My apologies on the lack of updates, I am just too slammed with work. Simon, our man from GW, was here this week, so design took a back seat to meeting with him and going over our plans for the next year or two. We hadn’t seen him for many months, so it was good to catch up. Nicole made sure to find plenty of vegetarian restaurants for Simon, since she is determined to keep him well-fed on his trips to Seattle. Dinners at Wasabi and Carmelita were delightful. The tuna tataki at the former and eggplant-potato gnocchi at the latter were beyond tasty.

I did manage to squeeze in some design work as well, but not as much as I would have liked. We are in the do-or-die stage of WFRP’s development and I am madly writing and tinkering as we lead up to the final version. In general, I am quite pleased with how things have turned out. I just wish I was at this stage two months ago. This weekend its back to spells for me, since I have just finished the last six careers I’ll be adding to the core rules.

In other GR news, Red Star started shipping to distributors today at last. I’m very happy with how this book came out and I’m keen to see how it goes over. There’s really nothing like the Red Star in gaming and d20 Modern has no definitive campaign setting. Can you dig it, comrades?

When I was 11 years old, I couldn’t imagine a cooler job than getting to make games all day. Why that would hardly be like work at all, I thought. Well, funny story, it is in fact hard work and it can be just as frustrating as anything else. When your hobby becomes your job, things do change. You stop looking at your hobby as “that thing I do for fun” and start realizing it has become “that thing I do for money.” If you take it at all seriously, you have to learn to act like a professional (which often means doing things you don’t want to or NOT doing things you want to) and you have to treat it like work.

When I was working at WotC by day and doing Green Ronin nights and weekends, my two primary hobbies (roleplaying and miniatures games) had both become jobs. And that was not good. I remember when my boss asked me to stop playing Mordheim at lunch, reasoning that if I wanted to play a skirmish minis game I should be doing more Chainmail testing. And at home I was working every day on roleplaying stuff. So not only did I work seven days a week, but I had also professionalized two of my favorite leisure activities. Most of my game time revolved around various playtests, in which fun takes a back seat to analysis.

One way that leaving WotC was really good for me was that miniatures once again became my hobby. Sure, I still work every day for Green Ronin, but after ten hours of writing I can turn my mind to something else, or do minis busy work (cleaning, gluing, mounting, etc.) to distract me from the pitfalls of financial planning. So now, even though I am totally consumed by Warhammer Fantasy, I can still get together with Rick on Thursday nights and enjoy a game of Epic Armageddon (the smaller scale version of Warhammer 40K). And that’s nice.

I am considering going to Fall In, which is a historical miniatures convention in Gettysburg in November. Not to sell anything or do anything work related, but to go play minis games for a few days and tour the Civil War battlefield. By this point the Warhammer core book should be put to bed, so I could rightfully claim a few days off my myself. We’ll see how things look in October, but it’d be nice to get away.

You can’t let work totally overwhelm your life or you’ll burn out or go nuts. In short, it’s good to have a hobby.

On an industry mailing list, one of the blowhards on the current GAMA board asked me what I’d do to fix things. Of course it will be completely ignored, but at least I got a blog entry out of it. Enjoy.

Step One: The sitting board needs to be removed. This board is too divisive to accomplish anything constructive. They need to resign.

Step Two: Anyone on the board in 2003-2004 or who ran for election to the GAMA board at Origins 2004 needs to agree not to run for the board anytime over the next 5 years. The fires of partisanship need to be quenched.

Step Three: A new board needs to be elected. They need to keep GAMA going until the rest of plan unfolds.

Step Four: GAMA needs to reorganize into a trade organization that actually represents the entire industry, not just manufacturers. New by-laws should be passed to get this done. In its new form, GAMA would have four divisions: a Manufacturers Division, a Retailers Division, a Wholesalers Division, and an Independent Professionals Division. Each division would elect two representatives to the overall GAMA board of directors. A ninth, tie-breaking seat on the board would rotate amongst the four divisions, so each would have three votes on the board once every four years.

Step Five: Rename the organization GITA (Game Industry Trade Organization) or something similar. This needs to be done for two reasons. First, to better reflect the nature of the new organization. Second, to help win the battle of perception. GAMA’s name has been dragged through the mud over and over again this past year and may be damaged beyond repair.

Step Six: Run a recruiting drive for the various divisions to try to maximize participation. If you attend GTS, your booth/buyer badge includes membership for the year.

Step Seven: Elect a board using the new model (temporary board resigns at this point). The new board can move ahead with initiatives from the various divisions.

Step Eight: Run a marketing campaign for the new organization, possibly tied into annual Origins and GTS marketing. Again, we must win the battle of perception.

Step Nine: Transfer the Origins Awards to a third party to adjudicate.

Step Ten: Create business-oriented awards to be given out at GTS. These are more appropriate awards for an industry organization to give out.

An author sent me a rough draft yesterday, saying he wasn’t sure if I worked weekends or not, but if so I could get a jump on giving him feedback. I laughed and replied, “Well, only 95% of my weekends since I started the company in 2000!” Though I may have underestimated.

