A couple questions about Player View and Containers

[Venger]

Hello,
I just got RW a couple days ago. It is Wednesday and we have a game this Sunday and this evening I will begin transferring the info for the session from Word to RW in preparation.

I am plying through the tutorials and using RW is coming very quickly to me, but forgive me if this is obvious and have missed it so far.

Is there any way to increase the text size for the player displays?

And the other question about containers;
I will be inputting only the info needed for this game session for starters, but it is part of a larger hierarchy in scope.

So this question is mostly about nesting containers. I read a bit about containers in the Gamer's Guide and it mentioned something about not having two containers for one topic, which makes sense, and circular containment links or something that I didn't quite grasp yet.

I am thinking I should "show nested hierarchies" and then start top-down and create containers for all the layers of nesting as suggested on P.13 of the Players Guide.
Then Add (+) content where it needs to go for this game session, and then I can add the upper tiers as needed. Is this a sound strategy?

I guess the ultimate question is how deep can you nest containers, and are they easy to re-organize if I miss something?

 

[Farling]

The nested hierarchy works by allowing each topic to have only one parent. You can unlink a topic from its parent, and then attach it to a new parent if you want to move it.

I don't think there is a limit to the level of nesting, but I haven't tried to see how far it can go.

 

[Joseph Bender]

I see that a future expansion there will be a feature for specific player content reveal. But my question is there a way to make a player database in other words everything the player should know names and NPC's of people from his background, knowledge he should know about the geography of where he grew up kind of like his memory banks.

so that the player could search "remember" for information that he and he alone would have

 

[Venger]

I have been building since I got home lol
Reading through the manuals is good but there is nothing like hands on experience!

Setting up hierarchies is simple.

As I add data the auto-relationships thing kicks in and its pretty darn cool.

So, I am now wondering if custom tags can be created, for instance, I needed a Tunnel but couldn't find anything specific about one.

Also wondering about creating custom profiles for "People" and other things, there are quite a number of unused sections in the offered topics and I find myself deleting them to reduce visual clutter, and possible database size.

Simple orcs do not need the amazing plethora of possible information input opportunities.

Oh what a world one can build with all this!

 

[Venger]

I'm still wondering about enlarging the Player View. I did a test to display an image of an Orc Raider and some of its profile but it's very small even on a large 48" TV and I can't make out the image.

 

[MaxSupernova]

Also wondering about creating custom profiles for "People" and other things, there are quite a number of unused sections in the offered topics and I find myself deleting them to reduce visual clutter, and possible database size.

I found myself setting the included categories to NOT SHOWN and creating new categories for my game with the same names. I add no default snippets.

Now when I create a new person or planet or town I can create the snippets I need.

I understand the need for consistent category fields for when you are sharing content with other people, or selling or buying content, but the default categories don't have much utility for me either.

 

[Venger]

Hey MaxSuperNova, where is the Categories not Shown button? Ive been poking around.

I like all the categories for detailing an NPC or Entity, but for simple creatures to be used as sword fodder I dont really need it all

 

[MaxSupernova]

Hey MaxSuperNova, where is the Categories not Shown button? Ive been poking around.

I like all the categories for detailing an NPC or Entity, but for simple creatures to be used as sword fodder I dont really need it all

If you go to Manage -> Categories, and then select any category it shows you the definition and structure of that category.

There is a check box there labelled "SHOWN".

If you uncheck that box then it won't show up when you go to create a new topic and have to choose a category. It keeps things simpler.

I just reported a bug, though, in which they DO show up in the Quick Create window (CTRL-Q) even if the SHOWN box is turned off.

 

[Venger]

*jaw drops*

Wow, here you can edit all sorts of content...
I need to continue with the manuals evidently

Thanks!

 

[rob]

Is there any way to increase the text size for the player displays?

Not currently. It's been requested and is on our todo list. If you want to +1 the suggestion, you'll find it in the Feature Requests forum.

I read a bit about containers in the Gamer's Guide and it mentioned something about not having two containers for one topic, which makes sense, and circular containment links or something that I didn't quite grasp yet.

The latter bit is a reminder that you can do something silly. For example, let's say I have John, Peter, and Eric as my three topics. Now I make John the container for Peter and Peter the parent of Eric. At this point, I'm NOT able to make Eric the container for John, since that would result in the hierarchy becoming circular.

I am thinking I should "show nested hierarchies" and then start top-down and create containers for all the layers of nesting as suggested on P.13 of the Players Guide. Then Add (+) content where it needs to go for this game session, and then I can add the upper tiers as needed. Is this a sound strategy?

