer Notes. The second is actually more for my own gaming groups (which is true of all the rules actually).

Thank...does there happen to be a free link to any of the notes, or anything you'd particularly care to mention?

(For either the design or the history, I guess - I find for games that have gone through several revisions a history is another thing that's often interesting in making sense of a design. Often a major overhaul leaves behind a few puzzling anachronisms, or results in a new bug leading to another change).

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;545602Thank...does there happen to be a free link to any of the notes, or anything you'd particularly care to mention?

No, it's part of the book but I don't have a PDF available and it's sort of meaningless without the rules and thus I never formatted it for independent display.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;545602Thank...does there happen to be a free link to any of the notes, or anything you'd particularly care to mention?

You can get a lot of insight about Brian's take on design from his old Elements of Design column on RPGnet.  There are some quotes from some of Brian's designer's notes (likely an earlier version) here.

While it was being published by Steve Jackson Games, The Space Gamer had quite a few designer's notes articles for games published at the time (search for "notes" here).  They sell PDFs of old The Space Gamer and Fantasy Gamer issues on Steve Jackson Games'  E23 site here and here.  If I remember correctly, the Star Patrol, Fringeworthy, and Man-to-Man design notes were particularly interesting.

There are a brief set of designer's notes in the Fuzion Jazz 1.2 PDF.

ICAR designer's notes.

There were Call of Cthulhu Designers' Notes in Different Worlds #19 and Villains and Vigilantes Designer's Notes in Different Worlds #23, though I'm not sure where you'd get a copy of either (eBay?).  Also Designer Notes: How I Designed Land of the Rising Sun" by Lee Gold in Different Worlds #8, "Champions: Designer's Notes" by Steve Peterson, "Designer's Notes for Superworld" by Steve Perrin, and "Supergame: Designer's Notes" by Jay & Aimee Hartlove also appear in Different Worlds #23 and "Designer's Notes: Man, Myth & Magic" by Herbie Brennan are in Different Worlds #33.

Quote from: John Morrow;545955You can get a lot of insight about Brian's take on design from his old Elements of Design column on RPGnet.  There are some quotes from some of Brian's designer's notes (likely an earlier version) here.

Wow, I'm amazed at what one can find online. That site even has a updated entry for 5.0 and an image of the Lulu Book cover.

I owe some thanks to whoever made the entry, I would have guessed that it would have flown well below anyone's radar.

Thanks for those! Fuzion jazz link doesn't seem to be working... or at least looks very odd. The links to Gleichman's column are interesting as well (I'd seen the levels of abstraction essay but not the others).

Different Worlds and Space Gamer notes hmm -  I don't know where I'd find Different Worlds either, but the index of the latter may be quite useful - IIRC the pdfs were bit expensive to just grab offhand but targeted acquisition may be workable, if anything is particularly juicy.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;545962Thanks for those! Fuzion jazz link doesn't seem to be working... or at least looks very odd. The links to Gleichman's column are interesting as well (I'd seen the levels of abstraction essay but not the others).

Different Worlds and Space Gamer notes hmm -  I don't know where I'd find Different Worlds either, but the index of the latter may be quite useful - IIRC the pdfs were bit expensive to just grab offhand but targeted acquisition may be workable, if anything is particularly juicy.

With respect to The Space Gamer and Fantasy Gamer, if you were going to get only one, I'd recommend Issue #76 which includes both the DC Heroes and Man-to-Man Designer's Notes articles as well as World of Hârn Designer's Notes, so it's a sort of three in one with some other interesting articles about how to run various games.  The Man-to-Man article talks about how the GURPS combat system was designed and is quite useful, in my opinion.

ADDED: The Space Gamer #75 has designers notes for the Pacesetter games and the Twilight 2000 combat system by Frank Chadwick.  That would probably be your next best choice.  TSG #65 has 1.5 pages of design notes for the Tri-Tac games and TSG #51 has a single page on Star Patrol so both of those are questionable investments just for the Designer's Notes if money is tight, but they are both interesting and worth reading.  I would pass on the Designer's Notes for The Fantasy Trip in TSG #29 because they are sadly not very useful.

