Calculating Elevation Layers

Analyzing the elevation changes
For this project, I took a section of the world that has a strip of elevation changes going from sea level up to the snow line. I started by adding a #1 in the first open area that could fit a number, near the lowest part of the shore.

I counted each step up until reaching the first snow area shown in the center zoom out view which looks bluish white among the darker hues.

My assumptions are that the greens are the lowlands; tans, highlands and hills, browns hills and mountains, bluish whites and whites are above the snow line, mountainous glaciers.

Assuming each layer is 100 feet, I found this progression of elevation which I wrote near the color name on the right side of the screen

Logo for Aioskoru, maybe.

This is a possible logo - font and style - for Aioskoru. Of course I made many colors. This is just one, just because I felt like a purple day for my hometown University of Washington Huskies win in the Cotton Bowl.

Aioskoru world with clouds and shading

Aioskoru planet

The fantasy world of Aioskoru, third planet with three moons in the solar system.

The immense skeleton, Hewhoshestes, floated in the endless dark void, small strands of decomposed flesh still rotting in the joints and sinew. 

From this remaining flesh, a few maggots emerged.

The more the maggots consumed the ancient death creator's flesh the more the power changed them. Instead of flies, they morphed and changed into the beings of power. They inched towards the right hand where the tiny orbs, slowly changing in form and substance.

The ancient skeleton in desperation, dipped a quill into a bottle with the ink of life. And then it began, upon the scroll, to create...

The solar system inner planets and Hewhoshestes mythology

Comparison of increasing map resolution: Old vs New method

Using the old methods which resulted in the 3D map in the lower right corner. One pixel equaled about 5 miles. The latest method extracted more information. The topography map above it is more detailed information showing and revealing details missed on the 3D map.

The upper right hill or mountain close up had showed up as one pixel. I didn't know the shape nor details. Now it shows a series of rings in a very specific shape and an unseen lake right next to it. The river seems to split into two at the base. The mountain/hill is actually pointed, which I  interpret as a column.

The lake on the next close up wasn't seen in the 3D map.

I can see the 'hidden valley in greater detail now. I see a good high ground to place buildings on, safe from any surging canyon water.

The new easier to see features using the higher detailed method has turned the huge map into showing details less than a mile in size. It's probably down to 10th's of a mile which is more like a football field in size, per pixel.

All of these were done using the same original map just different techniques.

Closer up terrain map

Using some new techniques to bring out an interpretation of a region.

Old Technique

These were the original ones that I had been using.

This one was my best one using the 3D method. Notice that only two depressions are shown along the upper northern shore. I have outlined in yellow dashes the area of the closer map. The only hills that can be seen are off of the map.

This was another version of the map, which I call the Bump map. It is a little more helpful but only on a large area scope.

New technique. I don't know the resolution of the elevation changes for this next technique. I am excited about it.

New Technique

I came across this technique accidentally, when trying some editing techniques on a different area of another map. When I saw what emerged, I was very pleased and excited.

The other way that I had found to bring out similar data did not show this degree of detail. This would all be flat using that other way. An early attempt showed too much chaotic information and was unusable.

This has my interpretation of hills from this region in sort of a semi-isometric type drawing, drawn in the water and numbered to corresponding areas on the map. The round areas that the rivers or streams pass through are most likely lakes

Map of Melos Region © Copyright 2015 by Ken Wickham

Using this new technique of revealing the fractal world map, I can actually see the smaller hills and pathways for smaller rivers.

The two indentations from the 3D map seem to be part of a series of depressions which I interpret as lakes joined by a river, which may even split into two.

I can see the the light blurred areas are hills, too small to register in the 3D map technique, probably under 1000 meters high. I am not sure how high each topography line is. 10, 25, 50, or 100 feet? 

Maybe. I will have to compute the actual amount by counting the rings up to the registered hill amount  and peak amounts in the world. How many rings equal one macro level elevation change using the old method.

Quick free world maps using GIMP filters and Donjon fractal maps - Part 1: Getting a fractal map

Quick free world maps using GIMP filters and Donjon fractal maps series:

Part 1: Getting a fractal map,

Part 2: Getting different types of maps,

Part 3: More accurate 3D maps with mountains,

Part 4: Zooming and resolution,

Part 5 Expanding the Zoom Limits.

