Emerald City Comic Con

Apparently I will be at Emerald City Comic Con this weekend running 13th Age demos.

I haven't run an RPG demo at a convention in quite a long while - I've been running board game demos for a good long while.  But RPG demos are an entirely different animal.

There are a number of good points here:

1) It's a game I like.  A lot. I'm currently in a game that I'm very much enjoying.

2) I'm mostly familiar with it - obviously, I'll need to go over it and refresh myself on a few of the rules. But I'm mostly ready to go.

3) There is a scenario already set up and ready-to-go.  It's on Pelgrane's website. And I've already read through it a few times.  It's actually pretty basic - but it highlights the strengths of the game.

4) I'm already "in shape" with my GM skills.  I'm not the best GM - and I have no illusions about that - but I do enjoy it.

5) I enjoy introducing people to things I like.  Conventions are an excellent opportunity in which to do that.

So what do I dread?

1) RPG demos differ from board game demos in one significant way: they depend to a much greater extent on the people who are involved.  While one difficult person can make a board game demo difficult, it doesn't often color the perception of the game.  But one difficult person can utterly destroy an RPG demo.

2) I really really don't like crowds. GenCon is pretty difficult for me, believe it or not. Until after the first demo or two - I just need to remember that these are my people.  Because they really are. Even at a comic convention, the attendees are my people.  We are all geeks - and I'll admit to being a low-level comic book geek.

So we'll see how it shakes out.

I'll let you know, probably next week.

The following week, I'll have a character from my wife.

That should give me plenty of time to get a post or two together, despite the upcoming chaos at work.

Chaotic March + More D&D Reprints

Short post this week - my situation at work is suddenly in flux, as we have someone who is leaving the company.  This means that I may be working 10+ hours per day.

This means less time to write and/or think about games and game-related things.

So until further notice, please be aware that my posting schedule may become erratic.  I'm going to try to keep my normal schedule up as much as possible, mind you, but there will be slips and possibly missed days.

With that said, have you seen Wizards of the Coast's latest plan to make huge piles of money?

This one - if my Google Plus Circles are any indication - will do the trick.

It's a reprint of the original white box D&D. In a deluxe wooden box. With four additional supplements and new cover art.

The text lists seven books.  The picture shows eight.  The picture also shows dice which aren't listed in the contents list.  So there is some question about what will be in there.

Either way, it's $150.

Seriously.

So now they've reprinted the 1E AD&D PHB GMG and MM - all of which gave a cut of money to the Gygax Memorial Fund.

Then they reprinted the 3.5 D&D PHB GMG and MM.  Then the 1E Unearthed Arcana.  And now this.  None of these are called out as giving money to the Gygax Memorial Fund - they're just cash grabs. Rather blatant cash grabs, at that.

It makes sense - the Old School Renaissance is putting out a ton of 1E clones and seems to be self-sustaining. So there is a market for that 1E product.  And Pathfinder is big money right now, too, so the 3.5 reprints might land them a share of that cash cow.

And I've heard from several places that Hasbro is worried about the profitability of D&D.  It is, after all, the best-known and most-recognized brand name in the entire role-playing game industry.  By a long ways.  It should be much more profitable than it is.

These reprints?  Think about how cheap it is for WotC to produce them.  You spend a couple of hundred dollars hiring an artist for new covers.  Then there is production costs (which are not small, but are still much lower than cover price). These prices are essentially the same for any book - so why are these cheaper to produce?

Because you don't need product development.  You don't need to pay any writers or editors or R&D teams.  You just need someone to scan the old stuff into a computer (because it predates desktop publishing), and check it for scanning errors.

So even though the quality of the product is higher than most of their stuff, these are probably less expensive to produce than "current" products - and they sell for a higher price.

It's a good move from a business standpoint.

I'm not saying I think it's a bad thing - I'll probably end up grabbing one of those boxes. And the Unearthed Arcana book at some point.

I just really wish that WotC were continuing to support the Gygax Memorial Fund.

Game of the Year: The Early Contenders

We're now half-way to GenCon. Already.

As I've done for the last few years, I'm going to award Gamethyme's Game Of The Year while I'm at the show.

As we're half-way there, I figured I'd better list the candidates and highlight a few frontrunners.

