The break / disruption caused by my forced migration has been longer than expected, but at long last I’m back, with a reasonable expectation of being able to resume posting regularly. That disruption hasn’t quite run it’s course, so there may be one or two late / missed posts still to come, but it’s a danger that will decrease with each passing day.

My original intent (from the time of my last post) was that this would be nothing more than a quick announcement that regular posts would resume next week, but reality (as usual) had other ideas.

So I have divided today’s post into three parts – the announcement above, a section with news (including a Kickstarter project that may be of interest), and then a (relatively short) feature article deriving from my experiences of the last few months. By next week I hope to have concluded writing the promised follow-up to the guest article on memory plasticity, applying it to RPGs.

NEWS

1. Campaign Mastery honored

I hadn’t been in the new Unit more than a week or two when I was notified that Campaign Mastery had been included in their list of the top 30 RPG Blogs by Feedspot. When I followed up by actually checking the list, I was even more flattered to find that Campaign Mastery had been ranked #3 out of 30.

A couple of months without posting have seen that rating slip a bit – down to #5, the last time I checked. Hopefully, today’s post will start moving this back up the list, but even #5 isn’t small potatoes in my book. So I’d like thank whoever made the decisions, and personally thank Anuj Agarwal for his high-fives!

Unsurprisingly, ENWorld tops the list. With their resources, they are extremely hard to beat! As for the others, there were some that I knew, and with whom I had some sort of social media connection, and many more that had never come to my attention. So if you want to expand your reading list, or to look for an additional support mechanism that fits your game’s genre, you should check out the list for yourself. You will find it at https://gaming.feedspot.com/tabletop_rpg_blogs/

2. Unpacking & Settling In

The trigger for restarting posts at Campaign Mastery was to be one of two things.

My preferred option was to have the ‘home office’ set up and be able to cross most unpacking off my ‘current activities’ list. I haven’t quite reached that part yet.

The secondary option, which I have taken up, was to have the reference library fully unpacked. That proved more complicated than I expected, which is why it has taken so long to resume posting.

Overall Impressions

The new unit is lighter and brighter than the old one. The walls and ceilings are a slightly-off-white throughout, and the floors are all tiled, mostly with large white-marble tiles, some of which are broken. None of the floors is perfectly level or even uniform. Lighting is by fluorescent tube throughout except the living room which has four down-lights.

Not all rooms have windows; those that do all have new blinds. At the moment, it won’t surprise you to learn that there boxes everywhere, I’m still figuring out what will go where, and trying not to unpack anything until I know where I’m going to put it. There is not a single room in which all of the walls are square. Odd angles are everywhere.

The supermarket is at the extreme limits of my mobility. Most of the shops that I use frequently are closer, some much closer. And I’m a regular at the cafe downstairs.

In short, I’m settling in.

3. Assembling Bookcases

Depending on how you look at it, the move involved taking 2 locations and dividing their contents amongst 3 much smaller ones, or taking 3 locations and dividing them amongst four much smaller ones. That meant that things that were easily organized at the old location (being all in one space) had to be carefully organized – in a space that was barely big enough for that task.

When I calculated the shelf / storage space that each category of objects used to enjoy / require, and compared it to the shelf space that was available in each location in the new digs, I found that up to 12 new bookcases would be needed. Having one of the existing bookcases collapse completely while it was being unpacked did not help matters (repairs are underway).

Well, I couldn’t quite afford that, but I did buy 9 of them. And I’ve been busy assembling them, at the rate of 1-2 a week. Seven of them are done, two remain to do.

Of the seven, exactly four assembled the way they were supposed to.

  • One didn’t have all the screws necessary. I had to devise a new way to install the base, involving drilling additional holes (and making sure they lined up).
  • Another had provided four identical side pieces when they needed to be mirror images. On two of them, in other words, the pre-drilled holes were upside down when the unit was assembled. The bottom section is supposed to contain three tiers, the top section two; I solved this problem by rotating one entire side 180 degrees, so that on that side, it’s the bottom that is two tiers and the top that’s three.
  • And on the third, some of the pre-drilled holes for joining the sections had been drilled incorrectly – the base was supposed to be held in place with six pegs, but there were only holes for five. I had to drill a new hole in exactly the right place to complete the assembly.

Still, those were only relatively minor complications, and steady progress was taking place – until…

4. Bookcase dis- and re-assembly

Three of the shelves were described as ‘display bookcases’. These have offset shelves, and looked quite stylish. Two of these have been assembled with absolutely no problems, one remains. They are two of the four bookcases dedicated to the reference library, which is how I got to my ‘trigger point’.

Four days after completing the reference library unpack, one of these was showing serious bowing of shelves, to the point where I was totally without confidence in the structural integrity of the units, and the other (despite being more heavily loaded) was showing early signs of the same problem.

Shelves bowing because of the weight

.

The image above shows the problem and planned solution.

  1. Vertical spacers are added to the front corners to force the shelves as close to square alignment as possible.
  2. Wood strips are used at the front to create skirting. They hold the shelves rigidly in place, preventing further bowing and giving structural strength. I’m considering painting them white to match the existing shelves, that will depend on the expense of the timber and paint. When they are in place, in theory, the vertical spacers could be removed and moved to the next section, so only three of them are needed – but I intend to leave them in place for additional support.
  3. Wood strips are attached to the sides at the back to create vertical rails that will add still more structural strength. This may also be repeated at the front – which would definitely relieve the need for the vertical spacers.
  4. At some future point, back paneling will be nailed into place to provide further rigidity. the problem is one of transporting these home from the hardware store. I have two possible configurations – one panel per shelf, or one panel for all shelves. I would prefer the latter but the former may be more practical in terms of logistics.

