Lone Wolf Development Forums  

Go Back   Lone Wolf Development Forums > Realm Works Forums > Realm Works Discussion

Notices

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Kragshot
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2012
Posts: 4

Old May 12th, 2015, 04:05 PM
Okay, I've watched the tutorials and videos and everything. I know how most of the stuff is used.

What I don't know is how to put it all together and get truly started with it. How do you take this tool and use it to make an adventure? I've seen some of what you do to try to flesh out a campaign, but for whatever reason I can't see how to put it all together to use it in the manner intended.

Any help would be appreciated.
Kragshot is offline   #1 Reply With Quote
Acenoid
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 798

Old May 12th, 2015, 04:19 PM
I would suggest that you start out to add the most important topics first that you will likely need in your next gaming session. I would not add too much detail at first and try to create all the related topics to play around with the grouping & containment.

Decide also how you would attempt to navigate though your adventure...

Chapters (left side), various views, via map pins, via storypoints / plot views...

Join the (unofficial) Realm-Works IRC Chat: #realm-works on the Rizon Network (https://wiki.rizon.net/index.php?title=Servers)
-> Browser Client: https://kiwiirc.com/client/irc.rizon.net
Acenoid is offline   #2 Reply With Quote
rob
Senior Member
Lone Wolf Staff
 
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 8,232

Old May 12th, 2015, 08:13 PM
The first chapter of the World Builder's Guide offers some useful suggestions regarding how best to get started. It really depends on how you think about your world, so there are various ways to approach it. That chapter outlines five different ways, and it's highly likely that one of them will feel right to you.

Chapter 2 of the Tips & Tricks Guide also has some helpful suggestions about getting started. It's a very short chapter of a guide that is packed with incredibly useful bits of guidance to get the most out of the product.

After you've reviewed those two chapters, you may have further questions, but they'll be much more specific than just a general "how do I get started". So pick the approach that feels right to you, start experimenting, and post whatever questions arise here. I'm sure you'll get some very helpful ideas on where to go next.

But the first step is to pick a general approach to get started.

Hope this helps!
rob is offline   #3 Reply With Quote
Agyess
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: NorCal
Posts: 112

Old May 12th, 2015, 08:29 PM
honestly if your trying to design an adventure, I'd start with the storyboard and plot out the basic outline of the adventure. Then start at the top and look at each plot point and decide what you need to make that encounter/room/etc work. Then backfill from there.
Agyess is offline   #4 Reply With Quote
MNBlockHead
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: Twin Cities Area, MN, USA
Posts: 1,325

Old May 12th, 2015, 09:10 PM
I started using RW in November and went through the same thing as you—not knowing where to start. Some tips you may find helpful:

First decide if you are going to use RW to build an entire world or primarily just for adventures.


The reason I say this is if you intend to build a large detailed world or campaign, it would help to start with the big elements (realms, regions, cities, gods, etc.) and work down. That way you'll get more out of the autolinking. You don't need to enter all the details for each topic, just outline the major elements of your world/campaign, so that you have the titles created and linkable.

When you get to creating adventures, the story board is the place to plan out the adventure and then you can create scenes for encounters from there.

Don't worry about filling in every field.

You can always go back and fill in more detail. Also, if you have a lot of empty fields you know you'll never need in a topic you can easily remove them using Ctrl+` or Ctrl+Shift+` to remove empty snippets and sections.

Don't worry about picking the "wrong" topic type.
RW is designed to support any game system and DM style. That flexibility, however, can create a kind of analysis paralysis. Read over the reference materials so you have a general understanding of the different topic categories and just go with it. If you later decide that you should have used a different topic type for an item of content, you can always change the topic to a different category.

Browse the Forums

These forums are a great resource. No only for the help you can get from the very active community, but also the knowledge base it has become. For example, look at the thread "I want to see a complex realm." Start with page two in that thread, or just use this link: http://forums.wolflair.com/showthrea...t=52565&page=2
AEIOU and Exmortis have shared screenshots that will help you see how some more experience users have organized a lot of detail in RW.

