Recently I have been reading a lot about the Threefold Model and all the different models that branched from it. They are basically a series of discussions online between role playing game designers about what a game really does, and why people play certain types of games. For a little while, I actually felt like had an idea of what was going on. I wanted to create a simple diagram that represented my take on it so here it is, I call it The Threefold Model Cheat-sheet. I realize that it conflates a lot of topics and that the relationships between the elements change from model to model. I am not trying to show the model as put out by any single person, I am trying to represent the major components put out by all theories, and put them side by side for comparison. I think it is interesting and helpful to compare different theories, there are no value judgments here.
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A little while ago I posted a sector map generated using the Classic Traveller ruleset. I am working on a Debtrunner sector map now, and I realized that the random number generator I am using to help populate hexes could be useful to one somebody out there.
For the hex grid I drew (below), I generate a random matrix of zeros and ones using wolfram alpha: https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Randominteger[1,{10,18}]. The 1's correspond to an inhabited world, the 0's correspond to an empty hex. I could have it generate a number between 1 and 6, since the book calls for a d6 roll, but since it is a 50/50 chance, the binary (0 or 1) random number generator works fine. The outskirts have a lower probability the command line has to be modified to populate them.
