Scenario Designer      Go To Download Page    

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Basics: Basic operation

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Design: Program and parameter design

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Syntax: How to invoke or set data values

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Cascades: Editing cause/effect relationships

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Scripts: Advanced process control

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Explore: Explore cause/effect links

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Move: Move, Copy or Delete events

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Reports: Batch and single reports and previews

The Scenario Designer is a cause-and-effect engine that generates multiple coherent hardcopy randomized narratives.  These narratives are intended for practice scenarios (also called Simulated Emergency Tests or SETs).  The range of events covered is limited by only your imagination.  

You define what might happen, the odds of various events, and what the ripple effects might be from each event.  You define the people involved, the places they might be, their attributes and abilities.  The scenario generator then creates the drill "reality" as would be experienced by each place or person, prints it out as a playbook, and each person has to decide how to react when the SET begins.

Why multiple? To prevent participants from preplanning their response, or prepositioning themselves advantageously before the drill begins, the drill generator can create multiple different drill "instances" in a single report.  So each participant might have any number of basic scenarios in one playbook, and would not know until the SET begins what the actual drill will be about.  One instance might be a snowstorm, one might be a radioactive leak, you name it.

What's Coherent? All participants must operate within the same basic drill scenario, so if one person is responding to an earthquake all participants must see the same earthquake.  But each individual may be faced with individual situations, such as injured family members, or different personal responsibilities.  The drill generator lets the designer subdivide his/her "drill reality" into large and small "experiences", where each individual might have a different experience but might also share some information with other individuals.  Where information is shared, the reports to those individuals will agree; where information is not shared, no one but the designated recipient will know what he/she sees.  Joe and Bob respond to the same ice storm, but Joe won't know that Bob broke his leg by slipping on the ice, etc.

Why HardCopy?  Output is typically a paper report, and this is given in advance of a SET to each participant.  Although the SET is computer generated and therefore requires things like a running computer and some power source, the SET often tests emergency responses when there is no power or other technological infrastructure.  So each participant works from a paper report, period.  The drill generator output can be written to a disk file, but that feature is provided only so the drill report can be emailed to participants.  

There is no online simulation, but later versions are planned that will create sealed follow-on reports, to be opened during the SET.  Additionally, the drill designer (that is, you) can set up "umpires" who can have data that is not publicly available, and can announce situation changes during the course of a drill.

This is a work in progress, and screen shots here might not be quite current.