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Ortho: One book or two?

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Submitted by Anonymous on Sun, 2008-02-24 15:33
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We have somewhere near 600 pages of material so far in the Ortho Campaign Setting. Mind you that's pre-editing but it's still a rather sizable amount of material. At this point the question has come up of how to organize it all into a PDF for download. Two major solutions have come forth:

1) As a single book, the Ortho Campaign Setting, following the precedence laid out by the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, and the PSCS. It'll be a very large download, with high quality images. Downloading of individual chapters will also be available for those with weaker internet connections.

2) As a pair of books - Player's Guide to Ortho and DM's Guide to Ortho, following the precedence laid out by the PHB and DMG. This will be a pair of moderately sized downloads with high quality images. Downloading of individual chapters will also be available.

I would like to hear back from both our writing staff and potential audience on the boards on which would be a preferred format. Chances are this is the format that we will stick with for all future setting work on the sight - so please, take your time in considering it.

Sun, 2008-02-24 15:43
#2
Clueless
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Ortho: One book or two?

My own vote is for a single book, for the following reasons.

1) Precedence with the FRCS and the PSCS as well as other works. This is as far as my brain looks at it - a setting book - so that precedence and organizational structure feels more natural to me. I suspect it will feel that way to a lot of people, and given our ability to present in chapter forms which are faster to download, smaller to print and smaller to read online, I see no reason not to keep it a singular book. While there's an argument that two books makes for less printing I'll point out that most people - if they want a hardcopy of the release - are going to print both out anyway. So they're using just as much paper and ink either way (possibly more if the DMG repeats material in the PHB).

2) Because it is a setting book, determining what goes into the Ortho Players as opposed to the Ortho DMs is very difficult, if not downright arbitrary. If we go the arbitrary route then that makes it more difficult to find the material you're looking for swiftly because it could be in one book or the other. If we split the material based on relevance to the DM then there's just not enough DM exclusive material in a setting guide without quickly reaching the conclusion that we'll have a slender manual next to a thick tomb of doom. In which case we might as well have one book.

3) Related to the division of material from #2 - the editing and writing restrictions of splitting material for two books will make it very difficult for me to re-edit our current material. The writing already done is definitely in a single-book style, so it will easily double or triple the time it takes to go through editing as I will need to consider nearly paragraph sentence by sentence to see which book to move something to and hope I can reedit it afterwards for coherency. If we choose to have the authors do the rewrite instead - that will still take time, and editing time to place the materials correctly with the right introductions. And that's not even accounting for the authors who are no longer with us. As hard as it can be for us to get time in this sort of project to do the 'tedious' work - I just don't want to add to that end of the job. It took the PSCS over 5 years to get even close to done.

4) My last concern is a worry that the style of writing required for a 2 book release will stifle future writings both for the Ortho release and for future setting releases. A writer will have to keep the end goal in mind, and may find themselves tediously repeating material for one book that was already clearly laid out in the other in order to explain one subtle DM related difference. It can be a pain in the butt to write that way and I don't want to put any more stumbling blocks in front of volunteer writers than there already are as an online-no-profit project.

Sun, 2008-02-24 16:11
#3
Duckluck
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Ortho: One book or two?

I voted for one book as well, for pretty much the same reasons.

I would also like to suggest another option, that maybe will appease both groups. We'll have it organized so it's downloadable by chapter anyway, so if we wind up with a chapter or two of "DM only" stuff we can separate it out, so that people can either download the whole book, or the book minus the chapters for DMs. It depends on how the book winds up looking, but if we do end up with a chapter or two for DMs, it shouldn't be that hard to offer an extra download option.

Sun, 2008-02-24 17:02
(Reply to #3) #4
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

I've made my opinion known. I don't like the chapter idea and personally think it's something that will kill the interest of any potential new readers in Ortho due to the ridiculous length of the thing.

I was hoping for a full line of Ortho products and a single supplement, no matter how large prevents me from getting much enthusiasm over the issue. While I love the PDF for Planescape, after finishing it, my first thought was why wasn't it several others.

