About this series: Trials, Triumphs & Trivialities is a column offering advice on how to build online prose games, written by Shannon Appelcline, Vice President at Skotos Tech. It uses as its examples the many Skotos games, and thus offers a unique, behind-the-scenes look at these nearly twenty titles.

Trials, Triumphs & Trivialities Column ...

• Collective Choice: Ratings Ease of Use, Part Two - #213: More ease of use, with a look at making things easier for raters.
• Collective Choice: Ratings Ease of Use, Part One - #212: How making ratings easier for consumers to use can improve your system.
• Testing Characters, with a Look at Battlestar Galactica - #211: How do you create interesting characters? With active personality traits.
• Anatomy of a Game: Project Runway - #210: A look at lessons learned from a reality contest.
• Games & The Law, Part Seven: The D&D Dilemma - #209: Dungeons & Dragons and the IP protection of game systems.
• Anatomy of a Game: The Mole - #208: A look at The Mole, from season one to five.
• Collective Choice: Ratings Inputs and Outputs - #207: A look at the trustworthiness of ratings and their usefulness.
• Strategic Insights: Three Community Issues - #206: Comparing and contrasting The Prisoner's Dilemma, The Tragedy of the Commons, and The Free Rider Problem.
• Strategic Insights: The Free Rider Problem - #205: A final look at the community vs. the individual: do you support the community good?
• Strategic Insights: The Tragedy of the Commons - #204: A look at how personal greed can damage the common good.
• Strategic Insights: The Prisoner's Dilemma - #203: A look at game theory, with the Prisoner's Dilemma, and some discussion of how to apply it.
• Anatomy of a Game: The Triple-Hidden-Exile Survivor Twist - #202: How and why hidden immunity idols, exile island, and a three-person final council have changed Survivor.
• Anatomy of a Game: The Amazing Evolving Race - #201: A look at how (and why) The Amazing Race has changed in the last two years.
• Anatomy of a Game: Pirate Master - #200: A look at the gameplay of the reality TV show, Pirate Master.
• Collective Choice: Experimenting with Ratings - #199: A more thorough look at the results from our rating experiments.
• Collective Choice: More Thoughts About Ratings - #198: Seven lessons learned from actual ratings work.
• Collective Choice: Polling, Voting, and the '06 Elections - #197: A look at the problems with polling, and the results from '06.
• Collective Choice: Ratings, Who Do You Trust? - #196: A look at trust mechanics that can be used to improve low-volume rating collections.
• This Blessed Plot: TV Episodics - #195: A look at episodic storytelling, with Veronica Mars and The Dead Zone as examples.
• Collective Choice: Using Five-Star Rating Systems - #194: The problem with 5-star rating systems, and how to use them anyway.
• Managing User Creativity, Part Two - #193: Cleaning up data in the RPGnet Gaming Index.
• Managing User Creativity, Part One - #192: How to allow users creativity and to make that creativity useless, with three examples.
• Encouraging User Creativity - #191: How to encourage user content and the RPGnet XP System.
• Online Games & The Law, Part Six: The DMCA - #190: What does the Digital Millennium Copyright Act mean for online game companies?
• Art Imitates Life, in All Truthiness - #189: New artistic projects at Skotos, and what it can tell us about game design.
• Downtime & The Online Game Designer - #188: A short whine, with some lessons learned, as always.
• Social Software & Gaming: Dunbar's Number - #187: A look at the RPGnet forums, and how Dunbar's Number affects group size.
• Online Games & The Law, Part Five: Property Rights - #186: Looking at the right of publicity and virtual property rights.
• Designing Strategy: Computerized Board Games - #185: Advice for creating computerized board games, borrowed from Gone Gaming.
• The Skotos Articles Archives: Five Great Miniseries - #184: A look back at some of the best articles posted to Skotos from 2000-2003.
• Collective Choice: Ratings, Rankings, Reputations & Games - #183: How comparison systems of collective choice can be used by and in online games.
