Story Hour feedback

[the Jester]

Re: Re: Story Hour feedback

I read a lot of story hours, but I don't usually post in them since it's impractical for me to do so. Most of the time when I log in to the boards I open up ca 20-25 pages, log off the internet and browse trough the pages offline. Therefore when I get to a thread i might like to contribute to it's usually not worth the bother to log on just to reply. The fact that I've posted to your story hour is because I find it a tragically under-commented thread for such a good sh.

Well, that's a nice thing to say! And I appreciate the feedback, too, every time I get some from anyone.

Carnifex: I saw your sneaky Piratecat-stolen tactic, and couldn't help but chuckle- I did something very similar years ago, when the party was deep in a nasty dungeon with an opposing party of npcs after them... the villains came at them with babies in their arms and threatened to kill them if the good guys wouldn't surrender (and this was with NO coming back from the dead in the world just yet- it had never happened).

Of course, the party hothead drew and fired and the fight was on... only one of the babies got killed, the bad guys were too busy fighting the good guys to do them in.

Also, about posting the crunchy bits, you could always start another thread like Piratecat has. I've posted tons of new monsters, prcs, etc. on the homebrews and house rules forum before, but maybe it would be cool to integrate them into the story hour thread... I dunno, what's the consensus? Should I post the monsters and npcs the pcs fight in the thread where they fight them, maybe as the next post or something?

 

[Duncan Haldane]

Re: Re: Re: Story Hour feedback

Also, about posting the crunchy bits, you could always start another thread like Piratecat has. I've posted tons of new monsters, prcs, etc. on the homebrews and house rules forum before, but maybe it would be cool to integrate them into the story hour thread... I dunno, what's the consensus? Should I post the monsters and npcs the pcs fight in the thread where they fight them, maybe as the next post or something?

I've been thinking about something like this as well. I want people to be able to view the characters as they were designed at that point in the campaign, and I want to hyperlink to various details (eg, who this group is, where that location is, etc).

So, my current plan is to post in the story hour, with a link to a website I can post files on. Character files (in HTML), and hyperlinks would be linked to that page, while the storyhour would contain the campaign story.

How does that idea sound?

Also, I was wondering - how do you story hour authors keep notes during a session? I just started my new campaign, and I made up a little combat tracking sheet, and asked one of the players to make notes in that. Then I asked the other players to keep track of different things - eg, names I make up on the spot, quotable quotes, base notes for the game.

I do this hoping to give them all some extra reason to focus on the game, and also to help me build notes for the story hour and the players.

And finally, I'm trying something with this campaign that is new for me. Before each session I'm trying to write about a page of world information that is pertinent to the upcoming session and the past session. Reading this out means that the session is starting. It provides a focal point, and the players should come to know that this means end of Out-of-character comments, down to serious roleplaying. It also gives me more to fill out the SH with So what do you people think of that idea?

Now I've just got to come up with a name for the campaign.

Duncan

 

[Rune]

This is a great question, (the) Jester! Could you post it as a poll in the Story Hour forum?

To answer, I'd say that I don't tend to comment on most of the story hours that I read (or comment often, anyway), because I generally find that I don't have anything intelligent to say. I usually post a simple little note of encouragement when I first start reading and then lurk from then on out. Despite my fairly hefty post-count, I'm still a lurker at heart.

On a related note, my story hours (in particular, the one linked in my sig, which was the first and which I only edited--although that will soon change), haven't received much, if any truely constructive (non-"cool, I'm reading") remarks since we lost the old storyhours to the (swedish?) host of the old server. I figure it may be one or both of two things. A whole lot more story hours are being added all the time and I've probably crippled my ability to get good, consistant feedback by starting so many, myself.

 

[the Jester]

Right, I put a poll up in the story hour forum, everyone give me an opinion! Since I tend to post a lot of that info on the other forums anyway, but I don't think most people get to see the way it all connects, I'm leaning towards posting it myself- but I'll wait to see what other folks think.

 

[rackabello]

Re: Re: Re: Story Hour feedback

Also, about posting the crunchy bits, you could always start another thread like Piratecat has. I've posted tons of new monsters, prcs, etc. on the homebrews and house rules forum before, but maybe it would be cool to integrate them into the story hour thread... I dunno, what's the consensus? Should I post the monsters and npcs the pcs fight in the thread where they fight them, maybe as the next post or something?

I really enjoy the crunchy bits -- character and npc stats, new critters, maps, etc. However, rather than include them in the Story Hour's main thread, I prefer a separate thread in the Rogues Gallery or Monster Homebrew forums.

First, hyperlinks to secondary threads will draw more readers to these relatively quiet forums (I think it's a shame that more people haven't seen cool creatures like your Dreaming Screamer, Jester). Second, it could allow DMs to feature information that they may not wish their players to see (assuming they won't peek, the lousy cheats!). Finally, mulitple threads might draw new readers to the Story Hours.