Indie RPGA II (split)

[MrWrong]

It boils down to "running demos = getting stuff" As independents, we can't afford to just give books away to our most energetic fans.

Don't be put off by not being able to give away stuff to your demo team. People will get together simply because of their love of the game, and because otherwise they don't get to play the games they like.

Both the UK Cthulhu Nationals team and the The Ring of HeroQuest Narrators (which I coordinate) were formed because we wanted to play  something else other than D&D, and realised that having organised teams of GMs was the way to go. This has been highly successfull.

My own experience of this running HeroQuest has been dramatic. One year at Battlemasters (a medium sized con held in the heart of England) I struggled to get  players for one game. The next year as the RHQN, with 4 Narrators at the same con we ran 5 games, plus a Saturday night HeroQuest themed film night, and a game of Troll Ball on a rather hungover Sunday morning! I can tell you which one was more fun.

Although we're now all members of the MIB programme, by virtue of HQ being published by SJG, its still love of the game that drives us to put on so many games for what could easily be considered a cult game.

I would love to run/play games like Sorceror and Donjon at conventions, but face the same problem as I did with HQ. In the face of all the much better publised and organised games of D&D who will want to play?

I would certainly be interested in helping out if an Indie RPGA took off.

[taepoong]

There was a guy at Origins who slipped me a card with the exact intent of supporting an indie-RPG network with a model very similar to RPGA. The card is in Abzu's hands (box of stuff, really) now, but it exists I tell you!

[Ron Edwards]

The above posts were split from Indie RPGA?

Best,
Ron

[Dregg]

Being at Dexcon over the weekend has even given me more reason to try and give a push for a Indie Forge or just Indie designer based organization. As indie designers unless we are at every convention (and we all know that is an impossibility) the likely hood of some "Joe GM" running our stuff is almost Nil. I have approched a few designers and besides a few who are really motivated, it almost like asking them to give a piece of thier souls. For example, Nerd NYC here on the east coast are huge advocates of Indie gaming and a few  of us are constantly at cons running programming or in charge of said programming.  What's it worh to the individual desiner to have thier games demoed or highlited at conventions. If you were even to sell a copy or two of your game at cost to a group who would carry your game and run it at convetions. Even if this was say a 100.00 dollar investment. How much would that 100.00 carry you in advertising at 1 convention, yet alone actually go to one.
Look at SJgames MIB's or Atlas Spec Ops
What about Forge related Demo teams? How about going to a con and seeing a Forge sanqtioned room like the RPGA's where our poduct is ran for all to play?
Ok mayhp I'm being emotional or over passionate about this, but in a world where D20 and Wotc is the only people who get any friggin respect from Con chairs how can we compete...
In numbers and unity!

I'll shut up now

[Valamir]

Dregg I'm with you.

One thing I do not have time for is dong the full local con tour and heavy promo effort.

Others who are ready willing and able to do this sort of thing are a great asset.  Largely they'd have to be doing it out of a general desire to support something they love, but some form of compensation for their efforts is not in the least unwarranted.

I don't know what compensation scheme you'd imagined, but my personal favorite is the one Eero is using for Ropecon.

He bought a small inventory of books from me at 50% off and is selling them at Ropecon and any other venue he cares to.  Keeping some for himself, giving others away, whatever he wants to do, they're his copies.

His compensation is profit he can pocket on his sales (just like any retailer) and mine is the same profit I'd make selling to a retailers with the added advantage of getting personal promotion to a market I'd never have any direct exposure in otherwise.

I think that's the simplest "everyone wins" situation you can get, and there really isn't any barrier to entry.


For pure demo running without any corresponding sales effort things get more complicated, but I'm certainly open to any suggestions on how to make such a thing work.

[jdagna]

There is an organization called the ARPL (arpl.org) that's trying to become an alternative to the RPGA.  I've been looking into it since I met the organizer/owner at GenCon last year, but I haven't had time to figure out how to really get going on it as a publisher.

But when it comes to demo teams in general, I've never had any trouble finding interested people.  Just do some research on gaming clubs, and ask if anyone is interested.  Yes, you'll have to send them some free stuff, but the kind of enthusiasm I've seen is more than money can buy.

[Dregg]

I'm not really looking for a RPGA alternitive, I'm looking for a RPGA equal where there is no "Living" games but a grouping of Indie fans, GM's and Designers running and demoing the best in indie RPG's, Card and Board Games. It honestly would not be hard to organize and the effort would be on the heads of those who want to participate. I think people get the wrong impression when we say "Hi I can demo for you", It's not Money or 1st born children we want, just support for the most part. I totaly agree with the see the demoers your product at cost, this way we can demo and sell your product and in the long run make a few dollars in the act. Not even at cost, hell a % off works too. Nerd NYC already does this for Burning Wheel and Memento Mori (as well as a few other FOrgers as well) This Model can work and The Demo team that stems from NerdNYC already runs games of Kill Puppies, Burning Wheel, Bulldogs!, Life with Master, Bad Muthas, and others.
This is something that cannot happen over night and I invite Ron and Clinton to voice in as I would like to see the Forge involved in this, even if just by name.
Mayhaps we should move this to it's own thread or via private email.

