Hey all, Sam here.
How have we made it to another Friday already? The time seriously just goes flying by. It’s mind-boggling sometimes. It feels like we’ve been doing so much here on the home front, and so there isn’t as much downtime as we’d like. But David’s getting back into his urge to paint miniatures and stuff again, and my reading drive has come back as strong as it was during my reading and blogging peak a few years ago, so while it has been busy, it has also been fairly fun.
I’m finishing my training for my new job this week and next week will probably be on a different work schedule, so we’ll see what happens with that. We’re really hoping that we’ll get to share at least one day off together. It has actually really sucked having less time together these past few weeks.
Anyway, welcome back to Weekend Writer, a weekly series I host here on Free State of Geek that is fully dedicated to creative writing. On the first Friday of the month (like today), I use several story generator tools to create various creativity prompts for both you and I to use to help kickstart your creative projects (your choice if you want to write something or draw something). Then, on the last Friday of the month, I share snippets of what I’ve been working on over the month…it could be from the prompt generation, or it could be from some other project I’ve been working on…or it could be from both. I’ve had a couple months where I’ve shared a couple passages from different writing projects.
For the rest of the Fridays of the month, I do a deep dive breakdown that focuses on some aspect of creative writing. That has mostly been deep dives into sections of books about the craft of writing, but sometimes might be a deep dive into a lecture or an episode of a podcast or a YouTube video or just a general discussion about some sort of creativity/writing topic.
The past couple months had been focused on Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book on Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need by Jessica Brody, and that was really informative. The book I’m starting tomorrow should also take about two months to get through…but I’m wondering if I should do it all at once, or if I should break it up with some of the information gathered and lessons learned from the Gen Con Writer’s Symposium (which I’m attending August 3rd-6th). If I do it all at once, then I could either do the Writer’s Symposium panels as bonus posts…or start them in September, after I’ve finished with this book.
What do you guys think?
All right, that’s enough dilly-dallying. Let’s jump into the post.
July Prompt Time
All right…I currently have five different creativity generator tools in my collection/arsenal. Some of them are technically aimed at TTRPGs, BUT I’ve found that for the most part they work for creative writing just fine as well, which is why I include them all. With each prompt, I take a photo of the prompt randomization (whether that is dice rolls, card draws, or whatever), type up the prompt below the photo, and then I include a paragraph where I give you information about the generator tool I used.
If you know of any other useful tools like these, please let me know. I’d love to keep expanding my collection. It’s cool to see what sorts of ideas can be generated when you use a randomization method for creation.
Story Engine Deck
Prompt: A Secret Admirer Wants to Find Love With An Overlooked Artist But It Will Make Their Timeline Dangerously Unstable.
This prompt comes from this storytelling deck from The Story Engine, which is a prompt and idea generating tool that I adore for both creative writing and for TTRPG plotting.
Tarot/Oracle Deck
Prompt: Luck, Risk, Survival
Once again, I used my Urban Crow Oracle Deck by MJ Cullinane for this prompt. I really like using this oracle deck, because the card names are different from a tarot deck. I do have a few different tarot decks as well, and I might use those at some point for future draws, but for now I’m really enjoying my crow deck. What can I say? I just like crows.
Roll & Play
Prompt: 1) In a puff of smoke, an elderly person with charred clothing appears. Their teleportation spell went badly wrong.
This month I decided to roll the dice on the Magical Encounters page in the Roll & Play book. You can use the dice I rolled, or if you have your own d20, you can roll on the chart yourself. Or heck, if you want to then you can just choose whichever option sparks your interest.
Sidequest Decks
Prompt 1: The City Beyond the Veil – When the stars align in certain ways–known only to hoary astrologers and maddened sages–a fabled city opens its gates. Only then can the daring attend the court of the powerful fiends that dwell within.
Prompt 2: On Their Best Behavior – An ambassador has been dispatched to a distant land. Those who travel with them must not cause an incident with an alien culture.
The Sidequest decks from Inkwell Ideas are another wonderful accessory designed for TTRPGs, but can easily be used for writers as well. This time around I went back to the Political and Urban Fantasy deck, and again, I went with two options as prompt inspiration. You can use either option, and you can either use the basic concept at the top of the card, or you can use the various encounters at the bottom of the card to expand upon the adventure/story further.
The Oracle Story Generator
Prompt: A Priest Will Coerce A Peer To Forge a New Alliance But Their Action Costs Them Everything.
Finally, we have a new addition to the prompt generation: The Oracle Story Generator by Nord Games. They have a Character Generator as well, but that one won’t be shipped out for another couple months. I’ve only looked through a few of these cards before writing up this post, so I’m pretty excited to delve further into the story options with these decks. With this prompt, you can make it even more specific by either rolling a four-sided die for each card, or by simply choosing which option you like best.
As always, when we reach the final Friday of the month, I’ll be sharing some snippets from what I’ve been writing over the past weeks. If you choose to create anything based on these prompts (or even if you don’t), feel free to share your creative projects with me for the last Friday of the month too. I’d love to celebrate whatever creative progress you’re making too!
Tomorrow I’ll be back with a bonus Weekend Writer book, diving into the first two chapters of our next creative writing deep dive book: The Emotional Craft of Fiction: How to Write the Story Beneath the Surface by Donald Maass.
Well, that is all from me for today. Thank you so much for stopping by, and I’ll be back soon with more geeky content.
Free State of Geek 
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