Part 6: Quick outline maps

Available from Google Play Books.
https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Ken_N_Wickham_Quick_free_world_maps_using_GIMP_fil?id=tvZmDAAAQBAJ

Also available on Kindle and RPGNow
https://www.amazon.com/Quick-world-filters-Donjon-fractal-ebook/dp/B01H131XPY/

http://www.rpgnow.com/product/187006/Quick-free-world-maps-using-GIMP-filters-and-Donjon-fractal-maps


Through several blog postings, I will show the techniques and free tools that I used to generate maps for Aioskoru, I new world that me and a Rolemaster blogger Peter R are using to create an Open Gaming License (OGL) world for Rolemaster (RM, RM2, RMC, RMSS, RMFRP, RMX), HARP & HARP Lite, MERP, D20 SRD, and PFSRD primarily. It is a fan-based world, not affiliated with ICE, AA, or GPC. For more information on Aioskoru, you can see the site at https://sites.google.com/site/aioskoru/.

Quick way to get detailed world maps

Hours upon hours of map making, isn't something I wanted to invest my time doing. In this case, what my world looked like wasn't preconceived. I just wanted a neat looking world with interesting land forms. A little research, some ingenuity, and experimentation has helped me streamline world creating at least when speaking about skills and abilities.

The first step is you need the basic fractal map. 

Online Fractal Map Generator - Donjon

First, I went to http://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/world/. There a random world is shown.

Overview of settings for using the map generating page

Hitting the return key [enter] at any point will cause the map to begin to generate. When you enter data, it is best just to click on a blank area of the screen to and wait a moment to see the updates. If you generate a map, you can simply click on the back browser button to return to this screen.

1. #1 Record the seed number, since that will be important when trying to retrieve that same map and make additional maps. The seed number identifies your random map. If you return to the page and enter that seed number, your map will be shown, instead of a new random map. Clicking on #7 button will cause this value to change randomly as well as the #2 values.

2. #2 Percent (%) water and percent (%) ice will effect how much landmass is shown compared to water. For comparison, the Earth has 71% water and around 10% ice. During ice ages, the value can become closer to 30% ice. By hitting the random button #7 it changes both the water and ice values. You can type your own values, and click in any blank area to update, to see how it changes the map.

3 #3 Geography inserts a handful of terrain, climate, and biome icons on to the map. Mountains, hills, deserts, jungle, mixed forest, coniferous forest, desert, and grasslands. There are more public domain icons that can be added at a later time such as swamps, cactus, broken terrain, volcanoes, dunes, concentrated feature areas, and mixed feature areas, which I might show you in a different post. You can select either the default 'Yes' or change it to 'No' by using the drop down menu.

Rivers inserts major rivers - not all the possible rivers. These are your Amazon, Nile, Yangtze, Danube, Ganges, Mekong, Zambezi, Volga, Mississippi, and Sepik types of rivers. They should be considered major rivers, not the only rivers. At a later post, I will show you how you can find the other rivers using the terrain and simple logic. You can select either the default 'Yes' or change it to 'No' by using the drop down menu.

4. #4 Cities and Castles can add icons for cities and castles on the map. The icons are rather large. You can select either the default 'Yes' or change it to 'No' by using the drop down menu.

5. #5 Hex Grid will add hexes to the entire map, to be used for gaming purposes. Checking the box adds the hex grid to the map. You can uncheck the box to remove the grid.

Label Map adds randomized descriptive names to mountains, deserts, cites, castles, rivers, forests, and hills.

6. Button #6 Construct or simply hitting the return key [enter] will generate the map according to whatever settings you currently have. You can return to this screen, change the settings and resubmit the changes to generate altered setting maps. This feature is import in that when I generate maps,  I save several different versions of the world map, to be used in different situations.

7. #7 randomizes the settings for 1 and 2.

8. Although a name is randomly place here. You can add your own name, though this doesn't actually put the name on the map anywhere.

Building Aioskoru

Plain Map

First of all, I generate what I call the plain color map. This first map is probably the most important of all the maps to generate topography and terrain.