Lets talk Indie games at cons, even if this is just a hobby for most of us, it would be nice to share our ideas with the gaming communities who just might be inspired by what we do.

[Valamir]

As I mentioned earlier Ron and I had talked of an idea right along these lines several months back.  I'd love to have a list of all the Midwest cons between Chicago and St Louis, Iowa City and Indianapolis and out of a dozen participating members be able to send 2-3 Indie Reps to every single one of them.

The problem is simply one of organization and coordination.  Someone has to do the leg work to locate the cons.  Someone has to do the leg work to contact the cons and find out the policies on open demos, sales at the cons, vender registrations, event sign up, housing availability, etc. etc.  Someone has to serve as a recruiter to get members to do the demos.  Somone has to coordinate the effort to make sure the members get to the cons and the games from the publishers get to the members.  Someone has to follow up to make sure the demoers actually went, and collect the after action reports and what worked and what didn't, etc, etc, etc.

I think its a 1000% wonderfully amazing idea and one that I put my full support behind.  But I'm not going to be that "Someone".  At least not at this point.  My Real World Job (not to mention relationship) isn't going to allow me to commit that kind of effort on top of the effort I already spend on Ramshead.

If you're volunteering to coordinate and be the first elected president of the first Regional Forge Demo Squad then consider yourself nominated, but until somebody is willing to take ownership and shoulder the burden of making it happen I don't know what more I can say other than "I agree with you, its a great idea".


As for compensation, I have no problem giving free product to demo members; I just don't see why demo members would accept that.

The way I see it, if I give a free book to Squad Member A...they get a free book.  I get some added buzz and representation at a con or two with the amount of buzz and number of cons being directly proportional to the enthusiasm, dedication, and reliability of Member A.

But if I sell 10 books to Squad Member A (or 4 or 20 or whatever) at 50% off, then all they have to do is sell 1 at full cover price (which shouldn't be hard if they're dedicated enthusiastic demoers) and they have their free copy.  Plus they have 8 more copies to profit from.  If they sell 5 copies, they've got all their money back, got a free copy, and have 4 more free copies of gravy to do with whatever they want.

This model seems infinitely preferable to me on many levels.  First it ensures the publisher that they aren't giving out freebies to people who are less than dedicated and reliable.  A $75 investment in 10 copies of Uni (or $30 for 4) is enough to weed out any folks just looking for comps.

Second, as "salesman-ish" as it sounds, I've found the opportunity to make a few bucks (or at least recover expenses) to be a pretty good motivator to get folks out of bed for those 8:00AM sessions.  

Third, getting actual play at cons is great.  But getting actual play leading to actual sales at cons is WAY better because now you don't only have the couple of sessions at the con being played but more sessions with different people when they get home.  Get them to buy a copy when they're still enthusiastic about the demo.  Get them to play the game when their still enthusiastic about the purchase.  A successful demo that ends with "maybe I'll pick up a copy at the gamestore next week" isn't a complete failure...but it isn't a complete success either.  

And Fourth I think its great to be able to give something back to the demoers who bust ass to get the word out.  You're not going to get rich pocketing $75 on 10 Uni sales, but it can certainly help defray some of the expenses of attending the cons.  

Get a team of 2-4 hyped up folks with a few copies of half a dozen different games to sell running demoes like crazy and one can easily offset the costs of attending the con...especially the smaller ones.

[M. J. Young]

I'm on the east coast, and regretably sales at conventions have not yet paid for costs of conventions for me; I thus only get to conventions if they're close enough to somewhere I can stay free that I only have to worry about gas, food, and tolls. That's limiting.

However, Valdron has always had the policy that people buying certain levels of product get discounts. It's not a lot--Eero bought six copies of the rules and six world books, and that was sufficient for 50% off. (I don't know the break point off the top of my head, but we have a lower tier for 30% off.) Also, in the United States we'll pay the shipping, book rate, to get it to you if you order from us.

Unlike Ralph, I can't afford to send free copies of my books to anyone who offers to demo them. For one thing, although I own the game, I don't own the books--they were paid for by my stockholders, really. However, if I know you're planning to do convention demos, you've got my full support--I'll send you everything I've got that I've found useful for conventions, including on-the-fly character creation materials, advice on running Multiverser as a demo, and free worlds that work well in a convention setting.

I'd be happy to run some demos for other people's games when I'm at a convention. I was going to do Alyria recently, but a major traffic jam delayed my arrival and my players dispersed before I reached them. If the rewrite reaches me in time, I'll probably do it this fall (Ubercon is a comfortable driving distance from my parents' house, so I can do several sessions there), although I'm open to presenting other people's games. I don't often get to conventions which aren't attended by the NerdNYC group, so many Forge games are available already there.

If someone is organizing demo groups for indie games, let me know how to participate.

--M. J. Young

[Dregg]

M.J.
If you are going to be at Ubercon let me know, I will be there hang'n with Nerd NYC and doing some demos of my own Inide stuff. But I would love to talk with you about some Ideas about a East Coast Indie Demo team.

I'm also trying to work on some Kick ass Indie Programming for I-CON 24 next year so hopefully I can pull this off as well