Forums of the Megaverse®

Marrowlight wrote:

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:I am not a representative of Palladium.

~Josh

Oh thank God.

~Josh

Mephisto wrote:And here I was hoping Josh would have some witty parlance regarding what I don't want to see...since that is the whole point of this thread...

I have a nasty cold today, it's hard to be witty.

~Josh

Misfit KotLD wrote:I don't want to see Literacy: American at any percentage less than 98%!

Fixed.



~Josh

Misfit KotLD wrote:

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:

Misfit KotLD wrote:I don't want to see Literacy: American at any percentage less than 98%!

Fixed.



~Josh

I don't want to see Josh slacking off when he should be writing.

Pfft... all my projects are finished.

...which means I should be writing up some proposals...

~Josh ( )

Misfit KotLD wrote:

Stiffler wrote:Ring! It's for you. It's get back to work, ****.

After I'm done laughing...

~Josh

Misfit KotLD wrote:

Operations wrote:I don't want to see the line canceled, I just discovered it and love it.

I don't want to see it become Rifts.

I don't think that'll be a problem.

Nah... it's you thinking that's the problem.

Misfit KotLD wrote:

Warwolf wrote:

Misfit KotLD wrote:I don't think that'll be a problem.

Nah... it's you thinking that's the problem.

Hi Pot, I'm Kettle.

You're my dedicated heckler and that's the best you could muster?

I'm going to return these people to their regularly scheduled thread before you embarass yourself any more than you have already.

C.R.A.F.T. wrote:No more new RCCs/OCCs/weapons/NPCs unless they have a bearing to the overall theme of the book.

Yeah good luck with that wish, but I won't be holding my breath. Palladium seems to love padding books out with classes and equipment that are redundant, NPCs that are unlikely to be anything more than background figured in most campaigns, and monsters and magic styles that are only tangentially related to the setting. Nightbane's managed to avoid copping it as bad as Rifts (thank god it's not a sci-fi game, or a game where you're expected to have dozens of playable races to choose from), but you'll never see a Palladium book without at least a little of that.

Can't say I blame 'em though. Every time you put in a new class, race, weapon, or NPC, you instantly get at least half a page worth of effort-free text in the form of stats (more if its a robot of power armor in a sci-fi game). And anything from another half-page to two or three pages of text about the doohickey that doesn't need anything more than a tangential connection to the main setting and story. And at least half of 'em will need at least one illustration a piece. Throw in a few and you've got a fairly impressive boost to your page count without even beginning on tricky stuff like establishing a theme or giving the setting an overarching narrative.

Rallan wrote:Yeah good luck with that wish, but I won't be holding my breath. Palladium seems to love padding books out with classes and equipment that are redundant, NPCs that are unlikely to be anything more than background figured in most campaigns, and monsters and magic styles that are only tangentially related to the setting. Nightbane's managed to avoid copping it as bad as Rifts (thank god it's not a sci-fi game, or a game where you're expected to have dozens of playable races to choose from), but you'll never see a Palladium book without at least a little of that.

Can't say I blame 'em though. Every time you put in a new class, race, weapon, or NPC, you instantly get at least half a page worth of effort-free text in the form of stats (more if its a robot of power armor in a sci-fi game). And anything from another half-page to two or three pages of text about the doohickey that doesn't need anything more than a tangential connection to the main setting and story. And at least half of 'em will need at least one illustration a piece. Throw in a few and you've got a fairly impressive boost to your page count without even beginning on tricky stuff like establishing a theme or giving the setting an overarching narrative.

Wow... you've just managed to demonstrate how little you know about writing source material for an RPG. You think stat blocks are "effort-free?" How can I put this concisely? WRONG! Original stat blocks have to be one of the HARDEST things to put together in my experience (close behind writing skills). Granted, you might be able to get a page or so of art out of it, but that requires effort from the artists (and a lot of gamers enjoy a healthy chunk of art), more collaboration time from the editor, and more money to pay for said art.

As a writer you have to make sure all the aspects of the stat-block are consistent with the rules (well... I like to anyway), that the block is distinguished and interesting enough to deserve inclusion, that the description is clear enough that almost anyone can understand what it is and what it can do, etc. Not to mention, making sure the formatting is laid out intuitively on top of the other general concerns governing your writing and the fact that they aren't fun to write most of the time (I don't make near the same progress when working on stats). Even Kevin has stated that stat blocks are the hardest thing for him to write.

Kevin specifically limits NPC's to those that will be major elements of the setting (even if only to give an example of what a particular race/class is like) and wants classes that will be fun and interesting to play (even if they share some similarities with another class or two). I will give you some roughly duplicated equipment and outright reprinting of certain pieces (as well as a few classes). However, to claim that Kev somehow "pads" the books with this stuff (even if you don't hold it against him) is at the very least overstating the situation. As far as tengentially related monsters, Shadows of Light was good for that, I'll agree. For magic, though, I don't think I've really seen anything "tangentially related" in that realm for Nightbane.

