Typo Inzpiration and different mini-posts

Some article concepts are merely not sufficiently big to maintain a complete put up on their very own. Every now and then, I collect these mini-posts collectively to kind yet one more substantial put up.

The final time I did this was in Eight Little Ideas: A Confection Of Miniature Posts, 6 months in the past. It’s time I did it once more.

Contents:

• Typo Inzpiration (Discovered Concepts)
• The Form Of A Cup (Social Imperfection)
• Technobabble Gone Dangerous (Cringe-worthy Sci-Fi)
• Dichotomies Of A Private Life (Character Era)
• Pencil Is Erasable (Character Era)
• Reboots Can Kill (Marketing campaign Content material)
• Perfectionist – To A Level (GMing Precept)
• The “Cruising Vary” Precept (Sport Meta-mechanics)

Typo Inzpiration (Discovered Concepts)

You by no means know the place your subsequent concept is coming from. There are sources of inspiration throughout us, however too many individuals (who actually ought to know higher) ignore too a lot of them.

Take typos. That’s the place you imply to put in writing one phrase however unintentionally enter one thing else. Or your enter machine thinks you’ve enter the flawed factor and auto-corrects you.

Each could be embarrassing once you don’t discover. Each could be irritating once you do discover.

And, once in a while, there could be a gem of an concept lurking in what’s truly been written, however individuals are so busy correcting the error that they fully overlook the potential.

Let me supply an instance: I used to be typing “Demographics” in a plot define the opposite week, and inadvertently typed “Demongraphics”. Earlier than I may right it, I used to be interrupted by a telephone name, which put simply sufficient of a pause on the method that I used to be in a position to look upon the error with recent eyes. The wheels inside my thoughts instantly started to show over – what may this check with if it had been not a typo? Demon populations? Possession statistics? Promoting campaigns by the underworld? Faux Information? An infographic so fiendishly sophisticated that it may by no means be accomplished and interpreted accurately? An illustration so evil that it drove all who beheld it into spiritual despair, leaving them open to corruption?

At the least 4 of these concepts could possibly be enlarged into a real plotline.

So, earlier than you delete or right your typos, mine them for concepts. Since you by no means know the place your subsequent good concept is coming from.

The Form Of A Cup (Social Imperfection)

I used to be studying a e book on British Science Fiction – the truth is, I nonetheless am – the opposite day. The chapter I used to be engaged with discusses post-apocalyptic tv. The extraordinarily mental and barely pretentious evaluation took the view that the creators of the completely different science fiction examples underneath dialogue thought that society would degenerate into a selected social kind, one which was predetermined by advantage of being probably the most environment friendly mechanism for the extant society to attain the ends for which social constructions exist amongst a human inhabitants.

One thing crystallized in my considering as I learn this dialogue. I used to be already conscious that human beings are messy and disorganized by their nature, and constructions emerge and mutate and evolve from an preliminary start line in response to the circumstances and surroundings wherein that society operates. However numerous spinoff implications of this precept had escaped me – and had clearly escaped the writer of this chapter, too, regardless of their having referenced a transparent literary demonstration of the appliance of the precept.

In The Day Of The Triffids (an awesome sci-fi catastrophe novel, should you’ve by no means learn it, and I additionally suggest The Hassle With Lichen as associated to the topic in query) (hyperlinks are to copies accessible via Amazon, I get a small fee should you purchase), society is disrupted by a cometary show that in some way renders blind those that observe it. The precise mechanism is rarely defined particularly, and is just tangentially related to the story, anyway. At first, society devolves to a gang degree, a dystopian counterpoint to the proposition that “in a kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is King”.

Up so far, then, the content material would argue in favor of the premise recognized within the evaluation. However, within the subsequent chapter or two, John Wyndham depicts the collapse of those gangs and the emergent society that they characterize, and – later nonetheless – the approaching collectively of a splinter of the unique organizing pressure round a extra communal social construction that’s directly extra advanced, extra civilized, than the straightforward gang construction and on the similar time the product of the devolving and overthrow of what’s proven to be a short-term answer confronted by a long-term drawback.

