Good formatting a rules document is just as important as good writing in a rules document. This past weekend some friends and I learned Fast Forward: Fortress, and it’s a blast of a game. I highly recommend you check it out. However, it has a fatal flaw in our opinion.
-- WARNING: Minor Spoiler Ahead --
Take a look at this card and read the rule:
We had 4 highly educated people playing the game, 2 of which are hard core gamers and 2 of which are casual gamers. None of us read this card correctly.
The problem is as follows. At the top of the card it says to either draw or attack as bullet points. However, outdented from the bullet points, it also says “if another player owns the fortress, you must attack it”.
Each of us read this card and each of us thought it meant that once a fortress was held by another player, you must attack it each round. This lead to 2 major points of confusion:
First, it meant that whomever got to the fortress first was pretty much going to hold on to it, because you were constantly giving them a card every turn, so you were never able to build up your hand.
-- WARNING: Another minor spoiler ahead. --
Second, we thought it meant that you always had to sacrifice a card on the first fortress in order to conquer unclaimed fortresses (as you proceed in the game additional fortresses are added).
I’m willing to admit we may be alone in the universe falling into this pitfall, but it could have been avoided all together in one of 4 ways:
a) Keep all the text under the bullet points indented as much as the bullet points to indicate that all the text is part of that section and thus you only need to apply those rules if you attempted to conquer a fortress.
b) Add a line above as a heading that reads: “If you attempt to conquer a fortress:”
c) Add section numbers rather than bullet points so that we know how the pieces fit together.
d) Add a %^% %$#* rule book to the #$% @@^# game! Games should always come with a rule book, rather than trying to fit everything on to some cards. When you put it on cards you always have to leave something out. In this case, clarity.
Anyway, overall the game is a lot of fun. I highly recommend it to anyone. Just note this one little caveat, so you don’t fall prey to our pitfall.
