One of the most oft repeated pieces of advice heard around the Forge regarding getting people playing your game (and hence getting your game sold) is that in order to get people interested in your game, you need to get the word out, specifically by getting people to play the game at conventions, thereby driving sales and interest via word-of-mouth and personal connections with the author. But if you can't make it to conventions, if you're lucky to have one group play your game with you once ever, is there any point to trying to publish your game and hoping you can otherwise make do with the internet?

For example, ORX has sold 120-150 odd copies (mostly to gaming stores), and has received a few reviews (four or five, as I recall). Yet I've never heard of one group (that didn't include me) actually playing the game, or even mentioning it in discussion. ORX has been out since 2005 and I doubt anyone but me, even in the "indie scene", really remembers it, let alone has played it. I'm aware of a good number of other games/designers who are in the same sort of limbo. All the games I do see being played and being talked about being played are games where the creator (or someone else with an interest in the game) is regularly able to go to conventions and promote the game through play, not just by talking about it on-line or maintaining an on-line presence.

I personally began thinking about this when I started working on incorporating the feedback I've received on eXpendable into the current document -- wondering if I should. Given that traditional publishing is discovering, as we have, that in order to sell you have to utilize your community, and will generally only be able to sell to that community, and that authors have to be their own publicists these days...and that I might make it to one convention a year. So another way to put it might be: if you can't grow your own network (ie: community) from the ground up, for whatever reason, is there a real point in creating and publishing a game in the modern climate (if your purpose is having others purchase and play the game)?

But then the other part of this question is thus: is the accepted chestnut about the necessity of convention play true?

Well... I live in Finland, so I never do American conventions, either. Here in Europe we don't usually go to conventions outside our own country, so I haven't promoted my games at European conventions aside from Finnish ones. Zombie Cinema has sold around 400 copies after its first year, I think. Some people have apparently played it, too. I believe that the game could do better through active marketing, such as conventioneering, but that's geography and motivation for you.

(I could also discuss Solar System, but that's tainted by the fact that there is a pre-existing brand and community supporting that one.)

I do agree that not hearing anything about people playing a game is a pretty bad sign. And my experience towards ORX concurs with yours in that it hasn't sold much here, either (0-1 copies I've sold, I think). I don't think that this is so much the lack of convention presence, though - rather, I usually ascribe this sort of thing to bad luck and a lack of Internet noise; if the game had more visibility in the Internet, then it'd attract more people and more buzz, and then its sales might better reflect its quality. A part in why the game hasn't built up an audience could be related to how difficult it is to learn from the text (as I've said previously, ORX almost rivals Capes in incomprehensibility), but ORX is by no means the only underappreciated game in this scene, so it could be just bad luck in timing the publication or something like that.

In summation, I don't think that conventioneering is mandatory to get your game to people's hands, but in all likelihood it's a great help. I wouldn't consider it crucial, as it's lots of work and bother - in principle nothing is preventing me from travelling around Europe conventioneering with Zombie Cinema, but for the fact that I'd rather spend the time writing new stuff. I might be more keen about the matter if my sales were worse, I suppose.

Two points:

1) Games are social. They require more than one person to play as a group. But that is as much a "community" that is required to make a game commercially viable. If you can market and sell it to "group leader" type personalities, then you will have placed your game at the center of a bunch of local gaming group (ala, micro communities). That can be enough to drive brand recognition and word of mouth propogation that can lend itself to more sales.

2) If you are apt to builder a larger, all connected community around your game (which may or may not in the end be a more overall successful marketing strategy), the Internet is more able to offer that opportunity that play at conventions. Conventions are merely a front line location where you get an opportunity to make a great sales pitch by showing the product in action. Its a sales methodogy with a secondary branding opportunity.  I think it tends to be a favorite method by small companies because its straight forward and can be done with good ol elbow grease rather than needing more capital, coding or resources more involved marketing and sales systems may require. But I don't think anyone should walk away witht he idea that conventioning is the "only" way to market a game. As an example, GOB Publishing has not attended a convention since 2002. Back then we were a two man outfit, part time operation, with no one pulling home a paycheck. Today it is has a staff of 5 between part and full timers and generates many multiples of what it did back in 2002. So convention appearances had zero to do with our growth.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Retail Group - http://www.gobretail.com
Guild of Blades Publishing Group - http://www.guildofblades.com
1483 Online - http://www.1483online.com

I only used cons a little bit during my first few years publishing, and those were tiny local ones anyway.

At that time, "community" for me meant various zines, webrings, and my email list, and that was it. It worked out very well.

