Book Structure - the ordering of chapters

[Mark Stahl]

I spent the last weekend looking through countless books (personally owned, and store owned) because I am having trouble deciding on the chapter structure for my current project. It seems that author preferences largely vary.  I should clarify that I am not necessarily speaking about individual chapters and their structure; I am debating on the chronological order each chapter should take in the context of the entire book.

I still can't decided and I thought, after reading countless posts on this site, that I should become an equally active writer.  

So I would like to ask this cauldron of experience what has worked for them in the past, their personal preferences (both as a gamer, and as a publisher), what has been noticed giving demos, or anything things that little mice may have told them.

Thank you everyone, in advance, for any advice. And thank you to the administrators and moderators of The Forge forums for providing us with a campfire to tell our stories and experiences.

Best regards,

MJ Stahl

[Allan]

Welcome to the Forge, mjstahl!  It's great, they know everything here.  
So, chapter structure:

1. Examples of play, or short fiction.  This is to grab the player picking up the book for the first time.
2. Setting.  Establish terminology of the game world.
3. Rules.  Use the world terminology to define system terminology.
4. Character creation, then any other info for players.  
5. Info for the GM should be your last section,
6. possibly followed by anything you want easily accessible at the back of the book.  

That's my own preference, backed up by some comments from players.  My first edition of Sweet Dreams was structured poorly and players were confused.  For the current edition, I used the outline above, and it's working well.

[Grand_Commander13]

Personally, I'd put Character Creation before the rules.  It doesn't do you any good to know how many special attacks and spells you can use in a round of combat if you don't know how you get them or which ones there are.  Personal preference, really, but it just feels like it starts at the smallest part (your character) and expands outwards (how he interacts with the world) when you do it that way.

[Simon Marks]

It is important to note, however, that character creation - once out of the way - is rarely needed during the course of play.

Essentially, you have to also look at it's ease of use. As such I would suggest character creation goes to the back - easy to find but doesn't clutter the rule book up.

[timfire]

I know that DnD 3.5 rearrange some information to make the book more useable. What I heard was that they moved the sections they thought were getting used the most either to the front or the back of the book, so that players wouldn't have to flip so much. That might be a concern for large books, but I don't know if its such a big deal for little books.

I think there are multiple reasons for setting up the chapter structure, based on what the author wants to do. So you're not going to get a blanket answer. This is how I'm organizing The Mountain Witch:

1. Introduction (summary of genre and summary of play)
2. Resolution
3. Chargen
4. The Adventure (setting + monsters)
5. Playing the Game

My reasoning for putting Resolution before Chargen was that certain aspects of Chargen (Zodiacs, Abilities, and Fates) only make sense after the reader has an understanding of Resolution (& the Trust system).

"Playing the Game" is the conclustion of the book, its where I put together all the pieces. So naturally that was put at the end.

With those concerns in mind, you can see why I structured the book like I did. But other people might structure their books differently.

[Ron Edwards]

Whoa, whoa, folks. This is not helping.

A whole ton of "well, I think" or "what I like" posts will be completely counter-productive.

MJ, I suggest instead that you recognize an important thing: no one knows what chapter structure works best for a role-playing game. The good news is that there certainly is one best chapter structure for yours.

What you need to do is consider how this book will be used. Is it primarily for reading pleasure, as in, the owner spends hours enjoying reading it, maybe months, and occasionally imagines playing it? Or is it primarily as a user manual to be consulted during play?

Is one person basically expected to be the reader, or is it something that ought to be passed around among a group before they begin to play?

And similar questions, which you can make up or maybe others can contribute.

By answering these questions, you will find that the necessary chapter structure will jump out at you as the only and obvious way to do it, for your game.

Best,
Ron

[MatrixGamer]

After you've done Ron's thought experiment and writen a book, do some experimenting. Hand it off to cold readers and listen to what they say about it. Individuals may not be experts but they are pretty good at spotting errors. You don't have to get this perfect the first time out. Give yourself development time and play testing. It pays off in the long run.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

[Mark Stahl]

What you need to do is consider how this book will be used. Is it primarily for reading pleasure, as in, the owner spends hours enjoying reading it, maybe months, and occasionally imagines playing it? Or is it primarily as a user manual to be consulted during play?

Thank you everyone for your replies. I'm sorry I haven't replied sooner, but to be honest I didn't expect anyone to reply so quickly. So I will say it again, thank you.

What is important to me about the structure, is what is important to me as a player. I am a customer first, and a designer second. Although I do admit my tastes differ from the 'mass' market.

To be honest, I don't think I have every read an RPG book cover-to-cover. They always felt like text books to me. I can't say at this moment if my writing will end up the same way, but I do know that topics of greater interest need to be easily accesible. Rules, spell lists, race/class information need to be in the front or back of the book.

This is especially important because the game atomsphere is equally suited to a sit-down and live-action environment. I know from playing many live-action games that I don't want to spend time looking for rules (due to time constraints -- you don't want to loose the mood) where this may be more acceptable within a sit-down environment.

So I guess my plan of action is to decided what I feel will be accessed more times than the other sections. Place those sections in areas that are easily accesible, and provide a fantastic index for other areas the player might be interested in.

Regards,

MJ

[MatrixGamer]

This sounds like s olid plan of action. Try putting it together and then set it aside for a few days. Then pick it up and see if you can find the information you are looking for easily. If you can't no one else can either!

Simple imperical tests like this - and of course handing it to somebody who has not seen the book in a while and asking them to find the answer to a question, let you know if your communication is working.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

1950's cartoon caption "I don't care if I understand pragmatism as long as I can pass the test."