[GenCon 2007] The plan for this year - important

[Blankshield]

Ron, new question. If we sign up strictly through you for our badges, how will we sign up for things like True Dungeon?

Having dealt with this exact issue in the past, I can field this.

The by *FAR* simplest method to do this is to have a friend who is buying their own ticket register you.  Yes, this means that your ticket will say "Bob" instead of "Fred", but speaking as an event organizer for several years running: nobody cares about the name on the ticket. 

Speaking as someone whose wife is a True Dungeon junkie, do that anyway, if you want to run through TD.  Maybe get two or three friends, all of whom are poised at their computers with shopping carts already prepped, hovering their fingers ready to click "Submit" as soon as the event prereg opens.  TD sells out as soon as it opens, for all desirable slots.


The less simple answer is "Wait for the registration guidelines and FAQ for this year to come out."  Most years, there is a way for Exhibitors and others who do not directly purhase their badge (TD volunteers, various other staff types) to register for events.  Because the registration system gets tweaked and changed each year, there's no way to tell what that process will be, or how simple/complex it will be.  Some years it's been OK, some years it's been nigh impossible.  Also note that when the method for this year comes out, if it looks like it might muck with how you get your booth badge, Ron may well veto it entirely.

For my money, have a friend register you; it works, and there's zero chance of it screwing with your booth badge.

Hope that helps,

James

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

James is right on all counts. However, especially when wearing my official booth-buyer hat, I'll add this: for those who sign up with the Forge booth, this convention is a working event. If you want to "go to GenCon" in the usual sense of the word of enjoying its entertainments, then you're a lot better off getting an attendance badge and simply visiting the Forge booth when you like, rather than exhibiting there.

That's a fairly extreme view, I know, and as I posted above, the obligation at the Forge booth is half a day per day, not the whole time. So there's room for entertainment too. But I'm posting here to say that when and if those two things come into conflict, your role at the con as exhibitor takes first place. That's part of the picture.

Best, Ron

[Josh Roby]

Ron, speaking in as shark-like terms as I can, what do we get for our $100+badges buy-in?  We get no poster space; what will be going up against that back "wall"?  How will what's going up there, and what's going into the convention program, get customers at the booth for us?  Or is the thinking that enough people show up for Sorcerer, The Shadow of Yesterday, and The Princes Kingdom (but not Burning Wheel/Empires, Capes, Dogs in the Vineyard, My Life with Master, etc) that certainly the unadvertised publishers can snap up some sales?  How much of what we get for the buy-in is, "You don't have to worry about the details at your first (or second) GenCon?"

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Joshua,

Let me answer your question, as it's a good one for a new person at the booth.

The booth is advertising enough. The Forge booth is now a premier destination at GenCon: buyers come directly to it, knowing it is where they can get the newest independent games. (This usually includes a good number of game designers and company owners, which, I should say, buy a good many games.) The booth is also an activity hub: you have never seen demos like at the Forge booth. At any moment, 3-8 demos will be happening, with 3-4 people each: this is 9 to 32 people cramming into a booth and being really excited! When you walk by, you notice this, and you cannot notice posters, as they are obscured by people playing games.

The majority of returning customers (and they are a large part) come to see what they don't have. People will come to the booth, look through the games, pick up everything they don't have that they can afford, and buy them. As a first-year publisher, your job is to make your game look grabby, unusual, and awesome. Jason Morningstar did this last year, and he should comment. The Shab-al-Hiri Roach was visually arresting; it has a grabby element in that all the nerd-dom can connect to its Lovecraftian elements, even if that is super-tangential; and it was also pretty. It sold like 15 million copies. John Harper and Agon also did this. The game was relatively unknown before GenCon, but the 7 x 9 inch format, the beautiful cover, and the pitch of Grecian gods and combat sold the hell out of it.

Also, for $100, you get Ron Edwards, me, and a bunch of others telling people about your game all day. Of course, the fact of the matter is that you have to make us love it, too. But if you sell one of us, you sell to dozens of people. You, of course, have a shoe-in: I already love Full Light, Full Steam.

[Jake Richmond]

As someone who saw the booth last year but was not a participant (I was over with key20) I can say I was very, very impressed and very eager to be part of this this year. I'm now a big believer in the booth.

[Jason Morningstar]

Hey, thanks Clinton.  I tried really hard to be prepared for the booth and I think that effort was rewarded.  I had a fairly tight demo that just got tighter after each run, I had stuff to give away, I had laminated comic strips for God's sake.  I demo'd it for booth people the night before. I demo'd it for a superhero and a clown.  I also seriously bought into the whole mutualism thing and talked up, steered people to, and demo'd other games.  I heard others do the same for me and it was reassuring and good.  The $100 + badge was an insanely good investment, predicated on the accurate assumption that I would bust my own ass. 

