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Finishing Flawed Fiction And Processing Piecemeal Prescriptions

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

As I edit A Bridge To The Quiet Planet to get it ready for my awesome professional editor, I reflected on what I went through to write the book.  I see now this could have been faster if I hadn’t spent time editing as I went, chapter by chapter until the halfway point.  In short, I actually aimed for quality too early.

At first this violated my expectations.  Being into Agile, I figured that doing it piece by piece, making chapters available to prereaders, would result in better quality.  It’s something I’ve read about authors doing before, and I’d read several articles on how instructional writing (which I’ve done for awhile) can be released in modules.  Shouldn’t a story be something you can release chapter by chapter and get good feedback?

Not entirely.

Now I’m not saying it’s a bad idea to make fiction available to prereaders in parts, but I’ve come to the conclusion that’s of very limited value.  Here’s why.

Instructional and nonfiction works are often something we can break down – and indeed, should break down – into pieces that almost anyone could edit.  Yes, some may miss context or seem borderline useless on their own, but nonfiction is often very modular.  We process instructions, history, documentation, etc. in discreet chunks – we think step-by-step.

Nonfiction works are a lot like modular software or dishes where you can sample individual ingredients and get an idea of their combined taste.

But fictional works?  They’re different.

Fictional works are much more of a whole.  They’re intellectual and emotional and literary, requiring many modes of thought and feeling to appreciate them.  They often have mysteries and callbacks and references – indeed, deception is part of some some fiction writing.  Fiction is hard to evaluate apart from the whole of the work – to truly “get” it you need the whole experience a complete work.  Finally, as fiction involves imagination, you often discover your work as you write it.

Fictional works are like software that requires a lot of code to be done before it functions or a crude alpha before it can be evaluated.  They’re like a dish that you can’t appreciate until it’s done, or ones requiring careful tweaking to get “just right.”

I now realize that I could be delivering A Bridge To The Quiet Planet to you quicker if I’d decided, as opposed to editing chapter by chapter, I’d just run on and pushed myself to finish the thing and accepted it wasn’t perfect – maybe put out one or two chapters to get my groove.  Now that I have a complete work, all the edits are far more richer, far more revealing, far more coherent – and much of my best edits were made when it was done and I could see the whole thing.

When I write fiction in the future, I think I need to accept that my initial effort is basically going to be like a piece of alpha software.  Good planning and thought can make it a very good alpha, but my focus should be to get it done so I have enough to work from.  Many things in fiction writing only become apparent once you have the whole picture.

Again, I don’t think this means you can’t put unfinished fiction up for review.  I just think people need to accept the limits of such things – and ask what delivers the most value for them and the audience.

I also find this very satisfying to think of.  I can accept that fiction starts imperfect because of all its factors and charge ahead, admitting it won’t be perfect.  It’s just that when the imperfect version is done, the perfect version follows more easily.

(By the way that title took me forever to come up with so I hope you appreciate the attention to alliteration.)

– Steve

Playing Producer: An Overwatch RPG Character System

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

Taking a break from my more dramatic posts to do a bit of game analysis here –  I’m playing Product Owner and Producer in my head asking just what an RPG of hit game Overwatch would need.  I’ve noted that it’s probably viable (if the target date is 3-4 years from now), that it’d have to be highly personal – so now let’s get to the final question.  Also feel free to use any of these ideas.

What would the Character system be like?

Overwatch as noted is a Superhero story through a sci-fi lens with some mysticism thrown in. This means characters people play have to be UNIQUE. When you create a character in an Overwatch RPG they should feel just as unique as the characters in the game. That’s a tall order, but I actually believe it can be done.

In addition, there’s certain gameplay challenges for this uniqueness; loot and crafting. But again, I think this can be handled.

So let’s get to it.

Characters: Backgrounds Must Matter

Character’s need to be able to have some kind of background and have it matter. Uniqueness comes with history, and a paragraph of charcter description doesn’t cut it. That means you need some kind of way to portray backgrounds so they matter.

