Actual Play - [Hell 4 Leather] Playtesting

Posted by: Gregor Hutton On: Feb 17th 2010

So, last night Russ, Joe and I got in some playtesting of Hell 4 Leather. I've written it up on the Forge for anyone interested.

Basically we tried out some obtuse/extreme ways of playing: one where you hold on to your Boons resisting the (I think, natural) urge to use them, and the other where we played them to maximize the chances of overall group survival.

I think it's unlikely that either of these scenarios would ever happen with a real gaming group. We could see that when playing through -- at points in the game you could see where the temptation to use a Boon was writ large! And in the other case you could see where you might think about saving your "own" character's hide rather than someone else's! (And I also like the incentive the game throws up to have more than 1 character. Basically, it increases your chances of having one of your characters survive.)

Anyway, the two extreme ways of playing don't break the game down or result in uninteresting play, which was great to check.

The great thing about the game is that if you pick Death (a hell-given talent for a player!) you don't need Boons, but even loaded with Boons you still need to find Death to kill everyone. Though targetting a subset of the whole pack of Leathers is a valid choice for the Fool, as he can get those ones definitely killed. But in return you have to let the others go and accept incomplete revenge.

I think the balance is really nice.

As I said on the Forge we talked a bit about how to present the rules and we have some plans on that front. More to follow!