[Paul Czege]

Hey Joshua,

(but not Burning Wheel/Empires, Capes, Dogs in the Vineyard, My Life with Master, etc)

My Life with Master will be for sale at The Forge booth, by virtue of this qualification from Ron in the very first post on this thread:

"And if you have been a long-term participant at the booth and aren't carried by IPR, and if you're at GenCon in any capacity, the booth will have your game on the rack too for no charge beyond IPR's commission, if you desire."

Paul

[Joshua A.C. Newman]

Josh, I can't stress enough that people come to GenCon just to see what's at the Forge Booth. My first year there, with no publicity at all and a tiny, black and white, shrinkwrapped game with totally kooky mechanics called "Under the Bed: The Child Endangering" I sold dozens of copies. People came there because either they knew there was going to be good stuff, or they were passing by and wanted to know what all the excitement was about. Cuz there was a lot of it.

Shock: with its alarming cover, more palatable subject matter, and hefty dose of chatter did substantially better. If people come looking for those, they'll see your games, too. I'm selling games because of Vincent, Paul, and Ron. You can sell games because of Vincent, Paul, Ron, John, Tim, and me. If you go elsewhere, you can't.

[Josh Roby]

Thanks for the responses, guys.

So it will be "The Forge Booth," labeled as such in the program and/or with signage?  Or is it just that the masses of people playing demos is what identifies the Forge Booth?

[Blankshield]

In programs etc. it will be identified as "Adept Press/other primary sponser/other primary sponser/other primary sponser", but you're not going to see that anyhere except on hall maps and the like.

There is a banner with the forge logo that gets run up high for visibility, but that's it.

There is no other advertising, promotion, signage, etc. that draws attention to the forge booth.  Advertising at Gencon is stupid expensive, and pointless.  There is a lot of grassroots and word-of-mouth awareness, and there are people who come to Gencon because the booth is there.  And there is a lot of traffic.  And the traffic sees all the excitment and gaming and wants in. 

Gamers want to have fun.  The forge booth is concentrated fun.  The booth works.

James

[TonyLB]

The booth absolutely, positively, does work ... and at more than one function.

Yes, if you go you will have fun.

Yes, if you go and do what other people are doing (chat up customers, run demoes, sell product) then you will probably pay for your convention.  A lot of people do.

But the biggest thing, to my mind, is that if you go and watch what's happening, and study how the way things are done translates into results, you will learn a tremendous amount about the challenges and opportunities of running a booth.  It is a place of learning.

I could sell the argument "If you don't understand from the description of the booth's energy and how it runs demoes why you have to go be part of it ... then you clearly have to go be part of it, in order to learn to see that connection."  It would be annoyingly self-referential, but not without a grain of truth.

[Matt Gwinn]

And if you have been a long-term participant at the booth and aren't carried by IPR, and if you're at GenCon in any capacity, the booth will have your game on the rack too for no charge beyond IPR's commission, if you desire. (Note: this is different from previous years in which doing this cost you $100.)

So, how does this work exactly?  Do I have to sign up at some point or do I just show up with copies of Kayfabe and hand them off to IPR? 

Oh, and sorry i've been away so long.  I'll try to post more.

,Matt

[Ron Edwards]

Just get in touch with me by email, Matt, probably in a couple of months.

As far as the con goes, yes, that's exactly right. You bring the books to the booth (we'll set a time, it can't be any ol' time whenever), and you pick up the money and the remaining books at the end of the con. I might have to be a bastard about some aspects of that, in that leftover inventory can't be anyone's resonsibility but the publisher's.

To repeat an earlier point, publishers in this situation are strongly advised to spend time at the Games on Demand event. We know people came from there last year looking for books to buy, and some ideas are under way for making that connection stronger in both directions.

Best, Ron

[andrew_kenrick]

Now I'm not going to Gencon (no way can I afford the plane tickets), but I'd like to be a part of it. How can I get Dead of Night demoed and sold at Gencon, without actually being there and doing it myself?

Dead of Night is already sold by IPR, will it be there on sale by them anyway?

Except we know it's demos that sell books, so how can I get Dead of Night demoed at the Forge Booth/Gencon?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Andrew,

Dead of Night will definitely be on the rack at the booth.

As for demos, well, that's a problem. In the past, we have accepted games without authors for a $100 buy-in and run demos for them. The fact is, it doesn't work that well. Bluntly, I'm just about the only person who honors the promise to demo such games, which ends up taking away disproportionately from promoting my stuff; this is compounded by the fact that I spend a solid 75% of my time at the booth supporting others' stuff anyway (being in demos, running demos).

I don't really see a solution in terms of activity at the booth.

However! One thing you can probably count on is someone (I wonder who) running Dead of Night during one of the hard-core, fermenting, high-impact play sessions during the evening. If you haven't read about these before, then let me tell you, GenCon evenings with the independent-games crowd is like seeing the whole first page of Actual Play in action before your eyes. I know this game, and I know what playing it looks like. It seems to me that one such session will siphon all the copies off that rack at the booth within the first business hour of the following day.

Best, Ron