I’d suggest the followin:

  • First, cover different basic characters – human, altered human (like Genji or the Soldiers), Uplifted Animals (like Winston) and Omnic.  These should alter options and maybe offer benefits and disadvantages.
  • Ensure factions matter (let’s face it, there will at least be Overwatch and Talon).
  • Give those characters some background choices that flesh out history, some bonuses, and probably initial reputation. Maybe even a short almost choose-your-own-adventure type thing.
  • Allow the final summary of said choices to be made so they can be tweaked.
  • Background affects certain elements like training mission, initial reputation and NPC reactions, and so on.

Imagine you start Overwatch the RPG, and try to get wild by playing an Uplifted animal with healing technology. You pick an Uplift and get a few species choices, and pick a Bear. A few more choices and you decide you were created by an independent scientist and have healing abilities due to some kind of biology-altering process (nanites, cybernetics, whatever). With your story in place, you design your character, and your first mission might be a test of said abilities (taken from a stock list of missions, or a stock mission altered for you).

The choices would be deep in that you might get bonuses to certain aspects and a few summaries on your character profile, and the first mission and character reactions are different. One change to your choices would result in different experiences, but meanwhile every scientist NPC is cautiosu around your bear because they know he had a hard upbringing and they don’t want to anger several hundred pounds of traumatized muscle.

It’s not that the individual choices may be that radical – but they must add up.  In fact, this is a major theme you’ll see . . .

Characters: Appearance Matters

Overwatch presents a diverse cast of characters because it is basically a Superhero game.  Therefore it must have a very diverse character appearance engine and option.  The original game contains a robot monk, a genetically engineered gorilla, a giant dude in a suit of armor, a skinny time-jumping soldier, a plump scientist, and more.  Each character looks unique – as must any created character.

This means a few things:

  • Actually different builds.  No more “skinny, muscular, and average.”  Let’s have a range of heights and weights and builds.
  • You should be able to build someone that looks like they’re from our world – a range of skin, hair, face, eye types and so on.  Hire actual experts to ensure all the differences among humanity are represented.
  • Makeup, hair, jewelry, and clothes options that represent a range of past, current, and projected future cultures.  Every character has their own look, and many characters in the game call back to their culture, to legend and history, and so on.  Sometimes Blizzard has been a bit ham-handed on this, so again call some experts.
  • Ensure there’s also plenty of superhero-ish and sci-fi-ish options because hey, it fits.
  • Make sure missions and levels and purchases let you get really unique cosmetic items and choices.  Let people’s appearance reflect their experiences.
  • Don’t do anything insensitive.  Again, consult the experts.  Have this game have a bibliography.

I figure Blizzard can do this easily.  But to have something allowing diversity while keeping the aesthetic?  That’d be an achievement.

Also if you can get people to sit in a game for 30 minutes playing with options?  You win.

Characters: Characters Must Be Iconic And Individual And Easy

Now let’s get to the challenge and the chance for glory – the character creation system.

An Overwatch game has to let you make iconic heroes that are unique individuals with a system an audience can understand – as an Overwatch RPG may attract people of diverse gaming background.  It also has to be something a team can actually develop and test and patch.

How do you let people make characters as unique as a vigilante techno musician and a crazed life-manipulating scientist who looks like a Sailor Moon Villain?  How do you code and test this?

As I look over various Superhero games, game systems are always a challenge to develop.  You need a system to reflect the ability to do anything, while needing to make it understandable, createable, and testable.  But in my gaming over the years I’ve noticed a few trends that give me an idea

  • Skill Trees are a great way to provide customizable characters, but in ways that don’t become an overwhelming system.  The Borderlands series does this very well, with iconic characters that have three “trees” that allow them to be uniquely customized.
  • A lot of superhero games – and indeed games period – put characters into broad categories with options – even Champions pen and paper eventually acknowledged there were only a few major archetypes.  City of Heroes/Villains did this well, having you pick a character role (Ranged, Tank, etc.) with a variety of power options within it.
  • “Interacting Iconic Ideas” is something I’ve seen work well – give people a few kinds of iconic choices that together produce a unique character.  Wildstar Online did this in a marvelously simple way – you pick a fighting class (Stalker, Warrior, etc.) and a profession or social role (Explorer, Scientist, etc.)  Even these two simple choices would yield unique characters – like a Medic who sought out combat, or a brawling Warrior who build settlements.
  • “Categorical Choices” – DC Online’s superhero system is brilliantly simple, even if I have issues with the implementation.  A character choses a way to fight, a type of superpower, and a type of movement.  You can be a magician with pistols who flies, or a high-tech martial artist who can run up the side of building.  Simple, elegant, effective.
  • For clarity, some options should be simple either/or choices.  Make it easier on everyone.
  • Make simple characters choices customizable.  If your character has a plasma rifle that’s nice, but maybe they have options to tweak the speed of fire, ammo capacity, and so on.  Sure you can not change it, but maybe in time you want to make it “your own.”

