Rules in Realmworks

[Troedel]

Hi there,

for some time now I try to get my head around reading, creating and displaying rules in RW.

Using Gamemechanis articles one can write long stretches of text, good for reading and learning. But you can´t link the subsections in a way that I know of. So quick referencing is difficult.

Using Wiki´s I used a feature called transclusion to gather different topics in a single page for better reading. But each topic could be hyperlinked, see the PFSRD.

Is something like this planned or is there a way of doing it. How will 3rd Party´s present rules in RW so that they remain readable?

THX for considering,

Troedel

[MaxSupernova]

I use containers to keep things together and work around the "no links to subsections" part.

In the Mechanics Reference I have a container called "Combat" and each topic contained in that would be its own subsection if they were all on one page. You can even do sub-containers and sub-sub-containers if necessary.

I don't know how others will do it, but it works for me. The topic list is like a table of contents where you can see every point.

[Troedel]

Concept of container is a good one, my concern is readability. Lets say I´ve got 20 skills with descriptions. I could do one article not being able to reference to a single skill or I could use a topic list with titles but no descriptions. The first is readable but not referable for a quick lookup, the second the other way round. So what I would like to able to is displaying the content of one topic in another topic with the header being a backlink. Suppose that is a feature request Thank you for your answer.

[AEIOU]

For my towns and dungeons and mechanics like skills, I create a container topic to put all those things into. In the description section of the container, I create a table that refers to the items in the container. I think of it as an index or quick view. The nice thing about this is I can add anything I want to my table.

For towns, my table has business name, business type and map location. I need to add proprietors as most of them are not separate categories so it's currently difficult to find some NPC's if I don't know exactly which business they are part of.

For dungeons, my table has room, map location, connections to other levels and major NPCs. Since my rooms and major NPCs are each separate categories, this table automatically links to each of them.

For skills, I copy/pasted the skills list PFSRD table directly as my reference table. Since all the skills are separate categories with the full details, this table automatically links to each of them.

I'm working on geographic locations now so I can quickly cross-reference. This one is more interesting though as a town may be in a forest, on a road and in the hills -- so that town would be included in each of those. But some towns are not on a major road or within a named geographic area so I'm thinking I may include things that are within 50 miles of the geographic location. And a forest or mountain range may cross political borders. This whole process is helping me really think about how different things relate to one another (and much more importantly, whether I should be trying to link them at all). Trying to make order out of a continent is a fun challenge....

[MaxSupernova]

Originally Posted by AEIOU

I create a table that refers to the items in the container. I think of it as an index or quick view.

A simple yet great solution. You can list all the sub-items that are in a single topic and link to the topic itself.

I'll be using that...

[rob]

One thing on our todo list is to allow individual, custom sections to be designated as aliases for a topic. Then you can what would be small sub-topics within the containing topic and still be able to auto-link to them. Obviously, if you clicked a link to one of these sections, you would auto-jump to that section once the topic is loaded.

Another thing on the todo list is a custom snippet type that's specifically intended as a "table of contents" dispatch point. So this would be similar to the approach suggested by @MaxSupernova.

And another thing on the list is a new mechanism specifically designed to provide "previous/next" links on topics. When translating rules content into Realm Works, it's valuable to be able to navigate through topics in the book in the order of the book, essentially reading through the book contents in their originally presented order.

All three of those new features are in the queue for after Player Edition finally goes out the door.

[AEIOU]

A snippet for anything that is made into a container that lists/indexes everything that is within the container would be spiffy.