So of course I was working all weekend. In fact, I was much more productive than I had been earlier in the week. I get far fewer phone calls on the weekend and that helps tremendously. When I get in a writing groove, chances are I can stay there. My goal was to finish prepping the latest iteration of the WFRP rules for playtest. Happily, I managed that yesterday, after 10 or 11 hours of work. Today I was able to do some development work on other parts of the book, and write some additional material for those sections. And that’s all for the good.

I took only a few breaks. One to hang out with Kate for a little while and the other to continue to let the new GAMA board exactly what this Full Voting Member thinks. The latter didn’t take long, as the thrust of my argument is simply, “Resign already.” Of course they won’t, but as an FVM I’m going to make them listen to what I have to say.

Now I’m going to have some dinner and then we’ll see. I have more development work to do, but maybe I’ll be wacky and start assembling my Flames of War minis.

Well, what do you know; the Republicans are shamelessly milking the 9/11 tragedy for political ends. I’m shocked, shocked I say. Here comes Rudy Giuliani to cheer for the team. Here comes John McCain to follow party orders and pretend Bush is a real leader. And throughout it’s 9/11, 9/11, 9/11. I’m sure when those 3,000 people died, they were thinking, “Gosh, I may be dying, but at least one day a party of liars and scoundrels can use my murder to get a corrupt and morally bankrupt tool of big business and the energy industry elected as president.” You know, I shouldn’t even call it shameless. That’s an insult to shameless people.

What I find most hilarious about all this is that the tragedy happened on Bush’s watch. Why is the constant repetition of 9/11 supposed to make us think well of him? Shouldn’t it remind us all that it was the intelligence failures of his administration that allowed this to happen? Shouldn’t it remind us that for a brief moment the US had the sympathy of much of the world, but it was Bush’s cowboy diplomacy that squandered all that good will in no time at all? Shouldn’t it remind it us that, in fact, Osama bin Laden has not been “brought to justice” and resources that might have been used to that end were redirected to fight a baseless and illegal war in Iraq?

This is all the legacy of the 2000 elections. The Republican spin machine learned that it could literally say anything, make up any lie, and the media would give them a pass. More than that, they’d repeat any lie to the public and give it equal time so as not to show “bias”. This is why they can launch what would seem to be mind-boggling stupid ads attacking Kerry’s war record. I mean really, if you were in charge of Bush’s image, would you want anyone even bringing up Vietnam? Even if you think Kerry didn’t deserve some of his medals (and there are folks like Alexander Cockburn on the left who do), the fact is the guy volunteered and fought while W. was partying too much to bother to show up to his cushy Air National Guard gig. Bush just can’t win that battle, so you’d think the Republicans would be insane to pick that fight. But no, after the hatchet job they did on Gore in 2000, shamelessness knows no bounds.

My only solace is this: at least the RNC is the best fodder the Daily Show could possibly ask for. Their coverage so far has been priceless.

A good friend of mine from college is in town this week visiting. I don’t think I’ve seen Pat in at least five years, maybe longer. You always know you’re with a good friend when you haven’t seen each other for years and you drop right into good conversation. Time doesn’t seem to matter, that connection is still there.

I took Pat and his friend Brittany (who also lives in Seattle) out to my favorite Greek place, Panos Kleftiko. I’ve probably raved about this place before but it really is one of the best Greek restaurants in America. Everything is homemade, fresh, and delicious. Pat and Brittany were an appreciative audience, which was great. Over plates of loukaniko, skordalia, keftedes, ohtopodi, and their amazing smoked rega (herring), I caught up with Pat and got to know Brittany. It was a tremendously fun evening. They may join us for dim sum in the Int’l District tomorrow and I’m planning to take Pat to the new scifi museum at some point this week. I haven’t been yet and this is as good an excuse as any to see Daleks and Cylons.

After dim sum, I need to high tail it home and get back to writing. I’ve been on a roll this week, having just completed three very productive days, and I want to press on while I’m hot. I wrote the ritual magic system today, which I’m quite please with. Tomorrow it’ll more spells and magic stuff. In a few days I should be ready to send out the next iteration of the playtest rules. As the New Bomb Turks would say, I’m runnin’ on go!

I tell ya, there’s just nothing like GenCon. You go to other cons and you’re happy if they exceed your lowered expectations. Then you go to GenCon and have your expectations exceeded and then some. For example, we had our best Origins ever in June and I ended up feeling pretty good about that show. On the first day of GenCon alone, we did about 70% of our take for all four days of Origins. People come to GenCon primed and ready to game and to spend. For a manufacturer it’s like having people throw money at you for four days. We sold out of the Red Star and Foes of Freedom (our new books for the show), as well as Mutants & Masterminds rulebooks, Thieves’ Quarter, and a bunch of other stuff. My sales goal (based on last year’s sales) was exceeded by 40%. Nothing to complain about there!

We announced the Thieves’ World license to much excitement. We had some cool color preview fliers for Black Company and Blue Rose that grabbed a lot of attention as well. Then Friday night we attended the ENnie Awards. In the three previous ENnies, Green Ronin had outright won two categories each time. My goal for this year: three gold ENnies. Needless to say, when we received seven gold and four silver ENnies, I was stunned but delighted. I was especially pleased that we won the Best Publisher Award. In fact, if we had won that alone, I would have been satisfied. However, it was also nice that two books I did design work on (Nocturnals and Book of Fiends) got nods. Our publishing partners, the Game Mechanics, Human Head, and Dog House Rules, also did well. This all made Friday a happy, happy night.

