2008/11/25

Need Inspiration : Look Here

The page is staring at me, it's emptiness taunting me, freezing my creative juices and dooming me to another lost hour of "Not Writing". Yes, I often suffer from blank page syndrome (a.k.a) writers block. If I move away from the computer and consult with my oracle (a.k.a. my cat Mindy) I have dozens of ideas. Then when I return to the evil blank page, I freeze. One of the best way I have found to get around it is to use a random generator to give me a starting place.

A quick "cut and paste" stab and the blank page monster is gone, and I can move forward.

Sometimes a less "gaming specific" source of inspiration is more useful to jump start my creativity, to prevent me from settling into the standard Tavern/Clearing in the Woods/Dungeon tropes. These links are good for finding new ideas, though they may take more effort on your part to turn the ideas into something "game-able".

Finally there are (GASP) "non-digital" methods of finding inspiration:
  1. Open the Monster Manual and flip to a random monster, this will be the "Villian" of the adventure. (I got Goblin Hexer)
  2. Grab a book (even non gaming) and flip to a random page, the middle paragraph indicates what the plot or focus of the adventure. (It was a pragmatic choice).
  3. Grab a Campaign Setting or Adventure, either one of your own or a published one and reuse the map contained with in, but rotate it 90 degrees.
  4. Start writing.
Grab a foreign language dictionary (I like Latin) and flip find two random words and note their meanings use that as a title for the next adventure.

Also you can just start writing what ever gibberish comes to mind. What you write may not be game related in any way but at least the blank page monster is dead.

Snork

2 comments:

  1. Good stuff!

    I've also found that, ironically, the best cure for a blank screen is.... a blank screen. An editor such as Q10 or Writeroom which provides a completely distraction-free writing environment is a sure-fire way to keep the words flowing. I can't recommend Q10 highly enough - it's a superb cure for writer's block :D

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  2. Q10: Good lead, the default black background is reasonably nice and doesn't look like a "blank page". It should be a great tool for free writing, back story and such, though I am not certain how well it will work for "game writing" or blogging as they tend to be more layout intensive.

    Thanks for reading,
    Snork

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