In-Character Journals [Archive] - Wizards Community

In-Character Journals [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Siduakal
02-26-05, 12:41 AM Has anyone ever done one of these? Another player in our campaign suggested that since I'm fairly new, that I consider doing one to help develop and flesh out my character.

Think this would be a good idea?

I'm already planning to write out several things from his past.. Including a complete time line of what he did during the Last War(In the years he was able to fight, atleast).. And what he did since it ended. And then later writing out full battles for many of those things. Including the one he faced his own father in.
Ayers
02-26-05, 01:05 AM I've done this once. I had a lot of fun doing it, and my DM loved it. Of course I never put any real history into the journal, the journal seemed to have started when the campaign did. However, I think it's a great idea attempting to put some background into your journal.

So really in my opinion I think that yes, this is a good idea. I am unsure of how you are going to detail the last war battles your character was in. It seems as though it will be a daunting task, unless you only focused on a small portion of the battle, probably the area that your character was involved in. Unless of course your character was a captain or general of some sort standing at the back overseeing the battle progress. But I doubt that would be overly interesting.
Okami
02-26-05, 01:07 AM It's a great habit to get into, and a decision you will not regret. Hopefully your venture fares better than mine.. I have many half used notebooks of partial character journals but i'm not the best girl to judge by. Attention span of a spastic gnat.
ORC_Paradox
02-26-05, 11:39 AM I do this with every campaign I play in since I saw the idea from Earthdawn so many years ago.

My current journal will be uploaded to my web page soon. (With footnotes!)
Cairn Stone
02-26-05, 12:13 PM Most people in our gaming circle write character journals (often for xp). These usually range from in character accounts of a session's events, to additional backstory events and information. Sometimes they are in character correspondence to NPCs or something like that.

I think they are an excellent idea to enrich the game, but if you do reward players for writing these with XP, be careful that it does not get abused. In recent games, some in our gaming group have written well over fifty pages of journals/backstory. On the up side of this, the characters they play have a lot of depth, on the downside...they have shot ahead of other characters in the party due to xp rewards for their journaling.

Ways to avoid that problem could be to limit how much xp received from journaling can be immediately cashed in and put toward leveling. Perhaps you could donate the xp to an item creation pool for the character or the party. Any other thoughts or suggestions on that?
Chiba_Monkey
02-26-05, 03:04 PM Anything that helps a player develop his/her character and roleplay better has to be a good thing. I had one of my six players do this, and was pleasantly surprised at the outcome. He was the most "hack-and-slash" player of the whole group, and as he worked on the journal (and worked with me on it, because this game was set in my home campaign world), he began to have more and more personality wiuth his character.

It's a great idea, but don't make it mandatory. Some players don't need the roleplaying help, and more importantly, don't have the time to make such a journal.
Alac Luin
02-26-05, 06:13 PM I love the idea, but any DM should also consider if it is an "in character" journal, it may just be that!!!

Years ago, I had Lizardman first mate on a spelljamming ship, and the DM made me fill out daily logs.
Well, Everything was blunt, to the point and only expanded when he could complain about having to fill out stupid paper work.
Even though I as a player didn’t want the hassle, my Character was more so unhappy about it.
He was a fighter, not a paper pusher, would rather lead a boarding team to the deck of another ship (he had a cloak of the bat).
Also he was barely literate (INT 8, IIRC) so his logs had few words of over 4 letters.
It was kind of fun to have this thick brute have to do this, and I did my best to keep it “in Character”
I’m not saying my DM liked it, but it was what he asked for. ;)
Arcane Guyver
02-27-05, 02:41 AM Journal logs are great, and everybody playing should have some form of logbook (at least to keep track of what's gone before). In-character journals are excellent...I'd rather give bonus action point(s) for a well-kept journal than XP. From my experience, though, it's hard enough to get players to just bring a notebook and keep notes.
zambuka
02-27-05, 07:12 PM In character journals are .... interesting.

