How do you visualize relations in CL?

[Rardian]

A happy new year to everyone. I am about to start a new homebrew campaign and preparing the first adventure for it. The player characters will travel with a caravan through the desert for a while. I will have a couple of NPCs to juggle and thought it would be neat to have their relations visualized in Campaign Logger for easy reference.

I approached it with the fabulous mermaid integration and abused common diagram types for it. Please, let me know what you think. What have you used to visualize relations? Do you have suggestions for improvements?


Entity-relationship diagram

My first try was an entity-relationship diagram. I found it very cool that I could assign attributes to each npc. The example is in German "Rolle" means "role" and "Volk" means "race". I just the one-to-many relation type to give the relation a direction because it resembles an arrow. Arrman is Payar of Opalwind (which means father in the Riksharr's native tongue).

Pro's:
- Structured way to display attributes.
Con's:
- The relations (the lines) are non-intuitive to read and are cluttered with unnecessary orthogonal lines.
- The code (see below) is cluttered as well as you cannot use the alias feature. For every relation I have to type "Arrman Weißhaupt" again. Unless, @JochenL updates mermaid to at least version v10.5.0+ (currently v9.4.3).

Spoiler: Mermaid Code

```mermaid
erDiagram
    "Arrman Weißhaupt" {
        Rolle Karawanenfuehrer
        Volk Riksharr
    }
    "Indarr Weißhaupt" {
        Rolle Logistik
        Volk Riksharr
    }
    "Opalwind" {
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    }
    "Goldknochen" {
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    }
    "Smaragdschatten" {
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    }
    "Seidenleicht" {
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    }

    "Arrman Weißhaupt" }|--|{ "Indarr Weißhaupt" : Nurdama
    "Arrman Weißhaupt" }|--|| Opalwind : Payar
    "Arrman Weißhaupt" }|--|| Goldknochen : Payar
    "Arrman Weißhaupt" }|--|| Seidenleicht : Payar

    "Indarr Weißhaupt" }|--|| Opalwind : Mayar
    "Indarr Weißhaupt" }|--|| Goldknochen : Mayar
    "Indarr Weißhaupt" }|--|| Seidenleicht : Mayar

    Goldknochen  }|--|{ Smaragdschatten : Nursala

```

Flow Chart

The other diagram type I tried is the good ol' flow chart. Turned out that mermaid is arranging the boxes in exactly the same way as in the other diagram type. It just looks different.

Pro's:
- NPC boxes and relation lines highly customizable. (There's one player character in the view that I wanted to highlight.)
- Relationship lines are intuitive.
- NPC's can be abbreviated for further use in the definition of relations.
Con's:
- The attributes are not shown in a structured manner.

Spoiler: Mermaid Code

```mermaid
flowchart TD

    aw["Arrman Weißhaupt
        Rolle Karawanenfuehrer
        Volk Riksharr
    "]
    iw["Indarr Weißhaupt
        Rolle: Logistik
        Volk: Riksharr
    "]
    opal[["Opalwind
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    "]]
    style opal fill:#09993c,stroke:#085422,stroke-width:2px,color:#fff
    gold["Goldknochen
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    "]
    smaragd["Smaragdschatten
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    "]
    seide["Seidenleicht
        Rolle Karawanenwache
        Volk Riksharr
    "]

    aw <-->|Nurdama| iw
    aw -->|Payar| opal
    aw -->|Payar| gold
    aw -->|Payar| seide

    iw -->|Mayar| opal
    iw -->|Mayar| gold
    iw -->|Mayar| seide

    gold <-->|Nursala| smaragd

```

 

[JochenL]

Unless, @JochenL updates mermaid to at least version v10.5.0+ (currently v9.4.3).

We will see a version upgrade soon.

 

[Justin_Giver]

The part I like best about CL is that it is a blank framework. If you can conceptualize it in your head and work it with your group, that is all that matters. I use factions to describe the faction so lets say I want to have a new religous sect that wil play a biggert part down the road. I would creat it in factions and describe the goals of the group, the general type of people they attract and any rituals or specifics that identify them.. ie clothing, books etc. Then I would start to sprinkle them into the story. But, that is how I would do it becuase that is how I see it working best for me and my group.
I have been looking at what you have created and I do not see it conceptualized as well as say, writting it down with prose.. but, that is me. Wish I could help you out.. maybe i'm just exhausted from being ill the last week and some and need a few more days to catch up. I would def say that whatever you are doing, you are seemingly going deep, creating relationships and a world around your players before they step foot in the world wso it appears real and full of life. From that perspective, keep going. Nothing makes the game and story more vibrant than a world that is alive, changing, has relationships that appear outside your characters involvement.