Writing Process: Part 3 - Drafting/Writing

It might seem strange that this stage comes after sharing. The reason is sharing can be done with either brainstorming or drafting. What makes writing a process is the fact its steps are repeatable. You come up with an idea, draft it, you share it, you redraft, share again, and maybe even scrap everything then start from scratch. I freewrite for my brainstorming [first step] because it gets a draft out there right away, but everyone has their own methods. Some people make outlines and others visual aids to get a sense of what to write first.

Drafting in Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) is important because it gets content laid out on a page. The freewrite [Writing Process: Part 1 - Rambling] is sort of a draft. Writing is a process, yet it is not a linear process. Brainstorming always comes first as the ideas need to be generated. After that comes either the drafting or sharing part of the process. Most of the time I draft my work after brainstorming, yet with D&D I like to talk to people about the ideas my brain stormed first too.

Step 3 of the writing process is simply to have the work written. If you are like me and freewrite for your brainstorming, it is best to implement any comments people made on your work. This effectively creates a second draft. Yes, the writing process will require multiple drafts, but that's a good thing. The more work one puts into their writing the more refined it will be.


*Note to audience: I would have given an example of this serial's first part having been updated but I'm busy with classes. Next update in this serial will be more robust.

Have a great week everyone.

Peddler

To break up the Writing Process serial, I'm posting about a fun encounter I created. I've yet to test it with actual people, yet the concept is interesting. My first play group has been struggling to meet up and get back to our campaign in the Deadlands—map is provided below.

Deadlands requires 4 letter size (8"x11") papers to show.

The encounter is intended to happen in the Haunted temple—located at the most northern point of map. There they [the party] are to reclaim the temple. Doing so will increase the power of their patron Charon the God of Death. In a short 5 page document I made for the party to keep track of new information they learned, I made a throw away superstition of an evil peddler who stalked the roads [final page].

What their characters learned between sessions.

For the haunted temple encounter, I gave form to that lore superstition. In my game, the god of death is a betrayed god of Life/Resurrection; the betrayal made him a death god. I had decided to make the Foul Peddler the Slavon [living member of the Deadlands] trickster god. I had no intention of telling my players that fact, but it helped give a foundation to build the encounter.

Essentially the Foul Peddler is an Avatar of the trickster god Gazember. I made it an avatar incase the party attacks him. God's can't be beaten, not by 7–8 level characters; and avatar is another matter. The avatar would be powerful but much weaker, a puppet the god makes and inhabits. This way Gazember can perform his usual tricks and interactions in the world while not needing a champion or other disciples. Such a loophole seemed appropriate for a trickster god to use, as I don't have the various gods of Akura [the world my players are in] interact directly.

The encounter itself is capable of performing in an social or combat interaction. Being a trickster, the peddler likes games. Being a god, the peddler doesn't care how dangerous said games are. The card game is simple, the peddler's deck is like normal D&D's Deck of Many Things, just not as powerful. For those of you who don't know, the deck of many things is an item where the player draws from a prop deck/rolls on a table for a card. Some cards will give great benefits like a free wish [a spell that alters reality] others are negative like losing all your items, property, and gold. The Peddler's deck is a less severe version, but still annoying.

Now, the game isn't to pull from the deck. The game is to sacrifice something of value "[Soul of a Loved One]" is just an example. By sacrificing, the party member can transfer the card over to another party member. This mechanic is meant to turn party members against each other, or sacrifice to give a party member one of the positive cards.

Once the party is done transferring cards between each other, the one with the most amount of cards gets to transfer all negative effects to another member without needing to sacrifice something. It is another mechanic meant to turn the party against itself. A party member who was betrayed by another by receiving numerous cards now has a free means to retaliate. If they don't retaliate, then they are dropped to the beginning experience points of whatever level they are.

The final offer is that if a player doesn't like the outcome they can avoid the cards' effects by doing a small favor. The favor is intended to be that they carry a small card, which I made a prop for, that has runes meant to summon the trickster's avatar into another plane. The party won't know its true effects, but the trickster god knows the party will eventually need to enter the Feywild [D&D fairy realm dimension]. My secret lore on the god's avatar is that it can only be created in one plane of existence, the card creates said avatar. Summoning Gazember into the Feywild would of course upset the fairy folk greatly too.