I also have to add a recommendation for the 4 page article Metamorphosis Alpha Notebook in TSG #42 which is an account of the lessons Bill Armintrout learned running Metamorphosis Alpha when he was in college.  One of the niftiest nostalgia and advice columns I've ever read.

Also, there are three pages of Designer's Notes for Gangbusters in Dragon #62.

There is currently a Different Worlds #23 on eBay.

Thanks again. I've grabbed (after some wrestling with e23) TSG 42,75 and 76. Still reading through them as yet, but fairly nifty magazine.
 
Also, have posted the Fuzion notes above (the unworking link) as a new thread.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;545568Thanks Clash!

To the designer themselves, I guess notes are they're not unbelievably useful in the building process. To other designers' though you never know...I'm quite interested in seeing the in-depth, not-always-obvious reasoning behind seemingly capricious design decisions.

Marco Chacon persuaded me to put designer's notes in SC 2, and I have always regretted it. Those for SC 3 DE were different - that is a special edition for game designers, containing a commercial/non-commercial license for making new stuff for the game and/or creating new games using the system. As a GM, I have no use for designer's notes. As a designer, though, I can learn from them, so I like them.

Why do I not like designer's notes as a GM? If the rules are not clear enough to stand on their own, they should be re-written until they are. Designer's notes should not be used to clear up ambiguities that should not be there. Systems should be robust enough to take tweaking at the hands of any GM and still work. You shouldn't need to look up what you can and can't touch.

As a designer, though, I want to learn how to use new stuff in my own games, so designer's notes work very well.  

QuoteIn some cases I think designer notes have a benefit to the designer themselves in the marketing side of things, however.  Burning Wheel for instance gets love from the masses because the designer managed to explain how/why he's done things in a way that makes those ideas seem like good ones, regardless of whether they were or how obvious they were. I haven't linked anything here for it, since I think the notes are primarily embedded in the text itself.

Marketing and I have at best a nodding acquaintance. I recognize the face, but we don't talk much.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmice;546038Why do I not like designer's notes as a GM? If the rules are not clear enough to stand on their own, they should be re-written until they are.

Designer notes are not intended to make the rules clear, but to explain why the rules are what they are.

As a GM and player who have looked at a large number of games over the years (I used to do reviews of free rpgs in the rec.games.frp.advocacy era), I typically enounter systems that are easy to understand mechanically but seem to have no reason to exist.

Good Designer Notes explains that reason and often gives one a new insight into what the game is about.

Now that type of Designer Notes may be contained in the game itself, but there they are in the way of rule lookups and cause needless page flipping and skimming.

IMO they are best either in the introduction (if short) or at the end of the rulebook.

And as a designer, who looks at the work of others- they are invaluable for gaining new insights.

Sadly, good designer notes are like hen teeth.

Quote from: gleichman;546041Designer notes are not intended to make the rules clear, but to explain why the rules are what they are.

As a GM and player who have looked at a large number of games over the years (I used to do reviews of free rpgs in the rec.games.frp.advocacy era), I typically enounter systems that are easy to understand mechanically but seem to have no reason to exist.

Good Designer Notes explains that reason and often gives one a new insight into what the game is about.

Now that type of Designer Notes may be contained in the game itself, but there they are in the way of rule looks and cause needless page flipping and skimming.

IMO they are best either in the introduction (if short) or at the end of the rulebook.

And as a designer, who looks at the work of others- they are invaluable for gaining new insights.

Sadly, good designer notes are like hen teeth.

That is the sort of thing I put into the intro. If you look through this thread, though, and through the thread on RPGnet, you will find the most often cited reasons GMs and players like designer's notes are (1) to better understand the rules, and (2) to better understand where they can fiddle with the rules. Properly explaining rules does away with reason 1, and designing the game so that it can be tweaked anywhere and still run does away with reason 2.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmice;546048That is the sort of thing I put into the intro. If you look through this thread, though, and through the thread on RPGnet, you will find the most often cited reasons GMs and players like designer's notes are (1) to better understand the rules, and (2) to better understand where they can fiddle with the rules. Properly explaining rules does away with reason 1, and designing the game so that it can be tweaked anywhere and still run does away with reason 2.

-clash

I've read at least one of your intros, and gained nothing like I want to see in Designer Notes. In fact, when I latter tried to gain the information directly from you here- you dismissed the request and refused to answer.