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How much paper planning do you do before you start working on a plugin,expansion,conversion? Do you: plan everything out down to the specific spelling mistakes that lead the player to victory, plan major details, make a rough outline, or do none at all.
I know this will be different for everyone, yet I am curious on how much each person does. I personally plan a lot of the major events and storyline first and leave the minor details.
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You don't want to see how much paper I use. Not that I'd let you of course, but you know...
It's a lot.
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Paper, how outdated is that.
My team has done quite a lot of planning, but it has all been done on webboards where we can all discuss the ideas.
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(This message has been edited by Andcarne (edited 08-11-2004).)
Quote
Originally posted by yandiyen: **How much paper planning do you do before you start working on a plugin,expansion,conversion? Do you: plan everything out down to the specific spelling mistakes that lead the player to victory, plan major details, make a rough outline, or do none at all.
**
I did quite a lot of planning, I had a couple of sketchbooks full of drawings, storyline Ideas, mission briefs, Timelines and all sorts. It turned out to be mostly useless. The Storyline changed completely (for the better, I must add) I dropped two races from it, So Half the ship designs and most of the galaxy were gone. I then also managed to lose the main sketchbook, so It wasn't that useful in the end.
Planning is good, but be prepared for your Ideas to change and evolve. Something that sounds good in your head may turn out to be a crap Idea when you put it down on paper.
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Originally posted by Andcarne: **Paper, how outdated is that.:p
My team has done quite a lot of planning, but it has all been done on webboards where we can all discuss the ideas.**
"My team...", sha!
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I collect rough ideas on paper while I am at work but I accomplish nothing creatively unless I am on the machine.
A side note, I thought that ArcAngel Counterstrike was a Mac user? :confused
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Originally posted by rmx256: **I collect rough ideas on paper while I am at work but I accomplish nothing creatively unless I am on the machine.
No one said you couldn't have both.
Personally, I keep all my ideas in my head, and if I fear I'll forget, I write down the gist in a tiny little notebook. From right to left, for some reason. ~ SP
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I write reams of paper. Most of it never gets into the plugin, but it's a lot easier to just focus on the creative writing without having to wrestle with any of the editors.
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Originally posted by Hudson: **"My team...", sha!
Alright, shall I rephrase that... 'The team I'm on..."
Paper and secure webboards do the trick. Security and economy are reasons I don't like using paper or elaborating my ideas outside of secured FTP or personal hard drive space.
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Don't be so sure about that. When I joined, you inherited some paper-use.
Stickies.
Found in your Application folder for OS X users.
Found in your Apple Menu Items for Classic/OS 9 users.
(Unless you moved them from their default positions of course.)
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I have sketch books full of doodles that I made when I created ship plug-ins. I have lots more involving the current plug-in in development, the revamp of all EVO ships. As for mission related plug-ins, I just use a word document program to come up with stuff. But anything relating to graphic starts on paper first, unless a design is so simple, I can just work straight on my computer.
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Some of my best Idea's come from random scribbling on small pieces of paper. I have a thick stack of papers covered in drawing of ships, stations, landing pics, large shipyard pics, test descs, and ideas. And that is only the half of what I've done that didn't end up in the trash can. I have alot of mission idea's, but most of those stay in my head untill I'm ready for them. The best go on paper and later into a word document.
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Originally posted by getcrack4me: **Stickies.
Or the real kind. I use those all the time.
Is anyone else of the opinion that using looseleaf paper and stickies only makes a mess, and is bound to get lost? I mean, I use a tiny notebook, and that's pushing it. I haven't touched it, except for like one night that I got bored and wrote some stuff down.
I trust my memory a bit more than my organization skills. ~ SP
Originally posted by SpacePirate: I trust my memory a bit more than my organization skills.
Hehe. Now why does that sound familiar?
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Originally posted by UE_Research & Development: **Paper and secure webboards do the trick. Security and economy are reasons I don't like using paper or elaborating my ideas outside of secured FTP or personal hard drive space.
Why the security? Are you expecting SIS or the CIA to raid your plugin?
Mainly, I just scribble ship sketches (they're very primative) down randomly when I'm bored, in everything from church bulletins (when I definately don't need to listen... don't want you guys to think I do it through the whole service. =P) to an actual notebook. Missions stuff I usually think up while my brain isn't doing much, like when I can't get to sleep (happens often). It just doesn't work when I put it down on paper.
One other thing that has ever worked on paper for me is putting down a galaxy. However, it's nearly pointless, because it mostly just helps me figure out how many races I have and what my main ideas are. Becasue by the time I put the systems of my galaxy in they were all nearly completely different from my first galaxy drawings, and only loosely based on my latest one. I didn't sweat over exact positioning like the Nova team did. Calling out numbers? What, are they crazy, or just pulling my leg?
The last thing that has worked for me is outfits. Putting down outfit ideas (no actual numbers... numbers are things you have to precisely enter later if you take them too seriously. It's better just to guess and tweak it during beta, not that I speak from experiance in beta testing... Anyways, ideas for outfits like how armor should really work, etc. etc. Even just writing down names and the types of outfits you want helps. It's always helpful not to be adding an outfit in Nova and then say "Dur, what the heck is it called?"
Anyways, I still have some of the best ideas on the fly. Like solving Nova's big-ship armor upgrade problem by not making it more expensive/more massive with increasing ship mass, but moving that stuff to engine upgrades. It might not be completely realistic, and it requires several levels of armor if you want small ships to be able to get anything, but at least it provides the type of gameplay I want: Large ships should be able to have substantial armor upgrades without actually being penalized for it, and engine upgrades should be relatively impossible on them. Who ever heard of a private captian adding an extra engine on his Star Destroyer?
Anyways, to summarize, the three things I've written on paper successfully on paper are these: Ship doodles, galaxies, and general outfit ideas. Also, Add names to the list, as it really helps to know a bunch of system names for human space... all I can make up are alien ones, like "Opatha." Then again, I get those from websites that tell real star system/planet names, so it's not like I brainstorm them on a sheet of paper, I just write the good ones down for future reference.
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