Indie RPGA?

[Dregg]

Going on some Ideas from the AGOG Thread...
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11041

I was thinking about this over the weekend as I look at the RPGA section of the con.
The RPGA... I look at them from convention to convention and wonder what makes them so great? Why do people fight over spots in thier events?
Ok Granted they push D&D, and to be realistic D&D will always have the power to bring in players.  Can anyone Run D&D? yes... So there again why a RPGA?
Well one is community, it give players and GM's a chance to share in a shared world and community, a chance to play thier favorite character at any con they go to and get nifty rewards for being a dedicated player.
The next would be Familiarity, The RPGA has standard guide lines, when players come to an event they know that "Igor the Poerwe gamer" wont be bringing in Thog the miughty who has killed everything in the MM 5 times over.
The last step would be advertisement, people see the RPGA and ask "What is that, who are you?" It spreads the gospel of a single RPG (In the past RPGA did encompass alot more than just D&D, but now D&D is the primary focus) to the masses, and pulls in interest and revenue to the great Hasbro.

With this in mind, I was thinking about the why as a Community the Indie gamer or Designer are so scattered. Honestly we are a huge Clique that really just associates ourselves with only the other we are friends with. We as a community are more Feudal in nature than anything else, we are Warlords of our own systems and domains and even though we try to form our little groups at conventions, when all is said and done we go back into our stongholds and not think about future events. The Only way we are going to succed in this is if we spread our Gospel in more out in the open ways, give the con going a reason to ask "Who are you, What is this?"

What I am Proposing is a Indie Press version of the RPGA, a group of GM's who will know our systems, and run Events at conventions. I'm not just talking about running a random game here and thier, but having a presence at cons, either a Fan Table of an Indie room. Have lillte cards and a registration system. When we have our events posted, have them taged with a name that will let them know that this game is part of the "Indie" game community.
We could offer discount to people who come to our events and use the game space to try and advertise, give away froeebies or spread the word.
I propose people like myself "Adopt" another indie Press game and make sure we get a chance to run it at the cons or gamedays we go to.
If you don't like the imagery of a RPGA then think of this as a Indie Press Union of some sorts.

Currently I am working with Nerdnyc to get the "Gotham Gamers Guild Demo Team" and getting together a crew to go to Dexcon 7 in July. I would like to see this idea flurish and would like to talk to interested parties.
As Per Michael Miller I am posting this to the list for some discussion, mayhaps this can be a positive thing and we could make this work.

[Michael S. Miller]

Hi, Dregg. Thanks for posting this.

You raise many good issues, but at the moment I only have time to respond to one of them. I'll get back to the others.

I propose people like myself "Adopt" another indie Press game and make sure we get a chance to run it at the cons or gamedays we go to.

I think this is really a great idea. Why don't more people do this already? I've had some thoughts.

Just this weekend, I learned from a friend of mine the details of how the Steve Jackson demo team works and encourages its people to run SJ games whenever they can. It boils down to "running demos = getting stuff" As independents, we can't afford to just give books away to our most energetic fans. However, recognition is inexpensive and, done right, can go a long way. For example, speaking for myself, I know I'll always do my best to talk up Universalis because everytime I've mentioned doing something for the game at a con, Ralph has sent me a brief PM saying "thanks for promoting Uni." It takes him all of 30 seconds to do it, and it's cemented in my head "Ralph's a cool guy. I want people to buy his game."

If some sort of more formal recognition system were instituted, I think it would go a long way toward encouraging people to run independent games. I'm imagining something like a page on a game's website listing the people who have run demos of the game, perhaps links to actual play threads, a general physical location, contact information, and then a brief personal note from the designer along the lines of "I wish that I could have John Doe run MY GAME for me, because I never would have imagined that flying cattle could be so terrifying as he made them. Read his actual play report here."

As indies, we have to capitalize on our strengths. Coolness and personal attention are two of them. When Excelsior is out there, you can be damn sure I'm going to praise my demo folks to the heavens.

[Valamir]

Ron and I were just talking about something along these lines.  We'd scratched our heads and came up with at least a dozen Forgites in the midwest area (iowa, illinois, wisconsin, michigan, indiana).  

I was thinking it would be extremely cool if we collectively could identify all of the local/regional cons in this area for a given year and make sure there was 2-3 of those dozen at each of the cons.  Some sort of advance schedule..."ok, you three guys are signed up for WinterCon in Champaign this year", etc.

We didn't get beyond the "wouldn't it be cool stage", however.  Unfortuneately such a prospect requires a fair amount of organizing and planning and motivating and following up, and niether of us are currently in a position of doing more than "yeah, love to participate if someone organized it" at this point.

[Dregg]

We didn't get beyond the "wouldn't it be cool stage", however.  Unfortuneately such a prospect requires a fair amount of organizing and planning and motivating and following up, and niether of us are currently in a position of doing more than "yeah, love to participate if someone organized it" at this point.

Well I'm more than Interested in getting this up and running, and trying to see who would be interested in participating. Right now I do have access and run a Demo Team that supports I-CON in NY and travels with me to local conventions.
I stongly feel this can be done, and with the right  set up may be a great way to spread the word.