From my years of playing different games, I think I see an ideal Overwatch character system:

  • People pick a Field Role based on the four groups in Overwatch – Offense, Defense, Tank, and Support.  These represent (to an extent) your combat role in the field.
  • The Field Role gives you a range of Weapon Specialties and you pick one.  This provides your basic weapon or weapon set.  Much like current Overwatch, it’s what you usually are shooting or hitting with all the time.  There’s also probably a skill tree associated with the choice, letting you customize your choice over time.
  • The Field Role also gives you a range of Field Skills to choose from.  These are individual and highly iconic like “Explosives” or “Stealth” or “Healing”  You’d probably get to choose one or two – these are more or less your special powers and gadgets.  Like current Overwatch, these are special abilities you use – and should be customizable.
  • You then select a Profession role – your noncombat role.  This would be general professions like Scientist, Doctor, Engineer, etc.  This is for non-shooty adventure elements.
  • Your Professional role gives you optional skills – like Biology, Botany, Computers, Deception, and so on.

So the idea I see is that you pick how you fight, what combat abilities you have, how you function professionally, and a specific profession.  These would give you a few skill trees that are simple and clear.  So your character is already pretty unique from the start – and more customization can follow.

Yet at the same time you can sum your character up easy – “I’m an Offense Type with a Shotgun that uses Explosives and Scanners, and a  Survivalist specialized in healing and salvage.”  There you just summed up your characters – a person who likes big booms and setting up gizmos to find enemies, but they’re also good at helping people heal and salvaging cool stuff from combats.

(It’s not hard to imagine even a few sets of options would yield thousands of basic character types).

Character progression would be handled by expanding and customizing skill trees.  Take that Crusader Hammer and add extra impact.  Jazz your healing skill with an option that draws health from enemies as you heal.  In fact . . .

Characters: Handling Loot

Loot is a big part of RPGs, but also in Overwatch it seems kinda an odd thing to have.  I mean Overwatch is a semi-military organization and they probably, you know, have equipment.  Talon may be a criminal organization but they’re an organiziation.  You don’t exactly want people to be constantly trying to unlock treasure and hoovering up loot when they’re busy saving or stealing from the world.  It doesn’t fit the scene for most characters (looking at you, Junkrat and Roadhog).

Also a superhero game shouldn’t be about managing tons of loot.

I think this can be addressed in a few ways:

  • First, ditch money.  Go for the classic “reputation” system where doing actions gives you a spendable reputation.  That’s . . . well, like money.
  • Character weapons should be iconic – IE they can’t swap them out.  Like JRPGs and some other games your weapon choice is very narrow – classic Superhero.
  • Skill trees should allow for customizing skills and weapons – representing leveling up technical skills, being cleared for new components, etc.
  • Specific missions and amounts of reputation would let you upgrade your core weapon or purchase a new one.  This represents your increased reputation an rewards.
  • You may also get rewards for certain actions that let you customize your skill trees.  A mission may yield a new barrel for your rifle or an “insight” you can choose to enhance a non-combat skill.  City of heroes did something similar – people would find icons that represented new technology or mutations that you “dropped” onto a power to make it customized.

So in short, money that isn’t money, standardized weapons that are otherwise customizable or replaceable under some circumstances, and “customizable” skill trees that represent new technology and unique learnings.

This is fuzzy, it’d require thought.

Characters: Handling Crafting

And finally the hard part – crafting.  In a game that is highly social, but also has iconic characters and doesn’t focus on loot, how can you handle crafting?