For causes of his personal, the protagonist leaves this communal society behind and continues exploring this ‘courageous new world’. His subsequent encounter is with a fascist society which is comparatively superior technologically and when it comes to captured sources, however which has the everlasting flaws of such societies, as perceived by the era that overcame Nazi Germany. This society will pressure itself upon the world for a time, however finally splinter, wither, and fall within the face of the pressures being exerted upon it by the circumstances.

There’s much more to the story, and I’ve glossed over large swathes of debate on this and different facets of it, however that provides you sufficient to see my level.

You may by no means impose a utopia by pressure.

No society is ever excellent in principle, or in implementation. The society evolves in response to causes of dissatisfaction, together with failures to adequately fulfill its functions (each overtly acknowledged and implicitly assumed), usually violently, in direction of one thing that’s perceived as higher suited to assembly the challenges and addressing the failures of its predecessor. There’ll nearly definitely be division and disagreement (and that will even be violent), and what finally emerges received’t ever be precisely what was envisaged initially. Revolutions tackle lives of their very own, and all you are able to do is strive to not be swept away by the floodwaters of change.

Even when a specific social construction – that of historic Rome, for instance – is an ideal match to the contrived circumstances envisaged by the writers, you’ll be able to’t get there from no matter preceded, not completely; as a result of the implementation is being carried out by flawed and fallible people.

The notion that circumstances produce a metaphoric ‘cup’ and that any given society which encounters these circumstances will naturally assume the form dictated by the cup, is whole nonsense at worst and a dramatic oversimplification at finest. There’ll all the time be a spot between supreme and actuality, and there’ll all the time be flawed members who search to subvert the mechanisms of the society to their very own ends, who will trigger larger deviation from the perfect than could be corrected by any social self-improvement mechanism until there’s fixed vigilance exercised towards such breakdowns.

And that implies that any evaluation which proceeds from the belief of such a metaphoric ‘cup’ or ‘excellent societal form’ goes to be inherently flawed.

This turns into related to writers of science fiction and RPG GMs each time we think about a society that isn’t straight modeled on, and spinoff of, a historic instance full with artistic forces and historical past – just about each time, in different phrases. As a result of we usually make the identical mistake – we create an ideal set of circumstances to match the social construction that we wish, and assume that the social construction that we create will completely fill that void.

If we’re fortunate, this can merely show to be an oversimplification of a fancy structural necessity that doesn’t truly get in the best way of the plot. If we’re exceptionally fortunate, the failings may not even be seen, or is likely to be written off and ignored by any who so discover – which is very the case the place our plot revolves round some transition inside the society in query. More often than not, although, the failings within the mannequin will come to mild unexpectedly, and both be taken benefit of by the PCs or be the topic of hasty patch-work by the GM.

However, if we begin by implicitly assuming that the society shall be an imperfect match to the circumstances, and even intentionally incorporate some egregious failure modes, not solely is the end result extra plausible, however it’s inherently extra versatile and in a position to be massaged right into a semblance of what we actually wished within the first place.

So construct your societies with flaws. Figuring out the place the comfortable spots are lets you put together for somebody poking at them with a stick.

Technobabble Gone Dangerous (Cringe-worthy Sci-Fi)

One in all my many pet peeves is Dangerous Technobabble. One significantly devastating instance of this phenomenon was just lately repeated on Australian tv. I’m talking of the Star Trek Voyager episode “Demon.”

The fundamental premise of the episode is that Voyager is working out of a substance that’s essential to the great operation of the ship. They discover a supply of that materials which leads them into an encounter with an odd alien type of life which contains excessive ranges of the substance in query into their biology. Completely acceptable premise, and in most respects (by the requirements of a TV Sci-Fi Drama) the ensuing story can also be completely acceptable honest.

However the entire thing is nearly completely ruined from the very outset by Dangerous Technobabble, when some half-wit who knew simply sufficient science to be harmful determined that the substance in query ought to be Deuterium, as a result of, you recognize, it sounds actually sciency.

