by Keith
January 23rd, 2013What makes a rulebook stand out from the crowd of rulebooks? Let's face it ... it'd be a whole lot easier if we could just buy the game and instinctively know how to play it! :)
There's something special when a rulebook just gets the explanation of the rules right. It's indicative of more than good writing. It's a demonstration that a game's rules AND rulebook have been appropritely playtested by blind playtesters who have provided useful feedback that was acted upon by the designer/publisher. [I'll do an article later on appropriate playtesting using website usability and user acceptance testing as a model.]
Good designers know their game is great and they have an insatiable desire to ensure that people are able play their games without the hair pulling that goes along with poorly crafted rulebooks. There are, however, a few things beyond just playtesting the rules that separate good rules from average or *gasp* poor rules.
Rule #1 - Don't invent a new language required understand your game.
If you have a few novel concepts that can ONLY be understood in the context of your game that's fine. If you're throwing out acronyms and abbreviations throughout your rules that are essentially a shorthand you cooked up for understanding a complex behavior necessary for your game, it's time to go back to the drawing board and rethink how you explain it.
You'll notice that rulebook length is NOT one of the things that's a problem with rulebooks. A 40 page rulebook is eminently manageable when done well. Let's face it though, there are very few great rulebooks out there! Taking the time to introduce a concept, explain how it works, and then demonstrate it is critical if it's core to understanding your game. I'd hate to advocate for stifling innovation in rules and games. I just believe, pretty firmly, that novel concepts require adequate explanation for players.
THE GOOD:Band of Brothers: Screaming Eagles - The model for morale/proficiency checks in this game are somewhat unique. The concept is introduced and built upon throughout the course of the rulebook in incremental steps rather than being mentioned in VERY broad terms once and then referenced as though players are familiar with it.
THE BAD:Advanced Squad Leader - Nothing is particularly novel about this ruleset. Nearly all of the concepts presented in the rules pre-dated the publication of ASL, but they were combined in new and novel ways. The issue, however, comes when paragraphs feature a dozen acronyms that may or may not already have been described. The PAATC is mentioned prior to its introduction which is distracting EVEN IF it's not necessary for that particular reference.
THE UGLY:Fields of Fire - Incredibly innovative game. If you've served in the military, I'm sure mission planning follows the appropriate Field Manual that covers tactical planning. If you've not been in the military there are simply too many assumptions about what the gamer knows already. The volume of fire concept is wonderful because it does such a great job at discussing things like chaos on the battlefield, suppression, and the concurrent nature of fire combat.
RULE #2 - Pictures are great, but don't overdo it.
We all love pictures. They do a fantastic job showing the components of a situation that needs further explanation. They lack, however, in providing the full context for rule delivery. Pictures and diagrams are great in supporting rules, but not as the primary delivery method for understanding a game's point-by-point rules unless it's really that simplistic.
The tendency, when this is done poorly is to set up a single graphic and have it explain 3 or more rules to the player. This is great, except when those explanations are either too detailed for the rules they're demonstrating or they begin introducing new concepts that haven't been covered in the rules narrative!
THE GOOD:Combat Commander: Europe - Chad did a great job on these rules and they've been heralded on BGG in the past for their succinct and understandable nature. I believe the way in which Chad presented his rules in the examples was the difference maker. When a graphic was necessary ... there was a graphic. When text would suffice ... there was text.
THE BAD:Advanced Tobruk - I found the rules at once natural and foreign because of the lack of graphics in the stand along product I had that used the system (Darkest December: Battle of the Bulge 1944). The basic game rules had a few handy graphics in them, but the full blown rules really made you work to understand and required that you set up the situations on the board to get a handle on it.
THE UGLY: I can't think of a whole rulebook that's ugly in this regard. Generally graphics are handy regardless, but overworked graphics can be a real bear. In ASL there's a rout example that has a giant two page spread with about 8 different situations and how route is handled.
RULE #3 - Games are fun, don't make your rules a chore.