The above was the social interaction. The combat encounter, as my players are just as likely to get mad and attack the peddler, is unique. First the avatar would use darkness to obscure the battlefield and then use its Divine Eyes trait, which is a reskinned form of the Warlock class' Devil's Eye eldritch invocation. The peddler also has several abilities that can be used outside normal round combat to create a sense of randomness and confusion amongst the party.

Most importantly is how I intend the peddler to act sporadically: constantly shifting across the battlefield, moving up walls, casting darkness spells, doing small cuts to the players, reviving the players if they are near death, and the like. The whole premise is that the players are there to amuse the Foul Peddler. If the players are beaten, he'll offer them the aforementioned small favor. If the peddler is beaten, he'll decay into dust and rags. All of value left behind would be a small prop card, which can never be lost or thrown away. Essentially the players would end up doing the small favor anyway.

Encounter itself

Hopefully you enjoyed the post. Feel free to borrow ideas from this encounter to enhance your own.

Have a good week.

Writing Process: Part 2 - Sharing

My current job is to tutor people in writing at the college undergraduate level. What I've found is that the act of sharing one's work is often ignored. Within the college environment this is partly due to procrastination but more importantly is how one's writing is very personal. In general people don't like to share their writing because, "it's bad, I'm not very good, writing is hard, just edit it for me, I'm scared I'll be made fun of, why bother," et cetera. Look, writing is a process. Think hard on this idea, was there ever a skill you picked up and able to do professionally? Consider it seriously.

When you have a group project at work, in class, at home, or generally anywhere else, how well does running in without thinking work? Better analogy, how well does running face first into an unknown dungeon work? Is it more effective to casually stroll in or have the stealthier characters scout and check for traps? Is it best to create an area to rest or to only search once everyone is out of spell slots? Where you amazing at the game from the start or did it take practice to get better?

As a player creating a backstory or a Game Master (G.M.) creating a sessions it is important to sit down and consider how and with who you can share your work. The purpose of sharing what you have done whether it is a late draft or ideas in a brainstorming session is to gain a second opinion. New perspectives can be crucial in catching or incorporating things into your work.

In regards to G.M.s making a session, find an online forum or chat room where other Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) players congregate to trade information. Better yet, such as with a session zero, discuss with your players what they would generally want or ideas you have that you are playing around with in your head. Player's working on a backstory simply need to do the same with the G.M., so it can better be incorporated into the campaign.

As an example of the second stage of the Writing Process [Sharing] I sent my post on free writing to my university's Online Writing Lab (O.W.L.). The person who reviewed it had no knowledge of D&D, yet their comments are still very useful.

The main thing to understand about these comments is how they give direction for the piece. The first major comment made is about grammar/ sentence structure. Considering how the blog post is meant to be shown in the written word, grammar errors should be fixed.

Notice how the second comment is talking about translations not transitions as the sentence stated. Not all comments need to be taken into consideration, and sometimes a comment is wrong. The third comment queried about table-top-games. This question may or may not be considered. I could state more specifically D&D or any other list of like games, or add "most, general, all" in front of table-top-games to indicate I don't mean any specific ones. The comments are a means of bouncing ideas off another person, where those ideas land depends on you.

My favorite comment was of course the final one where the commenter honestly mentioned they were confused from not knowing what those pronouns I was tossing out were. I think their comments about being confused are even more important because of the confusion. My blog was initially set for G.M.s; however, it should be readable to people not accustomed to D&D. Not every nuance should be explained in great detail for every post, yet there should be some elaboration for people new to this sea of fantasy to anchor themselves.

Nothing New. . . YET!

Nothing new this week unfortunately. Reasons being, first I've been busy with midterms in college, yes you learned more about me just there. Second, is my boss at the place I tutor wanted me to create a short PowerPoint presentation over Title IX, which is a sexual harassment policy and protocol within all federally funded universities.

I have some of the second part of my Writing Process serial done, which will go more into how that step in the writing process can assist both players and game masters. If I'm diligent, more work will be done on Asteria Rising as well. If I'm extra diligent, perhaps a new Villains pdf will be made for posting. Time can only tell, in the mean time enjoy the adorable cover slide I've made for my presentation.

Ice Ravine

I went into Paint.Net and experimented with map design. The background image [table] was taken from an image search, but everything else was made in paint. The idea was of an Ice Ravine map where the board was coming to life and rising up from the table. Not really much more I have to say on this beyond it taking quite a bit of time. The image could be useful for Roll20 or FantasyGrounds.