Personally, it was also a good show. Many of my good friends were in attendance and I made time to catch up and hang out. Wednesday night, I was foolish enough to stay up until 5 am talking politics with old college friends. I operated on two hours of sleep the whole first day of GenCon, then stayed up until 3 am again the next night. My friend Bill ran a WFRP game for our old game group (plus special guest Dr. Evil) using the new rules. It was a blast to play with the guys again, as we haven’t roleplayed together in two years at least. We also got a chance to go out with friends from Canada and do a big end of show GR dinner. That latter is a tradition of the past few years, including the attendance of AEG’s Jim Pinto (which makes no sense I know, except Jim is a great guy and it’s usually our only chance to hang out).

I did not get much time out of the booth, so I’m not the best guy to report on what was new and exciting. I did trade for a bunch of stuff, including the new Blackmoor, dungeon tiles and a Battle of the Bulge wargame from Fiery Dragon, the latest Shadowfist expansion, and some other d20 books from Necromancer and Paradigm. My only actual purchases were for the Flames of War miniatures game. I picked up the new Stalingrad book, which is excellent, and a bunch of miniatures for my emerging DAK force based on the historic Ramcke Brigade of paratroops. Plus of course tanks, because, well, I like tanks. I haven’t even assembled these yet and I’m already eying the Stalingrad book and thinking of doing a Red Army force as well. Stop me before I spend again.

Well, it’s time for big convention #3 this summer. We’re leaving for GenCon in just a few hours. I had too much to get done today, so I’ve been going for a good 14 hours now. Our flight is at 7 am, which means leaving here about 5 am. Wohoo. At least we’re getting in early. Last year we ended up with a redeye that didn’t get us in until Thursday morning around 9 am. In other words, one hour before the show opened. We arrived, dumped our stuff at the hotel, and ran over to the exhibit hall. An hour later I had to dash off to run a Freeport game on maybe three hours sleep. That was frickin’ delightful.

Our plans seem to have all worked out (knock on wood). There should be advanced copies of the Red Star (which is absolutely gorgeous) and Foes of Freedom waiting for us there. That should be a nice double whammy. We should also have some cool fliers for Black Company and Blue Rose and we are announcing a new licensing deal as well. Friday night is the ENnies (these are RPG awards for you non-gamers), which ought to be interesting. In short, lots going on.

Unfortunately, the GAMA bullshit just won’t end. There was new shit-stirring today. I expect there’ll be a lot of politics going on behind the scenes at GenCon. I plan to ignore it as much as possible, having made my feelings vividly clear earlier today on an industry mailing list. I’d rather take care of business at GenCon. That’s what’s important.

Mental note, do not read playtest forums right before heading to bed. I made that mistake tonight and have thus utterly failed to get to sleep. It’s still hot here, so that didn’t help either. I read for a half an hour (Jim Dunnigan’s incredibly interesting Dirty Little Secrets of World War II) and then lay there for an hour trying to get to sleep. Instead I just kept thinking about rules I need to add, tweak, throw out, or revise, sections I need to flesh out, examples I needed to write, and questions I needed to answer. Then I had to wonder how much I could get done before GenCon and how much during GenCon (probably not much, but I’m going to bring my laptop anyway). I guess it started earlier, because Tuesday is game night. We are, of course, playtesting WFRP and we had a good session that highlighted a number of areas for me to look at closely. Afterwards, I thought it’d be a good idea to see if any of the playtesters had encountered similar issues. The result: I am thoroughly awake.

The game was pretty funny. Nik decided it’d be cooler to play outside, so she brought out my minis battle board from the garage and laid it on top of a blanket. We sat around it on the lawn, drinks in hand. We had one light run out from the garage, but as it got later that didn’t provide enough illumination. Nik dug out a bunch of small candles and placed them around the battle map. It made the whole thing look like a low grade Satantic ritual, which we found pretty amusing in light of the accusations leveled at roleplaying games over the years. Completing the scene was Evan’s infant daughter Zoey, who was tonight’s special guest. Evil RPG? Check. Ritual candles? Check. Innocent child? Check. Guess we really blew an opportunity to please the Dark Master by being social and having fun instead. We were able to blame all of Zoey’s crying on Chaos though. It’s a new maxim: Chaos makes the baby Zoey cry.

Photo at Nikchick.com

Seattle has been unusually hot this summer, which is too bad because one of my favorite things about the city is the temperate climate. Today it was hot enough that the ceiling fans weren’t doing much good (and most homes here don’t have air conditioning). Nik suggested we catch a movie, so after a good day’s work we took a bus downtown and caught the Bourne Supremacy. Sitting in an air-conditioned box for a couple of hours was the perfect thing to do. By the time the movie was over, the city had cooled off and so had we. The Bourne Supremacy was good too. Made me want to write a spy story, as the running gag goes around here, “in my copious free time.”