With respect, I'll gladly handle the handle the editing and checking necessary to transform a the material into several books if you want. In fact, I'd like to request the material's RTF form to do it into several supplements because I won't recommend a multi-chapter "Ortho book" to my players.

I'd prefer to give them RTF files of multiple books even if it looses format and art because it will give a stronger feeling of completeness and a "living" line than these giant mega-chapters that will be a pain in the ass to read.

Bluntly, multiple supplements will be FAR FAR FAR better for telling players what is and isn't essential.

Honestly, I am to assume by the first option that Ortho as a line is dead? Frankly, I'm still waiting for the master document of the original Planescape campaign setting to be finished because I don't like having a dozen chapters online and separate.

Frankly, I encourage people to change their votes.

Edit: I don't see any remote similarity between the Forgotten Realms Campaign setting and what you want to do with Ortho. It's more like jamming the City of Splendors and Silver Marches supplement into one book.

Sun, 2008-02-24 23:52
(Reply to #4) #5
Clueless
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Ortho: One book or two?

There is absolutely nothing to imply there won't be more resources focusing more tightly on provinces, or adventures. This is certainly not the last of the books to produce in the Ortho line as far as I'm concerned.

Mon, 2008-02-25 00:01
#6
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Clueless' wrote:
There is absolutely nothing to imply there won't be more resources focusing more tightly on provinces, or adventures. This is certainly not the last of the books to produce in the Ortho line as far as I'm concerned.

I'll explain, Clueless.

Primarily, I think that a lot of the information we've accumulated in the recent months is great stuff for Ortho but a lot of it isn't really the kind of thing you'd necessarilly find in a Campaign Setting book.

Specifically, a lot of the extra info I've crafted is for RPGing Ortho and optional rules that might confuse a lot of readers. Likewise, the extra information on the Planar Harmonium and colonies is awesome but utterly unrelated to Ortho and really distracts from the main narrative. I'd love to see 30-plus pages on Ortho's government but I'd prefer that in its own portion of the book.

It's not just an issue of the size of the PDF (The Song of Fire and Ice sourcebook is 500 pages), it's the fact that plenty of it is discussing issues for the DM that is irrelevant to a lot of players. Also, a great deal of the good stuff of Ortho is also not particularly relevant to the actual world itself.

Like I said, I'd happily volunteer to sort through stuff and write the intros for a DM's guide.

Part of the issue may be that I print out my books to read.

Mon, 2008-02-25 00:41
#7
Gerzel
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Ortho: One book or two?

I'd say a single book with clearly marked sections for DMing the setting.

Players are going to read the information anyway often enough that separating things out doesn't really do much.

Mon, 2008-02-25 00:47
#8
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Gerzel' wrote:
I'd say a single book with clearly marked sections for DMing the setting.

Players are going to read the information anyway often enough that separating things out doesn't really do much.

Well, at my request, should I begin writing a DM's guide then because I'd prefer to have a lot of my information in one rather than the Ortho main guide?

Mon, 2008-02-25 04:03
(Reply to #8) #9
Duckluck
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Ortho: One book or two?

I... don't think that will be necessary. What we have here is a problem of organization. The stuff in the Ortho PDF is scattered every which way and whether we break it up into one book or two will need serious rearranging. Don't get me wrong, I think we're doing good work, but the way its laid out now is no where close to what the finished product needs to look like. For one thing, we'll need a chapter that is nothing but "how to run a game On Ortho" that should incorporate most of the tangential DM-only stuff we currently have scattered around. We'll also need a place to put all the Ina's Lore sections and other DM exclusive information. That will likely be another chapter on its own. Once that stuff is strained out of the main narrative, we should have something looking much more like the PSCS: a steady stream of general setting exposition and player "crunch" at the beginning followed by a more in-depth section for the DM. It should work pretty well.

Oh, and as for the government section: Ortho's political structure is what sets it apart from most campaign settings, and it would be a shame if we didn't devote at least 30-40 pages to it in the main book -- provided those thirty pages include feats, prestige classes, and stat blocks to keep the players interested.