Multiply all of the above by three (for three different bookshelves).

5. Still to do:

The unpacking process has been like a sliding-panel puzzle, using the space created by completing one task to make the next one possible.

  1. Unpack one more box of fiction (done!) and one more box of board games.
  2. Setback recovery: Two of the (old) bookshelves that looked fine on first inspection need urgent repairs (done!).
  3. Two more plastic tubs of clothes to unpack.
  4. Create a cutlery storage tray from foam and emplace it. I’ve designed the unit (which reuses packing foam from the bookshelves), but need to cut it out and assemble it.
  5. Repair three bookshelves as above, unpack (again) the reference library.
  6. Repair the broken bookshelf if possible (I think it is, and the repairs to the other old bookcases have only added to my confidence). Park it temporarily where the boxes of fiction were.
  7. A lot of little tasks like cutlery and pots and pans to unpack.
  8. Move the boxes of videos to the repaired bookshelf without unboxing them – this will test its structural rigidity.
  9. Move the boxes of art and art supplies to the space now occupied by the boxes of videotapes.
  10. Assemble New bookshelf #8 and preemptively apply the fix described above. Temporarily place it in the fiction library.
  11. Assemble New Bookshelf #9 and emplace it. This is to hold DVD spindles, blank media, and magazines.
  12. Unpack the boxes of those items and put them into place.
  13. Sort the Unwatched DVDs into priority sequence (they were sorted but became muddled during the unpacking process. Place them on the shelves next to the main DVD collection.
  14. Unpack the campaign reference boxes to occupy the last shelves of that bookcase.
  15. Unpack the Gaming Resources into the shelves allocated for them, ready for use.
  16. Unpack the RPG reference into the shelves allocated for them (currently being used as a workbench!)
  17. Move the office table and desks into place from the storage room. Critical – I can’t resume running my RPG campaigns until this happens.
  18. Move new bookshelf #8 into the space occupied by the office table and desks.
  19. Pack computer gear on the shelves of Bookshelf #8.
  20. (assuming the repairs have held,) Move the boxes of videotapes to a temporary location.
  21. Move the repaired bookshelf into the space created by moving the computer gear.
  22. Pack the rest of the computer gear into the repaired bookshelf.
  23. Move the boxes of videotapes into the space thus created.
  24. Contemplate moving the chest of drawers into the storage room now that there’s space for it, to give more bedroom space.

How long will all this take? I figure that I can do at least one of these tasks a day, sometimes two – but some tasks might stretch into a second day (bookshelf assembly / repair being the main potential culprit)..

But Mondays and Tuesdays and most Saturdays won’t be available, so four of them a week, maybe a little more. So around 23/4 = 6 weeks. Right now, I’m not running gaming, so that’s an extra day this week and next week. With workarounds, I hope to be able to restart my campaigns at the end of the month – at which point it will have been six months since I last ran a session!

But if I have to steal one or two Campaign Mastery Mondays to get everything done, or an extra gaming day, I will.

6. A Fundraiser That May Be Of Interest: The Sassoon Files, 2nd Edition

Click the image to open the Kickstarter page

At around the same time as I moved, I was advised of The Sassoon Files being in pre-fundraising state and offering press resources to use in writing about it. At the time, I didn’t have the capacity to look into it.

On May 3, I was notified that their campaign was launching on May 11. So it’s now been running for about 2 1/2 weeks.

So, what is it?

The Sassoon Files, Second Edition, is a set of scenarios and campaign resources for Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition. The new edition contains “almost double the content of the first edition, with more scenarios, expanded campaign settings, and improved production value.”

The Sassoon Files will include the history of Shanghai and some of the primary factions that competed for influence and power: the Communists and Nationalists who played a game of deadly cat and mouse; the Jewish tycoon who provided succor to refugees; the Triad societies who competed to provide vice for the city’s residents; the Japanese who were moving closer to invasion. The Sassoon Files will also explore the secret history of the Mythos, and the local factions who sought to exploit that which could not be fully comprehended.

It will be available as a 300+ page hardcover or PDF.

I could definitely have made use of it back when I was running my first Dr Who campaign, which had a creature from the Mythos released into the Time-stream, where he kept bouncing further and further away in time, both backwards and forwards, creating chaos wherever he touched down in an attempt to stabilize his existence and open a portal to admit his “kin”, accompanied (as always) by a companion, a Tibetan Monk. Lots of Dr Who backstory along the way, too much to go into here, so I won’t get sidetracked quite that easily!

That campaign is over, and regular readers will have seen some of the development work for the sequel, which is focusing on the events that led / will lead to the 6th doctor becoming the War Doctor – which either means nothing at all to you, or everything.

This shows, however, that if the 1920s semi-pulp setting of CoC doesn’t suit, most such resources can be modified / twisted to suit another time period / genre. It’s just a matter of rolling up your sleeves and getting creative. So if this sounds like it might be of interest, I urge readers to follow up by clicking on this link.

Frankly, there’s so much crossover between Pulp and CoC (even though our pulp campaign is set a decade later) that I may well end up getting a copy myself.

