Changes to PCs / NPCs / Characters (can't figure out how to make a character?)

Micah
Micah
edited January 2010 in Campaign Portal Building
We've just released (2010-01-18) a large batch of changes to the way characters are handled. Essentially, it's no longer possible to create a character separate from a campaign. Just like a wiki page or adventure log post, characters are now integral to campaigns.

*To Make A Character*

Go to the "Characters" tab in one of your campaigns and click on the "Create New Character" button. Easy to do, even if it is different from before.

If you'd like to know more, read "the full description on our blog.":http://blog.obsidianportal.com/?p=13

Please let us know if you have any questions or comments.

Comments

  • bevinflannery
    bevinflannery
    Posts: 114
    Does this mean that if the NPCs were, in fact, created through the NPC tracker tab on a campaign, that they are already "assigned" to that campaign?
  • Micah
    Micah
    Posts: 894
    Yep, that's right. If your characters were PCs/NPCs before, then that hasn't changed. They were already part of the campaign, and we just "strengthened" the connection in our database.

    Our goal is that by doing this we'll be able to enhance the characters and make them easier to work with. No specific details for now, but stay tuned.
  • Genesplicer
    Genesplicer
    Posts: 8 edited January 2010
    Why are you limiting how we can create our characters and our campaigns? My group often runs multiple campaigns in the same universe, and it is common for characters to be a PC in one, and an NPC in another at the same time. The old system allowed us to keep track of this, but the new system does not. We also have characters that have switched between campaigns for one reason or another (either in-character decisions, or sometimes RL scheduling conflicts that require the player to shift their character to a different play session.) Also, campaigns eventually end, with some characters transferring over to NPC status in the sequel. How do we move characters from one campaign to another?
    Post edited by Genesplicer on
  • Micah
    Micah
    Posts: 894
    The decision was based on some of the features that we want to support moving forward. The characters have not been touched since the beginning, and they're starting to show their age. We want to make them better and make the site easier to use, and this necessitated simplifying the relationship between characters and campaigns.

    Certain features are very difficult to do if a single character is in multiple campaigns. A perfect example is the "GM only" section that exists on a character. It's actually a very simple feature, technically. However, it would have to be much more complex in order to support multiple campaigns. Another example is privacy/visibility. The characters had their own settings, and most people found this confusing. To most people, if the campaign is private, then the characters in it should be as well. They were often surprised to find that their characters were public even though the campaign was private. Once we simplified things to the current setup, it's much easier. There are no strange cases where a character exists in both a public and private campaign.

    There are other examples too. The main point is that for the vast majority of people, characters belong to a single campaign. We wanted to simplify things to support this overwhelming majority of cases. It's a case of power vs simplicity, and we chose simplicity.

    Still, we understand the desire to keep characters across multiple campaigns, and we're working on some ways to make characters more mobile, and allow them to be moved from one campaign to another, or to clone a character and place them in a different campaign.
  • ZorkFox
    ZorkFox
    Posts: 5 edited January 2010
    I started a campaign, and added two characters to it before the patch. Now, those characters still say, "Is a PC in..." Dice of Destiny. But when I view the Characters tab of my campaign, they're not in there. How can I get them to show up? Right now, they are living on a wiki page.
    Post edited by ZorkFox on
  • neolithic
    neolithic
    Posts: 1
    I've got the same problem as you ZorkFox. Would love to know the answer :)
  • larryhl
    Posts: 1
    @ZorkFox and neolithic, PCs currently don't show up in the Characters tab, it only shows NPCs for now. The Obsidian Portal team is working on making the Characters tab show all the characters along with other nifty improvements. My fix to this is putting links to the PCs on the Wiki or Main pages for easy access.
  • ZorkFox
    ZorkFox
    Posts: 5
    Yes, that's what I do (with the wiki, I mean). I mentioned it to AutumnsChild (who I think is the voice behind Obsidian Portal on Twitter) and he (she?) said it'd be brought up to the developers. *hangs tight* :)
  • acidargyle
    acidargyle
    Posts: 5
    Really looking forward to the PCs showing up in the Characters tab.
  • zero
    zero
    Posts: 13
    Just noticed that if you create a (PC) character for a campaign that doesn't have an assigned game system, the Game System remains blank even after the GM selects one. I tried editing and resaving the character, but nothing changed.
  • bloodymage
    bloodymage
    Posts: 13
    In my game's initial post, I encourage players to generate their own characters and submit them for my review. I don't really want to have to manage some 12 year-old who thinks it's neat and kosher to have the biggest fighter with the highest stats and the best arms and armor. What link should I use to review submissions, assuming I don't wan't to use my e-mail (though if worst comes to worst, I have one available.
  • bloodymage
    bloodymage
    Posts: 13
    Hey! You cut off my head! ;D
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