Anybody who is aware of even high-school chemistry is aware of that Deuterium is an isotope of Hydrogen and some of the widespread substances within the universe. And with that data, the entire premise collapses into nonsense each time the substance is called within the episode. In the event you work at it, you’ll be able to pressure your self to disregard the Dangerous Technobabble and discover the remainder of the episode fairly fulfilling. However you do should work at it, and work arduous – and also you received’t all the time succeed, and infrequently received’t succeed instantly. It nags at you, and undermines the credibility of every little thing else.

This wasn’t the primary time that Star Trek Voyager had fallen prey to this phenomenon. Within the pilot, an enormous deal is fabricated from a space-faring race, the Kazon, being critically wanting Water. By no means thoughts that, like Deuterium, this is without doubt one of the commonest substances within the universe, and that any space-faring race ought to be capable to ship giga-gigatons of frozen ice to their planet within the type of asteroids and mountain-sized hunks carved out of ice-worlds. Hearth these on the planet, allow them to deplete on reentry – as a result of that merely creates water vapor that may ultimately manifest as rain, placing the water onto the floor precisely the place you need it to be.

Sure, you’ll be able to assemble all kinds of believable counterarguments that make sense of the state of affairs – nevertheless it’s an effort to take action as a result of the implementation of this idea is halfhearted and never correctly thought via. In impact, it’s Dangerous Technobabble. It makes the Kazon laughable as enemies, a undeniable fact that – when first aired on tv right here – led me to drop the episode from my viewing schedule for a number of years. Thank goodness, they by no means check with this particular drawback once more, and you’ll deal with all the opposite ‘Kazon-As-Enemies’ episodes at face worth.

I put loads of effort into the Technobabble that I make use of in my varied campaigns merely to keep away from this drawback. If I check with a “Quantum Instability,” I’ll have thought over every little thing I do know of Quantum Mechanics, and what “Quantum Stability” may reference, and subsequently what a Quantum Instability may appear to be when it comes to look and results – and if it’s not proper for what I need, I’ll have dumped that Technobabble in favor of one thing extra credible, if needed doing extra analysis to assist get it proper.

Virtually as dangerous, via lazy writing of Technobabble, is “Reverse The Polarity” as an answer to an issue with a specific piece of expertise. I received’t use that (or any variants, like “Invert The Polarity”) besides as a deliberate joke.

Fantasy writers and GMs, you’ll be able to cease hiding within the nook and smirking. Except you might have a rigorously-defined mannequin of how Magic works in your marketing campaign, you’re utilizing Technobabble simply as definitely each time you translate the method of casting a spell into narrative phrases – until you’ve stored it strictly deterministic, after all: “The mage waves his fingers round and throws a pinch of purple powder into the air and says one thing unpronounceable”. It really works as soon as, however will get skinny in a short time. The fantasy-oriented amongst us are simply as able to writing dangerous Technobabble because the Sci-Fi-oriented, it’s simply that it’s often much less noticeable till they explicitly contradict themselves.

Dichotomies Of A Private Life (Character Era)

Let’s carry out a fast character era experiment. Draw a two-by-two packing containers on a sheet of paper. Label the cells down the left “occupation;” and subsequent to the primary cell write “circus acrobat” and the second, “desk clerk”. Label the opposite axis “character” and the cells as “flamboyant” and “workplace geek”. Now, image every mixture in 3 ways – speech, gown, and mannerisms. If the outcomes appear particularly memorable or compelling or fascinating, put a cross within the cell for that mixture, in any other case put a circle.

I’m keen to wager that “Circus Acrobat” could have largely circles underneath “Flamboyant” – and largely crosses underneath “Workplace Geek”, and that the alternative will maintain true for “Desk Clerk”.

A Desk Clerk who seems to be like a desk clerk, acts like a desk clerk, and speaks in a meek and gentle method, is a really forgettable cliche. A desk clerk with a component of flamboyance about them stands out. They’re extra fascinating to put in writing, extra fascinating to work together with, and customarily, extra enjoyable.

Equally, a Circus Acrobat who’s all flamboyance is a inventory character who has to work thrice as arduous to face out (if no more); one who has one thing extraordinarily conservative about their gown, mannerisms, or speech, stands out.

All you then should do is reconcile this eccentricity with the character – background, historical past, motivation, and so forth – to make them credible in addition to memorable and distinctive.

