Forge or Indie RPG Online Convention - Feedback Please

[GaryTP]

The Forge or Indie RPG (probably the second) could host an online convention for creator-owned works. What do you think of the idea.

Put up a site page with icons of the companies. Next to each is a pict of the product they're selling. Under the company logo is a CHAT button, under the product(s) is a PREVIEW button.

Chat takes you to a page telling you what IRC channel to get on, where you can talk to the creator(s). (Each company agrees to be on chat for 4 hours (simultaneously) with other companys, and run online demos. Each company would have its own room, but also monitor the convention floor room.

Preview button takes you to a preview of the work (possibly a PDF download) and a BUY button option.

This could do a few things:
Build a buzz.
Players can see what the game is really like.
Sell product.
Connect creators with the online public.

Prep work would be to make sure you have either a pdf preview, or prepared text for running an online game. Create a one-shot mission exclusively for this online convention with your system. I'd suggest a test run a few weeks before the actual date.

Give a cut of any sales to IndieRPG.

Any thoughts on the value of this?

Gary

[Ron Edwards]

You're nominated, Gary!

Although since the Forge and the URL are non-commercial entities, no official fees would be collected. It seems to me that all money made by the publishers belongs to them, and they may make donations to the Forge the usual way if they see fit.

Best,
Ron

[Eero Tuovinen]

That's a great idea. Some first thoughts:
- Some people have strong fears about Forge as a trademark or brand on games. This would strengthen that view, as games participating would get a boost of Forgety. It'd be kind of a sign of approval. The standard cures apply (declamations, etc.), but I have no idea at all about where these lines are drawn. Then again, the Forge booth in actual conventions is pretty established, too.
- A permanent or limited-time only thing? Permanency (or "repeated each three months") is not hard in the web, but would lessen the convention meme, which is bad. And a permanent page of this kind is effectively a web shop, a kind of a competitor to RPGMall and such. Then again, a non-permanent webshop is still a webshop, so I don't know if those considerations are valid reasons to not be permanent. Permanency or predictable repetition would strenghten the concept by an order of magnitude, when considering the relative slowness of the web.
- Any other program? The key to differentiating between a webshop and convention (apart from the permanency question) is in what's on offer. The discussion and demos are essential in this regard. It'd be easy to have other kinds of program as well, if interest catches.

Anyway, there's all kinds of ideas that could be developed in that kind of framework. One option is to time the convention for the Forge birthday week. Overall, I like the idea very much, mainly because I like fun projects like this and am politically a panforgite: the more coherency in the act, the more force and visibility for the ideas. There are other views, so care is recommended.

Following the development of Forge community from the beginning, I see this kind of thing as pretty radical. That's probably because the web operation is the kernel of most publishers' efforts, and tying them together gets much more intimate than just going to a convention together. When you do it once, the bias lowers, and it becomes easier to follow up with stuff. As I say above, it's no kind of step at all from a convention to a permanent webshop. Consider it well. Might be that the best solution is to create an associated-but-separate product identity for this kind of thing, like was done with NPA. Actually, NPA would work nicely as the "sponsor" of such a convention, instead of Forge, if some distance were desired.

(Let me finish by saying that a coordinated Forge convention/webshop would kick ass from here to California; nothing would stand in it's way, especially with intelligently planned chats, demos and other program to renew the concept...)

[Jasper]

I agree with Eero that some distance might be desirable.  IIRC, Andy originally had suggested the Forge put on the indie awards, but when Ron said that wasn't in the cards, went out and did it himself.  How about the same kind of thing happen, with a separate entity that exists just for this purpose?  If you really want a little distance, call it something like "Online Creator-Owned RPG Convention," (or sub-title it that) instead of using the word "indie."  

(If you used the above, you could call it OCO-Con, though as an alternative I'd suggest "Indie Moot".)

[Eero Tuovinen]

I agree with Eero that some distance might be desirable.

Just clarifying that in my personal opinion Forge should do it. Forge should also start a non-profit rpg press and run for president if I'm asked, but then again, I'm not. While I myself feel (tentatively) that coordination is more important than independence, many here (among them Ron/Clinton person, too) feel the opposite. I was airing their possible fears, not my own.

Forge as a concept is a complex one. On one direction it is tied to the convinctions and leadership of Ron/Clinton, but on the other direction are us, the users who have invested a significant slice of our hobby identity into it. Then there is the general public and it's view on the Forge, which is dissected here once a year like a clockwork. All these have concerns over what Forge is, so I don't wonder if an ambitious (it can't be anything else) new project like this would generate differences. In the past the projects have been very careful with the Forge association, so these concerns should probably be addressed.

But anyway, "Indie Moot" is a brilliant and warm name for a convention, much better than the usual fare. I'd go there. It's a much better name than "Forge convention", too, regardless of the above policy questions. Policy questions which, I might add, are not the topic of this thread, despite me dragging them in ;)

So how about it Gary, you game?

[Nathan]

Greets,

I ran some of the first online cons (Delve of Destiny) back in like 1997.... so if you need advice or tips or whatever, holler.

It's good stuff, but there are ups and downs. For one, running games online is cool, but it still works like an old fashioned demo. You need a scheduling system so that you sign up 4-5 players at a time for a demo slot. If you do open chatting, you probably need to set some timeframe for that. I'd suggest you put the thing over the course of three days in the evenings (depending on interest). Start things at like 8:00 PM EST/7:00 PM CST and go to midnight. You might have hour long roundtables of open chats with two or three authors at a time. Meanwhile, you have other indie publishers running demos.

