@@drewlichty8091 that's not a bad idea! I think my only concern would be getting that set up. Though, thinking on it, at the very start it could be a good way to get everyone to look through their decks at all the cards they have, then find/set the heat aside, then shuffle the rest and draw up to 7.

@ yes definitely! I think having everyone really get to know their deck before they shuffle and deal and start the game is also helpful. For example I also like to spread the cards out before we shuffle like so: 111,222,333,444. To really hammer home that your deck is simple and predictable. There’s only four movement numbers and they are all present in equal amounts. Only then do I add on the other types of cards, shuffle, and start the game.

We both know what you'd do with it 👀 (nothing)

Awww, thank you! My mom was a professor with a PhD in communications, so I come by it honest! I highly doubt I'll get an affiliate link to this through the publisher, and the only other way I know how to get one easily is through Amazon, which if that's my only option I'd much rather you go support your friendly local game store!

It's genuinely a super fun game. I'm scared for the day I have to cover a game I don't like because I don't think my enthusiasm can be anything but genuine 😅 But come on, this game has GUNHEAD, the objectively best character in any fictional medium ever, so it's not hard to see why I love it.

I was wrong

@@Thebrooky12 I set you up for failure, and I am deeply apologetic.

Oh snap u right

@@TheExp111 It's gotta be, right!?

Oh my god this made my day, thank you for sharing and I hope your family enjoys the game 😭💙

Yeah! But then you're also stuck in second gear, wouldn't it be soooooo much faster to go up a gear or two?

@HowToTeachTabletop Well of course it would be faster, it's not like I would like to play just in second gear. :) I just wasn't sure how cool down mechanic forks. Thank you for explaining to me. Cheers!

@ Glad I could help! Thanks for the question and I hope you enjoy the game :D

@@elijin Ah! It is a complicated game with a lot of systems. To clear up your initial question of when the game actually begins, the first location book round is where gameplay actually begins. Everything before is all setup/preamble. Where that confusion might come from is that my videos aren't strictly to teach you fully how to play. I structure these videos to instruct on how/when to introduce someone to mechanics without necessarily going through them in great detail like you would see in a full how to play video. I try to assume you generally know how to play before watching these videos. That being said, thank you for watching so far into the video despite being confused! I'm glad it had some value you were getting out of it, even if it was being enraptured by me being a train wreck lol

Glad you enjoyed the video! I'm glad Plaid Hat let me put my little sign up on their table 😅

I'll take it as a compliment!

@@TheKnightArgent thank you! I appreciate it very much so 🙏

So I've been on the fence about it for most of the reasons you mentioned, but after having tried it in just this past weekend, I can safely say it's a good idea! Maybe not for you or your group, and certainly not some of the groups that I've played with before, but for this group I just taught the game, it turned out to be necessary. They wound up loving the game and wanted to play it again, which ultimately is my objective when teaching a game. You've gotta remember this is How to Teach! I'm not trying to make them have the intended final experience their first time through, I'm looking to get players understanding how to play and maybe some general strategies as fast as possible so there's as little downtime between setting up and taking your first turns and ultimately game #2. I absolutely agree that declaring ambition is critical to the game, but I've seen tons of people bounce off games because they were forced to "stumble through" the opening half of their first game. In my experience, a modified "teach" game is more likely to bring players back than a rules-as-written "authentic" game. An amazing game and a terrible game collect the same amount of dust if you only play them once. Ultimately, giving people a good experience their first time through, leaving them wanting to give it another go, is what I'm trying to achieve with my teaches. So far it's been working!

@ I still not sure I agree, but I admire you sticking to your guns! And whenever you end up post a HTT video about Arcs, I will take notes and experiment with teaching “your way” at least once. I have a deep fascination with how to teach complex games so I have my own strong opinions on the matter, but by having watched your content I know you definitely have a way with this stuff, so I’m here to learn more than anything! :)

I think what I was getting at there is that it feels weird to "accidentally" blow something up in a battle, you know? I get it from a mechanical perspective, though, and the purpose of each die going from safe > riskier > riskiest with corresponding better rewards is one thing they make pretty clear in the rules, fortunately.

@ It’s weird if you picture yourself as the pilot of the ship in the battle. You probably not accidentally shoot something. But in Arcs you’re supposed to imagine yourself as a commander, issuing orders from afar, farther removed from the action than you’d probably like. Your issuing your commands, but you’re not in control of every ship and every gun. The dice tell the story of how close to your wishes the battle went.

Ah! That's an easy tidbit to miss. That does make sense though. Typically that was how the move was used/blocked from being used anyways, so it wasn't a major difference in the other times I've taught it.

Ah, and something I forgot to mention: if all you have are cards with suits that no one is playing so you can Surpass (or if all you have is low cards, which are hard to Surpass with), then pretty much every card in your hand is going to be worth 1 action. If you burn one of these cards to seize, you’re burning 1 action this round to essentially transform a 1-action card into a 3 or 4 actions card. It pays off! In higher level play, as far as I know, people seize initiative pretty much every round.

