I've just got to know -- how was GenCon

[Paul Czege]

Hey Jonathan,

My deal with myself is that I can't go to one of the major cons (Origins or GenCon, mainly) until I have something to sell. How's that for an incentive?

It sounds like a recipe for writer's block to me.

I think Scott McCloud's 24 hour "Dare," and the Forge's "Iron Game Chef" incarnation of it show a keen awareness of how and why people get and stay creatively blocked...and have the potential on some level to be an effective counter-agent. You get blocked when you can't keep your brain from focusing on needing to be brilliant/perfect/impressive in your creative efforts, for whatever reason. The "Dare" attaches a different objective to the creative endeavor, one of completion and effort, and in so doing works to melt away at the paralysis mode.

But a twelve month "Dare" isn't the same thing. At that point you're just flogging yourself. My advice to you would be the same that I gave to Dave http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?p=75558&highlight=#75558">here: a crash course in actual play. It absolutely does pay you back tenfold in energy and enthusiasm.

Paul

[ethan_greer]

What Paul said.  My best setting design ever was in Mike's Iron Game Chef Sim thread.  There's nothing like an impending deadline to get yourself writing.

[Jonathan Walton]

This thread is soaring rapidly off-course, but what the hay...

Thanks for the advice guys but, with all due respect, I'm not a moron.  I realize it's going to take a bunch of smaller steps to get me to the point that I have something to sell by next GenCon.  Also, I have come to a fairly decent understanding over the years about what can keep me working on a project, which is critical to getting me to the end.  I have an annoying tendency to jump from half-finished project to idea-of-the-week, which is really what this deal with myself is supposed to help with.  I'm going to devote some time here and there to side projects, but I'm not taking on anything major until Argonauts, Ever-After, and Vespertine get in a finished form (whatever that means).  This is not an 11-month deadline.  This just means that I'm not going to go to GenCon before I'm ready.  The 24-hour game and Iron Chef stuff rocked (heck, that's what Vespertine and Argonauts both started out as), but at some point you have to sit down and really work the idea to its full potential. And, since I have a life and still have a year of college to get through, that's going to take time.

[Gold Rush Games]

I'm am way late in posting a reponse here in this thread, but I wanted to say that it was great to meet the Forge folks at GenCon! I had a great time at the show. I hope everyone else did, too.