katie mae. 26. professional dungeon master, unprofessional fat audhd lesbian. creator + dungeon master of the 1st all fat all queer dnd show, famously uhauled with my two girlfriends. (she/they)
I think people have truly lost any ability to be patient with storytelling.
‘I don’t understand this’ They’ll explain it if you wait.
‘I don’t like how this episode left things hanging’ There’s a continuation next week.
‘This character is flat’ Wait for them to be fleshed out.
So many of the complaints I see about shows lately are people being confused by things THAT THE SHOW WANTS YOU TO BE CONFUSED BY THATS THE FUN OF MYSTERY AND FORESHADOWING YOU ABSOLUTE GOBLINS THE MAIN CHARACTER IS ALSO CONFUSED AND THEYRE GONNA DO A BIG REVEAL AND EXPLANATION LATER IF YOU WOULD JUST FUCKING WAIT
A while back a friend asked me to write up some pointers for how I write descriptive text. You know, for dungeons and such. I gave her the LICHES method, which I'm posting here now.
The primary purpose of descriptive text is to clue players in to what they need to pay attention to. When you ask your players, "What do you do?" think of that as less of an open-ended question and more multiple choice. Your descriptive text gives your players the potential answers. (This is, of course, a broad statement. Players will always pull something out of left field.)
Good descriptive text includes any applicable lights, interactables, characters, hazards, egress, and senses—LICHES.
Light
Characters should know how much light they’re dealing with, and what the source is. Sconces, torches, moonlight coming in from a window? Sunlight filtering in from the forest canopy?
Interactables
If there’s something in this room the characters are meant to look at or touch, put it in. If you want them searching in the desks, tell them there are desks. The opposite is ALSO true. If you put something notable in your description, players are going to expect to get something out of interacting with or studying it.
Characters
If there are people in this room, what are they doing? It's very helpful to give DMs a look at the "moment before" for any NPCs in your description. What were they up to before the characters interrupt their lives? This goes for monsters, too, if they’re readily visible.
Hazards
This one should probably come earlier on the list. Like if something's on fire, you either mention it FIRST or LAST. But lesser-noticeable hazards, like "patched-up holes" or "slits in the wall" can be mentioned casually, without drawing a gigantic verbal arrow to it.
Egress
Some people might disagree with me on this, but it’s very helpful to be told that there are doors, even if they’re already on the map. Some tables don't run maps, and sometimes your VTT's fog of war tool obscures what is and isn't a point of egress on your map.
Senses
A lot of LICHE is based on what the characters can see, but you can play with the other senses as well. Characters can smell “a foul odor wafting from the pile of corpses,” hear “the lazy whistling of a popular folk song,” or maybe even taste “the salt on the wind at the docks.”
Putting it all together you might get:
Fire crackles in the hearth, casting long shadows on the papered wall and the sturdy oak desk pushed against it. An orange tabby yawns and stretches out on the plush armchair, revealing for an instant her sharp claws. Two doors lead out of the room: the western door that leads further into the house, and the eastern door that opens into the porch.
L: Fire
I: Oak Desk
C: Cat
H: The cat's claws (watch out)
E: Door into the house, Door out to the porch
S: The crackle of the fire, the plushness of the chair
Don't worry about making this stuff sound poetic. You just need to give the players a list of things they can interact with or react to. Role playing gets compared to improv a lot, and there are a lot of similarities! Think of an effective description as the thing your players say "yes, and" to.
And you don't have to include every letter in LICHES if you don't want to, or if they don't apply. Sometimes a room is empty. There may be no hazards. But this rule of thumb has really helped me write up some descriptions for both published adventures and home games.
take your self-promo to the next level (again, without being icky): michael scott's #1 sales tip for indie creators
indie creators rarely have large marketing budgets--or money for paid marketing at all. but you can learn to make sure whatever self-promo you do has maximum impact. the sales tech i'm gonna show you will not only make you better at highlighting what's truly special about your project, it can also make you immune to sales pitches (since you'll know how they work under the hood). let's get started!
there's a scene in the office i've wanted to talk about for a long time, and here on tumblr i have the space! it's the episode where michael and jim are co-managers and go on a sales call together:
Michael Scott: You should wear this watch. I will loan it to you. It is a Tankard. I highly recommend you wear that.
Jim: No thanks.
Michael Scott: They are into style. They are into appearance. We are selling success.
Jim: ...and paper.
Michael Scott: That's sorta secondary.
it gets played as a joke, but michael is right.
the product itself is secondary.
think about it from the perspective of the customer. you can buy paper pretty much anywhere. if every salesperson that comes into your office showcases the same kinds of products, you'll probably go with the lowest price.
the solution isn't to lower prices. most indie designers (myself included) could stand to charge MORE actually. the solution here is to elevate your project.
and the #1 way to elevate your project is to focus on the emotional benefit: how will someone FEEL when they play your game? that's what you're selling.
the FEELING someone gets with your project is paramount. that's how people decide to get their wallets out and pay for your Very Cool Thing. people do not buy things out of logic (very generally speaking). they buy with their feelings. here's an example.