The campaign will continue until June 10, having already raised more than triple the original target. So we are well and truly into stretch goals territory. Kicktraq suggests that the fundraiser is on track (couldn’t resist) to reach $175K by the end of the campaign. I think that might be a little generous, from the curves – I think $100-$120 K is more likely. But it’s quite early in the fundraising campaign cycle, so it’s far too early to be certain of anything more than the current pledge total.

So there’s no good reason not to buy into the product if you’re interested.

UPDATE:

The numbers above were generated with the intention of publishing this article last week, so they are now out of date. As of this writing, the funds pledged total USD$35,048 against a target of $10,000, and Kicktraq now projects a total of $42-51K. The project seems to have hit saturation, hopefully this mention will push it up a notch.

THIS WEEK’S FEATURE ARTICLE: BIG PROJECT INSIGHTS

I’ve had a lot of big projects on my plate over the last six-to-twelve months. Packing, finding new accommodations, unpacking, bookcases, an Arkansas directory for my superhero campaign, designing a mansion (with a few secrets and surprises) for that same campaign, and valuations for 76 specific and unique “treasures” (some of them are, some are not), to be packaged into a website for player use, for the Adventurer’s Club campaign.

As you might expect from One word at a time: How I (usually) write a Blog Post, my processes for tackling these tasks is fairly tightly organized and carefully structured.

Along the way, because of that organization, I’ve noticed a few things that should be true of major in-game projects, too – but usually are not. I’ll get into the why of that, and what the GM can do about it, and why he should or shouldn’t intervene, after discussing those insights.

Definition

Let’s start with this: what do I consider to be a big project? Well, the minimum would be:

  • Complete focus for at least 1 week
  • Top Priority for at least 2 weeks
  • High Priority for at least 3 weeks
  • Low-to-Medium Priority for at least 4 weeks

That’s just to get to the fringes of a “Big” project. Somewhere between this threshold and double the scale there is a fuzzy line that demarks the difference between a medium project and a big project. Some of the project phases and their attributes will apply for anything meeting the minimum standard, all of them will apply to almost everything meeting double that minimum.

    Examples

    Let’s look over that list of recent and current big projects and see where they fall:

    • Packing – Complete focus for 4 weeks, High Priority for 9 more.
    • Finding new accommodations – Top Priority for 4 weeks, High Priority for 7 more
    • Unpacking – Top priority for 4 weeks, high priority for 4 more, ongoing for at least 2 more weeks
    • Bookcases – Top Priority for 2 weeks, High Priority for 3 more, ongoing for at least 1 more
    • Arkansas directory – High Priority for 6 months
    • Mansion design – Top Priority for 1 week, High Priority for 3 more
    • Valuations for 76 specific and unique “treasures” (includes designing & generating 862 graphics, many of the resizes or variations on the same image) – High Priority for 7 weeks, Medium priority for 4 more
    • Website – Ongoing, 7 weeks deadline to generate approx 70 pages using content created above. High Priority, rising.
    Project Scale

    The scale of a project can be specified (in general) as the product of intensity of work multiplied by the duration of that intensity.

    The Propensity For Setbacks

    Another characteristic trait of big projects is that the probability of a setback at some point rises to near-certainty (near-unity for the more mathematically-inclined). Again, this is a function of scale of project; the bigger the project, the more opportunities there are for bad luck to manifest and – because the projects tend to be big and burly with lots of moving parts – greater likelihood at each such step for error or mischance to creep in.

    The wise administrator makes allowance for this and reserves some “cushion” that can be called upon to fix the problem (whatever it is) without impacting the schedule/deadline too badly.

    Allowance For Setbacks

    How much margin? about 1 day for every 7 dedicated to the project, in part or in whole (the reserved day will also have a matching ‘in part or in whole” nature). Maybe 1 1/3 for higher priority projects, or excessively complicated projects, or projects with an especially firm deadline. 1 2/3 for projects which meet 2 or more of those criteria and so on.

But this isn’t an article about project management; it’s about the normal human response to a project that they want to undertake and complete (anything less than a sincere effort introduces unrelated complications to the nice, neat picture that I want to convey).

I break any project of this magnitude down into 6 phases. It’s my contention that each of these project phases is distinguished with it’s own set of psychological responses that it’s “normal” to encounter.

Project Breakdown

Let’s start by listing the project phases to which I have just referred:

  • Pre-project
  • Planning
  • Early project
  • Mid-project
  • Late Project
  • Completion and Post-Project

The Pre-project phase starts sometime after accepting the project and before actually sitting down to start working on it. It consists of vague and general thinking about the project and how you are going to go about it, and deals a lot with first perceptions. It’s also when you set the priority that you are going to give the project and how you are going to make room in a potentially-busy schedule to carry out the work involved.

The Planning phase is when you actually decide on protocols and priorities and workflows and how long the project is going to take. A lot of people skip this step, especially if they have underestimated how long / difficult the project is going to be.

The Early Project, Mid-project, and Late Project phases are when you actually work on the project.

And the Completion and Post-Project is fairly self-explanatory. It’s characterized by hindsight and second-guessing, and it’s also when you discover whether or not the project was actually necessary in the first place.

1. Pre-project

No matter how much expertise you can bring to bear, all big projects can prove a little daunting. This manifests as finding or manufacturing excuses to delay starting.

Acting to overcome this tendency is, generally, Overconfidence, which stems from not having really planned the project yet – if you can’t foresee the problems that will have to be overcome, the project seems a lot easier than it will eventually prove.