Today, I'm going to do it in reverse order of times played.

Zombicide - I played this at a friend's house.  I honestly wasn't too upset at having missed the Kickstarter until I played it.  We purchased it less than a week later, but I've still only logged one play.

Shave a Sheep - it'a long shot at best.  My nephews really enjoyed this, but it's a bit too random for me to enjoy playing a lot of this one.

Panic on Wall Street - This game will play with smaller crowds, but it really starts to shine a bit once the crowd gets closer to the eleven it'll handle.  It reminds me of Pit, because there aren't "turns" - once the game is on, it's on, with all players simultaneously trying to negotiate with all other players.

Tsuro of the Seas - Another Kickstarted game that I didn't Kickstart.  I will eventually pick this one up - it's different enough from basic Tsuro that I see the value in owning it.

River Dragons - on further checking, it's not really eligible this year, because I played Dragon Delta in 2007.  But it really should be.  The new edition is amazing.

Mythic Battles - I got my contributor copy of this one at GenCon.  I really like it, and it makes me wish I played more two-player games these days.  The only problem I have with the game is that when you play at the 100 point level, each player looks at their options and chooses the one or two units not to use.  It's not the most difficult of choices.  There is an expansion coming this year which will alleviate most of the problem. And add some new cool things to the game.

Kemet - I like this game.  A lot.  Enough that I was willing to write an article for Game Trade Magazine for it.  It's the only wargame I know of where turtling is almost never a good idea.  The closest you should get is coiling like a snake - getting ready to strike. And the components are exceptional.

Fame Us - Another fun filler game.  I'll admit that, had I been spending money, I wouldn't have bought into the pink box with a glittery cover. But with the right group, this is a total riot.  The hidden teams aspect of the game keeps  the voting fair and unbiased.  This one is surprisingly entertaining.  Note: The box pictured on Amazon doesn't match my box, so they may have changed it.

Seasons - A big GenCon release.  It was actually several months before I got my copy, which I immediately played a bunch of.  It's seeing less play, now, but it's still in the car.  And there is an expansion coming.  I really like this game - in large part because I'm not playing Magic: the Gathering anymore and this scratches that itch without a $3k investment necessary on my part.

Gentlemen Thieves - A hidden role shift-alliances game.  The more I play this one, the more I appreciate it. Once the game is explained (which takes about five minutes), the game is on.  Usually the players have been able to figure out who is who by the end, but not always.  This game needs more love, because it's really good.

City of Horror - This one continues to be a favorite.  I think I raved about it in October or November.

Mutant Meeples - This is the only game on the list I Kickstarted.  And it was delayed and delayed and delayed.  And, now that it's here, I don't mind the wait.  It's a ton of fun, and we've been playing it a ton.  In fact, this is my most-played game since GenCon.

System

I did a few posts a few years back about system, and how it matters.  This weekend, I found myself facing that directly.

You see, I'm running a Cthulhutech game for some friends of mine. And I'm really not using the system right. The game, for those of you who don't know, provides players with a small pool of points that they can spend to add dice to their rolls.  That's not at all unusual in modern RPGs. What is unusual is how many points players get - they get ten points per session.

Not per adventure, not per campaign - per session.

This means that I should, if I'm running the system as it's designed to be run, be forcing die rolls pretty regularly.  And a few of them should be high-stakes and important to encourage players to spend more points.

As it is, in the game I'm running, players are averaging only one to two rolls per session.  In theory, they could blow five points per roll and not sweat it.  In practice, however, they've been hesitant to spend their points, because they are afraid of what I have coming.

Now I'm not going to say, "Clearly I'm running the game wrong."  Because I'm having fun, and the players seem to be having fun.  But it makes me wonder if, perhaps, there is a system which might better fit how I'm running the game.

Some of my friends and I had a brief discussion on Google Plus, because I was already struggling a bit - I have one player who wants a psychological game of personal horror, and one friend who wants action and adventure.

Someone suggested that Gumshoe might be a good system for me.  All I'd have to do is mash up Trail of Cthulhu and Ashen Stars. Which, honestly, is easier than it sounds.  And my initial reaction was to recoil.  I don't know that I could run Gumshoe, I thought, That's a tough game! You need to map out all kinds of clues and ... and ...