let's say i wanna sell you on HEXFALL. here's the logical approach:
new school narrative-focused hexcrawl with modular hex tiles so you can add your own
every roll is 3d4, so it's easy to learn
gmless and everyone builds the story together
12 unique playbooks, including BLADEWING, MOTHERTHAWED, HORIZONCLAD, and OSTEOMANCER
zero prep required
this isn't bad honestly. it's specific, it's clear, it gets the job done. heck, i've written copy exactly like this for HEXFALL. if someone knows they like all these things, they'll give it a shot. but let's see an emotional approach:
gameplay feels like wanderhome meets interstellar
because every roll is 3d4, you can immerse yourself in the story without sweating mechanics
explore the existential phantasmagoria of the Rift, where all players can decide reality
the game provides everything you and your friends need to sit down and start playing immediately -- no gm or prep required
playbooks like the BLADEWING, MOTHERTHAWED, HORIZONCLAD, and OSTEOMANCER embody never-before-seen yet poignant archetypes for an electrifying roleplay experience
see how different you FEEL after each one? the first one sells a game. the second sells what it feels like to play.
you might have heard this idea framed as "features vs benefits" which i still find useful, but i wanted to drill down into the nuance a bit more. the logical approach above still translates features into benefits. that's why it's not bad. it totally works. but focusing on emotional benefits in the second bullet list makes for a more impactful pitch. the idea here is how to take your self-promo to the next level--again, without being scummy.
final takeaway: when promoting your indie project, focus on how it will FEEL for the person who buys it
good luck!
lex
titanomachy rpg
some questions i imagine might come up
"can't I simply make a really good product?"
the problem with selling on quality is unfortunately, no non-essential thing sells itself. sure, maybe your project IS unique and IS literally the best in its class. but if you cannot get someone to download it and see that for themself, what difference does it make? word of mouth, sure, but if you're waiting for your thing to magically become popular, idk about that strategy friend.
"does learning sales make me a capitalist pig??"
no! learning how to sell is one way to seize the means of production for yourself, imo! the cool thing about being an indie creator is you are getting the full product of your own labor, instead of giving the majority to some leech. in my view, by learning how to sell better, you are essentially giving yourself a raise on your personal projects. no one else can give you that raise. plus, learning how to effectively but responsibly and respectfully promote your creative work is a good skill to have! just make sure you're paying collaborators and freelancers fairly!! i don't wanna see that $0.05/word shit out here
**if you use these techniques in a scummy way, however, people WILL ignore your projects. and i will be v mad at you. so use responsibly.**
i like the concept of soulmates—not a “you’re destined to meet me, and love me” kind of soulmate, but a “i’d pick you, every time.” kind of soulmate. a “no matter what happens, and what has happened, i want to go through it with you.” kind of soulmate. a “i love you by choice, and you’re a blessing, and i’m going to continue thinking about you this way not because i have to but because i want to.” kind of soulmate. a “you help me rest easy when everything is difficult” kind of soulmate. a “in every possible outcome, i want you there, to share it with me.” kind of soulmate.
Word counts are incredibly important. They maintain the scope of the project, ensure equitable contributions, and (if viewed correctly) are a fun challenge to meet head on!
Writing concisely is a hard-earned skill that takes a lot of practice. Oftentimes editing your own work will feel like a war of attrition: 1 word here, 2 words there; but it all adds up and means less ideas get cut from the final draft!
So how do you write concisely? Here are some tips I use to reduce my word count:
1) Limit descriptions to maximum of 2 words.
"A pouting teenager with her arms folded" is 7 words, but "a sulking teenager" is only 3. Choosing the right word to convey emotion AND associated behaviour is tricky, but online dictionaries can help your selection process (I recommend Merriam-Webster's.)
2) Search your work for places where you can use 1 word instead of 2 or more.
An example: "The character looks around the room." "Looks around" can be replaced with "searches" or "scans".
An example in this very post: "Writing consicesly is a hard-earned skill that takes a lot of practice." COULD be shortened to "Writing is a hard-earned skill requiring lots of practice." (See, I just saved 2 words there. A war of attrition.) Even "lots of" could be removed from the sentence, saving me a further 2 words as there isn't a significant difference between "lots of practice" and "practice" in this context. If you find this step difficult, consider:
3) Create a list of "naughty words" to search for and delete or replace.
"That" and "will" are relatively well known "empty words", meaning they add nothing substantial to the text, eat into the word count, and can easily be written out by changing to a continuous-present tense. They aren't the only words that could be trimmed before sending your work to an editor though! Some words on my personal list are:
In order to
Manage/intends/seems/-s to
So
of the
Anything ending in "ly"*
"Allows"
"Can"**
"May"**
Using these words shouldn't make you feel bad! My roughest drafts are littered with these words as it's more important to me to get my ideas written down than to have them immediately look amazing. The important part is to use the search function to find and replace these instances in a way that means less substance is removed to meet a word count.
Fun fact: once I reduced a word count by ~400 words by removing "will" and "that", and then reduced it by another 200 by searching for "s to".
*Not every word ending in "ly" is bad, but things like "fairly", "really", or "naturally" don't always add meaning to a sentence and can be cut for space.
**These words are situational. Using them is a personal judgement call.
It is important to know that you can do all of these things and STILL have to cut ideas to meet a word count, but knowing how to write concisely is the difference between cutting a minor element (e.g. having an NPC appear using a specific action) versus a major element (having the NPC appear at all).
The defunctland video was great and all but the bit that's sticking with me is when they talked about how they would covertly get children interested in fish a whole year before any finding nemo advertising so the film would be more popular. And he went "that's pretty sinister actually" and she just said "Yeah! :)"
prguitarman
ellievsbear
germansingergirl
