posted by ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
elanya at 10:32am on 10/05/2005
elanya at 10:32am on 10/05/2005I was watching the Teaser trailer for Goblet of Fire, and was reminded again of my reaction when I first read that line in the book. I was shocked, and impressed.
I was thinking about my cadet days last nightand I realized that I often have a hard time giving up on things into which I have envested a lot of time, and money, and emotion if they are giving me back things that I should appreciate, even if I don't enjoy them. I feel anobligation. It took me a long tome to quit cadets after I stopped enjoying it, because it was still a useful thing for me. It gave me money, in the form of jobs, and skills, and some friends. But I hated the things it asked of me in return. I eventually realized how much I dreaded and hated it, and left without a word of warning. IN my tired brain last night, I thought there was an analogy to be made there with my relationship with Joel. It was something I had put a lot of time and emotion into, and I was still getting a lot of things. In fact, joel never did anything wrong, or rarely enough that it should hbave counted. But I nevertheless was unsatisfied about *something*, and it was making me unhappy. So I left, finally, and now I am happier. And no one was really expecting that either, were they? And though I do have good memories from each of these experiences, I don't regret ending either of them.
I think the point of the realization was that I need to watch out for other situations like that, where I continue to invest myself personally into various kinds of relationships because I *should* appreciate/enjoy them, rather than because I actually do.
In other news, I am trying to figure out how to soend my day. I still need to sort out my tuition, and buy a present for Bart's wedding. Those are my most pressing errands, as they both need to be done by the end of the week, and sooner is better.
Also, eek! I can't believe that I am leaving for Ohio in *two days*! Eek!
I think my plan is a s follows: I will go to school and see if I can sort out the tuition thing. Tonight, I will cann Dina, Michelle, and/or![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tsiankiio (if she is still in town), since this is the last free night I will have to see people before I got to Ohio. I don't know if they are around next week, or how their schedule for this works out. Anyway, if I can see one or more of them, *and* get someone to take me to BB&B, bonus! Otherwise, I will go up on my own, probably via taxi.
I also need to get some rosemary, because I forgot I took out my shank of lamb to thaw on Sunday. And I need to read moe South, and possibly some other things. And make more Gnomes. I hope it doesn't take me as long to make all my NPCs as that one did last night :( Experience, though, is key! And most of them don't need to be very detailed. I did find some useful name lists/generatos, at least. However, if anyone has time for quick and dirty NPC creation, I'd appreciate them. This is only a short game, after all... I think the way it is working out is that most of them don't need much detail at all, but those that do need a lot :p
Breakfast, then get dressed, then go to school, then come home and read, I think.
I was thinking about my cadet days last nightand I realized that I often have a hard time giving up on things into which I have envested a lot of time, and money, and emotion if they are giving me back things that I should appreciate, even if I don't enjoy them. I feel anobligation. It took me a long tome to quit cadets after I stopped enjoying it, because it was still a useful thing for me. It gave me money, in the form of jobs, and skills, and some friends. But I hated the things it asked of me in return. I eventually realized how much I dreaded and hated it, and left without a word of warning. IN my tired brain last night, I thought there was an analogy to be made there with my relationship with Joel. It was something I had put a lot of time and emotion into, and I was still getting a lot of things. In fact, joel never did anything wrong, or rarely enough that it should hbave counted. But I nevertheless was unsatisfied about *something*, and it was making me unhappy. So I left, finally, and now I am happier. And no one was really expecting that either, were they? And though I do have good memories from each of these experiences, I don't regret ending either of them.
I think the point of the realization was that I need to watch out for other situations like that, where I continue to invest myself personally into various kinds of relationships because I *should* appreciate/enjoy them, rather than because I actually do.
In other news, I am trying to figure out how to soend my day. I still need to sort out my tuition, and buy a present for Bart's wedding. Those are my most pressing errands, as they both need to be done by the end of the week, and sooner is better.
Also, eek! I can't believe that I am leaving for Ohio in *two days*! Eek!
I think my plan is a s follows: I will go to school and see if I can sort out the tuition thing. Tonight, I will cann Dina, Michelle, and/or
tsiankiio (if she is still in town), since this is the last free night I will have to see people before I got to Ohio. I don't know if they are around next week, or how their schedule for this works out. Anyway, if I can see one or more of them, *and* get someone to take me to BB&B, bonus! Otherwise, I will go up on my own, probably via taxi.I also need to get some rosemary, because I forgot I took out my shank of lamb to thaw on Sunday. And I need to read moe South, and possibly some other things. And make more Gnomes. I hope it doesn't take me as long to make all my NPCs as that one did last night :( Experience, though, is key! And most of them don't need to be very detailed. I did find some useful name lists/generatos, at least. However, if anyone has time for quick and dirty NPC creation, I'd appreciate them. This is only a short game, after all... I think the way it is working out is that most of them don't need much detail at all, but those that do need a lot :p
Breakfast, then get dressed, then go to school, then come home and read, I think.
hungry
Quick NPC creation
The bare minimum I provide for an NPC is: name, age, height/weight (not specific numbers, but "short/average/tall" and "thin/average/stout" kind of info), hair and eye colour, alignment, class and level, and core stats (Str., Dex., etc.) Any NPC who isn't likely to fight doesn't need any more than that to be functional. Beyond that, however much you want to write in the way of description is up to you. Personally, I never write very much at all, unless I need to write a desc. of the NPC to provide to the PCs.
I produce all of that basic info (except name, obviously) via random rolling with tweaks as necessary. So I make a little table based on what I want the breakdown of the NPC population to be.
e.g. Hair colour:
Black 01-10
Dark brown 11-30
Medium brown 31-60
Light brown 61-80
Blond 81-90
Red 91-95
Other 96-00
...or something of that sort. For age, you randomly roll within a set of age groups (for instance: if your table gives a result of 21-30 years for a roll of 11-30, then you proceed to roll 1d10 and add it to 20, if that makes sense).
So this method takes a bit of time up-front, making up the random table, but thereafter you can go very fast in making your less-important NPCs, and even in making up the less-important details about your more-important NPCs (because, let's face it, hair and eye colour is rarely so important that you should need to think about it in any depth - much easier to just let the dice decide for you ;)
Two other things that will help the process go more smoothly if you do them in advance: compiling a list of suitable names that you can then choose from without having to think too hard (whether while creating the NPCs or on the spur of the moment in game when you realize you need a name, fast! :) and having a few pages full of randomly-generated 3d6 or 4d6 stats, so you don't need to roll them. Steve can tell you how to produce such a thing, or we could just send you a couple of sheets of our own via email ;)
However, since your game is going to be quite short, and (correct me if I'm wrong) a traveling-sort-of game, you are unlikely to need very many generic NPCs who live in our village or whatever, so don't go overboard with the randomly generated people, or you'll just end up not using most of them. You probably already know some NPCs who are going to need fuller stats because of combat requirements. In that case, I strongly suggest you take advantage of the DMG's tables of pre-made NPCs for various classes and levels. You'll tweak them, of course, but they will quickly provide you with such things as saves, combat modifiers, and so on, so that you don't have to calculate them yourself. Er... do you have the DMG?
Re: Quick NPC creation
Thanks :)
Re: Quick NPC creation
Re: Quick NPC creation
Re: Quick NPC creation
Re: Quick NPC creation
speaking of teases
Re: speaking of teases
It was posted in Kit's journal, and a couple other places on my friend's list, so I figured most people would have already seen it :o