At game that evening, one of the players mentioned that the mashup did sound good, and I stammers, "But I can't run Gumshoe!"

"But Eric," he scolded me, "You've never run Gumshoe!"

And it's true.  I haven't.  I've only played Gumshoe. Only a couple of times, too, with ... mixed results.

So I'm re-reading my Gumshoe books.  And a few pages into Esoterrorists, I realized: This is pretty much how I've been running the game already.  "Do you have Skill X?  Okay, you see ... "

I have one parapsychic player and one sorcerer character, so I'd need to figure out how to adapt that ... but I could run this as a Gumshoe game without even changing the character sheets.  I think that may be the biggest secret to Gumshoe: Every game is Gumshoe once you stop rolling the dice.

I think I'm going to keep the game as-is for now.  As a proto-Gumshoe game with occasional combat.  But I may take a good look at Mutant City Blues to see if maybe a tweak to the skills list might be appropriate.

A Tale of Two (Other) Kickstarters

This week, I'm going to talk about two projects that I didn't back.

The Pathfinder Online and Small World 2 for iPad.

Because these two epitomize some of the issues I'm having with Kickstarter in general.

Let me rewind a bit, first:  a few weeks back, Google Plus unleashed communities on the world. And I was immediately invited to a ton of communities which I had zero interest in joining.  I even started two communities as a joke.  Because I could.  Then, a short time later, I was snarking about some Kickstarter project or other, and I realized that I didn't have to be the only one snarking.  I could share the snark with like-minded individuals who could also then snark about projects in need of snarking.

And Kicksnarker was born.

I got very lucky very early, in that several extremely funny individuals joined almost immediately.  I won't say the community took off like a shot - because we didn't.  But the folks we got were high-quality funny people.

A bit later, one of them was snarking about the Pathfinder MMO project. Since I have exactly zero interest in MMOs, I didn't look too closely. Until it started appearing again and again and again in the community.  Goblinworks has done two Kickstarters for Pathfinder Online.  The first one raised $300k for a tech demo.  Backer rewards were split between the online and offline versions of Pathfinder.  It was ... odd. But it made its goal and then some.

That project didn't draw a lot of snark.

Then came Pathfinder Online: A Fantasy Sandbox MMO.  This one drew a ton of snark.  Ridiculous amounts of it.  Why?  Because the backer rewards were ... split between tabletop and online rewards.  And as the project went on, the tabletop rewards became more and more ridiculous. Paizo threw all of its weight behind the project, pushing it on its forums and getting PDFs and print versions from some of its third party partners to sweeten the pot and encourage gamers to up their pledges so it'd make its goal.

In fact, all of the pot-sweeteners were for the tabletop version of the game.  It was bad enough that I considered pledging just so I could get my own personal Pathfinder library.

It was a bit like going to the grocery store and being offered a potato that I don't want.  "If you get this potato," they would say, "We will throw in this gallon of ice cream.  And this chocolate syrup. And these candy sprinkles. And this ice cream scoop.  And if you buy a ten pound bag of potatoes, we will throw in this blender!"

Interestingly, all of this backing and pushing was apparently pointless - other than to make the project succeed.  But the MMO was going forward regardless.

Read this interview, pointed out by a Kicksnarkers member (the ever-funny Jason Paul McCartan).  The key portion of the interview?

Morrus: What happens if the Kickstarter fails to reach its $1,000,000? Will you try again, look for alternative means of funding, or cancel the whole project? 

Ryan: The game is financed and in production. The Kickstarter lets us speed up the time to develop it. We are focused on getting the Kickstarter across the funding goal and we're not making "what if" plans.

Read Ryan's answer again.  Especially that first sentence.  The Kickstarter project wasn't a make-or-break for the game.  The project was to show off that they could raise $1m. And get more programmers on the job to speed it up.

There was no need for Paizo to throw their weight around and post on all of their forums and spam their newsletter subscribers over and over and over, begging us to pledge.

It's possible that the third party support for the project may have hurt the overall Pathfinder economy for some time to come, too.  If I pledged to get the PDFs, then the PDFs that I have are both non-sales for the publishers that contributed and make it less likely that I'll be buying more PDFs for some time to come.  If, for example, the project gave out Eric's Big Book of Monsters, then as a consumer, I'm not likely to go buy Dave's Big Book of Monsters - why do I need to?  I have the other one.