That's a perfectly reasonable way to go. There are lots of different approaches that can be used, and different users will prefer different approaches. The goal is to find the one that works best for YOU. Starting out with that one is a good way to begin, and then you can revise your approach as you become more familiar with the product and discover what works best for you.

I guess the ultimate question is how deep can you nest containers, and are they easy to re-organize if I miss something?

I don't believe there's a physical limit, although I might be wrong. There's definitely a PRACTICAL limit, which is basically the fact that each sub-level is indented progressively further. So at some point, the indentation will make things not very useful.

 

[rob]

I see that a future expansion there will be a feature for specific player content reveal. But my question is there a way to make a player database in other words everything the player should know names and NPC's of people from his background, knowledge he should know about the geography of where he grew up kind of like his memory banks.

so that the player could search "remember" for information that he and he alone would have

There is no way to create a separate database of information that a given player knows. There is only one database. Once we implement support for reveal content to individual players, each player will only have access to what HE knows. So at that point, everything that you've revealed to that player is something he theoretically "remembers".

If you want to specifically call out backstory information to players, one technique you can leverage is tags. You could create your own tag domain for the players/PCs in your game. Then you could define separate tags for each player/PC. Once that's done, you could assign a player tag to each background topic a given player knows. Now the player can filter on his tag and immediately see just the topics he knows about as part of his background.

Hope this helps!

 

[rob]

So, I am now wondering if custom tags can be created, for instance, I needed a Tunnel but couldn't find anything specific about one.

Sure! You can add whatever tags you want. Go to the Manage ribbon bar at the top, then click the Tags button. You can now customize or extend the set of tags in all the built-in tag domains. You can also create new tag domains with your own tags.

Also wondering about creating custom profiles for "People" and other things, there are quite a number of unused sections in the offered topics and I find myself deleting them to reduce visual clutter, and possible database size.

MaxSupernova opted to make all his own categories and hide all the built-in ones. Another (in many ways better) approach is to modify the existing categories. You can select a category on the left, then select a section type in the list for the category. Once you do that, you can then check the Not Shown box next to those sections. This will pare down the list of sections that appears for each new topic, but all the hidden sections are STILL THERE. If you ever decide to turn them back on, you can. In addition, when you have a really important topic, you can easily add the hidden sections JUST FOR THAT TOPIC.

Hope this helps!

 

[MaxSupernova]

MaxSupernova opted to make all his own categories and hide all the built-in ones. Another (in many ways better) approach is to modify the existing categories. You can select a category on the left, then select a section type in the list for the category. Once you do that, you can then check the Not Shown box next to those sections. This will pare down the list of sections that appears for each new topic, but all the hidden sections are STILL THERE. If you ever decide to turn them back on, you can. In addition, when you have a really important topic, you can easily add the hidden sections JUST FOR THAT TOPIC.

Well fine, Mister Smartypants Staff Member.

Go right ahead and show me far better more efficient easier ways to do things.

Pfft. Know-it-all.





(thanks)

 

[rob]

A LOT of thought went into all this. And usually a lot of debate, as well. So there's typically a really good reason why did something. We really strove to make the default approach highly useful and highly flexible. However, we also made sure users could start from scratch if they preferred.

More often than not, it's best to at least TRY what we've come up with and look to tailor it to your preferences before opting to start over. And we'll do our best to help explain things and/or navigate you around problems when they arise.

 

[MaxSupernova]

A LOT of thought went into all this. And usually a lot of debate, as well. So there's typically a really good reason why did something. We really strove to make the default approach highly useful and highly flexible. However, we also made sure users could start from scratch if they preferred.

More often than not, it's best to at least TRY what we've come up with and look to tailor it to your preferences before opting to start over. And we'll do our best to help explain things and/or navigate you around problems when they arise.

I'm sorry if my sarcasm tags weren't obvious enough. I was laughing when I typed it, does that count? I totally trust you folks' design strategy. I should have known that this was the hard way because I was fighting the program rather than really working with it.

I am VERY happy for what you showed me. It's FAR better than what I was doing. You saved me a LOT of effort...

 

[rob]

I definitely noted the sarcasm, so no worries there. My post was really intended as a caution to everybody else reading this thread that there's usually a good reason behind all our choices, so it's usually in everyone's best interest to at least give what we've put together a try before throwing it out and starting over. You'd already recognized this, but I wanted to be sure others didn't inadvertently make the same mistake and potentially get frustrated down the line as a result.