Those with more experience can usually recognize this, and that in itself can be daunting; those with less experience are more inclined to wade right in.

Finally, there is an enthusiasm and excitement to tackling a major project, and its this that eventually overcomes any hesitation and permits the project to move ahead.

2. Planning

Lots of people who don’t know any better skip this step completely, figuring that they’ll work it out as they go. More experienced hands will at least conduct some cursory planning.

Planning consists of 4 primary activities:

  • Project subdivision
  • Necessary Research
  • Protocols and Procedures
  • Allowance for setbacks

Let’s look at those in detail:

    Project subdivision

    It’s good practice to subdivide major projects into smaller ones. It not only provides a more concrete breakdown of what’s going to be involved in the project overall, it permits management of the process.

    Defining each stage or phase of a project also permits thinking about what’s needed in order to carry out that work – that can illuminate stages that have been overlooked.

    Necessary Research

    This isn’t research needed as an input into one of the project phases; this is more fundamental, determining what is needed to actually perform the task. How can you determine how long it will take to do “X” umpteen times if you don’t know how to do “X” in the first place?

    Protocols and Procedures

    Once you know how, you can start thinking about how you are going to translate general ideas into on-the-ground works-in-reality processes and procedures.

    Quite often, you’ll follow the outlined protocol two or three times and then it will start to evolve and become more streamlined.

    Allowance for setbacks

    This all gives you a better handle on what can go wrong along the way, and how much time you need to allow for problem-solving. It’s actually fairly rare for everything that can go wrong to actually go wrong – almost as rare as a major project reaching completion without overcoming at least a few stumbling blocks.

The Impact of Deadlines

Deadlines vastly increase the pressure to complete the project. That can be both a good and a bad thing. Any problems encountered will be magnified in the way that they are perceived by the project manager.

A lot depends on whether the target is a “hard” (unalterable) deadline or if there can be a plan B to buy yourself more time. The softer the deadline, the less oppressive it can be.

3. Early Project

Once you start actually doing the work needed to accomplish the project, it tends to trigger a wave of enthusiasm for the project outcome. That enthusiasm is often your new best friend, motivating you to plug away.

Steady Progress Needed

It’s absolutely essential that steady progress is visible throughout. The more monolithic the project, the more easily this enthusiasm can – will? be corroded, until the project grinds to a complete standstill.

Rapid progress

It will also usually be observed ( at least, after the fact) that in this phase, progress is fairly rapid, even if it didn’t seem so at the time. That’s a function of the intensity with which the tasks are tackled, and that is a factor of the early-project enthusiasm.

In plain language, people treat the project as though it were one or more higher grades of significance and importance, then work themselves to death trying to keep up with an imaginary supervisor.

“Danger, Will Robinson”

This creates a trap for people to fall into (even if hey know better) – you down tools on the project because it looks like you can do so. Later, it becomes cleat that just as part X went faster and smoother than usual, so part Y of the process has been badly under-estimated and you need every minute of what you could have gained, or more.

(To be honest, though, this is usually a problem in Mid-project; the enthusiasm, which characterizes the Early project, makes projects less liable to this trap).

The transition to mid-project

The “Early Project” phase ends when participants no longer view the project as daunting; it has become a process that the participant(s) are happy with. But the enthusiasm and exuberance that have (at last) overcome doubt and hesitation have also suffered, and may now be non-existent.

If they aren’t, the dull routine plodding from project milestone to project milestone will usually finish them off.

4. Mid-project

In the mid-project phase, the process settles down into routines and habits. Certain parts of each week and each day become ‘earmarked’ as dedicated to the project, and other tasks and duties get scheduled around them. Working on the project has become part of the daily routine.

There is a sense of progress becoming a steady plod, an inevitable march to completion – all you need to do is stick to your schedule and hit your milestones to get there.

Any sense of being daunted by the scale of the project has been replaced by a quiet confidence of success, with time in hand.

There are some distinct traps that lurk in the underbrush, waiting for this phase of the project to spring out of nowhere.

    Enticing Side-alleys

    You begin noticing ways to “make the project better”. Or side-projects that might be worth pursuing. Or a better way to do something. Or an assumption that you are suddenly unsure of.

    Or, more accurately, you begin spending time actually implementing these side-projects, with little-or-no planning, and no real idea of what impact the side-project will have on your schedule.

    What most people don’t realize is that the routine has made them complacent about completing the primary project to the point where they feel free to complicate it or set it aside for a while – because “routines” are boring.

    Project set-backs

    At the same time, this is when you are most prone to set-backs. Because you’re taking time to look around. you notice things that may have already gone wrong (and that have to be re-done) or that something isn’t working in exactly the way you thought it would – often because you’ve ‘tweaked’ the process to “make it better”.

    First reactions can often be to find a way to manipulate the work done so that you don’t have to throw it away. The last thing you want to have to do is go back a couple of steps and start those project steps over.

    At least half-the-time, these half-baked ad-hoc fixes make things worse, not better. It’s times like this that you need to step back and revise the planning that you did at the beginning – and, especially, to revisit the question of how long it will take from this point forward,.under the different approaches.

    Comparing that estimate with the time available will confirm whether or not you’ve found a path through the thicket, or are lost in the tall timber.

    Project expansion

    Perhaps the biggest danger of all is deciding to expand the scope of the project. That’s what happened with the Arkansas Directory – the whole thing was under control and taking far less time than expected, and then I discovered a new resource that listed all the cemeteries in the state.

