How to write a Player's Journal for your RPG

Enhance immersion and creativity with a journal in your game!

A week ago we talked about how small props can enhance the playthrough of an RPG, and I presented the journal as a prop that both players and GMs can get to increase their own immersion in the game, and spark their own creativity.
How do we make a journal, though?

Fear not, fellow bathroom-reading wizards! Today we are going to take a look at making a Player’s Journal! We are going to use my upcoming game STRIGA as a basis, since it has a built-in Journaling mechanic, but everything can be applied to any game you prefer.

WHAT IS A PLAYER’S JOURNAL

Player’s Journals are pretty straightforward in concept: simply put, this is a diary of your Characters, where they express their thoughts, feelings, and ideas about what is happening in the game’s world.

While this may look just as a simple roleplay enhancement, the journal actually has a lot of in-game benefits.

The first one is obviously keeping track of what is happening in the game. In hexcrawlers, intrigue-heavy, or exploration games, it could be hard to remember everything that’s happening in an RPG session, especially if you play for a lot of hours or you don’t play every week. Having your character write down what happened in the last in-game days will surely give you something to cling to when you need to remember what happened in a session you probably had two weeks ago.

The second best reason is to further explore your character’s progression. You can update your journal between sessions, expand your character’s thoughts and delve into what their goals could be. When the adventure or campaign is over, you’ll have a clear track of your character’s journey!

Finally, one of the main reason you should have a player’s journal is to become basically immortal.
Particularly in STRIGA, your character’s journal is both a physical item you own and an item your character owns in the game’s world. This means that should your character perish, his journal is an item that can be found by another of your characters. This means all you accomplished survives and actually becomes vital information for another character!

Now that we have established what a Player’s Journal is, let’s get into how we can make one!

HOW TO MAKE A PLAYER’S JOURNAL

First and foremost, you’ll want a sketchbook you are comfortable with. You don’t have to get anything crazy-professional-artist level, anything will do! I suggest you use a blank page sketchbook so you’ll be able to have a couple of sketches too.
Now it’s time to fill those pages!

0. (optional) Sketch a Character Sheet

One optional thing I like to do is make a fast character sheet of the game I’m playing (and possibly sketch my character too), just so I have all my character’s info inside this book, and I only need to carry this at a game night.
This is entirely optional so feel free to skip this!

1. Start with your character’s first impressions

Your characters are starting a long journey, with people they may even not be familiar with. The first thing you could write after the first session is the impressions about the other characters in the party, or about the first NPCs you have found.
It could also be a good time to decide whether you wanna write your diary in first person, or write it like in third person, like if your character is writing a memoir.

2. Write a diary, session-by-session or day-by-day

Keeping track of what is happening is one of the reason you have a journal, so writing what happens either day-by-day or session-by-session is a good way to keep your “future you” informed. Update the journal with what happened, what you found and what adversities you faced.
In STRIGA you will also have a prompts table you can roll on, so you can have a little spark of creativity to get you started on writing.

3. Start sketching

I know some of you will probably tell me “but I suck at drawing!” and let me answer you right away: it does not matter.
Unless your character is a skilled artist, who cares if you are not doing “Carlos Castilho levels” of artworks in your own journal?
As a matter of fact, you can use this to practice your own drawing skills and have fun.
Try to sketch what you found during the session, a temple’s decoration, a particular flower, or a creature. Anything that sparks your imagination!
One little advice I can give you if you wanna have a basis, is to find some photo references and start trying to copy those reference as best as you can.
But remember, it’s your sketchbook, you can make mistakes and do whatever you want with it!

4. Keep track of your character’s feelings

One important thing in your player’s journal is to keep track what your character feels. Remember to always describe how the character felt in that moment. Were you scared when the beastmen attacked you? Were you happy when you found that treasure? Were you frustrated when you didn’t find what you were looking for?
This not only helps you develop your character but it also builds a deeper connection with the game’s world.

5. Map out places and take notes

This one is pretty self-explanatory, but your characters may want to keep track of the places they visit and make observations on such places. You can use your journal to take these notes, that may prove useful for your character and, well, for your other characters.

6. Stay connected with the game when you are not playing

While I suggest you take your notes on the go, it is better to write and sketch your Journal entries when you are not playing.
Not only to get focused on what’s happening during the game, as no adventurer would ever stop to write their feelings while being chased by a red dragon.
It also develops a deeper connection to the game, giving you an activity to do in between game sessions.

This is why I strongly advocate for having a player’s journal, and why I turned that into a full mechanic in STRIGA. There, every Extractionist adventurer has a Journal, to ensure that their discoveries never get lost, and serve to the greater effort of exploring the Spiral City.

If you want to know more about STRIGA, you can find a previous post here giving some details about the game.
Be sure to follow the pre-launch page so you don’t miss the launch of the game!