And yes, I know.  Monster books are not the right example for this - but the underlying principle applies.  Paizo may have long-term hurt their numbers for a short-term gain.

Now, by way of contrast, read this.

Why did Days of Wonder cancel their Small World kickstarter?

"Making the goal of the campaign the funding of a new ipad version we had already decided to do was wrong." Compare that answer to Ryan's answer above. And then think about it.

"Having Android as a stretch goal was a mistake.  We underestimated people's reluctance to fund a platform that might not happen." That is just sensible.  If I back just to get an Android version and it doesn't hit its stretch goal, I'm going to cancel my funding. Or be very unhappy.

"Making the designer edition of the centerpiece of the campaign's rewards left people wondering 'whether we were trying to fund the software or the Designer Edition?'"  In other words, "Giving free ice cream with purchase of potatoes doesn't make sense. If we're selling potatoes, we should give away butter and chives and bacon bits. Not ice cream."

Thank you, Days of Wonder, for continuing to be a class act. Even if it did cost you a small amount of money in the short term.

D&D Classics

At GenCon last year, Wizards of the Coast announced that they'd be doing digital versions of old books, again.  In addition to the print versions of some of their core books.

There was a lot of rumor and speculation, especially given their purge of a few years ago.

I should explain the purge for those of you who don't know about it.

Wizards of the Coast had been selling their PDFs via DriveThruRPG/RPGNow.  Then they decided to stop doing so.  That's not a big deal - there are dozens of publishers who stop making their products available.  But WotC went that extra mile, and had all of their products purged from DriveThru's servers.

Normally, if I lose a license or stop selling a product, it stays on DriveThru's servers. People who have already purchased it can still download it, but no-one can buy it anymore.  Wizards went that extra step.  If you hadn't saved a local copy, you lost access to your stuff.

It angered a lot of people and (arguably) caused a significant surge in interest for the Old School Renaissance.

So at GenCon, when they announced their digital initiative, people were curious what format it'd take.  We all hoped it'd be through DTRPG again, because DriveThru has a good thing going.  But I don't know that anyone believed it would be.  Because PDFs are too easy to share and sharing is piracy.

I received an e-mail last night from DriveThru.

DNDClassics.com is now open for business.  Not only that, but if you lost product in the Purge, it's back.  You don't need to re-buy it. Had they not done this, I would not have mentioned that it was for sale.  In fact, I would not have spent any money on Wizards of the Coast product.  Other than to suggest that you steer clear.

I'll be honest: There is nothing to prevent another Purge. Other than the customer outcry. But I think that it'd be a very bad move.

Price-wise ... you can find many of these books at lower prices in decent shape on eBay or Half-Price Books. But if you're low on shelf space or have a garage full of games waiting to be unpacked and brought inside ...

Where's My Stuff?

I've decided that I'm going to update my Kickstarter status quarterly, here.  My next update will likely be in mid-April (unless something happens).

Since June of 2010, I have backed 48 projects on Kickstarter and my wife has backed 43.  You can see the full list of what we have backed on this spreadsheet.

There are a few categories into which I have mentally placed these projects, and this is what fits into those categories:

Needs A Little Love

These are projects that I want to see succeed, but which haven't funded and are maybe running a bit close to the wire.  There is only one item in this category at this time, and that is Formula E. 

Bruno Faidutti has designed some of my favorite games.  When he says a game is fun and throws his personal support behind a project, I will listen.  When he takes that extra step and talks to Asmodee to get permission to use a given name, that tells me he's excited about the project.  Right now, this project is on track to miss its goal.  I invite you to check it out.  The rulebook is online, so it's not a blind backing, either - you can see what the game is like before you decide.

These guys are clearly clued-in and ready to go.  I don't anticipate huge delays between this funding (if it funds) and their going into full production.

Not Yet Funded

We just haven't hit the deadline, yet, and these projects are sure to fund. They're listed in the order in which I backed them, not the order in which they closed and/or funded.

FATE Core - a core rulebook for the FATE system.  This has blown its targets away, and they are working on their stretch goals at this point.  And there are some pretty sweet stretches in there.  Just announced: A post-apocalyptic setting by Kenneth Hite.  We backed at the $85 level.

