NBI: Guide for Creative Works

Since the it was actually requested by the NBI this year, I decided to make a small guide for creative works based on MMOs and such based on my previous experiences and failings. Hopefully someone finds this useful!

Know your Audience
Not everyone wants to read through an epic or play through a ridiculously difficult fan made game. It doesn't matter so much if you are just creating for yourself or for a small group but if you are trying to get the majority of people to view your work, first learn what that majority likes. For example in Neverwinter Online, majority of people prefer short and easy 15 minute player made quests over the longer ones that are spread across multiple chapters.

Plan and Draft
Regardless of your medium, you will want to make a plan first on how to handle it and how it flows. This might not be required as much if you are just doing cover songs, or a stylized drawing (though it would probably still help) but is quite essential in story telling. Making comics, animation, an in game quest or just writing a short tale will be much easier if you have the "skeleton" of what you want to do. Having to go back and change things because you didn't plan before hand is not only a time killer but also an enthusiasm slayer.

Writing Rules are still Relevant
Correctly constructed sentences, good spelling and good grammar are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to writing. With most mediums you would still need to have a plot with believable characters and story progression.  

Creating Characters
The best characters are those that grow or change during the course of the story. At the minimum you want a character to have is a motivation and something obstructing their goals (it can be themselves or their feelings, or an enemy, whatever). If you are writing fan fiction then you probably already have characters built for you - try keep them in character if you use them. If you are adding your own you have more freedom, but must make sure you don't become a cardboard cutout of any other character in the story.

Stay within Context
Unless you have a clear idea what you are doing and how to do it, it is always best to try stay close to the lore of whatever game you are working with. For example having the Avengers show up in Guildwars 2 is going to be pretty tough to pull off well. It is more likely that mish mashing genre/MMOs will be devaluing to both sides.

Open with Action
A tip given to me that seems to be working. It doesn't have to be a lot, or even explained right away but opening with an action or fast paced sequence acts as a better hook than a more passive start. It's also easier to pull off than doing a good "quiet" start (haven't managed any of those yet personally).

Try put a Twist
Having something surprising happen that most of your audience didn't expect is always a good thing which can separate your work from the many others of a similar nature, and can hook them onto your work. The twist still has to be something that works in the story though. Events and people that appear out of the blue which your audience had no hope of anticipating don't work as nicely as those that do.

Advertise Correctly
If you are making a movie and advertise it as such, don't have an interactive part in. I got burned a little bit when I did that with my flash animation years ago. Apparently while gamers don't mind movies in their games, movie watchers don't like games in their movies. Just be as precise when spruiking your work so people know what to expect.

Expect a "No" from official endorsement
Especially if you don't yet have a finished product and they haven't seen any of your works before, it would be rare for any company to open the door to a potential PR problem. You'd need to be pretty successful in your field and be an extra positive for the game before they'd give you that, examples being Dulfy for GW2 guides and Malukah with her music.

Shadowing Text Example
If you are using a graphic medium, especially one that is animated, it can be difficult to put readable text within your work. This method should help a little, all it requires is that you take the same line of text - shade it a different color, and move it a few pixels horizontally and diagonally from the original line. You can also use it to break a few text rules like, "no white text on a white background". Even better if your graphics program uses layers as it makes it easy to fiddle around with to your liking. The effect is this:

Free Resources
Lastly here are some freely available resources on the web that I make use of often.

Pixlr - web based graphics editor, also handy for resizing images to smaller sizes
rhymezone.com - helps for poetry (could be useful for the Poetry Slam! :P)
thesaurus.com - helps for word swapping

The Fall of Zhaitan

Part of my Explorer of Tyria journal - you can find the rest here!

After my prolonged absence from Tyria due to other games and my old PC not letting it run anymore, I finally returned there to finish off the elder dragon Zhaitan. DL, Thaldir and I warped out to the Anchorage Waypoint and we got lucky in that the pact forces had secured (sort of) the entrance to Arah. After sprinting past some angry undead we were joined by two random warriors to accomplish this mission. At first Zhaitan's powers were really holding us back in the form of people having to go afk and difficulty all being put in the same dungeon instance.