The settings I use to generate this type of map is geography: no, rivers: yes, cities & castles: no, hex grid: uncheck, label map: uncheck.

After generated, right click and save the map to a folder where you will be keeping all of your world maps. A folder dedicated to world maps for this world is ideal.

Aioskoru Plain Map

This map shows elevation of land from dark green to tan-yellowish, hills light brown to mountains brown. Whit is the snow capped peaks. In the water it goes from shallow light blue down to dark blue recesses of the oceans. The map should be 4000 pixels by 2000 pixes in dimension.

A small section of this map found in the left & right-hand sides that I will be using to show a close up is the lake found in the lower third along the border.

Ekouinmanus Kapos in Aioskoru

Also, at this point, save one with hex grid and geography. Be sure to name it something different. That will be used later.

Gray scale topography map

For this step, I will be using GIMP, which is free. You may have Photoshop, but this will focus on using GIMP. The latest GIMP can be found free at https://www.gimp.org/.

1. Opening your saved plain map using GIMP.

Creating layers using a gray scale Palette Map

On the main menu, go to Colors > Map > Palette Map

Aioskoru topographical gray-scale layer map

3. Save your map, I normally call it the ____ layer.

What you have now is a map that shows incremental elevation changes. A close up shows the difference.

Ekouinmanus Kapos close up of elevation topographical changes

If you compare especially the plain map and the layer map, you will see that this new layered map shows topographical changes better than the original plain. Everything that is the same color is at roughly the same elevation, except of course the rivers. The lakes may be somewhat higher, although I have noticed that the fractal map focuses on sea level lakes.

3D Terrain map

This next type will extrude the layers into levels. Mountains however, because the original plain map uses browns for mountains, they will be wrong. In another post, I will show how to correct the mountains to a greater degree. But for sea level up to hills, this method will be correct for 3d elevation changes. So ignore the mountains for now that result from this method.

1. Use your topography layer map that you created using the method above.

2. Go to Filters > Map > Bump Map

3. Make sure first that the Bump Map is the same map as your current map. When working with several maps, it may show another map as the bump map source.

 Elevation: I like at 1.5. Having it at 0.5 is too drastic for me.

 Depth: I like at 1

Azimuth changes which direction the sun is coming from.

Don't offset the bump map.

4. Save this map. I normally call it the 3D map.

Aioskoru 3D map, showing elevation changes

Here is the close up of Ekouinmanus Kapos.

Ekouinmanus Kapos 3D elevation map.

Remember that mountains higher than hills will be sunken and wrong because of the browns used, which can be corrected later.

I've been working on maps for Aioskoru.

Some is random, though controlled and deliberate. Some, like the castle on the raised ground and the docks or several other pieces were placed deliberately.

These maps may be used for Melos and Denusos for Aioskoru world shown at https://sites.google.com/site/aioskoru/

Using the fractal type tools.

These two maps are made avaialable as OGL maps in accordance to OGL v 1.0a

http://www.opengamingfoundation.org/ogl.html

OGL Maps of Melos and Denusos © Copyright 2015 by Ken Wickham

Finished again!
Made it to 50,000 words again my second year doing the contest. One of my short stories is not finished yet, so tomorrow I will try to finish it. Then it will sit for a month while I take a break from it. This weak, I may try to list the story topics to let you have a taste of what was created.

New possible title
My original title for the book may be changed to a more collection type title.

New experiences
With writing over for this NaNoWriMo 2015, I did learn a tremendous amount of experience this time doing a collection of short stories. 1) they are my first complete short stories. 2) Most of the stories only had a one sentence description written up. I also had a complete book structure skeleton, not based on any story, rather on unifying themes. The process was very unlike my detailed plan last year, where I had most every scene planned out in advance. 3) It was my first time trying to expand story information written in last year's Song and Fire and in the game started over the late Spring. 4) Music became more a motivator this year. YouTube epic and fantasy soundtracks played key in keeping me in the mood producing content. 5) I even threw in one fairy tale-like story which I made up on the fly.

First few days of NaNoWriMo

This year, I ended creating an outline with many holes.

That is unlike last year, where much of the story was planned and developed. However last year's story was something was several years in the making. Many ideas, thoughts, and creative juices went into that story.