    I had previously decided to leave cemeteries out, because there were too many of them and it was too hard to drill down to the information needed. This resource enabled me to put them back, expanding the scope of the project maybe five-fold.

    Setback: half-way through, the website changed its formatting in such a way that it was far less user-friendly for the purposes I was using.

    First reaction to the set-back – carry on, regardless. After a couple of weeks of noticeably slower progress, second reaction: using the Wayback Machine to find the site as it used to be.

    Notice that the thought of returning to the original scope of the project never even occurred to me.

    Anyway, the Wayback Machine didn’t have a capture of the site.

    Redoing the assessment revealed that there was no longer enough time to complete the expanded project – and that was when a couple of projects that couldn’t be ignored leapt up, forcing this to be abandoned (at least for now) And, when I do get it restarted, the cemeteries have to go back out.

    Projects that escape control

    Even more rarely, projects can completely escape control. This happens when the expansions to a project become more important than the original purpose. Again, the Arkansas Directory presents a compelling example.

    Initially, it was a planning tool and a player reference tool – a listing of the more important local businesses and those that could be accessed with a few hours driving. The cut-off was simple: anything that Google Maps showed at a particular zoom level was in; anything that it didn’t was out.

    The expanded project was a complete directory / database of everything and anything that might be of interest or value in the state, and how far away it was. Other aspects of campaign planning became dependent on this concept, abandoning less-comprehensive solutions that could be more quickly produced.

    For example, I intended to go through the list coming up with plot ideas. for example, so that I always had something to ad-hoc if the players decided to go to “X”, or that they needed to go shopping for “Y”. Some of these would also be used to implement the players’ plans for their time in-state. These would then get documented in a GM-only version of the tool.

    The expanded project, post-setback, could no longer produce such a list in time to be of use. In fact, most of their time in-state would have to be hand-waved to get the main plot back on track. Or, more accurately, saved for their next sojourn within the state.

    Abandon Hope All Ye That Enter Here

    Once a project has expanded to the point of fully occupying the available time, the smallest setback goes from molehill to mountain. Existing but unnoticed Mountains grow to Everests.

    There are times when the only solution is to abandon the entire project.

    For example, there are articles and even series here at Campaign Mastery that I’ve had to abandon because they have come off the rails, or started taking more time than I could afford.

    It was my intention, when I abandoned “regular” weekly Thursday posts, that I would spend the time that had previously been earmarked for writing those posts working on those longer-term projects, posting each part whenever it was completed.

    Set-back: my physical condition worsened to the point where tasks of everyday living took enough additional time that working on these bigger-posts was no longer possible. So I either make the Monday Post irregular, or I abandon those series and articles that will take more time than I have available. I chose the latter option, but not a week goes by that I don’t second-guess that decision. I still have the outlines and the half-finished drafts…

5. Late project

I’m currently in the late-project phase of unpacking. I’ve had delays and multiple set-backs along the way, but have managed to make visible progress every day.

I’ve also just finished the late-project phase of the Valuation-content project, and the memories are fresh.

There are several attributes that start to manifest late in a project, and directly impact it. Ironically, the habits that developed in the mid-project are your best defense against these problems.

    When does a project enter the late-project phase?

    There are two primary signals: Waning Enthusiasm and Exhaustion.

    There are also two secondary signals that start off being quite mild (so it can be hard to point to a milestone and say, “that’s where the transition occurred”) but which tend to grow more difficult as the project slew-walks it’s way to completion, and they are both forms of experienced intimidation.

    As a general rule of thumb, when the project begins its final step before ‘production’ of the finished project, it has almost certainly entered the late-project stage. It may have done so at a prior milestone, or it may be just doing so, but either way, the four “signals” are things that you will almost certainly experience in some form or another in these final steps.

    Waning Enthusiasm

    Especially in projects that have taken a lot longer or more intense effort than you originally expected, you can often find your enthusiasm waning. You would literally prefer to be doing something else.

    The most minor form of this problem is wondering if it is all going to be worth it.

    In its most acute form, you can find yourself actually avoiding working on the project, something I’ll discuss more fully in a couple of paragraphs..

    Exhaustion

    The other signal of the late-project stage is that you actually find working on the project more tiring than it was. This is because some of your energies are being used just to keep going (I was originally going to say, ‘overcome the reluctance generated by Waning Enthusiasm’, but I think it’s more general than that).

    As a child, I was always taught that ‘once you’ve broken the back of a job, it’s a downhill canter the rest of the way’. Some years ago I realized that this is only true of smaller jobs and larger projects that run completely smoothly; and those are rarer than hen’s teeth. In all other cases, ‘breaking the back of the job’ is like going 6 rounds with a heavyweight boxing champ. Even if he takes pity on you in the 7th round and just prances around, you’re still going to feel it. That 7th round is just prolonging the agony.

    Exhaustion makes for sloppy work and a propensity to make mistakes. Overcoming that tendency and fixing the mistakes takes energy, leaving you even more exhausted afterwards; it becomes an ongoing cycle.

    Yesterday I fixed a bookshelf that was starting to come apart. It was agony on my back and good leg, pushing both to my current limits.

    Despite this, today I repaired another bookshelf that was showing signs of distress. Only after repacking it did I discover that on one entire shelf, all the staples connecting the back to the shelf were located above the shelf. Yet, I specifically checked that before starting, or so I thought.