I gave up asking for this however after my players started getting a little too into it.

froma second ed campaign:
One played a pretty compulsive perfectionist, he delivered 3 or 4 pages, printed in 10 point arial, each session.

One player played a rather insane wild mage. He delivered 3 or four pages as well, typically done as stick figures and commenting on the flavour and mind altering effects of local fungi and molds. One time he even did it on the back of another players journal.

The barbarian deliviered his as a single crumpled, torn page with 2 or 3 paragraphs written in crayon.

The dwarven fighter delivered his as a pretty plain single typed page but said "imagine this is carved on 100 pounds of stone tablets".

All these "journals" were perfectly in character, to the point of being done the way the character would do it.

So... my take on "in character" journals is to let the players with characters who would keep a journal do it. Otherwise encourage them to do a player journal instead.
Shurijo
02-27-05, 09:59 PM I just started a IC journal over at blogspot.com. I've done this using the phpbb journals before, but this time I'm going to try to keep the entries somewhere central rather than on each forum (when I play PbP) and I can keep journals for other online and offline games, too.

A DM can also create a single blogspot site and then allow multiple authors to post. So you could have a game journal allowing each character to post.
quenya
03-05-05, 05:01 PM A former DM who is a wonderful storyteller wanted me to do an illistrated log of the groups adventures. Being very lazy I ended up doing really crude almost stick figure drawings on 4x5 inch peices of paper every monday morning (our games were sunday night.) Brandon (our DM) who I worked with would write a caption to go with my crude art. At the end of a year long campaign we still remembered little details of every session we played, and laughed our selfs silly readingour log.
Dragom
03-05-05, 08:41 PM Once after a very memorable game I as the DM felt the creative compulsion to make it a comic strip. I struggled for days trying to learn how to draw the characters in the party. Then I gave up and struggled for days to learn how to draw. Then I gave up. I did some interesting art though. Blight the Necromancer dueling with the Black Dragon Gafgarion, Shawna the Lizardfolk ranger saving a child from the womb of a fallen foe and that druid who's name I have forgotten fighting with a half-dragon...

Good game...