Mon, 2008-02-25 04:26
(Reply to #9) #10
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Duckluck' wrote:
Oh, and as for the government section: Ortho's political structure is what sets it apart from most campaign settings, and it would be a shame if we didn't devote at least 30-40 pages to it in the main book -- provided those thirty pages include feats, prestige classes, and stat blocks to keep the players interested.

Honestly, I think that it should be the focus of the DM's Guide because the Campaign Setting is for describing the Provinces and the Races of the Planet. The Political structure is a main point but the Campaign Setting is for geography and culture plus unique bits.

It's a preview, not the real thing.

Mon, 2008-02-25 16:23
(Reply to #10) #11
Gerzel
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Charles Phipps' wrote:
Honestly, I think that it should be the focus of the DM's Guide because the Campaign Setting is for describing the Provinces and the Races of the Planet. The Political structure is a main point but the Campaign Setting is for geography and culture plus unique bits.

It's a preview, not the real thing.

yes but the politics is part of the people of Ortho. You can't really describe the people well without describing the politics and government those people live in.

It would be like describing medieval European people without mentioning anything of their feudal systems, or the role that the church plays in politics.

Mon, 2008-02-25 16:44
(Reply to #11) #12
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Gerzel' wrote:

yes but the politics is part of the people of Ortho. You can't really describe the people well without describing the politics and government those people live in.

It would be like describing medieval European people without mentioning anything of their feudal systems, or the role that the church plays in politics.

Yes, which is absolutely why a DM's Guide is essential. It'll go into detail in ways the Campaign Setting book shouldn't. Honestly, I would never play Ortho if I had to read a 600 page Campaign Setting book.

I would if it were divided up into appropriate books for reference. World of Synnibarr is the only RPG setting book that approaches this size and its widely believed to be the worst RPG ever.

Wed, 2008-02-27 12:09
(Reply to #12) #13
Armoury99
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Ortho: One book or two?

Weighing the matter up carefully.... there are as many ways of playing D&D as there are people playing it - these threads prove that every single day. Most DMs will decide for themselves which information is open to the players and which is for their eyes only: The politics debate above is just one example - in some games (and it might vary between campaigns) politics is an essential aspect to Ortho, in others it would just be wasted space. The question then becomes do we have clear distinguishing features that make info player or DM appropriate?

You can say a few things, like Feats in the PHB and magic items in the DMG, but even here would could probably find differences. If we could agree and there was parity in the size of the two books, then I'd be fine with a dual release. On the other hand, the only thing I don't really don't want PCs looking at are any 'secrets' of the setting.

Aesthetically, I think that I'd prefer one book release. Everything in one place for me the Dungeon Master to work with.

I'm also keenly aware that once you actually sit down with the point of view of writing a book for someone who's never laid eyes on the setting before and not been involved in the design there's a lot of editting required. Add to this the need to ensure that topics are coherent and reference each other within each book and within the work as a whole, and that's a lot of hours in front of the MS Publisher (or whatever). So I'm against it for the general sake of Clueless' sanity and social life, and frankly, if we were going to do a two-book release we should have decided it a long time ago before all this writing got done; there are numerous literary tricks we could have done with it, but that ship has sailed unless we're prepared to go back to first principles.

Finally, if as Clueless said the final work will also be available as individually downloadable chapters as per the PDF, then all these problems of having too big a tome - or a book with the 'wrong' stuff in it - become null and void. The pagecount would be the same if you were printing out a two book epic (actually probably more , given the additional information required) and you can simply dole out whichever chapters you feel are required for your players on a case by case basis.

For all these reasons, I'd refer a one book solution.

Wed, 2008-02-27 12:36
#14
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

well I print out my books.

Also, I'm annoyed because I am still waiting for the single PSCS document so I can delete the individual chapters. I *LIKE* my books a reasonable length so whenever I need to check something, I just flip down through them.