Fantasy Flight Games brings a design ethos and flourish to rulebooks that is hard to replicate. Their bright designs, respect for whitespace, and language keep game rules a light affair where as other publishers tend to give you, "just the facts ma'am." I always think of the Victory Games, & AH rules from the early 80s and late 70s when I think of this phenomenon. Densely packed rulebooks that read as though they were written by DMV Employees: to the point & humorless...
These are games and there's no shame to inserting some light hearted fun in your examples or in the narrative text. I love the line about coming back as another character in Magic Realm where Hamblen wrote, "...perhaps a relative..." There are just funny little bits like this throughout some of gamers' favorite rulebooks. Share your favorite in the comments!
THE GOOD:Star Wars: The Card Game I LOVED opening the rulebook open for the first time and seeing the familiar Star Wars scroll. What a cool touch that cost FFG essentially 4 pages to pull off...but it was totally worth it in my opinion.
THE BAD:King of Tokyo The rulebook is visually very playful, but it makes this list for being a missed opportunity to do something hilarious. Instead of picking a monster mash motif and running with it ... they just threw game art all over the place and crazy typeface. The playfulness seems forced and like it was done by a committee of people rather than one person being allowed the creativity to turn that simply pamphlet into something that was really funny and instructive like a "What to do in case monsters attack your city" manual.
THE UGLY:Victory in the Pacific - Short and too the point. This one reads like a life insurance brochure. Mercifully it's very short.
RULE #4 - Index, Table of Contents, & Player Aids
If you cram everything into the rulebook...it better belong there first and foremost. If you pull something out of the rulebook and put it on a player-aid ... it better deserve it. If you want people to respect the rulebook ... provide a handy way for people to find rules they may need.
Don't give me a text only player-aid when you're covering visual components. Give me a picture to reference. This is particularly true of terrain charts and unit information.
If I need to go back into a rulebook to find something ... I don't want to hunt for it or have to refer to my OCR scanned copy of it on my tablet. Let me have an index with GOOD references and not just things you thought were easy to pick out Mr./Mrs. Designer!
THE GOOD:Panzer (second edition) - Great player aids and rulebook all around. They really did a fantastic job making the most of the variable difficulty level for this game and supporting it on the table.
THE BAD:Band of Brothers: Screaming Eagles - The rulebook is great. There is no graphical terrain chart and the player aid is a text only mess. It's useful, but if the only place the terrain is going to be detailed is on the player aids at least make them full color and graphical. Nobody minds a folded chart if the panels are arrayed properly.
THE UGLY:Fields of Fire - Again ... This is an awesome game plagued by terrible information design. The thing about it is that there's just too much "stuff" contained inside the rulebook, on the back page of the playbooks, etc. It wouldn't hurt to have those on separate cardstock for a lot of reasons. I hate beating up on this one, but the information design is just plain ugly for an otherwise fun game.
RULE #5 - Publish an electronic copy (free or otherwise)
Five years ago I wouldn't have felt this way. In fact, I might have said I don't want a laptop near my gaming table. I boardgame to get away from the digital world for a while. It's an escape that I don't want my games bridging.
Fast forward to the growing ubiquity of tablets and smartphones with display screens large enough to handle electronic rulebooks and I've changed my mind. Searchable, fast, and a library of them at my fingertips? I'm sold. I don't care whether you're selling the electronic copy or giving it away for free...you need to have an electronic copy.
The pragmatic benefit is, of course, that you can update the rules with each passing revision or errata to ensure that players are always getting the best game experience from your product! Isn't that the awesome part of this digital revolution in boardgaming??? Let's take advantage of some technology that will really aid gamers.
THE GOOD: GMT Games. Hands down the best company at doing this AND at providing multiple formats for download.
I won't comment on bad and ugly for this one because so many companies ARE trying to embrace this. Fantasy Flight is also a huge nominee here because of how well they keep their support sections updated for their library of games. Even MMP is working on an eASLRB for sale that sounds pretty spectacular.