Zhaitan uses Meta-gaming to slow us down! :P

Once we got through there it became a case of repairing an airship with the reunited Destiny's Edge, because that's obviously the best use of a pact commander and his resources. Surprisingly the guardians of the airship bits were actually the most dangerous in the entire mission, the champion lich who acts as the first boss being the worst of the lot. Fortunately DL managed to pick us up during that encounter because the new dungeon mechanic (no more res-rushing) really would have been a pain against him.

Seemed to just get easier after that though, fighting monkeys, slimes, giants, and various other undead until finally we went up into the clouds to join other airships to battle a whole flight of dragons. Well, we assume they were fighting anyway as we blasted three of the winged beasts to hell. Some very beautiful scenic stuff up there too. When Zhaitan finally decided to show up he was very awesome but not very dangerous at all, meeting his defeat through cannon fire. I wanted to pursue him down into Orr and hack him up but everyone else just decided to celebrate. *shrug*

The victory party back at Fort Trinity was very nice with some familiar faces in the crowd, and I got a Pact Spear to commemorate the triumph - that being the only functional weapon that had better stats than what I already had. For me the final song, a lyrical version of the Grove theme, was the best reward though, and I stayed at the celebration to listen to its entirety. I usually complain about GW2 music with themes from Mabi, UO, Uncharted Waters and hell, even Wizardry Online being more memorable but for this piece - they got it just right. ^_^

Edit: The Skalds of the Internet also have their version of the song - Fear not this Night. (Laraplays, Taylor, Malukah/Malufenix)

Recruitment Drive

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Vacations at home are so relaxing, and memories of the civil war and defeating the soul-eating dragon are so distant now I'd almost forgotten them. My lizard buddy Derkeethus decided to leave us though, to investigate a rumor about vampires or some such becoming more and more prevalent in the region. Wished him the best of luck as I figured it was time other heroes picked up the slack while I enjoyed my R&R. However one night a visiting bard, Judith De Los Santos (aka Makulah/Malufenix), inspired me with her renditions of familiar songs to get my level 48 butt back out there and righting the wrongs of the world. First up was a session in the basement to simply re-learn my higher motor skills, and then I decided to send my little band out to recruit more adventurers and return them to our base of operations at Solitude.

If only I had a huge mustache I'd get more people too!

While Njada stayed home to mind the fort and her shop - Wynna and Anni travelled the snowy mountains and recruited Mia, the dark-elf blade at Dawnstar as well as Alle, an elf blade and Ono the orc at Nightgate Inn. Rayna went to pick up her "knight" friend Alyssa at Old Hroldan while Jordis accompanied me to Morthal where, using an attack my an ancient dragon as a distraction, we snuck past the guards and found Lynn, another blades girl and Wynd, a gay (male with female voice?) dark elf willing to join up. Sent them back with Jordis while I pushed on into the plains. Didn't want to risk Whiterun itself so instead I found the khajit named Bane at the Honningbrew Meadery and after getting him to murder his Black Briar employer sent him off to Solitude.

At Riverwood all I found were angry guards but my old pal Ralof was there to help fight them off. He didn't want to join my army though so I proceeded to Riften where again the guards gave me a merry chase. Another shady character called Maul tried to fight them off when we entered the docks area but they ran him through pretty quick. Did manage to get Anu the lizardman archer at the Meadery there though and between the two of us, killed all the guards on the way back out. He mentioned an associate of his at Ivarstead on the road so we stopped there to pick up the arrogant knight named Cutter. He sat idly by as we killed the pursuing guards and seemed very up himself when asked to join. When we returned to Solitude, he even went out of his way to attack another ancient dragon beseiging the city - at the guard barracks (the guards who wanted to arrest/kill me). He managed to somehow survive all that, and scared a penticus occultus agent (imperial scum) out of hiding for summary execution by yours truly.