I’m not 100% sure to be honest.  You want people to be able to make stuff and share it, but inventory management isn’t a big part of superheroes.  So a few thoughts:

  • Crafting unique clothes and items for one’s room/personal base is de rigeur.
  • Crafting “items” seems to either be out or something that should be onerous.
  • Maybe add “resource” missions that let people go into the field to get valuable resources – of course it’d be a challenge.
  • Crafting powerups and special one-use items would fit well, especially if it fit certain skillsets.
  • Crafting the “components” I mentioned above seems very viable.

This one is a bit hard for me to figure out – it may be the hardest part of the game.

I would add, finally, that if the game could add crafting-only and/or non-combat professions for people to play it would expand the game’s reach.

In Closing

So there we go, my large-scale analysis where I play Product Owner and Producer and ask about an Overwatch MMO.  It can be done with the right mix of simple ideas and complex interactions.

– Steve

A Bridge To The Quiet Planet: Magic

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr.  Find out more at my newsletter.)

Let’s get to know more about the setting of my upcoming novel, A Bridge To The Quiet Planet.

Magic

Magic has three definitions to the humans whose worlds orbit the star Avenoth:

  1. Magic is the potential for a person or being to alter beyond its nature and/or the liklihood of probability.
  2. The alteration of something by a person whose mind is able to, via various disciplines, call upon the potential in themselves or a target to alter it’s nature and/or bring about an otherwise improbably event.
  3. The results of the alteration in #2.

When mages don’t want to mess around with semantics they usually put it simply “people can both instinctively and in practice change reality because people and reality are malleable.”  However, as magic is common (and indeed, everyday), most of humanity gives it little thought.

Reality has the potential to be altered, it is alive with probabilities.  Humans have over the aeons developed disciplines to allow them to use their own mental effort to “align” with new potentials and bring them about.  This is akin to a conversation, a dialogue where reality is rewritten, though in modern magic it happens extremely quickly.

It is akin to a dialogue as this change is created by visualizing various symbols in one’s mind that align a person’s mind with the potential in reality.  These symbols and methods have been hard-won over the ages, crafted and improved to create the most efficient ways to invoke magic, and to do so in the most efficient and least painful way possible.  Combined with practiced meditations, the understanding of other relevant sciences such as chemistry and physics, and guiding physical actions, mages can create powerful changes in their environment.

There are still disciplines and individuals that require such things as magical circles, runes, and diagrams created to help visualization.  These may be used by less practiced mages, but also by those who have to invoke complex forces such as Necromancers or those creating powerful warding magics.  Sometimes having a map is just easier.

Many mages discover an aptitude for magic without training, and there are some disciplines (such as Shadowing and Divination) that develop instinctively during a person’s life and experiences.  A surprisingly large amount of people do low-level magic instinctively with no training or detection, such as luck manipulation.

Modern mages tend to train in specific disciplines and elements, such as manipulating stone or calling upon fire.  Specializing in a few forms of magic means they learn quicker as similar lessons play into each other – to try and manipulate many elements or forms over time requires extensive learning and practice, as well as unpleasant potential accidents.  The more elements or forms one can master, the higher ranked a mage is considered by their various Guilds and organizations, though certain complex specializations (Necromancy, Illusionism, and some forms of Divination) have their own ranking systems.

Magic is taught in large schools and universities, and is carefully regulated because of it’s nature.  A mage, as respected as they are, as much as they are a part of society, is powerful – and with all the unpredictability of a human.  Responsibility is emphasized by schools, parents, clerics, and society.

All mages are required to either join one of the many Guilds (which provide services and employment) or register with appropriate Universities in whatever Great City they live in (which is very rare).  All mages must wear Guild colors and badges or logos at all times to identify themselves, no matter how poor the Guild’s fashion sense is.  This policy, enforced over the centuries, goes virtually unquestioned – and has helped people trust mages.

The god of magic is Ivonau, The Spellshaper, The Eye of Magic.  Ivonau is a thoughtful god who focuses on knowledge, education, responsibility.  A bit of a “wet blanket” among the gods, Ivonau isn’t exactly exciting at parties, though occasionally they get off on a tear or an odd experiment or impart some new idea to a sorcerer that is world-shaking (and probably the other gods would have wanted to know).  Ivonau as of the 250’s has decided it’s time for them to “rethink” this whole god of magic thing and has been conducting research and polling.

 

– Steve