Hey all.
A week or so ago, while working on collating a bunch of my static gaming pages into a single wiki (PMWiki, since you asked) and also reading something really useful for Sorcerer here on the Forge, I thought "Hmm, I want to save that.", so I made a new "Sorcerer" group in the wiki and paraphrased the entry in there.
Things kind of snowballed from there. As I started gathering other little rules bits and errata and rulings from various posts and sticking them in where I could find them a bit more easily later, I went kinda OCD.
I'm better now. (Mostly because I feel like the little project is reasonably complete, at least for a first-pass.)
Anyway, the (not final) result is, IMO, pretty useful and relatively complete so far as my weak-ass Forge-search-fu can determine.
I hereby invite you to check it out, improve it, add to it, flame it... whatever.
http://random.average-bear.com/pmwiki.php/Sorcerer/HomePage
Just fergawdsakes don't delete the damn thing -- it was a hell of a lot of work.
Unspeakably nervous about this particular post; please take it easy on me.
You rock. Thank you!
This is something I've always thought about Sorcerer needing, but never had the time or dedication for myself.
A quick gander... it looks very handy to me. I've seen many of the clarifications, but having them carefully compiled is nice.
When I read ranged, I though that you might have overlooked the whole meters thing, but that's listed under the general "demon powers". Perhaps link back to to that general power for the stuff that's listed with specific units? Also there's a Clinton link at the bottom of trading humanity that I was tempted to remove, but thought that you might have there for a reason.
Thanks for your efforts, the pages will be handy.
--Scott
Quote from: ScottMWhen I read ranged, I though that you might have overlooked the whole meters thing, but that's listed under the general "demon powers". Perhaps link back to to that general power for the stuff that's listed with specific units? Also there's a Clinton link at the bottom of trading humanity that I was tempted to remove, but thought that you might have there for a reason.
Added a note to the Ranged page.
The Clinton link was there simply to attribute the quote it followed, since it essentially a direct quote.
Glad folks see a use for it. I'm going to go ice my mouse-hand. :)
Hello,
I am astounded. Doyce, you have done a fantastic thing. it might take a day or so, but I'll make an announcement and a big plug for this at the Sorcerer website.
Best,
Ron
Wow. You just completely removed the need for me to continue working on this document I've slaved over for the last month.
Now, do I kill you, or kiss you?
Okay, actually, that's overly dramatic. You've removed the need for me to continue working on this document with the aim of posting it for the edification of others. I still need to do it for my own benefit, and for my players. But I'm under less pressure now. And doubtless your wiki will make it easier for me to finish. So...
Smooches coming your way =*
***EDIT***
Ye gawds... that's just creepy. Since my Sorcerer for Dummies / Quickref document has taken shape in large part based on my and others' queries here, often taking text directly from posts here; and your Wiki has done essentially the same thing... they actually are frighteningly similar. Especially since I've asked most of the recent questions... much of the text under first few headings I read mimics text under headings in my document almost word for word. Heh. Go figure.
No concern over it, it just caught me off guard and was kind of funny/wierd.
When I'm doneish I probably will end up posting what I've got, for approval / final editing, and then if you want to take it and wikify it for everyone to use, that would actually save me a lot of trouble. So yay for teamwork ^_^
*******
This thing rocks.
It is like all of the times I have re-read Sorcerer and prowled the Adept Press Forum looking for an answer, all bound up in one document.
Nice.
Wow! That's fantastic. I'll definately be adding to it in the near future.
yay for teamwork indeed! I'm sure you've covered the few posts I've got bookmarked, I'll have a closer look when I have more time after mid-June
doyce, how keen or unkeen are you for others to contribute to this?
nev, depending on that answer I'd say this truly is a perfect opportunity for teamwork - I'm not familiar with PmWiki specifically, but XHTML can be tweaked for print if that was your goal
ron, tangentally, I've been meaning to suggest that "wiki" get added to the glossary - while it isn't Forge Jargon per se, it's a web tool that Forgites have been using very effectively for stuff-about-roleplaying (this instance) and Actual Play (TUA, obviously) and occasionally people don't know what it's about (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11142) - just a thought
doyce, this rocks!
Quote from: kwilldoyce, how keen or unkeen are you for others to contribute to this?
I'm very open to it, provided everyone respects everyone else's work and acknowledges the goal of the thing, which is to compile clarifications and explanations of aspects of the game, not to create an online copy of the Sorcerer text :)
Quote from: kwillnev, depending on that answer I'd say this truly is a perfect opportunity for teamwork - I'm not familiar with PmWiki specifically, but XHTML can be tweaked for print if that was your goal
Actually, PMWiki has a very nice 'print this page' button that switches your view to a good view for printing stuff out. All in all it's one of the best easy-install, easy-customize wiki tools out there.