• Anatomy of a Game: The MTV Challenges - #182: Examing the Real World/Road Rules Challenges for gameplay and voting mechanics.
• Anatomy of a Game: The Amazing Race - #181: Examing the game design of television's The Amazing Race.
• Collective Choice: Competitive Rankings - #180: An overview of ranking systems used for competition, from ELO to tourneys and thresholds.
• Collective Choice: Ratings - #179: Looking at ratings systems, beginning with where eBay went wrong.
• Collective Choice: An Introduction - #178: An intro to collective choice, including voting, ranking, rating, polling, and more.
• How to Cheat at Online Games, Part Two - #177: The difference between what players see as cheating and what administrators do. And, how to better define these.
• Online Games & The Law: More Latest Cases - #176: Storyline patents, indexing infringement, and contributory infringement.
• Skinner Boxes & Socializer Gameplay - #175: A discussion of operant conditioning, Skinner Boxes, and other sciences underlying online gameplay.
• On Blogs: The Ascendance of the Form - #174: How blogs are causing problems for article sites on the Internet, such as this one.
• Another Postcard from Indianapolis - #173: Thoughts and Pics from Skotos at GenCon
• Balance & Consistency in Game Design - #172: How a CCG game design can illuminate the need for balance & consistency in online games.
• The Elements of Good ScaryTelling: The Horror Within - #171: How good horror contrasts the terrible with the mundane.
• Creativity & The Creative Commons - #170: A discussion of the Creative Commons licenses, joint creativity, and how we've put our comic where our mouth is.
• Mixing Mediums: An Overview - #169: About the Castle Marrach comic, and how mixing mediums can strengthen a creative work.
• Online Games & The Law, Part Four: Community Rules - #168: What you should be aware of, legally, when you create an online community.
• It's All in Your Point of View - #167: How the storytelling technique of point of view can influence online game design.
• Postcard from San Francisco: GDC & Innovation - #166: A look at GDC '05, and the topic of innovation in game design.
• A Theory of Game: Psychology & The Prisoner's Dilemma - #165: Discussing four variants of the Prisoner's Dilemma, and how abstract game theory can impact real game design.
• Online Games & The Law: The Latest Cases - #164: An update on recent cases affecting the game industry, including Cryptic, Hasbro, and Apple.
• Social Software & Gaming: User Content - #163: Looking at the field of Social Software when thinking about user content in online games.
• Strategic Insights: Majority Control - #162: An overview of how majority-control strategy games are put together.
• Designing Strategy: The Auction Grand Unification Theory - #161: How Risk, El Grande, and Hearts are all auction games.
• The Power of Enthusiasm - #160: How enthusiasm is the most important resource in any business venture.
• Communities & Online Games - #159: A discussion fo the ways to create community in online games (and the importance thereof)
• Game Lengths - #158: Considering the different lengths possible for online games.
• Licensed Games & Novelistic Worlds - #157: A look at the plotting problems caused by making games in licensed worlds.
• Tabletop Problems, Online Solutions - #156: Tabletop, Analysis Paralysis, and Kingmaking in Online Games
• Strategic Insights: Bluffing Games - #155: An overview of ways to bluff in strategy games.
• Strategic Insights: Connection Games - #154: An overview and glossary for connection-based games: railroad games, pipe games, and more.
• Mechanics & Theme - #153: Two ways to design games: from top-down themes and from bottom-up mechanics.
• Some Thoughts on Artificial Intelligence - #152: Expert rules, cheating AI, and organic ideas: a look at gaming & machine intelligence.
• Transcreation - #151: Building new stories on top of classic plots and characters.
• Strategy & Tactics - #150: Defining strategy, tactics, and their use in online games.
• It's Not Fair! - #149: How to achieve fairness in games of all sorts (and what to avoid).
• Online Games & The Law, Part Three: Patents, Trade Secrets & Licenses - #148: Finishing off the discussion of IP with a look at patents and trade secrets.