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Siduakal 02-26-05, 12:41 AM	Has anyone ever done one of these? Another player in our campaign suggested that since I'm fairly new, that I consider doing one to help develop and flesh out my character. Think this would be a good idea? I'm already planning to write out several things from his past.. Including a complete time line of what he did during the Last War(In the years he was able to fight, atleast).. And what he did since it ended. And then later writing out full battles for many of those things. Including the one he faced his own father in.
Ayers 02-26-05, 01:05 AM	I've done this once. I had a lot of fun doing it, and my DM loved it. Of course I never put any real history into the journal, the journal seemed to have started when the campaign did. However, I think it's a great idea attempting to put some background into your journal. So really in my opinion I think that yes, this is a good idea. I am unsure of how you are going to detail the last war battles your character was in. It seems as though it will be a daunting task, unless you only focused on a small portion of the battle, probably the area that your character was involved in. Unless of course your character was a captain or general of some sort standing at the back overseeing the battle progress. But I doubt that would be overly interesting.
Okami 02-26-05, 01:07 AM	It's a great habit to get into, and a decision you will not regret. Hopefully your venture fares better than mine.. I have many half used notebooks of partial character journals but i'm not the best girl to judge by. Attention span of a spastic gnat.
ORC_Paradox 02-26-05, 11:39 AM	I do this with every campaign I play in since I saw the idea from Earthdawn so many years ago. My current journal will be uploaded to my web page soon. (With footnotes!)
Cairn Stone 02-26-05, 12:13 PM	Most people in our gaming circle write character journals (often for xp). These usually range from in character accounts of a session's events, to additional backstory events and information. Sometimes they are in character correspondence to NPCs or something like that. I think they are an excellent idea to enrich the game, but if you do reward players for writing these with XP, be careful that it does not get abused. In recent games, some in our gaming group have written well over fifty pages of journals/backstory. On the up side of this, the characters they play have a lot of depth, on the downside...they have shot ahead of other characters in the party due to xp rewards for their journaling. Ways to avoid that problem could be to limit how much xp received from journaling can be immediately cashed in and put toward leveling. Perhaps you could donate the xp to an item creation pool for the character or the party. Any other thoughts or suggestions on that?
Chiba_Monkey 02-26-05, 03:04 PM	Anything that helps a player develop his/her character and roleplay better has to be a good thing. I had one of my six players do this, and was pleasantly surprised at the outcome. He was the most "hack-and-slash" player of the whole group, and as he worked on the journal (and worked with me on it, because this game was set in my home campaign world), he began to have more and more personality wiuth his character. It's a great idea, but don't make it mandatory. Some players don't need the roleplaying help, and more importantly, don't have the time to make such a journal.
Alac Luin 02-26-05, 06:13 PM	I love the idea, but any DM should also consider if it is an "in character" journal, it may just be that!!! Years ago, I had Lizardman first mate on a spelljamming ship, and the DM made me fill out daily logs. Well, Everything was blunt, to the point and only expanded when he could complain about having to fill out stupid paper work. Even though I as a player didn’t want the hassle, my Character was more so unhappy about it. He was a fighter, not a paper pusher, would rather lead a boarding team to the deck of another ship (he had a cloak of the bat). Also he was barely literate (INT 8, IIRC) so his logs had few words of over 4 letters. It was kind of fun to have this thick brute have to do this, and I did my best to keep it “in Character” I’m not saying my DM liked it, but it was what he asked for. ;)
Arcane Guyver 02-27-05, 02:41 AM	Journal logs are great, and everybody playing should have some form of logbook (at least to keep track of what's gone before). In-character journals are excellent...I'd rather give bonus action point(s) for a well-kept journal than XP. From my experience, though, it's hard enough to get players to just bring a notebook and keep notes.
zambuka 02-27-05, 07:12 PM	In character journals are .... interesting. I gave up asking for this however after my players started getting a little too into it. froma second ed campaign: One played a pretty compulsive perfectionist, he delivered 3 or 4 pages, printed in 10 point arial, each session. One player played a rather insane wild mage. He delivered 3 or four pages as well, typically done as stick figures and commenting on the flavour and mind altering effects of local fungi and molds. One time he even did it on the back of another players journal. The barbarian deliviered his as a single crumpled, torn page with 2 or 3 paragraphs written in crayon. The dwarven fighter delivered his as a pretty plain single typed page but said "imagine this is carved on 100 pounds of stone tablets". All these "journals" were perfectly in character, to the point of being done the way the character would do it. So... my take on "in character" journals is to let the players with characters who would keep a journal do it. Otherwise encourage them to do a player journal instead.
Shurijo 02-27-05, 09:59 PM	I just started a IC journal over at blogspot.com. I've done this using the phpbb journals before, but this time I'm going to try to keep the entries somewhere central rather than on each forum (when I play PbP) and I can keep journals for other online and offline games, too. A DM can also create a single blogspot site and then allow multiple authors to post. So you could have a game journal allowing each character to post.
quenya 03-05-05, 05:01 PM	A former DM who is a wonderful storyteller wanted me to do an illistrated log of the groups adventures. Being very lazy I ended up doing really crude almost stick figure drawings on 4x5 inch peices of paper every monday morning (our games were sunday night.) Brandon (our DM) who I worked with would write a caption to go with my crude art. At the end of a year long campaign we still remembered little details of every session we played, and laughed our selfs silly readingour log.
Dragom 03-05-05, 08:41 PM	Once after a very memorable game I as the DM felt the creative compulsion to make it a comic strip. I struggled for days trying to learn how to draw the characters in the party. Then I gave up and struggled for days to learn how to draw. Then I gave up. I did some interesting art though. Blight the Necromancer dueling with the Black Dragon Gafgarion, Shawna the Lizardfolk ranger saving a child from the womb of a fallen foe and that druid who's name I have forgotten fighting with a half-dragon... Good game...