This years story was undeveloped until a month before the contest.

In the last month, I had written about 5000 words of conceptual structures, character archetypes, drama interactions, and thematic discussions. But at the core of my planning, the story arc content was largely defined by just a dozen or so single sentences. This story would be more wide open and built more spontaneously.

1st day of NNWM was difficult. I largely took my 5000 word outline, some references from the last book, and only wrote 1000 words or so of new writing. That day was very difficult.

The 2nd day went very productive. Suddenly the main character and the antagonistic character seemed to be filled with life. I wrote 2000 words easily.

The 3rd day began agonizing. My head was sore and I didn't feel like writing. Later after noon, ending the day with well over 1700 words. Suddenly I am writing another new and fresh character which came from nowhere yet fits in perfectly.

Today is the 4rth day. It sucks. I have only written 753 words, mostly transitioning from the beginning of the story, the opening scenes, to an entirely new setting. This however makes myself disoriented - unsure of that new unfamiliar setting, different than the setting that had spent in the last few days. So much so, that I feel more comfortable writing this post, and writing something else earlier today.

I really hope that I can at least get more than 1000 before the night's end.

This writing year is an attempt to put into practice both the concepts that I had learned last year, and new ones that I developed in October, from three different books.

As of now I am a fifth way done, though my momentum is suffering.

Keep pushing on!

Ken

NaNoWriMo 2015 is just a month away.

If you have never tried to make your own novel in one month, why not try this November along with thousands of others.

http://nanowrimo.org/

October is the month that I will once again throw together my outline, create my characters, develop the plot and subplots.

I plan on writing a collection of prequel stories based in the same world, and also expanding the world somewhat.

Everything from the original arrival of people to Ea, to a massive cause of the Ice Age, to the final demon battle between Wiluwichi's father and the demon are slated for the collection of stories, which might make up the novel. Maybe a necromancer and elf storyline. Tetwa's defeat of the troll king. So far, I have written down 13 possible storylines.

Now is your time to write!

Ken Wickham

The last two months have been crazy with the death of my nephew on the 4rth by a drunk driver. RIP Jordan.

I've also been testing the new Rolemaster Universal (RMU) shortly after family came a visit. My testing continues, which has stopped any writing. I plan on continuing after the testing.

Fate Accelerated Story Gamebook - World of the Fifth Sun

Over the past few weeks, I have changed direction with my focus. For WotFS, I for the longest time wanted instead of reading all these rules to somehow incorporate game play with the reading of the rules. A few weeks ago, I toyed with the idea of using a basic rule-set in order to jump right into the story. My search lead me to FAE, Fate Accelerated. I might be able to use a limited number of those rules in order to realize my idea of game play included in character creation and story telling.

During my teens, I encountered Joe Dever's Lone Wolf Adventure Game, which took Choose-Your-Own-Adventure to a more exciting height. The rules were fairly simple, and the adventures were fun.

With FAE rules, I might be able to do this as well, a sort of simple adventure gamebook, where readers can choose their path, for solo gameplay.

Ken Wickham
Copyright © 2015

---

 You wake up this morning ready for the big day.

 In the wake of the big day, your stomach flutters, you slept uncomfortably, and uncertainly lies in front of you.

 From your bed, you stare at the ceiling. You can hear the world coming more alive outside. Birds are singing their morning songs. In the distance, rosters are crowing. A neighbor’s dog seems to be barking at something. You can smell the fresh breeze blowing the spring scented warm air up to the plateau. The world of Ea is coming increasingly alive, awake from the deep dark night.

 Ea, the World of the Fifth Sun, is a vast expansive world filled with great-blue oceans, high-majestic-mountainous peaks, rugged earthen hills, desolate-broad-sandy deserts, deep-green jungles, and white-frozen glacial lands. You have heard the legends from Tsum’il, the local story teller. Although you have only traveled at the greatest distance of up to three days journey into any direction, however Tsum’il’s legends bring alive distant lands, never before seen beasts, and strange cultures from far away places. He has always had a way with words, bringing mental images to life.You have also seen oceans and distant lands on recorded memories, kept on the memory trees.

