Senior Member
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Louisville, Ky
Posts: 330
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#11 |
Senior Member
Lone Wolf Staff
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 8,232
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I can understand if you don't like the way plots work. They definitely aren't YET as powerful and flexible as other tools that are specifically designed for that one purpose. However, if you keep your plots reasonably small and use sub-plots instead of complex plots, they work pretty well. The use of a Storyline TOPIC provides much of the same benefits as plots, with the notable exception of the visual element. It provides you with a navigation "hub" for a story arc, and it's ideal for users who either prefer topics in general (the non-visual types) or who find the current support for plots insufficient for their needs (as a fallback solution). Hope this helps! |
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#12 |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Louisville, Ky
Posts: 330
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Rob,
Thanks for the clarification. I did misunderstand you. I fit into the "visual" category I think, but I will take a look at the topics again for use as you suggest. I have been playing around with storyboards again though and am seeing some potential. I still would like to see a lot more functionality than is currently there, but I think I see what pjrichert is getting at in his post. My adventure is somewhat location based, so I created a storyboard that had all the villages locations in it. For each location I created a "Subplot" that showed all the plot lines it connected to. By creating a few levels of "subplot" I was able to create a pretty functional navigation hub to use. I think this will work much better when I next run the game. Being visual, I would love it if some of you would post some screen shots of how you organize with either topics or storyboards. I will post some of my own tomorrow. I am getting ready to leave my computer for the day Thanks for all the great advice. |
#13 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 798
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Looking forwrd for some examples as well
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#14 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Feb 2013
Posts: 14
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Also, at some point in the storyboard for each more detailed level, I'll have the link back to the broader level. So I may have the Duke ask the players to do something with 3-4 choices. Rather than trying to put all those paths on the one storyboard, I'll do something like having a link from "work for the Duke to find stolen goods" to the sub-storyboard that shows all the steps in that quest. Then at the end of the sub-board, I'll set a link that takes me back to the main storyboard to follow it to whatever direction they choose to go. It makes for a lot more boards, but if you link them to and from the adventures it keeps it pretty orgainized, and the main board stays fairly neat, without a whole lot of spaghetti mess to follow. If you follow shows like Burn Notice, Justified, or even Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you can see kind of how my mindset works. A "season" will have an overall arc, ie Burn Notice season 1 - figure out who burned Michael. That would be the main storyboard with the steps needed to figure it out. Each of those steps would be an episode of the show, in the case of Burn Notice, all the stuff that Michael and Crew do to help out others in need, while still working toward figuring out the "season" arc. Each Episode, which is a step in the "Season" arc gets its own storyboard, you could continue to go further with each event in each episode getting its own storyboard, depending on how many levels you want to get to. The episode then has some nugget in it that helps with the overall arc, Michael gets a file that gives him the identity of someone who helped burn him. That step in the "Episode" storyboard links back to the "Season" Storyboard, and you can follow those paths to whatever step the PCs take next. Hope that helps |
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#15 |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Louisville, Ky
Posts: 330
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This is still a work in progress, but here is where I'm heading.
The main plot hub is location based: http://screencast.com/t/EvadjBlYiL Then each location links to the plot(s) discovered in that location. Here is an example of the linked storyboard for the Healer's Hut: http://screencast.com/t/WPcdGhtdGzzD Some of the plots get fairly complected, but this gives me a way of jumping to the appropriate links. I think there is potential for the storyboards to become very powerful as RW grows. |
#16 |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Louisville, Ky
Posts: 330
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I have spent some time continuing to think about organization for my game. I think I am beginning to see how I can use a combination of the storyboard organization pjrichert suggested and the topic organization rob suggested. Again, screen shots are the easiest way to show what I mean. I tend to create the storyboard and topic entries simultaneously as I go. Shot one is the location based story hub for the village of Bocsa. For my adventure loccations make a great way to organize. Most of the plotlines are tied to either a location or an NPC that is tied to a loaction. This won't work in all adventure designs, but its working in this one. Then each location links to a subplot that gives details for the plot. Shot two is an example of a plot line. This one is very simple, but I think it gives you the general idea. Then I link each part of the plots storyboard to a story topic that gives the details. Shot three is a shot of my topics for the current adventure I am building. It still has a long way to go before completion, but, again, gives you the idea.
Shot One: http://screencast.com/t/EkxUrMLrYEK Shot Two: http://screencast.com/t/BnjZfFimBje Shot Three: http://screencast.com/t/ceXKses3a |
#17 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: Denmark
Posts: 740
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Thanks for giving suggestions as to how you organize the things.
Very useful. Vargr Deputy Calendar Champion Legend has it, that the Tarrasque is a huge fighting beast, perpetually hungry. Sleet entered History when he managed to get on the back of a Tarrasque only to be ridden out of History shortly after. Using Realm Works, Worldographer (Hexographer 2), LibreOffice, Daz3D Studio, pen & paper for the realm World of Temeon and the system LEFD - both homebrewed. |
#18 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Feb 2013
Posts: 14
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Meek,
Glad that seems to work for you . I do the same thing. Start writing out the plot in the storyboards, and then create my topics etc as I go along. Using links helps in not having to click tab to tab. I just wish they would let you link back to the storyboard item. Then you'd only need to click once, no matter where you were taken. |
#19 |
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