Pencil Is Erasable (Character Era)

Okay, that’s pretty apparent, isn’t it? This was a thought that got here to me throughout a scene in a TV present a couple of tattoo, and the diploma to which they’re indelible. That present was adopted by one other wherein a personality writes one thing on a pad in pencil after which destroys the highest sheet, difficult the opposite particular person within the scene to get well the message, which they’re able to do as a result of the pencil has left an impression on the sheet under.

And one thought related with the opposite, after which with a 3rd…

All characters have marks on their previous, errors and misjudgments that they wish to reside down. Whereas the outcomes of such deeds can straight influence on the character’s profile – character and circumstances – the try to cover or reside down any deed that doesn’t get detected on the time could be an excellent stronger affect on a personality. The issue is {that a} character by no means is aware of whether or not or not a given black mark is drawn in pencil or written in pen till they try to erase it.

“Out, out, foul spot” – however generally the try and erase the previous leaves a void that may be detected, and generally all that you simply obtain is chewing up the paper.

Each character ought to have no less than one black spot, a blemish on their perfection. How they react to that spot shall be as definitive of who they’re as the rest you’ll be able to level to – and infrequently in way more compressed kind.

Reboots Can Kill (Marketing campaign Content material)

They’ve simply began repeating JAG on Australian TV. I’ve seen all of them earlier than, so I’m not watching. There’s a pilot episode, which leads into the primary season with some retooled characters and a few fully changed characters. The present was canceled on the finish of the primary season, solely to be picked up by one other community with the identical main man and one other retooling of nearly every little thing else – type, tone, plot course, and a lot of the solid obtained redone.

And eager about that led me to the aphorism used as a title for this part.

Everytime you reboot – be it a TV collection, e book collection, or RPG marketing campaign – you’re accepting an inherent danger of catastrophe. That comes within the type of alienating extra of your present fan-base than you add to it with new followers.

Knight Rider, season 2, was with out Patrica MacPherson as Bonnie. The producers thought she was only a fairly face, and simply replaceable. In impact, they did a partial reboot of the present. The followers didn’t prefer it, rankings dropped and complaints went up. End result: from season three onward, Bonnie was again.

You see the identical factor time and time once more. For each reboot that succeeds, there’s one which’s a catastrophic failure.

In terms of an RPG, the Viewers are your gamers, who’re additionally your starring solid. And that’s a significant issue when rebooting a marketing campaign with a unique premise.

However there are methods to reduce these dangers – most notably, realizing what these gamers favored about your final marketing campaign and being cautious to not mess with these issues an excessive amount of, whereas nonetheless making the brand new marketing campaign distinctly completely different from the outdated.

Perfectionist – To A Level (GMing Precept)

I noticed a meme the opposite day which learn one thing like “I’m a perfectionist. In the event you aren’t excellent, take notes.” That obtained me to considering – with regards to RPG Prep, I’m a perfectionist, too, usually spending time on nuances that the gamers won’t ever discover, or are fairly able to glossing over on their very own – however solely up to a degree.

I don’t need my gamers spending time and psychological vitality glossing over minute flaws and discrepancies if I will help it, I need them targeted on being in character and interacting with the plotline and NPCs. If there’s an incongruity or inconsistency, I need them to have the ability to acknowledge it as such and work with it as a result of it’s been inserted, or left in place, deliberately, as a clue or trace.

My fundamental normal is, “would I’ve seen this, if I had been a participant?” If the reply is “no” then ‘ok’ excludes placing greater than a obscure effort within the course of no matter ‘this’ was.

If the reply is “sure” then effort is clearly justified.

It’s within the grey areas, the area in-between these extremes, that there’s uncertainty, and the judgment turns into extra nuanced, juggling effort required, experience required, time accessible, the probability of one thing else giving an even bigger bang for buck, and whether or not or not the remedy is prone to be worse than the illness. Generally, these assessments yield a tough ‘sure’ or ‘no’, generally the duty will get put someplace on a precedence listing, and generally I’ll begin and see how I’m going with comparatively minimal effort, as a result of these assessments are all seat-of-the-pants estimates.

