A friend told me my game explanations were too long and it clicked

We were setting up a game of Terraforming Mars and I started going into every card detail. My buddy said 'Casey, you're giving a lecture, not teaching a game.' He was right. I was taking 20 minutes just to explain the basics. Now I stick to the core rules and let people learn as we play. It cut setup time in half and everyone has more fun. Has anyone else had to shorten their teaching style for new players?

3 comments

3 Comments

rayc892mo ago

Man, this hits home. I used to kill the mood by over-explaining strategy before turn one. Now I just teach how to take a turn and what winning looks like. The secret sauce is letting people make bad moves on purpose. They see the consequence, learn the rule, and it sticks way better than me talking at them. It turns a boring lecture into a shared "ohhh" moment that's actually fun.

laura94021d agoMost Upvoted

Is letting people make bad moves really the best way to teach though? I get that it creates those "ohhh" moments, but sometimes that just leads to a lot of frustration before things click. I tried this with a friend learning Terraforming Mars and she spent three turns making clearly awful plays, felt dumb, and almost quit the game entirely. It ended up being way more awkward than if I had just walked her through a couple smart early moves to set a baseline.

wright.finley2mo ago

Yeah, letting people make bad moves on purpose is key. My buddy did the whole lecture thing with Scythe once, and half the table was asleep before we placed a single mech. Now he just says "you're farming for points, here's how you take a turn" and it's way smoother.