Sorcerer - Ron Edwards is doing an upgraded version of the game which kicked off the Indie revolution.  This closes on the 18th, so hurry if you want in!  $25 gets you the core book and the supplements in print and PDF.  Well, $31. Because shipping isn't cheap.   I'm of the opinion that there is a good game in there - it's just hidden behind his discussion of the rules.  And I'm very curious about his annotations.  We backed at the $25 level before he closed it.

Deluxe Tunnels & Trolls - A classic reborn!  I have the 7.5 edition of the game, and this is a case of a rising tide lifting all boats. The OSR is starting to attract non-D&D games which are clearly Old School. This is a good thing, even if it can (and will) lead to market confusion eventually. Backed it at the $35 level.

Cortex+ Hacker's Guide - I am a huge fan of the Cortex Plus system. I like how it's heavily customized for each setting. And I've seen some good hacks out there - there is a Smallville hack for running a Star Wars game which doesn't have the Jedi Balance Problem, for example.  We backed this at the $25 level.

Crokinole Game & Accessory - I've wanted a Crokinole game for a good long while.  While I'd love to have one of the Hilinski Brothers' amazing boards, I just can't make the money work all at once.  $250 is a lot of money.  The Mayday Games boards have received mixed reviews overall, but the reviews have steadily improved. And Mayday has done a good job of responding to customers who had problems with their boards.  Eventually, I will own a Hilinski board. But, as a casual player, the Mayday board will fill my needs.  We backed at the $130 level.

Funded Too Recently To Worry About

I'm not worried about anything funded since October 1, 2012.  So I'm not going to bother detailing them - you can check the spreadsheet (linked above) if you really want a list.

Shipping Soon

Gunship: First Strike is starting shipping this week.  Dungeon World will be shipping soon, too - they are just waiting for the last few backer rewards.  It's well overdue, but Kings of Air and Steam says they'll be shipping soon. The Battle of Red Cliffs should be shipped by the end of this month.

Still On Target

Tenra Bansho Zero is an excellent example of a project done well.  It funded, and he has been keeping us in the loop with regards to the project's current status.  Mobile Frame Zero is similarly good at keeping backers informed.  In fact, I'm not concerned about these.

Some News Would Be Great

In that three months and more back, there are a few projects where I'm a bit concerned due to a lack of information and/or updates.

The +5 Food of Eating Cookbook - No updates since late November, when the author was having some software-related issues.  I'd love to know how it's going - there have been a few sample recipes dropped here and there, but I'm in the "update me every two weeks, even if the update is 'Nothing new to report'" school of thought. Depending on the project.

Psi-Punk - This one barely made its goal.  The writing is finished (as of December 10th), and they were commissioning art.  No word, yet, on how that's going. Have artists been chosen? Have sketches been approved?

Oh My God! There's An Axe In My Head! - After going through two publishers who took too long, you'd think these guys would finally have their act together, right?  The last update was December 11th, and said that it would "probably ship" the first part of March. 

I really wish I could see the backer-only updates on my wife's account.  Because I want to know what's up with Top This! and Guide to the Village By The Sea. And Witch Girls Book of Shadows.

Polish Needed

There are a couple of products where I need part of my pledge, but I have most of it.

They Became Flesh is a bit infamous on several forums, because most everyone is still waiting for most everything. I'm only missing one set of dice, but my requests for updates have gone unanswered.

Dreadball got most of Season One to me with no problems.  I'm still waiting for my acrylic board and a few star players before my collection is complete, however.

Thanks For The Update, Can I Have My Stuff, Now?

Powerchords has become, for me, the poster child for potential problems with the Kickstarter system.  It funded, then there was a three-month silence.  Then a four-month gap while he worked on a freelance project to pay the bills.  And then he started with the weekly updates.  For two years.  And the game isn't going to be a freestanding systemless book, anymore.  It's going to be a full game.  No, a game line. So these six hundred thousand words written so far?  They're going to be in other books, most of them.

Far West is also frustrating to a lot of folks. I'm ... I'm $75 into it, so it's not a small amount of money - at the same time, it's not a huge amount, either.  And I've received a few items (the Tales of the Far West anthology was really good, for example). I just want the core book.  I want to play the game!  

... and that's about where things stand so far.