 A few times you have heard Tsum’il tell of ancient times. Your ancestors, as legends reveal, were not of this world. They settled this world, one eventually reaching your village of Everwood.

 You decide to get up, stretch and yawn, your spine and shoulders popping, and you walk to the door. Opening the cloth cover on your home, you peer out into the early morning sky.

 To the right, the morning sky becoming lighter, and half of the sky is light, but half is still dark. You notice the light wispy clouds, indicating the weather being fair today. After a few breaths of air, and looking at the peaceful morning dawn, you head back in to prepare some food.

 You think back on your early childhood as far as you can remember on down to you current day life. What was your early childhood like? Did you live in a structured family, or were you adopted into a situation because of an early childhood event. What was your home life like? Did you grow up in a more important family, or struggle coming from a lower, unimportant family. Did you move to Everwood or did you grown up here?

 Record your background as your 4rth aspect - important or unimportant family - then read the one of the two following paragraphs that fits your family background. For more information, you can name now or later your family name. In this world, family names come from either what you do, or named after common paleolithic objects or creatures. Ex. Stonewolf, Skyspear, Fletcher, Healer, Tracker, Hunter, etc.. So you might write down, of the unimportant Stonewolf family, which moved here four years ago. Importance only limits how someone begins life, not where they end. So an unimportant family one generation might become important because of the acts of a character. Likewise, important families might crumble and produce unproductive offspring and become unimportant. In the tribe and clan society, value is based on importance to the group, rather than inheritance. 

 An aspect is a word, phrase, or sentence that describes something centrally important to your character.

 1 If from a important family read this. If not, read the next paragraph: You live in a cramped small adobe brick building that is nothing like the larger spacious adobe home you grew up in. The reddish adobe bricks keep the heat in during the winter, and the cold in during the hot summers. You crack open two of the windows, rolling up the woven window coverings. Your bed is a raised structure made from smoothed straight branches. Your bed is very comfortable. A nice soft skin creates a nice soft hay mattress. You make your bed and straighten your bedding furs. Skip the next paragraph and continue reading.

 2 If from a unimportant family read this. If you read the last paragraph, move on to the next paragraph. Like most of the people of Everwood, you live in a meager small wikiup structure. Although it is not much, at least it is your own home. It is made of bent tree limbs and small trees, covered with grass and evergreen branches. In the center, you can stand up fully, though around the edges the roof curves rapidly dome shape to the grown. You sleep along the back of the domed wikiup. You try to pile a nice amount of dried grass to help cushion yourself from the cold earthen floor. The center is where the fire pit is, a whole in the roof lets the smoke from the fire go outside. The coals from last night’s fire still smolder, pop, and glow. White ashes cover most of the fire pit. This wikiup has one window, which you roll up the woven window covering to allow the morning light in.

I've been slowly building the creature and encounter database. 21 encounters so far. Stats are subject to change as I try them out. Many are D20 SRD or PFSRD based. My main goal is to try having the main common creatures and encounters listed for the World of the Fifth Sun around the Sunland/Everwood area, which is sort of an alternate earth, set from 5k to 10k BC.

I have been piled up a little art and graphics.

The rules still are being revised and picked for a prototype which can be test played, which will be very much based on Fudge rules, with the personality, wound & power track which I mentioned in other posts.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2I_GEXbFycdWE9OdFM0Qmg1ZkU/view?usp=sharing

Everwood Guard Post

Everwood Guard Post

Sketched up a drawing from above of Everwood Guard Post. It is an adobe brick building, with wooden rafters serving to support the roof and upper floors. There are 3 floors in total, and external ladders are used to reach the upper floors. Smaller domed wikiup structures surround the sides and rear of the post, housing several soldiers each. Longer Long Houses store supplies. Several leafless trees can be seen, this drawing taken place in late fall, although a few evergreen trees can be seen. also a few bushes are scattered around. A distant mountain Tocha Tono can be seen beyond the edge of the plateau.

Here is the mountain that it is based on. The white is not snow. It is the color of the soil. You can also see the mountain in the Google Everwood satellite picture.

Introductory Mythology of World of the Fifth Sun

Introductory Mythology of World of the Fifth Sun 

The wars have been going on for millenniums. Whether gods, as many call them or some ancient galactic super race or species, the “gods” have battled each other long before they created Humans, a recent creation.