I thought I had wiped out all the Imperial agents running about, but I suspect they are being shipped in to investige -me- and the small army I'm building. Glad the guards don't have the cahones to just barge in and arrest everyone, it probably means I've cut their numbers down so much that they only have enough people to patrol the inner keep. Speaking of which my house is getting kinda full now, with fifteen (myself included) people sharing the place. Njada isn't saying anything but I can tell she's annoyed.

Once a Traitor, always a Traitor

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the whole story here!

Right after the truce meeting I headed up to Paarthumax with Ogol and we put and end to the traitorous worm, and while that upset the Greybeards a fair bit (well at least one of them, the others don't really talk much), my two blades friends were overjoyed. They also asked that I help rebuild their order so they can begin to hunt down the flying lizards once more. However I had other things to take care of when I returned to the Dark Brotherhood HQ to find that Cicero has gone beserk. I was tasked to find the fool and given the nightmare Shadowmere (very awesome horse) to catch him with. We tracked him back to another sanctuary inhabited by murderous spirits, and a named troll. Ogol met his end there and with a sorrowful heart also killed the happy jester. I was starting to like that guy.

Next orc from the village to join me was Ugor, and she quickly proved her skill by surviving an elder dragon and blood dragon simultaneous attack. That was a fun battle! After killing off another imperial fool I was tasked with eliminating a reknowned chef who would be cooking for the emperor. Up near where he was hiding we also helped Salma and Beemja with a cairn they wanted to clear before a quick trip back to Whiterun to trap the dragon Odahviing. After a relatively easy fight he was caught and spills the beans on his master's hideout. He also holds the bargaining chip of me needing him to fly there as it is inaccessible by foot. That's a shame, I remember wandering up the red mountain past all those cliff racers and tossing Dagoth Ur into the lava before even doing the main quest in Morrowind (didn't kill him, but I think that was a technical victory :P) however I guess Alduin has more smarts.

While I contemplated this offer it was back up to Solitude again to cook for the emperor. How the heck does anyone NOT suspect me of being an assassin while wearing complete nightingale armor, bristling with weapons, travelling with an orc body guard escapes me. Instead they accept I am a chef. Just more proof that the empire is filled with morons. The poison dish is served, the emperor is killed and I make my escape - or so I thought! Looks like I've been sold out, and the guy that just died was a body double (you think the emperor would have lots of that with there being magic in this world). After fighting my way to freedom I quickly returned to the Brotherhood sanctuary which was being successfully assaulted by imperial forces. Most of them were already horribly dead by the time I arrived which was awesome. I would have liked to do that myself but apparently missed my opportunity to do so (as Juris informed me later on). Anyway I "save" two of them and the corpse who tells me to continue to hunt the real emperor down.

I think he's a chef, or possibly a monk.
First I deal with the guard commander at Solitude docks, a short and sharp skirmish that resulted in their deaths and Ugor's. Afterwards I quickly snuck into Solitude (I'm a wanted man) to get Jordis from my house before we swam out to board the real Emperor's boat. There we hack, stab and shoot our way through all of it, leaving the ship devoid of life and the empire devoid of a leader. I also decide to take out the turncoat who ordered the hit, since he sits on the imperial council. The payment of 20,000 gold is nice, and the remaining Dark Brotherhood people request I use it to rebuild their guild and recognize me as leader. What idiots. How about I turn them in instead? Again not an option, so I leave them to rot with the corpse of their Night Mother and ignore her whispers in my head. They and the thieves guild can and should fade into oblivion for all I care.

One a side note, one guild that I felt was very under utilised was the Bard's College so it's good to see that the true bards like Malufenix didn't let that get in the way of them sharing their talents with the rest of us plebs. :D

Skyrim covers by Malufenix:
Dragonborn Comes
Age of Aggression