Neitherworld Stories

June 3, 2007

WoAdWriMo: Day Two

Today I set aside my outline/notes and forced myself to write the introduction and overview/background to the adventure. I also wrote up a new treasure item and a new special material for the appendix. I wrote 1550 words today, which isn’t bad at all (admittedly, though, one of them was “blahblahblah.”) What took me the longest? Stat blocks. Gah. I...

June 1, 2007

The Challenge Format

In thinking about my WoAdWriMo adventure, I realize that not every challenge to be overcome by the party is a monster to be defeated in combat. Sometimes there is a puzzle to be solved or a short quest to be completed. Many of these transcend the physical location that they are found in, so embedding them in the text describing...

June 1, 2007

More Exalted Frustrations

Last night was Jenn’s piratey Exalted game. I think I’ve concluded that I made the wrong character for the game. My PC (Hijiki) is a generalist, but the things that he’s good at are either not terribly useful or are things that someone else does better… and which we only need one person to do. For example, Hijiki has 8...

June 1, 2007

WoAdWriMo: Design Notes?

I’m torn as to whether or not to include substantial design notes for my WoAdWriMo entry in this blog. On the one hand, it might make for interesting reading. On the other, I’m worried about revealing too much about the adventure itself. In any case, I’ll definitely talk about some of my general rules. For instance, there are some things...

June 1, 2007

WoAdWriMo: Day One

Angela and I are writing the d20 adventure Goblins of Gourm. Currently, we have 3.5 pages of rough notes that outline nine encounter areas or scenes. Some of these are more developed than others – the first area is about a page long. The last one is four words. Total word count on day one: 1229 1229 words sounds like...

May 31, 2007

PC is for PsyChopath

The other night, I saw the first episode of Dexter, a TV series on Showtime which is based upon the novel Darkly Dreaming Dexter. It was really good, but that isn’t the point of this post. Dexter is about a guy (named Dexter. surprise.) who was adopted at a young age after some sort of traumatic incident. He believes himself...

May 29, 2007

Gearing up

Life is busy. I was out of town last week for work. I’ll be out of town for at least one weekend this coming month, and I have a big work-event that I’m planning for the end of June. …all that and Worldwide Adventure Writing Month. I’m going to make it happen. There will be goblins. Oh yes. There will...

May 29, 2007

Touched by the Hand of Fate

Yesterday I ran the Secret of Zir’an one-shot for the C-U Run Club. We didn’t quite have enough time to finish. I had a nice set-piece battle for the end that we never actually got to. Part of it was me not noticing the time (I would have rearranged things to speed the plot up), part of it was me...

May 21, 2007

They come for your brain!

On Friday, Jeff asked an all-important question… what the heck is a Bathalian supposed to be? OK. Maybe the question isn’t that world-shattering, but the answer got me thinking. The answer, of course, is that a Bathalian is a non-copyright term used by miniature producers for something that looks an awful lot like a mind flayer. I don’t want to...

May 18, 2007

When do they stop being goblins?

The goblins in Goblins of Gourm share a number of traits with “typical” goblins. They are malicious, creepy, little guys. As the adventure progresses, however, the PCs will run into goblins who are increasingly unlike the stereotype. Goblin farmers aren’t a huge stretch. Goblins need to eat, and – despite D&D’s tropes – raiding is not a sustainable method of...