Around four different stars - or suns - Humans have lived on planets . Each resulted in the destruction of the world, causing the gods to move their creatures to another prepared world and different sun, and the fight moved along with each movement. 

Concerning the prior suns and worlds, much has been forgotten. Humans, short lived and less willing to record details, only have snippets in the form of legends and mythological stories. 

During each world destruction, the gods moved their surviving creatures in great ‘Sky Birds’. 

This fifth star, the Sun, is called ‘Sol’. 

The chosen races of the gods were sent to Ea, the third planet circling Sol. 

Sky Birds landed scattered strategically across this world, dropping off the races in key areas, for each of the gods. Several continents serve as war grounds. 

Although at a disadvantage in the prior four stars, at this world - Ea - Humans will thrive.

Ken Wickham

Conceptual Sketches from the Story World

Conceptual Sketchs
Did this the last few days. A conceptual drawing from the story world of the three main characters.

(Front) Tetwatoko - strong warrior in training, (Back left) Wiluwichi - emotional musician in training, (Back right) Tsum'il - old Orator, Story  Teller, and Wood Worker.

This story is the origin of the idea for the World of the Fifth Sun.

Everwood aerial Main City map modifying a Google Map to appear more like my vision.

Main Battle plateau Fire Demon in front of enemy camp.

Beta Character Sheet

I hammered out a prototype character sheet for the game the last few weeks. The rules I am still working on.

I will test it out a bit.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2I_GEXbFycdSFUzS0sxYjIyRkU/view?usp=sharing

Spent some time learning some border skills to use in the future. If you want to see what I learned today, check out my WPS Writer border creation page.

http://worldofthefifthsun.blogspot.com/p/i-played-around-with-border-creation.html

Personality Traits

Personality Traits
In this game, I will present the Big Five Personality Traits as describing characters in five dimensions. Many people use the other popular Personality Trait model that has four traits, which is becoming less popular and is under copyright. Big Five is under Public Domain.

Personality Traits are assigned levels similar to traits focusing on from Superb to Terrible. They are assigned according to how the player wants the character to react and act. I present also an option to limit the levels assigned. GM always has final say.

The negative and positive don’t mean anything except depending on the polarity of the situation. If you are neutral, you wont receive a bonus nor penalty for your personality for the situation.

These traits may will either help the GM decide who controls a situation or provide bonuses or penalties for situation rolls, accounting your personality rather than attributes. The positive and negatives may be reverse based on the situation.

Example: A character has Great Conscientiousness. A character is in a situation were someone wants the character to do something spontaneous. If it was a conscientious situation requiring organization or duty, they would have received a Good or +2 to a situation roll. In this case, spontaneity is required, so they receive a Poor Spontaneity or a -2 as a reversal type roll.

Here is how it looks on my character sheet

The acronym OCEAN can be used to remember the five dimensions of personality. Personality affects how characters see the world and interpret what they see. It presents how they basically react to events and conflicts.

O - Openness to Experience [Ideas & Experiences]: On the positive side is inventiveness, creativity, artistic nature, imagination, independence, adventurous spirit, curiosity, and preference to change, variety, and novelty. At an extreme a person becomes liberal, rebel, and anti-authoritarian.

On the negative side is conscientious, consistency, conventional, traditional, plain, straightforward, obvious, and stick to familiarity and resist change. At an extreme, a person endorse authoritarian, ethnocentric and prejudiced views.

C - Conscientiousness [Rules & Laws]: On the positive side is organized, efficient, dependable, dutiful, have self-discipline, focus on achievement against goals or expectations, prepares, pays attention to details, likes order. At an extreme are perfectionist, workaholics, and compulsive.

On the negative side is easy going, carefree, spontaneous, misplaces items, leaves stuff around, and doesn’t like duties. At an extreme level the person becomes antisocial and maybe criminal.

E - Extroversion [Energy & Activity]: On the positive side is outgoing, energetic, positive emotions, assertive, social, talkative, seeks to be with others, breadth of activities, enthusiastic, action-oriented, center of attention, life of the party, and starts conversations with many different people.