I think what past-me was getting at (since he's terrible at improvising, there's a reason I script my videos), is trying to express a frustration with non-standard mechanics and how they add to a teach. Like, in most trick taking games, I only have to explain "highest card of the led suit leads the next trick." But with Arcs, there are way more layers and options with it. Ambitions, copying, surpassing only involving the lead player, seizing the initiative, not to mention that all of this is on top of the actions that are powering the game, they all add up quick! I'm aware of the action economy and all it's juiciness, I think I was just frustrated at all the different options you have to go through when teaching the game, as good/unique/interesting as they may be. I'm not worried about deep strategies or optimal moves here, I'm worried about how I'm going to explain the four-ish different things you can do with just the start of your turn! If I ever say something that sounds like it's against the design of the game, it probably is, but it's not against the design of how I want to teach the game, which can be at odds sometimes! In this instance, I'm happy to fold and let the depth shine through the complexity since it's an interesting action selection system, but that doesn't mean I can't whine in my podcast about how it's harder to explain because of that!

@@HowToTeachTabletop Totally fair! And yeah, it’s not a straightforward teach. Everything circles up on everything else. You can’t teach the Influence action and then NOT talk about the court cards; but you’re talking about the actions now, so you don’t want to take that detour. Especially because once you start talking about the court cards you’re gonna have to talk about the icons, and how they’re different to the actual resources even though they also count for the ambitions that care for them and then what the hell you’re now talking about ambitions??? You know what’s funny? In the Leder Games community, with the people who are fans of Cole Wehrle’s games, Arcs has been *constantly* praised for how comparatively easy to teach it is. But that’s because the main points of comparisons are his previous games for Leder Games, Root and Oath, both notoriously hard to teach. That said, Root is my personal favorite game of all time, and teaching it is always, for me, every bit as fun as actually playing it. Teaching every game is a form of performance art, but Root especially so. I LOVE that game, and I LOVE teaching it.

@@FBracht Oooooh yeah, totally agree that Arcs is by far the easier teach. Symmetry is absolutely the reason behind that. Glad to have you around to provide all the awesome insight to the game and share your thoughts too! Loved reading your comments and hope to see you around on future videos!

​@@HowToTeachTabletop I'll be around! Not sure if I'll have much to add to most videos, as I've been slowly transitioning from "I want to play and learn as many games as possible" to "I just want to play the games by Leder/Cole Wehrle, and Marvel Champions, as much as possible". But I'll definitely watch your videos for any games I'm even remotely interested in, for sure!

Oh I get why they're are multiple setups and why you'd want to reduce the play space for smaller groups and all that from a gameplay perspective. I think what past-me was getting at was asking why they had to be cards in specific, and why they used a number/letter system. Plus not using the full board has the ramification of having to remember the uncovered gates are adjacent now, which like I mentioned was probably just a me thing 😅 For the record, I love variable setup games! Some of my favorite games rely heavily on it to keep things interesting. I just think that there were likely better solutions to how you set the game up if they were committed to the card method like I mentioned in the video (including a reminder on the card of what you put on each A/B/C part, for example).

@ I totally get you, the setup cards really are a bit unwieldy. But once you play with Leaders & Lore you’ll understand why they had to trade a little bit of usability for some extra flexibility. (In short: when you’re setting up with with a Leader, your A, B, and C systems can be set up with different pieces than my A, B, and C. There’s a leader who don’t get any starting cities, another who has an extra ship on A, etc.)

Yeah, I was about come comment this. I agree that the setup could be easier, but at the same I can't imagine how, and at least I know why it is how it is.

That makes sense! I haven't even had a chance to look at any of the advanced modules because I've been so focused on working on the first-game experience, but having a generic number/letter system certainly would help have more streamlined leader setups.

Everything I mention to leave out or simplify is always at the discretion of the teacher. Sounds like you made the right choice for the group you were with! The issue, at least for me, isn't with explaining what the cards are and how you work them. The issues can come when it starts interrupting your teach with things you don't want/need to explain yet. Imagine a new player, who has never taken a chip out of a bag yet, NEVER played the game or knows what it's about. Then imagine they have a fortune teller card telling them to add new chips to their bag. Now you have to explain the different chips and the ramifications of them and on and on, or you just wind up telling them what to put in, and that can a bit demoralizing or confusing for someone just getting into the game for the first time. The compromise off the top of my head would be to introduce them day 3 or so, once everyone's gotten their bearings on the basic mechanics, since I do think they're fun and help with catching up!

Disney's Villainous is an interesting one! That wouldn't be a terrible one to get sponsored for because then I could HOPEFULLY get to use some copywritten music...

Yeah, it's definitely a tricky one to introduce to players new to the hobby. It also doesn't help that it's cooperative, too. Something that might help that "anticlimactic" feeling is in the theatrics of how you play your cards. Let's say it comes down to you to play that last card to win the round. If you look around at everyone and sloooooowly put the card down, really draw out that moment of "Oh man did we win this mission or not?", that drama can add a shocking amount to how good it feels to win a round. And, once you start leaning into the dramatic side of things, newer players are likely to parrot that type of acting and will start playing dramatically as well!

Thank you! I worked really hard on it and it came together much better than I had hoped! 😁

@@CardboardBones I get all my music through Epidemic Sounds, so it was just a random assortment I found on there through searching "space" lol

This will make NO sense to anyone not in our D&D group lol