• Online Games & The Law, Part Two: Copyleft & Trademark - #147: Discussing the open source movement, trademark law, and their connections to online games.
• Online Games & The Law, Part One: IP & Copyright - #146: A broad discussion of how copyright work and what you need to know.
• How to Cheat at Online Games - #145: A summary of top methods for cheating in online games--and how game designers can avoid them.
• Strategic Insights: Auction Games - #144: An overview of how auction games work, and a discussion of what makes them work well.
• If You Build It They Might Come: Critical Mass & Other User Buzzwords - #143: How the science of growth will impact your online game's user community.
• The Disconnect Dilemma - #142: Solutions for when players bail out of a game.
• User Interfaces - #141: An important, but overlooked, aspect of program design.
• Guns & Flaws - #140: Admitting your flaws, but sticking to your guns in game design.
• A Brief History of Game, Part Eight: Forging Partnerships - #139: Looking back at Skotos in 2003.
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part Three: Cooperation & Freeform - #138: Improving social interactions through cooperation and freeforming.
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part Two: Competition - #137: How to improve competitive interaction in multiplayer online games.
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part One: A History of Form - #136: On the limits of social gaming interaction, and how they can be expanded.
• Anatomy of a Game: Survivor Twists - #135: How twists in the game of Survivor show that "the game is what the game is"
• A Brief History of Roleplaying, Part Three - #134: Concluding up a history of roleplaying design with a look at storytelling games.
• Anatomy of a Game: Big Brother - #133: Game design of a reality TV show? Seriously.
• A Brief History of Roleplaying, Part Two - #132: The history of RP continues, with a look at task resolution, character models, and character advancement.

Top 20 Trials, Triumphs & Trivialities Articles ...

• Collective Choice: Ratings - #179: Looking at ratings systems, beginning with where eBay went wrong.
• How to Cheat at Online Games - #145: A summary of top methods for cheating in online games--and how game designers can avoid them.
• Managing User Creativity, Part Two - #193: Cleaning up data in the RPGnet Gaming Index.
• Collective Choice: Ratings, Who Do You Trust? - #196: A look at trust mechanics that can be used to improve low-volume rating collections.
• A Brief History of Roleplaying, Part Three - #134: Concluding up a history of roleplaying design with a look at storytelling games.
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part One: A History of Form - #136: On the limits of social gaming interaction, and how they can be expanded.
• Collective Choice: More Thoughts About Ratings - #198: Seven lessons learned from actual ratings work.
• Managing User Creativity, Part One - #192: How to allow users creativity and to make that creativity useless, with three examples.
• Anatomy of a Game: The Amazing Race - #181: Examing the game design of television's The Amazing Race.
• Collective Choice: An Introduction - #178: An intro to collective choice, including voting, ranking, rating, polling, and more.
• Strategic Insights: Auction Games - #144: An overview of how auction games work, and a discussion of what makes them work well.
• A Brief History of Roleplaying, Part Two - #132: The history of RP continues, with a look at task resolution, character models, and character advancement.
• Online Games & The Law, Part One: IP & Copyright - #146: A broad discussion of how copyright work and what you need to know.
• Encouraging User Creativity - #191: How to encourage user content and the RPGnet XP System.
• Creativity & The Creative Commons - #170: A discussion of the Creative Commons licenses, joint creativity, and how we've put our comic where our mouth is.
• Designing Strategy: The Auction Grand Unification Theory - #161: How Risk, El Grande, and Hearts are all auction games.
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part Two: Competition - #137: How to improve competitive interaction in multiplayer online games.
• Anatomy of a Game: Big Brother - #133: Game design of a reality TV show? Seriously.
• Anatomy of a Game: Survivor Twists - #135: How twists in the game of Survivor show that "the game is what the game is"
• Social Gaming Interactions, Part Three: Cooperation & Freeform - #138: Improving social interactions through cooperation and freeforming.