    So I then had a choice: unpack the shelves again, and pull the entire bookshelf back out to where I could get at the back, find some way of removing the offending staples, replace them with nails, and then put it back and repack it. Or ignore the problem, relying on the screws and nails that I’ve added to hold the shelf in place.

    The exhaustion I felt decided the issue. Next time I have to get it out, I’ll worry about the staples.

    Deadline Intimidation

    There are two forms of intimidation that frequently impact the final stages of a major project. The first is the natural result of having invested so much effort and is especially prone to occur if there have been significant delays and setbacks.

    It’s entirely normal for deadlines to narrow as the end of a project approaches. In fact, the better your planning, the less unused time will remain as the ultimate milestone approaches, which in turn can induce this intimidation – an uncertainty over whether or not you will actually make deadline.

    Some people recommend tacking on an extra ‘comfort margin’ in their planning just to try and avoid this problem. My experience is that this just makes the project manager more likely to explore one or more of those enticing side-alleys.

    As a result, you usually end up in exactly the same position you would have been in anyway – and that’s the best case outcome. The worst case is when those explorations hamper the overall project, so the “comfort margin” can actually be significantly counter-productive. I don’t recommend the practice, no matter how enticing it may appear during the planning phase.

    Functionality / Peer-Approval Intimidation

    The other cause for hesitation and doubt stems from the separation of planning and final milestone. Having invested so much work, the project manager suddenly finds himself having doubts as to whether or not the end result will actually perform the functions it was intended to provide.

    And, further, will those on the outside appreciate the scale and quality of the efforts that have been invested, or will they feel that you have wasted a lot of time?

    These doubts drain any remaining enthusiasm for the project and can actually cause the project manager to look for excuses not to work on the project.

    This causes the pace of the project to abruptly slow to a crawl, creating still more deadline intimidation. The last phase of a project can easily be just as difficult as the entire first third was.

    Legitimate Delays

    It’s easy to encounter legitimate delays along the way. Setbacks can occur just as easily in the final phases as at any other point in the project, perhaps even more easily – this is the part of the project that would have been most fuzzy in initial planning, after all.

    The problem is that by this point in the project, you have the least possible margin remaining to cope with such setbacks. It is for this reason that it is expected practice that managers and workers (which may be the same person) are expected to have to burn the midnight oil in order to ‘land’ a major project on schedule, so much so that it’s almost a cliche.

    Illegitimate Delays

    The potential for legitimate delays is why you can’t really afford the ‘self-invented’ delays that result from the intimidation elements listed above. It’s entirely too easy to invent reasons for delay – totally self-convincing ones – just as you are facing down the final hurdles.

The different problems that can occur tend to play into each other, becoming entangled and entwined, and (even if small) can quickly snowball into far bigger issues. There are only two real defenses against this, maybe three (depending on how you count them).

    Side-alleys are less distracting

    The closer to the finish line you get, the less inclined to explore side-issues and side-alleys. Such tweaks can be left for after you cross the finish line, when you can explore them more fully – if there’s time. This alone helps shrink final mountain ranges back into molehills – well, into foothills, at least.

    Routine is your friend – if you are disciplined enough

    I’ve already made this point, but it’s worth amplifying. It’s entirely human to revolt against excessive regimentation, and the monotony of a routine can start to feel like ‘excessive regimentation’ after a while. That “while” is more likely to occur with longer duration of the habits and routines that have developed, so it’s far more likely to occur in the late stages of a project than in the early ones.

    I actually use awareness of this to bolster and reinforce the discipline of sticking to the routine that has developed (at the bare minimum).

    That, in turn, helps immunize you against the other late-stage problems described.

    I also routinely recalculate the time required to complete the project, relative to the time available. While this can make you hypersensitive to genuine delays, it can also reinforce the discipline needed to avoid blind alleys and overreactions to other doubts and concerns.

    Cutting the tangled knots out

    When setting out plans for a major project, I always try to evaluate which goals are “must haves” and which are merely “nice to have”.

    These are (generally) promptly forgotten until significant setbacks occur late in the project (if they do), when they can suddenly make it much easier to pare back a project, discarding a “nice to have” in order to nail down the “must have” goals. At the very least, they can help you refocus at a critical juncture – and that alone is enough to justify the effort needed to split those hairs.

    Let’s look back at the Arkansas Directory Project for a moment – having invested well over a hundred hours, am I reluctant to cut the cemeteries and pare the project back to its original goals? You bet. But the cemeteries are only a “nice to have” addition, so if I have to, I can steel myself to do it.

    The alternative would be to elevate that “nice to have” to “must have’ priority – which, due to the setback described earlier, will send the project out of control.

    When stark black-and-white comparisons like that can be made, hard choices become a lot easier.

6. Completion and Post-project

Some people are reluctant to actually consider this to be a part of the project management cycle, but I tend to be insistent about doing so. For one thing, this period is packed with recognizable characteristics just as are all the others, and for another, there needs to be as much effort invested in planning for it as for the others if burn-out is to be avoided.

The commencement point of this phase might appear straightforward at first glance, but there’s a wrinkle – in some cases, it might be better to regard the commencement point as being directly after the product of the project is first used instead of when that product is ready-to-use.

This is especially true when you are generating something for use in an RPG, when you think about it, but it can also be the case in real life.

Consider the three new bookcases, whose problems I highlighted earlier – if I considered the project of assembling them complete when they were ready to be packed with books, I would have been deeply into the next project when the problems with their design became manifestly obvious. Managing the repairs would have been a whole new project, one that would interfere with other things that had to be done.