Quote from: kwilldoyce, this rocks!
Thank you, and thanks to the other folks who've recently expressed similar sentiment -- it reaffirms that I'm better suited for Actual Play and game system forums :)
Maybe I didn't say it outright, but I do really dig what you've done. Reading back over my posts I kind of sound whiny, which wasn't really my intention. So, in case it wasn't clear, Good Job, Man!! ^_^
And I must say, that's the finest looking Wiki I've ever seen... very clean and concise and stylistically coherent. Nice job!
Thanks, Nev!
I also have to point out that some folks have already stepped in and made some quality additions to some of the pages... a tweak here, an addition there... all of it the sort of stuff that really helps start to tie together the whole. Great stuff.
Doyce:
Wow. This rules. Seriously.
doyce,
one suggestion so far - most of the pages are just "rulings" without reference to a particular source; I would suggest that including a link reference to the Forge thread/s where the ruling came up (or alternate sources, though I can't think of any other types offhand) would be useful
obviously this shouldn't overpower the utility of the wiki, which is to provide the end-product, the ruling itself, but a reference basically provides a context for the ruling
am I looking at this the wrong way?
Quote from: kwillone suggestion so far - most of the pages are just "rulings" without reference to a particular source
am I looking at this the wrong way?
I don't think it's 'wrong' at all -- it's a different design goal than what I set out with -- I saw a danger that, by providing links, I'd be tempted to not provide the meat of the actual ruling in the wiki itself. Links rot, the internet changes, et cetera, and I didn't want to rely on it at all.
While the Forge is invaluable and certainly the source of 90% of the conversations that provided these rulings, I didn't want to make the wiki reliant on the Forge to illustrate the rulings.
In essence, I was building a Sorcerer Errata/Ruling page. That's the whole of it's context.
Hello,
I love the whole page and the whole idea, so please don't read the following as disapproval.
What does concern me is that my and others' words are being used without credit. I recognize that the whole idea of a Wiki challenges the notion of single authorship, but the fact remains that I'm basically being ... well, quoted, and when I'm quoted, I want people to know it's me.
Any solution?
Best,
Ron
There's a couple spots in the wiki where the text is pretty much a straight quote (from you or Clinton or whomever), and in those instances I made a point of attributing it. In the cases where that's clearly the case, I can do that consistently.
The problem I ran/run into was when I was taking a sentence from post 1, a sentence from post 2, a paragraph from post three, and another sentence from post 4 and re-editing it into a single-voice thing from four different authors. How to attribute it?
In a sense, it's easy to say in the footer 'a lot of this = Ron's words', but then some of it isn't, and some of it's my reinterpretation of those words, and that then lends unfair weight to stuff that doesn't deserve it.
The easiest thing I can think of in those instances is to create a link at the bottom of such an entry that would look like this: source material here (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?p=120216#120216). Would that work? (Certainly, it would *be* work, but I do want to give credit to the folks that generated the discussion to begin with.)
**edit**
An example of the last suggestion would be what I did here: http://random.average-bear.com/pmwiki.php/Sorcerer/BonusDice
Yeah, I like that. Makes sense, and doesn't distract from the basic utility of the site entries themselves.
Best,
Ron
Cool, I'll do that.
Okay, the citations are up for everything I could find. (There's perhaps less than a half-dozen that are too paraphrased or concatenated to cite and about the same number that I was just writing as a note to myself. Other than that, we're good.)
For the record, I don't care about credit. Quote my posts in whole or in part all you like, as long as the info is correct, I'm happy. Feel free to not worry your pretty little head about acknowledging me. ^_^
but yeah, that link thing seems simplest, even if it means you have to leave two or three links for entries where you had to glean from multiple threads.
Lots of recent wikifiable posts... you keeping up okay? ^_^
Quote from: Nev the DerangedLots of recent wikifiable posts... you keeping up okay? ^_^
I... think I am, but if you've got any that you want to specifically draw my attention to, post them up here to PM links to me and I'll definitely double check.
Just a note for folks that use news aggregators: I've added an RSS feed for the Sorcerer rules collection that displays changes and updates to the site. http://random.average-bear.com/Sorcerer/RecentChanges?action=rss
Quote from: Doyce
I... think I am, but if you've got any that you want to specifically draw my attention to, post them up here to PM links to me and I'll definitely double check.
The wiki page is one hell of a resource. I know it's first and foremost a rules and errata collection, but I think stuff like how you play it and especially how you prepare play should be there as well. I am thinking in particular about the Art-Deco "how-to" campaign. I know it's old, but judging from the response it got at the time and my own reading of it, it would be really nice with a digested version. Any newcomer to Sorcerer would benefit hugely from the insights it provides.
But that's just me, I don't know what you guys say?
Per