Tiddlywiki - Nifty Trick

I'm a fan of Tiddlywiki for GM notes, something I've mentioned of before. I'm currently doing some work for my next Daruna game, and in the process of creating a couple stat blocks for some standard fighter types, discovered this little trick.


Here's a stat block from the game, a generic 2nd level fighter type:

!!!! <<view title link>> - Basic fighter type, no real tricks
Str: 15 Int: 11 Wis: 12 Dex: 14 Con: 14 Cha: 12
HP: 12 AC: 16/14 BAB (base/melee/ranged): 2/4/4 Damage: +2 by weapon
Level: 2 CMB: 4 CMD: 16 Init: 2
Fort: 4 Reflex: 3 Will: 2
* Move: 5
* Weapons
** <<tiddler [[Short Spear]]>>, <<tiddler [[Heavy Mace]]>>
** <<tiddler [[Sling]]>>
* Armor
** <<tiddler [[Studded Leather]]>>
** <<tiddler [[Light Wooden Shield]]>>
!!!! Abilities
* [[Dodge]], [[Natural Athlete]]
* Athletics 7
* Handle Animal 3
* Int Craft/Prof 2
* Perception 3
* Stealth 4
* Survival 4


Kind of confusing I know, so I'll walk through it and explain:

!!!! <<view title link>>


This bit translates to: show the title of this tiddler as a link and treat it as a 4th level header. This has become my standard way of setting up tiddlers that may be targets for transclusion. I use transclusion *a lot*. It's like delicious info-tech bacon. In fact that's what I'm writing about right now.

So skipping ahead a bit we come to:

* Weapons
** <<tiddler [[Short Spear]]>>, <<tiddler [[Heavy Mace]]>>
** <<tiddler [[Sling]]>>
* Armor
** <<tiddler [[Studded Leather]]>>
** <<tiddler [[Light Wooden Shield]]>>


Here's the fun bit. If you'll recall, writing <<tiddler [[target]]>> transcludes the information from target into the current tiddler. What I've done is written very short tiddlers for each weapon / armor type in the game so I can instantly expand them using transclusion. Here's the Short Spear tiddler:

<<view title link>> (1d6/20/2x R4)


The net effect? All my weapons and armor entries get expanded out with relevant stats when included in a top level stat block.

Here's what the original stat block looks like when viewed normally:

2F Basic - Basic fighter type, no real tricks
Str: 15 Int: 11 Wis: 12 Dex: 14 Con: 14 Cha: 12
HP: 12 AC: 16/14 BAB (base/melee/ranged): 2/4/4 Damage: +2 by weapon
Level: 2 CMB: 4 CMD: 16 Init: 2
Fort: 4 Reflex: 3 Will: 2

• Move: 5
• Weapons
• Short Spear (1d6/20/2x R4), Heavy Mace (1d8/20/2x)
• Sling (1d4/20/2x R10)
• Armor
• Studded Leather (AC 3/Dex 5/Check -1/Arcane 3/Speed 0)
• Light Wooden Shield (AC 1/Dex -/Check -1/Arcane 1/Speed 0)

Abilities

• Dodge, Natural Athlete
• Athletics 7
• Handle Animal 3
• Int Craft/Prof 2
• Perception 3
• Stealth 4
• Survival 4

This might seem like a lot of work, maybe it is, but after dealing with the setup it becomes very easy to create fairly complex stat blocks with minimal effort. You might have also noticed I had links to Dodge and Natural Athlete in there too. I didn't use transclusion there, because the full definition of feats tends to make things too wordy.

So there you go, another nifty Tiddlywiki tip for the budding wiki gnome. If you want to read more about Tiddlywiki, you can check out the product's own site, or check out the brief tutorial I wrote on my old blog. Enjoy!