Recently a group of us got together for a "playtest" on the Eastern Front. We used a variety of rough-draft and experimental material including draft maps, an experimental Soviet OB, and a batch of rules that I was very interested in testing. The following is my impression of what happened that weekend.

We decided in the interests of impartiality to have each participant command forces from both sides. However, I quickly found that I'd attached my ego to the fortunes of the Axis. This had the effect of both biasing my opinion as to how the new material was working out as well as firing my competitive urges. Those urges resulted in some very unproductive attitudes and arguments on my part. I also discovered that since most of the rules we were experimenting with were based on my recommendations, that my ego and bias prevented me from discussing questions and problems rationally.

Finally, after two days of this nonsense, I realized that I was doing more harm than good and took myself out of the game to get my mind right.

As you will read a few pages from now, the next Second Front playtest is about to get underway. I thought it appropriate to pass along my experiences and recommendations for those of you who are considering participating in that, or any other, playtest.

The Goal

The goal of any playtest is to draw valid conclusions from your results. Further, these conclusions should be recorded as soon as possible (the best method is a running commentary or narrative) to prevent memories from clouding. The greatest danger here is that bias and prejudice will creep into your conclusions, which could seriously complicate (or hurt) the evaluative process.

The Spirit

A playtest should be conducted with as much cooperation and impartiality as possible. This is especially difficult (at least to me) because winning is fun. However, it might help here to look at a bigger picture of winning. By this I mean that the entire Europa Community wins if we produce a superiorly-tested game. But nobody wins if we are blinded to the fact that a playtest isn't even an "official" game, but compete anyway as if it were.

The Rules

Many of us have our own favorite rules. I think it is important to guard against giving any rules your political patronage. Not only can this cloud your judgement, it can harm the evaluative process. It can also greatly prolong that process, and we've all been waiting a long time for SF as it is.

Recommendations

Assign one player to be the moderator. This person would not play, but would instead direct, record, and facilitate the playtest's flow. As such, the moderator should probably be the most experienced and/ or respected member of your playtest group. Assign each player important commands on both sides (and not in direct opposition to themselves). I bonded to the Axis in our playtest primarily because I had a very large Axis command and a tiny Soviet command. Lastly, step away from it all, if necessary, and remember why you're there. Best wishes in all your playtesting.

Large Letters Section

On a completely different subject, this issue's EXchange section is not only much larger than any published previously, it also contains a greater "dialog" content than usual. We decided to present the material in this format for several reasons.

Until now, it was our policy to publish a given piece in EXchange based on three criteria: how much space it occupied, how interesting we thought it would be to the Europa community, and how timeconsuming it would be to get it into the magazine. I would like to address each in turn.

We have usually preferred the shorter pieces for publication because we can present more offerings (i.e., more authors). Also, the shorter pieces are easier to manipulate when it comes down to the final crunch of squeezing everything we want into TEM's 48-page limit.

We take it as given that if somebody puts the time and effort into sending us an EXchange piece, then it's a burning issue for them. However, we usually have to choose which burning issues are the "hottest" at the time--which inevitably puts some material on the back burner. Admittedly, this is a subjective choice, but all-too-often a necessary one.

Most EXchange pieces are submitted as hand-written text on notebook paper. As such, this means that Rick or I must handtype that text to get it into TEM. Unfortunately, we almost always run into time problems getting the magazine out by deadline. Thus, we have often skipped the handwritten pieces and used those that were sent to us already on disk (which we simply download straight into the magazine).

However, when we recently did an inventory, we discovered that we had a large backlog of EXchange material (some of it over two years old). So, I spent several weeks typing, and the result is what you'll soon be reading.

Also, in an effort to compensate for the substantial time delay suffered by many of these pieces, I've inserted additional commentary, such as seemed appropriate (and much, much more than I normally would), in an attempt to make up for the feedback that such material would have received from all of you had the piece been published earlier.

Next Issue

Issue #29 of Europa Magazine will feature Jason Long's Europa Battle Scenario #5, "Operation Saar: The French Strike First". This scenario will use the new Second Front maps, Allied counters from Fall of France, and the counters from First to Fight. Could the French have saved Poland with a determined attack? Find out for yourself!

Articles will include a new and different look at FITE/SE Partisan Rule 40, Designer's Notes on A Winter War, a Balkan Front replay by John Astell, and a detailed discussion analyzing Fred Allen's FITE/SE deployment and how to attack it.

Also look for new installments of our regular features: SF Progress Report, GR/D Briefing, From the Editor, Rules Court, EXchange. And more....

Europa Scenario Update

A lineup of current Europa Battle Scenarios in planning or development includes:

• "Operation Crusader", a WitD scenario by Frank E. Watson.
• "Weserubung", a half-month turn Europa scale treatment of Narvik by Mark Royer.
• "Edelweiss", a FitEISE scenario by Trey Nelson and Roy Lane.
• "Berlin: 1945", the end of the 1000-year Reich by Alan Tibbetts.
• "Kiev: 1943", a FitEISE scenario by Flavio Carrillo.