I'll agree with you and C.R.A.F.T. in regards to not wanting to see such things, but I guess I'm trying to say that you probably have much less cause to worry than you think you do.

Warwolf wrote:

Rallan wrote:Yeah good luck with that wish, but I won't be holding my breath. Palladium seems to love padding books out with classes and equipment that are redundant, NPCs that are unlikely to be anything more than background figured in most campaigns, and monsters and magic styles that are only tangentially related to the setting. Nightbane's managed to avoid copping it as bad as Rifts (thank god it's not a sci-fi game, or a game where you're expected to have dozens of playable races to choose from), but you'll never see a Palladium book without at least a little of that.

Can't say I blame 'em though. Every time you put in a new class, race, weapon, or NPC, you instantly get at least half a page worth of effort-free text in the form of stats (more if its a robot of power armor in a sci-fi game). And anything from another half-page to two or three pages of text about the doohickey that doesn't need anything more than a tangential connection to the main setting and story. And at least half of 'em will need at least one illustration a piece. Throw in a few and you've got a fairly impressive boost to your page count without even beginning on tricky stuff like establishing a theme or giving the setting an overarching narrative.

Wow... you've just managed to demonstrate how little you know about writing source material for an RPG. You think stat blocks are "effort-free?" How can I put this concisely? WRONG! Original stat blocks have to be one of the HARDEST things to put together in my experience (close behind writing skills). Granted, you might be able to get a page or so of art out of it, but that requires effort from the artists (and a lot of gamers enjoy a healthy chunk of art), more collaboration time from the editor, and more money to pay for said art.

They always have been for me. They're fiddly and annoying, but you can pretty much set your brain on cruise control and treat it as an exercise in data entry rather than creative writing. Especially if there's already similar things in the game (and there almost always are) that you can use as a yardstick when you're making up stats. Ideas involve inspiration. Good prose involves writing skill. Interesting premise and a good overarching theme involve a combination of the two. Statting out critters and items and NPCs in an established game with plenty of existing examples? The only challenge is how dull and fiddly it all is.

SightblinderX wrote:I'd like to add to my original answer:

What don't I want to see? How about another year with no new Nightbane books.

Well we can dream. And while I'm sure they'd be interested if someone dropped a nice-looking manuscript on their desk, I get the feeling that until Palladium's finances are back on track they'll be focusing mainly on new books for the lines that have traditionally been their main earners (Rifts, HU, and PFRPG).

Could be worse though, other companies have used financial reasons to neglect products that actually were selling well. Like those mean ol' buggers over at Games Workshop, who pulled the plug on Dark Heresy (RPG set in the WH40K universe) for a while. Not because of poor sales, since it was selling rather well by RPG standards, but because their novels were making money faster.

What I don't want to see:

Anything at all on Canada. Leave it alone, I'll make it up myself. Palladium just doesn't have a good track record on this in my books. I know some will disagree but I've yet to see anything about Canada I liked and several things I hated.

Cliches.

Meta-plots. Starting up a story or plot is fine, but leave it to the GM's and players to finish.

Anything that leaves me waiting for the next book in the series. This has become a huge pet peeve of mine when it comes to Palladium.

Time line. Like meta-plots, it doesn't need to be advanced ever again.

World books that detail individual regions. A single world book giving a few details and ideas to build upon in each region is fine.

Morphus tables. Ironically, the thing I like the least about Nightbane ARE the Nightbane. Unless the book is specifically about the Nightbane, do we really need more tables about them?

North American Factions.

More hopeless situations. Things are pretty much grim enough.

More supernatural character races. Weren't they uncommon before dark day?

Writer fiat. Things should make sense because they are consistant within the setting, not because the writer said so.

Exclamation marks!

I'd really like to add a few general things that I would like to see. These ideas are general but you (or anyone) is free to use them in any product they might like. If you want it in writing contact me.

More history! Pre-Dark Day setting information would be great. You could go all the way back to the ancient history of the Ba'al.

More on Spook Squad and what the squishy humans are doing for themselves. Maybe some other countries version of Spook Squad (but not Canada). I always thought this was the best angle for the players in this game.

More paranoia and misinformation! Have a players sections and GM's section. Things in the players section will be shown to be false in the GM's section! I've always said that I wanted to be MIniSter of INFORMATION.

More details of the bleak life and existance for the common Joe. I want the players to see what it is they're fighting to change.

Finally, I don't want every little village in every corner of the globe detailed. Give me ideas, not restrictions.

Hope that helped and good luck with the writing.