Instead, by considering the project completion milestone to be when the bookcases in question were fully packed, the design problems had a chance to manifest as a setback to the original project, and the repairs became part of that original project, for which time had already been set aside.

Under the first schedule, that time would already have been ‘released’ and some other project scheduled to fill it. Repairs would have been delayed, and would be more difficult as a result, with greater likelihood of permanent damage having resulted.

While, at first glance, it might have seemed that the difference would have made no difference, the reality for a busy person is quite different, and I’m measurably better-off for having delayed the final milestone.

So let’s look at those characteristics of the post-project period.

    The need to recharge

    Every project drains your batteries. The more intense the schedule, the heavier the drain; the longer the project, the more prolonged the drain. As with several other project traits, it is the product of the two that is really indicative.

    You need to schedule some time off to recharge those metaphoric batteries before drawing upon them again.

    The usual headlong fling

    Without actually planning this as a phase of the original project, it’s human nature to simply throw ourselves into the next project that is to be completed, and we can find ourselves starting at an uncharacteristic low ebb; this is eventually unsustainable, forcing a longer break to recuperate than if we had simply taken a little time in the first place.

    This is a different phenomenon to that experienced with small-scale projects, it should be noted, where you can string 5-10 of them together before needing to take a break.

    How long a break?

    I recommend a minimum of 1/2 day for every week of the project, +1/4 day per week for each step up in intensity. If the result is more than a week, multiply by 2/3.

    Some examples to make this clear:

    • 6 weeks, Low-to-Medium priority: 6 × 1/2 day = 3 days R&R.
    • 8 weeks, High priority: 8 × (1/2 + 1/4) = 8 × 3/4 = 6 days R&R.
    • 4 weeks, Top priority: 4 × (1/2 + 2 × 1/4) = 4 × 1 = 4 days R&R.
    • 5 weeks, Complete Focus: 5 × (1/2 + 3 × 1/4) = 5 × 1.25 = 6.25 = 7 days R&R.
    • 13 weeks, Top priority: 13 × (1/2 + 2 × 1/4) = 13 × 1 = 13 days; 13 days is more than 1 week, so 13 × 2/3 = 8.7 days = 9 days.

    This doesn’t have to be complete rest; small tasks and even a Low-priority project can be carried out for at least part of each day. I’m talking about avoiding major commitments for a while.

    Jumping straight into another project

    Even then, if absolutely necessary, you can leap straight from one major project to another, so long as you’re aware of the potential impacts.

    In my case, 13 weeks of packing and house-hunting – initially Complete Focus, then Top Priority for a few weeks, with a week off for R&R in the middle, then Complete Focus again, have been followed by a more open-ended project to unpack and settle in at my new home that has lasted for two months so far (and is still incomplete) – sometimes Top Priority, sometimes just High Priority.

    I took that R&R week because I had been given the opportunity to do so (or thought I had), because I had reached the point of needing it physically, and because I knew the second project would inevitably follow the first. Aside from a brief period of taking care of the immediate essentials at the start, it has deliberately been done at a lower intensity than the earlier project (packing).

    In fact, as it winds toward a conclusion, I have been deliberately scaling back the priority and allowing myself more R&R – just a little each day, but enough that I have reserves to cope with setbacks.

    Dotting I’s and Crossing T’s

    I like to allow time for final cleaning up of minor details at the end of a project. It doesn’t always happen, but those final details can make a huge difference in how you (and others) perceive the outcome of a project.

    These are about perceptions and superficialities, not issues of substance, it should be clear.

    The fact is that you’ll almost certainly take time to do these, anyway; if you haven’t allowed time for them, the off-the-books time expended will come at the expense of something else, and that doesn’t benefit anyone.

    Hindsight

    There is also an inevitable period of looking in the metaphoric rear-vision mirror. Here’s a subtle and often-overlooked fact: The better the planning, the easier the project will seem in hindsight – regardless of the number or degree of problems or setbacks.

Big Projects in RPGs

Let’s compare the reality with the way big projects are undertaken by characters in an RPG.

    Hand-waved Tedium

    Tedium and routine are rarely roleplayed, for fairly obvious reasons. They are hand-waved by the GM instead, mainly because they are boring.

    The compression of time

    On top of that, time is naturally compressed in an RPG anyway. “I’ll keep doing X until sundown, tell me if anything interesting happens” is completely normal.

    Players heads in the wrong time zone

    The consequence is that players don’t experience the cumulative impacts that their characters would feel at different points during a major project. The player will still be in the enthusiastic early phase when the characters should be mired in the tedium of the middle of the project, and only approaching the mid-project phase when the project in-game is wrapping up.

    Most of the time, players and GMs aren’t even aware of the resulting discontinuity. When it does become noticeable, it’s often too late to do anything about it, anyway.

    But, once the obvious has been pointed out, the GM will realize that he has a choice: he can either encourage players to run their characters as though they had experienced the entire project, or he can accept that the characters are not required to “act human” in this respect.

    The superiority of PCs

    One philosophical underpinning of campaigns is key to choosing between these two alternatives – are the PCs inherently superior simply because they are PCs? If the answer to this question is ‘yes’, then it becomes far more acceptable to have that superiority manifest as better instinctive project management – in effect, subordinating the ‘normal’ big-project reactions to the unrealistic emotional states of the players.

