Quote from: JohnnyWannabe;224043I always read snatches of something inspiring. In the case of Boomtown, I revisited Arthur Gelb's "City Room" time and again. I never tried physical exercise as a stimulant, but I should

Taking a walk outside is the best, especially in a park or rural area, you get more sensory stimuli that way.

But I've gotten a spark when heading toward a deadline by just running in place for 10 minutes.

Blood to the brain maybe? Who knows. I have no idea WHY any of this works unfortunately.

Quote from: RPGObjects_chuck;224137Taking a walk outside is the best, especially in a park or rural area, you get more sensory stimuli that way.

But I've gotten a spark when heading toward a deadline by just running in place for 10 minutes.

Blood to the brain maybe? Who knows. I have no idea WHY any of this works unfortunately.

I walk a lot, too - in the woods. There may be something in that...

-clash

Play more.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;224149Play more.

Agreed! Nothing better for what ails you.

-clash

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;224149Play more.

Yep, I wish I could. I need to scrounge up more players.

Quote from: JohnnyWannabe;223776Lately, I've been struggling to give a fairy's fart when it comes to RPG writing. I write in dribs and drabs, a hundred words here and a hundred words there, but nothing prolific. I start off raring to go but then I just lose interest.

I think there a number of factors conspiring against me:

So, what is the secret? A lot of great designers post on this forum. What's your advice? How do you guys get the spark back?

I'm asking these questions because I am working on some great projects and I really want to soldier on and complete them. More importantly, I want to be excited while I do so.

Thanks in advance for any input.

Hmmm... A few workshops at a local convention. There's nothing better than getting together with a few other adventure designers and bouncing a few ideas around and taking some notes.

Pick a rules and mechanics light game to work with. Either that, or buy or write some software that can run the mechanics of the game seamlessley in the background. I use Roleplaying Master available last time I looked as a free trial on Enworld. Hands down it's the best $25 I spent in the last half a decade to support 3e, d20, or OGL games.

Great adventures come from drama. Drama comes from conflict, and contrary to what others say, Not writing for awhile may be the best thing for you. I have sometimes went for years not writing anything new but filling out a character sheet, and actually playing a few games instead of running them.

The characters have several major sources of conflict:
Player vs. Player
Player vs. Monster
Player vs. NPC
Player vs. The Environment
Player vs. Themselves

See how many times I use the word Player, when in comes to conflict?

Hang your storyline on just a few key points of conflict. Write up just a few salient details on each conflict, then throw them conflicts out in to the environment of your gameworld and let your players wrestle with them or dodge them as they choose.

Don't worry too much about filling in all the details on your gameworld or adventures, just keep a notepad handy at the gaming table when your players do.

Hint: They should be doing a bit more of the detail work. When you and they both come up with something good, The synergy will be there, then you'll be inspired to be prolific, and the play prep won't seem like work anymore.

Quote from: JohnnyWannabe;2237764. The mechanics bog me down. While I enjoy writing setting material, I realize the setting material has to be hung on a mechanic, and mechanics are like science and math rolled into one. Unfortunately, both those subjects bore me.

A couple of suggestions for this point in particular:

i) Do a setting and make it systemless, or for an existing game.

ii) Do a set of rules to allow a kind of play that aren't covered by the rules of a given game - for example, 'Star-Crossed Lovers: Romantic Tragedy for Traveller'.

iii) Get Risus or Fudge, which give you the basic mechanics but don't give you a setting or skills, and write a setting and an appropriate list of skills for it.

In my experience, for what it's worth...

1) Play regularly.  

2) Write stuff about RPGs regularly, even if it's just forum stuff.

The first one matters more than the second one, in terms of writing things that hold together in the face of play.  Which is a huge damn deal.

The second one is about practice, practice, practice.  Never, ever stop working on your stuff.  Writing eventually stops being work, stops being play, and just becomes automatic; you have an idea, you put it down.  I go through about a hundred sheets of paper a month just jotting stuff down on my clipboard, and at least half of it is gaming.