Best, Ron

Kind of thinking "Selling 'just' 120 copies is pointless??"

>>Kind of thinking "Selling 'just' 120 copies is pointless??"<<

Well, 120 copies sold of most items isn't going to be a huge pile of cash. But there would be a significant difference in how they were sold.

120 copies of an item that retails for $30, sold to distributors for $12, costing $6 to produce and another $2 per in free shipping, marketing communications with distributors and other expenses would net someone $720, less all their developmental costs. Which, of course, would vary as based on artwork expenses and if anything like layouts or other production elements were outsourced. If all of that came to zero, $720 cash in pocket for your effort need not imply failure. be up to the individual authors to decide.

Alternatively, 120 copies sold direct off the publishers website, shipping costs charged to the consumer, would be a totally different picture. $30 less $6 printing, less 4% for online payment processing ($1.20) would be $22.80 gross after costs of goods sold, but before developmental costs. 120 x $22.80 = $2,736.

Now, maybe of that 120, we're saying "only" 120 because it has taken 3 years to sell that many, meaning just 40 per year (Not saying that is the case, just making an example). So maybe with direct sales the annual return after costs of goods sold would only be $912. Well, ok, as an independent designer, cobble 50 such publications together in your catalog of games to sell and suddenly you are bringing home $45,600. Some folks could live on that. I know I lived on a lot less a decade and a half ago when starting GOB.

Give them slow sellers some time. You might find they are long distance runners rather than sprinters. They might run a whole lot further than you ever could have thought.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Retail Group - http://www.gobretail.com
Guild of Blades Publishing Group - http://www.guildofblades.com
1483 Online - http://www.1483online.com

Sorry, all, would have responded sooner, but the recent 504's on the board have been keeping me away via frustration (I hate sitting for five minutes just trying to get the "Post Reply" page to show up, let alone then trying to get the reply to actually post...and that's all assuming I can get to the thread in the first place).

Eero, Ryan, and Ron, thanks for weighing in. You all seem to be saying much the same thing, which makes me wonder how and why the "conventioneering" chestnut got started? Any ideas?

I do notice at least some small amount of convention play was indicated. Even if it was "just" local it was still connecting with a community through shared play experiences -- though it also looks like that may be no different from any other shared-experience community building (mailing lists, etc). This tells me the fundamental idea that community-building is a necessity to sales and play is correct, even though conventioneering in order to build that community is not necessary (possibly the easiest route though?).

But I think, at least based on what I've seen, most indie designers don't know how to do that bit. I think many of us are very much in a "build it and they will come" mindset, because we're not really sure how to help that along (apparently fiction authors these days receive a list from their publisher that tells them exactly what they must do in order to try and self-promote successfully--many are things publishers used to do for them).

What are the guys whose games are selling/well-known doing to help create/maintain a community? One thing I'm seeing: Vincent blogs about interesting gaming questions/observations; Ron started a general gaming forum (duh); Luke likewise has an active product-specific gaming forum. These are all community-building behaviors. So are things like using direct sales and talking to the folks who buy your book, asking them where they found out about it, what interested them about it, and making sure they know you're always open for feedback; all of it creates buzz/widens the circle of potentials and contact points.

Of course, I've also seen plenty of attempts to do similar--the whole "using the internet to create community"--just fall flat on their face, with empty or one-lone-voice mailing lists and forums and blogs with dust bunnies blowing through them.

Eero wrote: A part in why the game hasn't built up an audience could be related to how difficult it is to learn from the text (as I've said previously, ORX almost rivals Capes in incomprehensibility), but ORX is by no means the only underappreciated game in this scene, so it could be just bad luck in timing the publication or something like that.

Callan wrote: Kind of thinking "Selling 'just' 120 copies is pointless??"

if the motive for the game was to have people playing it or making at least some small profit from it

Callan, please note the question from the original post, with emphasis: "...if you can't grow your own network (ie: community) from the ground up, for whatever reason, is there a real point in creating and publishing a game in the modern climate (if your purpose is having others purchase and play the game)..." For this discussion, I don't care about the other purposes one might have for publishing. So I would prefer to avoid discussion of such as not topical -- similarly any talk about reasons for design (a separate undertaking). Let's focus on the intersection of community-building and publishing for the above stated purpose.

>>One has to do some kind of community-building?<<

Well, community building can happen at several different levels.