I really think that there needs to be a reference manual and videos that SHOW examples of realms using the various approaches the realm making rather than just writing about it. A serious of videos of users giving a tour of their work in RW would be very helpful. In the meantime, the screenshots users have shared in these forums are the next best thing.

Make copies of topic/article templates before customizing

I like to customize my topic and article templates to contain the fields that make the most sense for the ruleset I use and for my campaign. It is tempting when starting out to remove protection from the default topics and customize them. If you intend to eventually buy content from the content market, however, that may create issues. Also, you may later determine that the default was better. Instead, create a copy of a template, use that copy to make your custom template and hide the original if you don't intend to use it.
MNBlockHead is offline   #5 Reply With Quote
Exmortis
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Posts: 781

Old May 13th, 2015, 11:34 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by MNBlockHead View Post
I really think that there needs to be a reference manual and videos that SHOW examples of realms using the various approaches the realm making rather than just writing about it. A serious of videos of users giving a tour of their work in RW would be very helpful. In the meantime, the screenshots users have shared in these forums are the next best thing.
I have thought about doing this, maybe I will see what kind of time I have and try putting a few together.

Exmortis aka "Scott"
RW - Needs Rez spell
HL - Game Master/Designer
RPG Tools - Campaign Cartographer 3+, D20 Pro Ultimate
Real Life - IT Security
Hobby - Anything on water or ATV

Last edited by Exmortis; May 13th, 2015 at 11:42 AM.
Exmortis is offline   #6 Reply With Quote
Dhrakken
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: Mississauga, ON, Canada
Posts: 103

Old March 18th, 2016, 06:42 AM
Forgive me for the thread necro but wondering if someone can help me with some advice. I purchased RW a few days ago and intend to use it for my Reign of Winter campaign. The problem I'm faced with is how to get started with importing those modules into RW; not to mention the fact that I finished book one already with my group.

First question: I saw a post in another thread that it can be as simple as copy/pasting an entire module to start off, is this true? Secondly, as I'm done the first book already, should I still import the first book? I have to imagine that it would still be required due to the intro of the campaign etc...

Any other advice for getting started?

Again, sorry for the noob questions but I can't help but feel very intimidated by this tool and feel like I might have bitten off more than I can chew.....

Last edited by Dhrakken; March 18th, 2016 at 09:09 AM.
Dhrakken is offline   #7 Reply With Quote
MNBlockHead
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: Twin Cities Area, MN, USA
Posts: 1,325

Old March 18th, 2016, 12:38 PM
No, you can't just paste in the entire PDF in one place and expect to get the most out of the tool. It will take some work. You still should create the various topics and then cut and past the text from the PDF into the appropriate topic snippets.

Adding the content of the first book can be very helpful because you then can have that content available for players to review and it will autolink to your new content, allowing for easy cross referencing. You'll have to decide whether the extra work is worth it. If you find that you frequently need to consult content in the first book during a game, then I think it would be worth it.

RW Project: Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition homebrew world
Other Tools: CampaignCartographer, Cityographer, Dungeonographer, Evernote
MNBlockHead is offline   #8 Reply With Quote
Dhrakken
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: Mississauga, ON, Canada
Posts: 103

Old March 18th, 2016, 12:56 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by MNBlockHead View Post
No, you can't just paste in the entire PDF in one place and expect to get the most out of the tool. It will take some work. You still should create the various topics and then cut and past the text from the PDF into the appropriate topic snippets.

Adding the content of the first book can be very helpful because you then can have that content available for players to review and it will autolink to your new content, allowing for easy cross referencing. You'll have to decide whether the extra work is worth it. If you find that you frequently need to consult content in the first book during a game, then I think it would be worth it.
Thanks for your help. I know it's arbitrary but how much time do you think that would take to do? Was thinking of spending this Sunday afternoon just to get the first book in; I'll likely need more time right?
Dhrakken is offline   #9 Reply With Quote
daplunk
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Posts: 2,294

Old March 18th, 2016, 01:13 PM
Go watch the gen con session on you tube. They talk about a short cut key you can use to quickly chunk lots of text together.
daplunk is offline   #10 Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -8. The time now is 11:00 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® - Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
wolflair.com copyright ©1998-2016 Lone Wolf Development, Inc. View our Privacy Policy here.