Burning Books

I really have to give props to my friend Luke Crane. He designs roleplaying games - the kind you play with pencils, paper, and dice. Luke's most famous game is The Burning Wheel. He's also written Burning Empires, which has a lot in common with BW, but is it own game. I've written short fiction for both, but that's not why I like them.

The great thing about Luke's games is that they are constructed around a single ideal; produce an engaging and interesting story. Playing BW or BE, you wind up feeling really connected to your character, because in the process of character creation, you have given him/her a history, motivations, and even mannerisms. This is in contrast to the RPGs I grew up with; Dungeons & Dragons being the main one. In the RPGs I grew up with, all of the character stuff beyond pure statistics was all in your head. Burning Wheel not only provides all that information, it actually encourages you to play to it. Played well, BW can produce intense, emotional stories that grip you as a participant, and its a hell of a good time.

So, aside from pimping an awesome product, what does this have to do with writing the humungous?

Well, I was working on some character bios the other day. I like to have a lot of information and backstory - even if it doesn't all get used, it helps me form a picture of the character in my head, helps the dialogue flow, gives me a handle on how characters interact.

As I'm writing these bios, I realize that this is pretty much like making up a BW character. Of course, I'm not sticking to a rulebook or anthing like that, but the actual process is pretty similar. It inspired me to crack open the ol' BW books and have a look.

In terms of process, there's not all that much difference between making a character for a game and making one for a novel. It may be that I just have a heavy RPG background, so thats just my approach, but I find that it works really well. There's some differences to be sure. In a novel, the character's success and failure, skill and prowess is not determined by dice, but by my whim, so stats are pretty irrelevant. However, all the rest, the BITs, as Luke terms them (Beliefs, Instincts and Traits... he's very clever), are pretty much all you could ever want to know about a given character when paired up with a personal history.

I don't think BITs are exactly a revolutionary in the process of fiction writing - they're essentially a different way of expressing something that you learn in Creative Writing 101... the basics of building a character. However, I think they're easy to understand and reference, and a great way to organize the information about the character in question. So, in true writerly fashion, I'm stealing Luke's idea and using it for my own purposes. Sorry Luke. You really should have seen this one coming... ;)

In any case, it will make things easier when work begins on the obligatory RPG supplement.

I know, I know, getting ahead of myself. Back to writing.