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RE: Designer ranking his own scenarios?
First off, tracking this thread back to the original post I know see that Jay started this poll and discussion. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a designer promoting his work and I also understand that no monetary units are gained from doing so. Two other designers have also commented on this thread. If anyone's insight is to be treasured the most in the form of an AAR than it would have to be a designer's. In order for a designer to write an AAR here then, unless there is a way to avoid it, they have to rate it as well if I understand that correctly.
If a vote is treated like like a U.S. election then even the person running for office can cast their vote; something to the extent that every vote counts. If I made any comments that came off as brash then it was unintentional, I was just attempting to state the obvious concerns that one might have about the subject. I wasn't trying to single Jay out and I think it was quite decent of him to post a general disclaimer before writing his 'Saipan 44' AARs. Also am glad that he took the time to add some to the errata list knowing that once your work is submitted for editing that mistakes will be made; whether it's the designers error or the editors, or both. I haven't come across one PG product that doesn't have some sort of funk going on with it. Sometimes it's easily correctable prior to playing a scenario and in the worst case, a scenario is FUBAR and needs some winging or serious altering.
I do not own 'Saipan 44' and have not played a single scenario from it so I cannot vote on or judge it but I can read the AARs here. Out of 135 votes the graphs speak for themselves. The most frequent rating is a "4" while it looks as if only one or two people gave a certain scenario a "2" and maybe no-one a "1" rating. If 40 votes are taken away then that leaves 95 (assuming that Jay rated and play-tested all 40 from 'Saipan 44'). So if I were just scanning this site, looking for the best PG product then even without the designer's input it still comes up in the top 3 here. I think the question that matters is "if designers should be allowed to promote their own games" and the answer to that is a no-brainer. If you put that much thought and effort into designing then you had better promote it to some degree. If I have to be critical, though I appreciate the disclaimers, if someone is going to repeatedly tell me in their AARs that "all scenarios are rated a "4" or a "5" because I designed them and if they weren't that good I wouldn't have designed them to begin with" then I get a mixed first impression; either this person is the best damned game designer, ever; or they are blatantly boosting up the ratings; maybe they have a low self-esteem and need gratification; or, hopefully, just trying to be helpful, providing insight and are quite content with their design and finsihed product. I aspire to consider the latter but other people may get different ideas from such a disclaimer.
Once again, ratings do not affect whether I will play scenarios or buy games or not. Affordability and compatibilty with my existing collection comes first. 'Saipan 44' will have to wait until I expand upon 'Guadalcanal' and 'Eastern Front' but I will get to it in the next decade or so. By that time I don't think designer ratings will be an issue with it as it will likely have reached 1,000 plays by then. I'll end this with my most sincere and best wishes for all designers to continue to produce PG games and supplements. I wish I had the time and patience to work that hard. In the meantime I will continue to work away from the lower ranks.
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