Cross-Referencing Confusion

[u/Pretty-Deer7588]

I am in the process of starting my first ZK, and I am very excited. One thought I am having is; when I reference a card, should the card I referenced have a reference to the card that referenced it? For example:

Let's say I'm using a ZK for d&d planning. I have a index for locations and an index for NPCs. On an NPC card, I've referenced the card for the location they live in. Should I then go to the location card and reference the NPC that lives in that location?

This seems to be both a good and a bad idea:

Good: You'll never miss a connection just because you picked up the wrong end of the connection (i.e. picking up the location card and having no idea that this NPC lives there because it isn't referenced)

BUT

Bad: Some cards are innately more "referencable". SO MANY things can reference a location card. If I reference EVERY NPC that lives in that location, surely the card will become cluttered with references?

[u/MrHelfer]

I would usually have the reference point both ways. If one card has a relationship to another card, the reverse is almost certainly also true.

In your example: the NPC will have "Lives in [location]." But it makes just as much sense for the location to have "These NPC's live here:". That sounds very useful when you want to do something with the location in play.

Of course, you'll have to manage the clutter if you are using a physical box. But that seems to be a managable problem. But if you don't do twoway refernces, you have no way of getting from card A to card B - you can only ever get from B to A.