I attempt to apply these similar rules to each aspect of my prep work.

The “Cruising Vary” Precept (Sport Meta-mechanics)

I’ve written earlier than concerning the prep work performed to provide the gamers utility in selecting second-hand automobiles for his or her characters explorations of the American south-west. They’ve now chosen and bought the autos in query, and I’ve ready a handout for them to check with.

Amongst the stats which have been fastidiously compiled are journey ranges – how far every automotive will get on a full tank of gasoline underneath varied visitors circumstances. Specifically, there’s a high- and a low-range for city circumstances and a high- and low-range for freeway circumstances.

I’ve interpreted these as being the gasoline effectivity in, respectively, low-speed journey city journey, stop-start visitors, freeway cruising, and heavy acceleration – excessive speeds or loads of steep uphill movement.

There are two methods of integrating these values to inform me (and them) what the gasoline gauge will learn at any given level, which can be utilized to estimate after they might want to cease at a service station to high up. The primary is the apparent considered one of dividing the gap traveled in a given “pace zone” by the vary underneath these street circumstances, getting a share used of the gasoline capability, and accumulating utilization till it begins to get near 100% and an empty tank. This is able to inform me rapidly how a lot of their whole capability has been utilized in stop-start visitors, how a lot in freeway cruising, and so forth. Add these as much as get the entire share capability used.

The opposite is slightly trickier, however is extra forgiving of participant company, wherein I convert all of the gasoline efficiencies to a ratio, and apply that to the gap traveled in a given pace zone to find out an general gasoline utilization towards a given normal – the freeway cruising vary. By merely accumulating the ensuing “adjusted distances”, I can inform with a fast calculation what share of the gasoline has been used. As a substitute of 4 accumulating counters, I’ve only one.

It additionally implies that the place the gamers could be anticipated to spend time investigating a doable goal, I can use a pre-defined common “stop-start visitors common pace” to transform the precise time spent right into a gasoline utilization relatively than spending loads of time monitoring precise distances.

That is all way more helpful as a result of it lets the gamers select to differ their routes, double again on themselves, take unplanned side-trips, and so forth, with minimal effort on my half. Nevertheless it’s counter-intuitive.

To check the maths and ensure all of it works, I’ve been working with a hypothetical “common automotive” obtained by averaging the stats for the highest 15 selections in keeping with the standards that the gamers set forth. These gave “rule of thumb” changes of +50% for stop-start visitors and concrete sightseeing, +25% for city cruising, and +20% for high-speed freeway journey. So all I needed to do was plug distances into these to transform the gasoline utilization into the equal utilization on the base charge. This additionally let me do tough calculations effectively upfront of their selecting the precise autos that they are going to be utilizing. Now, although, that selection has been made, and I’ve to return via my prep notes, adjusting to the precise traits.

The tip end result shall be that the in-game exercise will mirror variations and nuances between the autos as chosen. The gamers may by no means discover it, or it’d develop into essential, nevertheless it’s a supply of added coloration, and since it’s rooted in arduous numbers, shall be fully internally constant.

It’s usually mentioned that in motorsport, each workforce will get the large issues proper, more often than not. What makes the distinction between successful and dropping is maximizing as lots of the little issues as doable, generally known as “the one percenters”, as in, “the issues that may make 1% distinction”. Compound sufficient extra of those in your favor than your rivals, and also you obtain success. I wrote within the earlier article that I’m content material to be a perfectionist, up to a degree, and that is one other means of claiming the identical factor. This specific one % may by no means be seen – or it’d compound with others to determine a degree of realism that might not in any other case be matched.

However realism isn’t essentially the objective – the objective is to create enjoyable. Nevertheless, implausibility, a scarcity of realism, can have a destructive impact on enjoyable, as was identified within the mini-article on Dangerous Technobabble. Minimizing that destructive, even by 1%, counts. This may not improve the enjoyable – however it may assist stop vagueness and a scarcity of believability getting in the best way of the enjoyable.

And that’s the principle lesson to remove from all this, a primary legislation of fine GMing: don’t get in the best way of the enjoyable. It’s so simple as that. The satan, as all the time, is within the element.