Again, it should be dependent on interest. For an indie con, several publishers pulling together should be able to get some sort of crowd, but even in Delve of Destiny's prime, when we had Peter Adkison, Gary Gygax, AD&D tournaments, Talislanta sessions, and Magic tournaments, we never broke over 350. The majority of those 350 were interested in AD&D & Magic, not Talislanta or homebrew games.

Another option would be to not make it an indie con. Invite game designers of established games and companies to do chats. Let gamers put together game sessions, and just make indie games a part of that too. You would definitely get a larger draw by having folks like Chris Pramas, Jonathan Tweet, Robin Laws, and so on. I've done some moderated Rpg.Net chats in the past couple of years with Shane Hensley, John Wick, Chris Pramas, and so on. Fun stuff.

It always draws a crowd and then to use that as a springboard for the rest of the con would be a nice strategy.

If you get going on this, I'd probably be willing to donate some webspace, and I always recommend my good friends at Magicstar IRC Network as a chat network (which I hooked Rpg.net to back in the day).

..............

In fact, just thinking about all the time I spent my senior year of high school and subsequent early years of college working on the whole online con thing.... wow. It takes me back. I thought I was doing something majorly "significant", when really I was just doing something fun. I wouldn't trade it for anything though. I met some cool people doing that.....

Old Delve of Destiny website:
http://members.tripod.com/~DoDIII/

Thanks,
Nathan

[GaryTP]

You're nominated, Gary!

Although since the Forge and the URL are non-commercial entities, no official fees would be collected. It seems to me that all money made by the publishers belongs to them, and they may make donations to the Forge the usual way if they see fit.

Best,
Ron

LOL.

Seems right the individual publishers get 100%. Donation of time and effor to get it up and going, with everyone benefiting. I'll check back in a few hours and see where this thread goes.

[daMoose_Neo]

(I love being the one to ask this ^_^) Is this specifically for indie-RPGs or could a card game fellow like myself jump in?

Indie CCGs are a newer wave of the independant games, and one thats not widely understood. I've been working on a little article on producing an indie CCG on a budget, ala Ralph Mazza's suggestion, as well as been in a few discussions here on the Forge and am seeing a real need to differentiate between the two markets.
A little spotlight time on Indie CCG Publication and the RPG Market vs. CCG Market I think would be VERY beneficial to some new designers.
I think it is becoming a neccesity, as folks are seeing what the Forge here is capable of doing and assume a card game is no different. If nothing else, a couple little chats and an article or two would keep suggestions or truly pie in the sky ideas down to a minimum.

[GaryTP]

I'd volunteer creating the "look" of the web pages for the convention and help organize it. But I'd need someone to actually assemble and host the webpages. If we get enough critical mass I think this could create some buzz.

Items that might be available from every vendor:
Downloads
Ability to chat with the creators or at least a posted thread that is heavily monitored for a certain time frame.

Start off with a pdf comprised of all the companies. Two pages per company. Talk about your product, contact info, artwork, etc. This would be used (along with a press release) to build the buzz. Hot links in the pdf would jump you to the creators website.

Convention could look like this:

Convention Page Contains:
Icons of company, products on rollover. Layout like booths set up at a convention. Click-thru to single web-page of company with downloads and chat connection. All companies are reachable from every webpage by using a simple nav. Purchase button on a product can take you to where the company normally sells from.

Any thoughts on this? More, less, different?

[Eero Tuovinen]

Solid. Being that this is a relatively straightforward project, I'd say that the next step should be to get some commitments, if any. No reason to do details before seeing if there's interest.

For myself, I'd be interested, depending on the schedule. I'm however definitely small fry in the English market, so that's not much. Try and see if any of the heavyweights here would like this kind of action.

[Christopher Weeks]

Any thoughts on this? More, less, different?

What about actual play?  I mean, demos?  spawned off chat rooms that players could type into, and observers could read only might be worth while.  With logs of the chat/game saved for the convention.

[GaryTP]

Good idea. Saved logs would be great. After it is all over with the whole thing could still be accessed. And everyone has a chat room up and running. Company would monitor their own chat room and a collective chat room that acts as the convention floor (lobby).

[Michael S. Miller]

Despite being less technically-competent than others (i.e., I don't even have a chat program on my computer at the moment), I'd gladly participate, schedule permitting. Discernment would run rather well in chat mode, I think. With Great Power... would require some thinking about. Please let me know details as they develop.

[Nathan]

Despite being less technically-competent than others (i.e., I don't even have a chat program on my computer at the moment), I'd gladly participate, schedule permitting. Discernment would run rather well in chat mode, I think. With Great Power... would require some thinking about. Please let me know details as they develop.

Michael brings up a good point.

Not all games -- especially indie games -- run well in chat rooms. If you haven't run your game in a chatroom before, it would be wise for you to try it out in a chatroom at least a few times before the con. In fact, some indie games might suffer in a chat room setting.

Thanks,
Nathan

[GaryTP]

Hi Nathan/Michael,

I was thinking that creators could just chat about their game if they didn't want to demo it. Dialog on design decisions, the premise of the game, and how you publish might be just a interesting as a chat demo. Especially if your pdf explains the game a bit.

Gary