On the negative side is introverts, reserved, solitary, less energy, quiet, low key, deliberate, less involved in the social world, like to be alone, things before they talk, doesn’t draw attention - not necessarily anti-social or shy -  rather more reserved and controlled expressively.

A - Agreeableness [Social & Helping]: On the positive side is compassionate, friendly, cooperative, trusting, helpful, gets along, kind, generous, compromises self interest for others interests, and is optimistic of human nature. In the extreme, they would sacrifice oneself for others.

On the negative side is disagreeable, analytical, detached, suspicious, antagonist, self-interest, unconcerned with others, skeptical, and uncooperative. In the extreme they would only care for oneself, even if they could help others, even close friends.

N - Neuroticism [Emotional & Tension]: On the positive side is sensitive, nervous, insecure, moody, upset, tense, emotional (anger, anxiety, depression, and vulnerable), emotionally unstable, low tolerance for stress, reactive, experiences many negative emotions.

On the negative side is confident, secure, emotionally stable, relaxed, less upset, calm, experiences positive emotions.

Option for assigning Personality Traits
Dominant Personality Trait: Only one of the five can be either Superb or Terrible, giving a +/- 3 to rolls depending on the situation.

Primary Personality Traits: Two of the five can be Great or Poor, giving a +/- 2 to rolls depending on the situation.

Secondary Personality Traits: The other two of the five can be either Good, Fair, or Mediocre, giving a +/- 1 or 0 to rolls.

Other option
The player can choose to demote any of these to a lower level towards zero, or do all of them at Fair. This would make things a little more dull and lease interesting in different situations.

For example: you could just have one Superb/Terrible, one Great, and the rest secondary Personality Traits.

Example of Personality Trait Creation:
A player is creating a character Tsuka as a tactical planning type person. When plans don’t go well or people don’t follow good plans, he has the tendency to explode and become emotional, yelling at people, not always politely.

Choosing Conscientious as Tsuka’s  Dominant Personality Trait, he assigns at Superb, since the positive side is for planning and organizing. As primary Personality Traits, he assigns Extroversion and Neuroticism both at Great. This is because he gets his energy by being in a crowd of people, yet becomes emotionally unstable very easy, when provoked by lack of order or following directions, normally openly expressing his opinion. As secondary Personality Traits, he puts Agreeableness and Openness at Mediocre. This is because he becomes slightly antagonist, skeptical, and uncooperative, easily vocalizing and expressing his emotions, unless others are following his plans, tactics, or strategy. He is slightly closed to new ideas, unless they make tactical, strategic, or methodical sense.

Most actions and reactions can be resolved logically by a GM without any roll just by comparing personalities. Whoever has the needed trait the highest normally get their way, unless challenged. If challenged, stressed, opposed, or up against something, you can easily turn the personality levels into a roll.

The assigned personality traits can be used with Situation rolls which are unopposed or in opposed situations where the rolls become Social Combat. Skills, Gifts, and Faults related can modify rolls, as well as environmental or situation factors.

Example: Tsuka would less likely explode in a religious area, or near a superior leader. He would be biting his tongue most likely, then would explode later, on some unsuspecting target.

Personality Situation Modifiers (GM Determined)
Superb Beneficial +3
Great Beneficial +2
Good Beneficial +1
Fair (no beneficial nor opposition) 0
Mediocre Disadvantage -1
Poor Disadvantage -2
Terrible Disadvantage -3

Example: The GM might say that being in a situation such as a religious area or near superior leader might be causing a Terrible Disadvantage (Maybe even Impossible) to Tsuka's Neuroticism emotional situation and his tendency to externalize via Extroversion his emotions.

Ken Wickham 3-19-2015

Exploring into RPG engine source documents

During NaNoWriMo, I created a world in ancient America, full of fantasy, creatures, and powers. While I continue to edit the story of Song and Fire, I will also look into game systems that can support playing a RPG within the world.

Fudge is one possible system that is easier than most, and would be able it seems, to be molded to whatever aspects I would need or want.

http://www.fudgerpg.com/

I posted a few postings in the community forum announcing my exploration.

http://www.fudgerpg.com/community/forums/topic.html?id=202&p=1271#p1271

Now to learn the system, and explore possibilities.

Ken Wickham