Furthermore, it was my hope we could pass these books around to other parties on the web and spread Planescape about rather than just host them on this site.

'ripvanwormer' wrote:
It's not too late to "go back to first principles" - to change anything or everything - but I'd rather see it as a single campaign setting. I don't see any advantage in breaking it up; it's not like many people are going to be printing it out anyway. The primary audience is going to be DMs looking for ideas, who might print out sections to use as player hand-outs.

Well forgive me, but can someone explain the advantages of never finishing the book? Because as long as it's not in a single document, I don't see how you can call it a finished supplement.

Also, I think there's no organization to a single giant super-supplement. 600+ pages means that the authors were unable to do any pairing down of the work. As I've repeatedly voiced, a lot of the stuff in the book has no business being there.

What we post on Meter, Colonies, and so on only undermines the focus on Ortho.

But apparently, I've lost this argument despite my strong feelings on the matter.

Wed, 2008-02-27 12:48
#15
ripvanwormer
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Charles Phipps' wrote:
Because as long as it's not in a single document, I don't see how you can call it a finished supplement.

There's no practical difference between a book being released as a single huge PDF or as 12 one-chapter PDFs, except the latter is easier to navigate and download. They look the same when you print them out, and the latter is every bit as finished as the former.

Wed, 2008-02-27 14:47
(Reply to #16) #16
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'ripvanwormer' wrote:
'Charles Phipps' wrote:
Because as long as it's not in a single document, I don't see how you can call it a finished supplement.

There's no practical difference between a book being released as a single huge PDF or as 12 one-chapter PDFs, except the latter is easier to navigate and download. They look the same when you print them out, and the latter is every bit as finished as the former.

I explained the difference. Bluntly, twelve chapters divided up is a hassle to download. To move in and out of in order to check things as opposed to "scroll downward", and also requires a lot more links to spread about if you want to share it.

Wed, 2008-02-27 17:46
(Reply to #17) #17
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Charles Phipps' wrote:
well I print out my books.

Also, I'm annoyed because I am still waiting for the single PSCS document so I can delete the individual chapters.


I'm not sure why you're annoyed. They're in draft form - it's not like I'm sitting on a 'final' version going 'nahnah nahnah you can't haaaave it'. Puzzled If you want the PSCS project to proceed swiftly from draft to finalized - then please consider looking at the Artistic requests list in the PSCS forum and locating additional artists or artwork - also consider providing errata for the existing chapters so they may be updated with reviewed material.

Quote:
But apparently, I've lost this argument despite my strong feelings on the matter.
I think it is important to point out at this point that either way we go - *someone* with strong feelings will be upset. There's simply no way to make everyone happy when it comes to decisions like this. That's in fact why I initially created the thread, to make sure that I wasn't simply stuck in the mud on the subject and so far in the minority that I was being insanely stupid. The poll itself is important as a general overview, but more important is the reason given for the choice. That's the part that may (or may not) sway judgment.

In this case I think your situation is well in the minority - but - and this is a pretty big but to point out - you've mentioned you would like to have an RTF version to do your own editing on. That's one of our three standard formats (the others being shiney PDF with art, and plain PDF), so you'll definitely get that RTF to work with for your own group. There's no worries about that, thats exactly why we have the RTFs available.

Rhetorically speaking, these sort of threads almost always benefit the most from logos based arguments, not pathos. I suspect we're about to slide from debating the question to debating each other and that's just going to get everyone hot under the collar. So - I'd like to call a 24 hr ceasefire on the debate so we can sit back and consider any additional arguments to bring up for or against the considered formats.

Wed, 2008-02-27 19:16
#18
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

'Clueless' wrote:
I'm sorry, man, I really am - I hate having to leave someone unhappy - so if you can think of an alternate solution that'll fit for everyone or a reason that'll override everything else brought up, please let us know. I've been trying to think of something since opening this thread and I'm stuck on it.

Actually, I thought it was the compromise solution. My basic idea was removing stuff that didn't fit the Ortho Campaign Setting for another book. I'm not sure where there's room to compromise on that point.