This is all excellent advice guys. I'm taking notes and will certainly apply many of the suggestions to my RPG projects. When it comes to writing for the day job, I'm never short for words. Now, I need to apply that energy and your suggestions to my RPG writing. This thread has inspired me to get back to it and I'm happy to report that I'm making some significant headway on a few things that I've let bubble for far too long. Clash, expect TS-Complete within the next two months (I'm projecting a mid-September publication date, barring any layout hiccups).

Quote from: JohnnyWannabe;225186This is all excellent advice guys. I'm taking notes and will certainly apply many of the suggestions to my RPG projects. When it comes to writing for the day job, I'm never short for words. Now, I need to apply that energy and your suggestions to my RPG writing. This thread has inspired me to get back to it and I'm happy to report that I'm making some significant headway on a few things that I've let bubble for far too long. Clash, expect TS-Complete within the next two months (I'm projecting a mid-September publication date, barring any layout hiccups).

A  W  E  S  O  M  E  !  !  !  !  !

-clash

Actually, every time I am against writing on game material (and I have the time and not uberstressed at work), I go to a special shelf on my bookshelf. It is here that I have games that really do not deserve to be published, they are just that bad IMO and they might of murdered a really good idea.. (probably while it was sleeping too).  I read them. I get enranged (go green). And strangely enough I can pump out more material. (HULK TYPE!).

I get flashes of ideas that I put a bit onto paper and then forget about. But with that first part written down, I occasionally mull over how to make them work.

I like games with a strong theme.

My 24 hour RPG was called AssassinX - it me being angry and wanting a game that was just about killing people. By the 12 hour mark my anger was drained and I was thinking of something more along the lines of Grosse Point Blank.

In turn, that thought process lead me to Mr and Mrs Smith, and that turned into a game idea I haven't done anything with yet called "Gunboy loves Gungirl - the RPG of romantic firefights". Nearly two years after creating a basic layout concept and style for the game, I had a flash of inspiration about two months ago for a game system for it, totally scrapping my original idea.

Quote from: MoonHunter;226392Actually, every time I am against writing on game material (and I have the time and not uberstressed at work), I go to a special shelf on my bookshelf. It is here that I have games that really do not deserve to be published, they are just that bad IMO and they might of murdered a really good idea.. (probably while it was sleeping too).  I read them. I get enranged (go green). And strangely enough I can pump out more material. (HULK TYPE!).

Haha! Good one. Unfortunately, I've purged by bookshelf of all the rubbish on it.

Quote from: The HellHound 101;227198In turn, that thought process lead me to Mr and Mrs Smith, and that turned into a game idea I haven't done anything with yet called "Gunboy loves Gungirl - the RPG of romantic firefights". Nearly two years after creating a basic layout concept and style for the game, I had a flash of inspiration about two months ago for a game system for it, totally scrapping my original idea.

Sounds excellent! Is it going to be a western RPG, or modern?

I feel your pain, man.  

Honestly the biggest hamper on it is just that I find game design pretty damn tedious.  Oh sure, some basic system monkeying is fun every now and again, and main concepts I can do alright, but when it comes to the nitty gritty of lists and more detailed rules and things like that, frankly, I start wanting to drill holes in my brain for excitement.  

I'm the same way when reading or playing a game, really, read through the basic concepts, skip anything that's a list or special case rules, and just reference that stuff in play.  It's not that I don't like it being there, it's just that reading through it all in it's entirety is tedious and dull, and when designing a game, you take that tedium to a whole new level because now you have to actually write this shit.

It lends me a considerably greater understanding of the appeal of the "Storygame" design philosophy, because it takes a hell of a lot less effort to slap out a couple primitive die mechanics and a rambling diatribe or two, than it does to create the kind of robust, traditional game I actually enjoy.  

I'd ditch it all and take my worlds to fiction, but truth be told, I'm not much of a story writer.  In fact, I pretty much suck at it, which is why until this board introduced me to the whole Wilderlands/sandbox approach I had little interest in GMing.  

End result is what writing I've done lately has mostly been food stuff and typical half-assed "games journalism" stuff.