NPC Postings

Hi Folks,

Don't know if this is something others would want and I'm still new to EpicWords functionality but here goes...

As GM I use some of my character slots for NPC's. They never earnt loot or experience but I do want to be able to post as that character, either as an adventure post or in response to a forum post.

If I don't create them as a character then I would have to post as GM and have to do something in the post to indicate who's talking OR I use one of my character slots as an NPC. I went with the latter and it works well aside from the fact that as an NPC I shouldn't be able to earn loot or experience and it slows down my assignment of either because I have to de-select the NPC's.

I was wondering what other GM's do?

My suggestions is to ask for a checkbox on the character creation 'is an NPC' if checked the character will not be included in the loot and experience screens. It could be introduced easily enough by setting all current characters to 'no' and applying a filter to the loot and experience screens to only display characters where the field is set to 'no'. Then as GM's transition the filter will start to take affect.

What's the advantage to the EpicWords team - well it's another reason for GM's to upgrade their account - as they will soon want a few NPC's to talk in character....

Thoughts?

Thanks

Paul

Nice! That's a good idea. In the mean time, one option is to use the quote feature:

We'll looking into setting up a way for GMs to setup NPCs within a campaign. You make a good point that they shouldn't count towards the Character limit for a user. Especially since they wouldn't be able to participate in normal PC features like loot and XP.
Thanks for the suggestion!

Any progress on this? This is a great feature, and it seems Obsidian Portal does something like this. I am evaluating both sites before I "Upgrade" one of them and commit to use it for my campaign. Being able to list NPCs (instead of just as references or wiki pages) would be very cool indeed!

I was just talking about this with someone at GenCon this past year. It is moving up on our priority list, to be sure.

I would LOVE this feature. I ran one campaign on Obsidian Portal, and I'm running one campaign on Epic Words, and I really wish I could combine them!

I love the journal feature - each person can post their own. On Obsidian portal there is only one journal and it's done by the DM. I love the loot and XP features which are missing from Obsidian Portal. I also love Epic Words' References. But Obsidian Portal's wiki feature is a little better, easier to organize.

My biggest dislike of Epic Words is the lack of NPC support. I don't even need space for each NPC to have their own character sheet, or stat block, but I'd like to be able to differentiate NPCs from anything else in the Wiki. Right now I'm listing some of them as references, but I think some of them deserve more text, so I have created a wiki called "Important people of New York" and another called "Important people of Las Angeles." As the Epic Words wiki feature is a bit limited, I don't want to have an enormous list of fifty or a hundred wikis clogging up the wiki front page, one each for every NPC. But then sometimes it's hard to find one individual (i.e. they started off in New York but then moved to Las Angeles, so where did I put them?). On top of that, you need to add them as a reference too. What do most people do for NPCs? Do you create one wiki that lists them all, an individual wiki for each NPC, do you divide them up (npcs of New York, npcs of the Red Skull Motorcycle Gang, party allies, party enemies etc), or do you bury them within a different page (i.e. page on New York would list the mayor of New York) and not have an NPC list at all?

Personally if I was designing Epic Words I would include a new heading on the Characters page, underneath all the PCs, called NPCs, and treat it exactly like References. Or even put it on the Wiki page - have essentially 2 References pages, but call one of them NPCs. It would be nice to have a few added features, you could add an image or link to one for a character portrait, you could add a field for race, gender, location, etc, but as-is with a short description is nice, to do the mouseover thing.

In my limited programming experience, it shouldn't be too hard to implement this sort of approach, since you already have the coding for the References section, just copy and paste. right?

Asking how people use the wiki's for NPCs is a very good question. I would love to hear more about how everyone actually uses and how they would want to use it. The wikis could certainly use some work along those line.

Much of the Reference code can be reused. The hardest part is actually figuring out what the user experience will be. I've been doing a lot of thinking about this over the weekend. I have some ideas that might be workable very soon.

Is there a reason that we can't create (as a GM) an unlimited number of NPCs the same way we create characters?

I think if you can figure out a way to use that side of the site, everything for me will be pretty good!

Then when I post a journal entry, I get a choice of who I want to post as (including the list of NPCs) and I'm good with that. :)

A couple of other suggestions:

1) If you add the ability to add maps to the site (ala "the other site") then I think you will win everyone over that needs to be won over. :)

2) OK, just that 1 other one for now. :) My campaign is just getting started so I am sure more ideas will come as we go.

Thanks for the great site! I will be upgrading.

Jim

GameKnight

Is there a reason that we can't create (as a GM) an unlimited number of NPCs the same way we create characters?

I think if you can figure out a way to use that side of the site, everything for me will be pretty good!

This would be cool too, and I would certainly not object if that was the way the developers went with it. My concern is for a DM running a large campaign with tons of NPCs... seriously I will have over 100... and I am more interested in being able to quickly create a bare-bones NPC with only a short tag-line (i.e. "Bartender at the Sticky Mermaid") but also being able to put in more details for an NPC who is more important. I really like that the References have the hover text and auto-link to the entry without you having to give the [ [ whatever ] ] code. But I suppose characters do that too?

I think References are already the "way to go" with simple NPCs. The ones that don't need details, or just a few so you can keep the straight as as GM.

Other NPCs, important ones, one that needs stat blocks and might adventure with the PCs, or be in opposition to the NPCs, etc., would be good to have as "characters" but be able to designate that as NPCs, etc.

Oh, and I did think of something else the Wiki could use: the ability to nest categories, or be able to nest Wiki pages under other wiki pages, so that the main Wiki tab doesn't get overwhelmed with too many individual pages to sort through. Categories within categories might do, it, or the ability to HIDE a page from the front page might work, too.

This can create the potential to LOSE pages though, if nothing links to a nested page, etc. So a link at the bottom that will just show the WHOLE lot of wiki pages would be the way to find those...

But keeping the Wiki Tab NEAT and CLEAN will go a long way in my campaign to actually get players to READ that darned things...hehehe

Is there a way to search the site/wiki?

I don't see one, and would see a huge problem with not being able to, if you actually use the wiki to track NPCs.

"What is that barkeep's name again? I know my character would know, but it's been 3 weeks since we last played."

The DM can't remember either, so he clicks in the search field and types in "barkeep" and gets a list of all the barkeeps he has entered into References.

"Argoth Quicktap turns and greets you, asking what you would like to whet your whistle today."

Handy! And way better/faster than scrolling through 100s of NPCs trying to find the right one.