Behemoth - Aug 2022 update: playtesting started

Time for our quarterly update on Behemoth!

The last 3 months have been incredibly productive, partly because I am unemployed since July 😁

I managed to knock off a number of design iterations - and I finally started external playtesting.

I must say, it has been amazing to see people pause and ponder, get excited, surprised, annoyed, scared... just thanks to something I created 😳

It gave me such an overwhelming feeling of joy.

Big shouts to the Playtest UK group for helping arranging the session.

I'm currently on version 5.0 of the game, which saw a streamlining of some mechanics over the previous versions - mainly around the design of the map, the action system and events.

Next iterations will be focused on further streamlining, as the game currently feels a bit heavier than I would like it to be.

Preview of a mechanics which proved super fun: facing events through dice rolls

As you grow your beast in a certain terrain skill, you gain new dice (d8) of the relevant colour to your pool.

When facing an event, you can choose how many dice to roll. But once a die is used, you can't reuse until you rest.

To achieve the event, you need rolls of given colour type to be greater than given numbers (e.g. a challenge could be to roll at least 5 with a yellow die, 4 with another yellow die and 2 with a green die).

If you haven't succeeded, you can re-roll all dice of a given colour by discarding relevant action cards or resources.

If you succeed (partially or totally), as a reward you get experience points and other benefits that make your journey a bit easier :)

Feedback from initial playtesting has been overwhelmingly positive on this, as it creates an interesting space for strategical and tactical decisions (do I prepare for that event, do I try to swing it or do I avoid it?) while allowing for tension and some surprises (well, dices are always magical!).

Timing and next steps - register as a playtester!

I reckon a Kickstarter launch date around April / May 2023 is potentially still viable, but it's too early for me to confirm - there is still quite some development work needed.

I'm aiming to confirm or push the date by November 2022.

In the meanwhile if you are really impatient to try our the game and you want to play a role in its development, register your interest to become a playtester.

This is a crucial part of the design process, and you would help make Behemoth the best game that we can. We are currently in closed playtesting, but hopefully we can open it up soon.

Happy gaming!
Andrea