    If you choose this option, the right thing to do is to make a point of it, in-game. Someone comments on how focused and disciplined the PCs are in pursuing the project, or a PC comes across an NPC undertaking something similar (or even working on the project for the PC), showing the PC reaction for the abnormality that it is. It only has to happen once or twice for the pattern to be established as campaign canon.

    If not, then the GM has a follow-up question to consider – whether or not they should intervene, and what form that intervention should take. I’ll get to that in a moment; first, there are a couple of other aspect of all this that needs to be addressed.

    The consequence of Dire Need

    ‘Desperation has a wonderful way of focusing the mind’ – I’m sure that’s a misquote, but it’s both correct and applicable, anyway.

    Hard Deadlines, of the sort that result from Dire Need, up the ante in every respect, but especially psychologically, on both the players and the PCs. Side-alleys are left unexplored, no matter how enticing or interesting. Priority kicks up at least one notch. There’s a palpable sense of urgency in the air. Both Drama and Melodrama kick up a notch. It makes for good gaming from the perspective of the GM and the players (not so much for the characters) – unless it’s overdone, or too frequent an occurrence.

    This overrides many of the normal behaviors being discussed, to the extent of making the questions being posed here irrelevant.

    I think that needed to be mentioned and made clear before we went down the rabbit-hole too far.

    Non-human Psychology

    Chronoception is a field of study within psychology and it plays a major role in the reactions to major projects. And that means that non-humans can have a completely different response to the same stimuli.

    In many of my Fantasy campaigns, Dwarves have a “Live fast, Live Hard, and leave a good-looking corpse” attitude; they can be impatient, more willing to take shortcuts, less willing to deviate from straight-lines, and more sensitive to the effects described. At the same time, they have a dogged persistence (sometimes characterized as a stiff-necked or bloody-minded reluctance to change course), even if the results are clearly not going to be the ideal outcome envisaged at the start of a major project.

    Elves, on the other hand, are far more patient, more willing to take time and pains, and more willing to look at the bigger pictures. They are more prone to taking the time to investigate side-issues, are more resistant to deadlines, and will take the time to execute each step in a project as perfectly as they can – to the point of exasperating humans and maddening Dwarves.

    You don’t have to copy my approach to the chronoperceptions of these races; simply take on-board the principle that they are psychologically different to humans, and think about what the differences are and how they will manifest in practical situations.

    For example, Elves will quite happily use a temporary facility for 1,000 years because they aren’t satisfied with the fine details of a proposed permanent solution to a social need. Dwarves will throw up a temporary structure with minimal planning and use it until it either falls apart or is shown to be clearly inadequate. It’s ironic that – in practical outcomes – the two end up in almost exactly the same place, for entirely different reasons.

Intervention – yes or no?

Okay, so neither non-human chronoperceptions nor Dire Needs are going to let the GM escape out the back door of the question of the differential mindsets of characters vs players. That lands him (and this discussion) firmly back on the question – should the GM intervene to push the players’ mindsets closer to what he thinks the characters should be feeling, or not?

What shape should such intervention take, anyway? To my mind, it amounts to describing the experience of the characters (and letting the players decide how the characters react to those experiences), while injecting just enough tedium and ‘representative’ setbacks to let the players get in touch with their characters’ feelings, even if these aren’t necessarily ‘fun’ in the strictest sense of the word.

At all costs, the GM should avoid telling the players what their characters’ feelings or attitudes should be. At most, if the characters are known for their impatience or extraordinary patience, for micromanaging or big-picture thinking, the GM should both call attention to this and should factor it into their own thinking. That’s the difference between helping the players run their characters and railroading the characters, and it’s a very important distinction to make.

There is no universal ‘yes’ or ‘no’ that is the right answer; it will always depend on the exact circumstances, the personalities of the PCs, and the attitudes of the players.

Intervention – how?

I’ve outlined, above, what shape I think the appropriate intervention should take, but I thought it worth closing out this article with a broader, more general answer, framed around the question of what your objectives should be in committing such an intervention.

ANY intervention to the smooth progress of the ‘project’ running its course from start to finish that achieves these tasks is appropriate and reasonable – for example, stating that a character is ‘working on the project’ when something happens to demand his or her attention.

A possible intervention is acceptable if it:

  • Helps the player feel the scope or size of the project;
  • Helps inform the players of what has happened during a hand-waved period of transition between project milestones;
  • Gives the players the opportunity to let their characters be distracted from the project;
  • Opens a doorway to more ‘interesting’ roleplay;
  • Gives players access to resources that might be useful to them in the future as a direct consequence of the project;
  • Makes the project seem more “real” to the players;
  • Makes the players aware of the context of the Project and / or any changes in that context; or,
  • Helps the players make informed decisions about their PCs and their actions, in accordance to the personalities of the character.

That’s quite an extensive shopping list, but a lot of it can be done through simple measures like the narrative example offered (“Your character is working on the project when…”). Spending five minutes of game time deciding in-game how a character will react to or overcome a setback, without actually playing through it is enough to ‘touch base’ with the in-game reality without making such a big deal of it that it becomes boring or dull.

I think it was Raymond E. Feist who once had one of his characters state, “Details. A Good plot swarms with details” – while discussing a rumor that the speaker wanted to have swallowed whole by an opposition. But it’s an entirely accurate observation when it comes to big projects in an RPG, too. You only have to touch on those details lightly to achieve the desired effect, and those projects will seem all the more real and realistic for the effort.


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