It's tough I think.

Wed, 2008-02-27 18:22
#19
Clueless
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Ortho: One book or two?

I'm sorry, man, I really am - I hate having to leave someone unhappy - so if you can think of an alternate solution that'll fit for everyone or a reason that'll override everything else brought up, please let us know. I've been trying to think of something since opening this thread and I'm stuck on it.

Thu, 2008-02-28 01:19
(Reply to #21) #20
Duckluck
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Ortho: One book or two?

You know, in retrospect, I think this discussion would be better to have after we've done more editing. Even though we have more writing to do, I don't really think it'll actually end up being 600 pages. Pruning is one of the hardest parts of writing, but it's also one of the most important, and if we do a good job, this book will wind up being much shorter. I don't think it's a stretch to say that we could trim the PDF down to 500 pages without losing anything significant to the setting, and after that there are still the things that are significant that we can push on to later releases. For instance, if we plan on doing full books for the races and the provinces (which I think is an excellent idea), we can probably shave a good hundred pages of the incidental details from this book and save them for later.

Don't think of us as having a book that is six hundred pages long, but as having a book that could be six hundred pages if we're too attached to our writing to remove the things that don't matter.

Oh, and by the way, Synnabar may be said to be the worst RPG ever, but only by people who haven't seen F.A.T.A.L.

Thu, 2008-02-28 01:29
(Reply to #22) #21
Clueless
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Ortho: One book or two?

Completely. *shudders* I've held a copy of F.A.T.A.L. in my hands before. It burned with the fury of a thousand Kirk-Bondian STDs. Synnabar's sin is merely in being 478 pages of Rifts ripoff. Hm - as a side note, Ptolus is 640 - so I think I know which one I'll go with for comparison.

Re: the estimate - I know theres some repetition of work in there that'll drop the page count a lot. And I think there's a section complete with thread commentary - the commentary is currently there to remind me to go back in and use the feedback from it. So yeah - 600 is a *generous* eyeball for a final product. Let me get it tighter and then we'll see what we have.

Thu, 2008-02-28 21:25
#22
Gerzel
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Ortho: One book or two?

I propose that this argument is somewhat stagnant at the moment and that it might be more prudent not to worry about the final form at all for now but instead to move on to other issues of layout and from where they go make decisions on the greater structure of the work.

In other words: lets drop this and get some kind of outline for what is the most essential information about Ortho, what needs to be released first and what can wait for future supplements.

As I see it what needs to be in the release (be it one or many volumes)--and this is not exhaustive:

* A historical overview in brief that should more or less represent what the "average" Orthonian would know about their world, probably written in character. Pictorial timelines would go here.

* A rundown of the major cities and geographical regions of the world with brief descriptions of each major region.

* A listing of the major races and peoples of Ortho what kinds of characters might be encountered in general when wandering about the land. This would be a good place to put feats or you may want to put racees, classes and feats each in separate chapters.

Beyond that it really depends on how the larger project will be organized.

I'd propose a single core overview book presenting Ortho as a whole and then supplements for the various regions and perhaps organizations around which campaigns will be based.

The "Secret" information, I think, should be kept to adventure moduals or put in clearly labeled sidebar sections through the main book and supplements.

In the end I don't think there is enough information that really should be help "secret" from the players to warrant a separate book.

Wed, 2008-02-27 18:11
#23
Charles Phipps
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Ortho: One book or two?

No I get the point.

Don't worry about it

Wed, 2008-02-27 12:22
#24
ripvanwormer
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Ortho: One book or two?

It's not too late to "go back to first principles" - to change anything or everything - but I'd rather see it as a single campaign setting. I don't see any advantage in breaking it up; it's not like many people are going to be printing it out anyway. The primary audience is going to be DMs looking for ideas, who might print out sections to use as player hand-outs.

It's not out of the question to take a vorpal sword of ruthless editing +5 to the book and pare it down to something more terse, either, but that has nothing to do with whether or not the campaign setting needs a separate book for players.

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