Primer drafted!
So the primer is drafted. I’ll be taking a few days off and then I will dedicate ten days, starting on Monday to re-write the whole thing. Once that is done, it will be for my proof-reader to check it. It will be a piece of cake for Davina, I’m sure. It’s about 8,000 words now, and it will not be one word over 10,000. In about 30 pages you will have everything you need to play an adventure, including four pregenerated characters, the character sheet and an adventure script. I have taken great pains (ask my eyes) to make the e-book readable. A nice standard font, single...
Read MoreCharacter Sheet 2nd Prototype
Well, here it is, not yet the final thing, but pretty close. As you can see under these lines, I have chosen an informal, hand drawn frame. I wanted something simple that could be have made by a dedicated newsboy of the early XX century. As for the software used, I emplyed Scribus, which is the best free desktop publishing software around for this kind of non standard documents. For ordinary books, I still favor LyX, though. You’ll notice we begin with the character’s name in a box, then his age and pace — that’s a game stats that tells how fast your character is...
Read MoreRewriting the draft
The draft of the primer was finished on Tuesday. I have stopped for a few days and today I’m begining to rewrite it, to turn what are little more than gamemaster notes into an adventure everybody can play. First of all, I’m re-arranging the material so the book can be as compact as possible. There’s no need to repeat the same thing twice, adding words just for the sake of adding words. Instead, I’ll make every possible effort to make the game playable. Can you tell us anything about the adventure? First of all, it isn’t going to be to easy. The...
Read MoreOK, Everett, the primer will be free
Free as in free beer. Just in case, Everett Bogue is the author of Minimalist Business, with Newsies & Bootblacks, I’m trying an experiment to see if I can prove him right, if a minimalist business can work for me too or if it’s more dependent on luck or fate. So, what did it happen yesterday? Everett emailed me and personally advised me to release the primer for free. I feel honored. It’s just great when somebody who has already been successful takes a time to offer you a tip. But when the guy is a vowed minimalist who won’t answer an email without a good...
Read MoreUpdates from the writing front
I have not been talkative lately, focused as I am on writing the primer. The rules, a simplified version with some changes from the standard game, are all there. The sample adventure is 2/3 drafted and the extras are all complete but for the pre-generated characters and filled character sheets. Until now, the most exciting part has been designing the adventure. It pitches a few pampered kids — not your usual newsboys — against a witch which feeds on despair, literally. The players who want to succeed should be able to think well, tell truth from lies, empathize and have some...
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