Since I feel bad for not sharing my wisdom (?) with you for the last couple of editions, I hereby present to you two – count ‘em,
two – editions in one.
The First Post
I’m a busy guy. I’m sure many of you are also busy guys, apart from those who are, in fact, busy gals. There are only so many hours in the day I can devote to reading AARs. That’s what makes your very post – not your very first update, which I will cover later – so important. Especially if it’s your very first AAR, it’s not a bad idea to properly introduce yourself, how you got involved with Paradox games, etc., although it isn’t mandatory.
What you do need to setup is, very clearly, what version of the game you intend to use and what your objective is in writing the AAR. If you’re using house rules, it’s important to have them there. Some people who write narratives use the first post as a kind of prologue. Personally, I don’t do that, but some really terrific AARs have done that (MondoPotato’s recent AAR on Cromwell and the English Civil War springs to mind).
If you have the graphical talent, a banner is a great idea to begin the AAR. You could also include a table of contents, although I prefer to save that for the second post. Speaking of which, while 99% of AARs these days include a TOC, if you’re part of the 1% who doesn’t, you should go back and add one. The table of contents is what will help new readers get acquainted once your AAR starts to grow.
Think of your first post this way. The title is what will get people to open the AAR. Later on, once you’re established, the author’s name alone will get clicks. If PrawnStar did an entire AAR on decorative gravel, for example, I’d click on it because he wrote it. But once they open the AAR, you need the first post to suck them in. What makes your Germany AAR in HOI3 different from the eleventy billion that came before? I don’t remember the author’s name, sadly, but there was an excellent German AAR that I normally would have skipped, if the author hadn’t established why, in particular, he was writing one: namely, to test how effective a mostly submarine based fleet would be. Rensslaer’s AAR, Kriegsgefahr, actually kind of had a boring title, but his reputation got me to click, and his first post kept me in. Very rewarding AAR.
So, to recap, it is absolutely essential that you include the following:
The name of the game, including mods, expansions, or DLCs, as well as version number
What country/character you’re playing and why
Any special house rules
Anything else that makes your AAR stand out!
The first update
Your first post is done, your table of contents is structured but blank, full of possibilities. Now what? Well, obviously, you need to make your first update! Before I dive into that, though, there’s a more interesting question: when you should you make the first update?
There is an argument that you should wait at least a day or so to build up interest before you post the first update. Update pacing is important – do it too frequently and people will be overwhelmed, do it too rarely and people will lose interest – but none more than the very first. In general, I think a brief delay could be very beneficial. The reason is that you want to see how people react. Maybe they don’t like or don’t understand a house rule for a reason you haven’t thought of; this will give you a chance to explain why you chose it or perhaps even change your mind. In any case, I would recommend about 24 to 48 hours between first post and first update, normally.
So, what should your first update contain? In narratives, a prologue is very popular and practical. You want to set up where your point of divergence is, after all. Even if you aren’t diverging from history, you can introduce your main character(s) and their motivations. Include your first pictures here (which will be the topic of part two of this jam-packed edition), if you didn’t include them in your first post.
If the title gets people to click and the first post gets people to read the first update, the first update will get you the sub, more often than not, and the comments which many writers desperately need to justify continued writing. I recommend leaving a cliffhanger, if it’s a narrative, to get people to “tune in” next week or the next day or whatever, but don’t rely too heavily on cliffhangers on the whole, which is a common novice mistake. I often write AARs in “threads”, or to use a pro wrestling term, “angles”, in which an episode may stretch for an update or three, with some sort of payoff at the end. If it’s just one cliffhanger after another, with no resolution, it can get irritating.
Now, if you have a gameplay AAR, the very best use of your first update is to set up your pre-pause world. Share your short-term goals, your early preparations, and what you intend to do with your opening moves. Introduce the readers to the world around you, which in a gameplay AAR is the “main character”, so to speak. This is especially important if you’re using some sort of mod, but even if you play vanilla, you can’t expect your readers will have familiarity with the game world. In fact, I’ve probably sold quite a few copies of Paradox games, as people have read my AARs before playing or buying the game. (I expect my check is in the mail, Johan.)
Part Two: A thousand words is worth one picture
As you are you doubtless aware, there is a hard limit of 20 screenshots/images per update on the forums, to keep bandwidth reasonable. At the same time, if you have no pictures, it will be incredibly difficult to attract readers. The important thing, in AARs as in life in general, is balance.
When I was first writing AARs, I used one paragraph of text (that is to say, five to six sentences) per picture as my guideline. That’s not a bad rule of thumb, but it’s not always ideal. Sometimes you have to write more. I said in the first part that I write AARs in “threads”, and I
love to use a screenshot as the payoff. I even end updates with little more than a screenshot. It’s a great trick, because the audience has to parse what it’s seeing and will inevitably guess what happens next (or try).
The very best screenshot, for my money, is a regional map. This is true for narratives or gameplay AARs. It will prompt good questions and that prompts good discussions, which make a very good AAR into a great one, in particular as you feed off those good discussions to improve the AAR. Second best are events, particularly important ones. Battles are a great tool too, especially in narratives, but only if used sparingly.
So when should you not use screenshots? First, if something is only tangential to your overall story, it’s probably best to use a sentence or two to describe what’s happening. If a character gains or loses a trait in Crusader Kings II, for example, I almost never use a screenshot unless it’s a weird trait or it’s critical to the story in some way. Minor battles and revolts are also, generally, not screenshot worthy, in my view.
Even if you’re graphically challenged like me, you should at the very least crop your pictures. There’s no need to include the entire screen, most of the time, and by making your images smaller, they’re easy to see and load faster. Not everybody who goes to the forums uses a broadband connection, so it’s a great idea to take that into account when you use pictures. I also resize my world map images when I do use them.
That’s it for the February edition of the AARlander! The next topic will be comments and act as a general wrap-up to the series; after that, we’ll have a special post on writing in English and English grammar to conclude my series. I hope you’ll all join me!