>>Or, Ryan, would you disagree? (I don't know if you did any community-building, other than just putting your games out there.) And that it is (or can be) just a matter of making quantities of potential interest available (ie: multiple games) rather than a focus on making social connections?<<

Well, ideally, if you can do both, that gives you two weapons in your marketing arsenal. For us, we've had different marketing strategies for our different game lines and otherwise an over-arching branding strategy for the company. For instance, with our Empires of History board game line, we've had three distinct target audiences for the games, each of which was approached differently and recieved varying amounts of our resources and attention. Those were we joinned existing communities for the Axis & Allies series of games, as our games were billed as "variants" to those. We did not have to build those communities, as they already existed, and merely needed to join them and behave responsibly once in (ala, not spam folks are shill our wares overly much). Another focus was to join existant wargame communities. As our games tend to be more simple than most war games, this was not a large focus, but it was done to maintain a presence to snag in the curious of mind. And the last, broader stroke effort was simply to target folks with an interest in history in general. Other than that, this line never established a "strong" cohensive community as a singular type entity, but rather we supported our customers with good customer service and other support along the way so that they could use our games within their own local play groups and such, forming their own micro communities.

Though one notable exception would be our 1483 Online game, which was born from one of the board games from the Empires of History line. It has been in development, first as a PBEM and the last few years in beta as a fully automated MMO game, since 1999. At its peak its had about 1500 active players of which the most active few hundred were at the core of a fairly active online community. That community was centered around the online game though and not direclty around the board game line, so while there was crossover (and still is), its not a 1 = 1 type thing. More an effort to build a seprate enterprise that happens to have a community and to broaden the brand rather than make a centralized community for the board games.

Similar marketing approaches were taken with our Heroes Forever RPG line and Button Wars line. It has worked reasonable well for the Heroes Forever line, but less well for Button Wars. Though we've come to the conclusion that that had less to do with the marketing strategy and more to do with value proposition of the line in its current incarnation. Hence why a new approach for a new edition is in the works.

My overall experience is that you can make all sorts of nice shiny games and sell them all sorts of ways, but the games and game lines with the greatest prospect for longevity will be those you help to build and support communities for (need not be a singular large community).

We ourselves are reshaping our marketing approaches for the relaunch of several game lines with this new understanding of how we should shape our marketing efforts to support community building.

Ryan
GOB Retail
GOB Publishing

I think I have some useful experience to offer on this.

I've been at this for over twenty years and can not honestly say I've every had much commercial success. We do okay at Gen Con because of stuffed animals and puppets not becuase of games. So profit has never been the prime motive of doing this. Having people play my games is the payoff and that is hard to achieve.

When I started I wrote a ton of articles for newletters (now it would be called Blogging - but this was pre-internet). I put out a newsletter which I gave away for free for a couple of years and then just charged cost. I ran play by mail versions of Matrix Games through the newsletter. Sure I went to some conventions but that was as much because this is my hobby as due to selling. I ran games at regional cons to run games. They were not tied to a product I had for sale. Duh! It took me years to figure out I should link what I run with what I sell!

Along the way all this effort has led me to burn out a couple of times. I could easily have quit but when I asked myself what else I'd be doing I didn't have a better thing to do. Pushing Matrix Games is important to me even though I've never had a hit. Along the way this has lead me to learn a ton of skills some of which are cool (like being able to make board games and hardback books). When I die I will not view this as wasted time.

Right now I continue to make games. I have a yahoo group where we play PBEM Matrix Games. We are about to get a Hercule Poirot murder mystery game going. These are all free and account for a good half of the gaming I do in a year. I attend a few cons for fun (Pentacon this coming weekend in Fort Wayne IN, the Seven Years War Association Con in South Bend IN, Marcon in Columbus OH) and Origins to run games. I only have a booth at Gen Con, where I sponcer three people to run games for me out in gaming rooms.

I know the next step for me is to take my most commercial products and sell them to stores. I know I fear doing this. It is mild social anxiety (one of my fatal flaws) but I move ever closer to that goal. Will that bring "success" I suspect not. A few games catch people's imaginations or get enough buzz to be called a hit. Most things don't so we have to be alternately motivated to do the work.

So about the original question - do con runs sell games? My experience is that they do but not many. Cons are expensive to attend and even big companies shot to break even rather than for a profit. Getting actual play is more elusive than a simple answer. Presistence though is a useful trait - one which I think you have - look at how many posts you've made!

Chris Engle

I think I have some useful experience to offer on this.

I've been at this for over twenty years and can not honestly say I've every had much commercial success. We do okay at Gen Con because of stuffed animals and puppets not becuase of games. So profit has never been the prime motive of doing this. Having people play my games is the payoff and that is hard to achieve.

When I started I wrote a ton of articles for newletters (now it would be called Blogging - but this was pre-internet). I put out a newsletter which I gave away for free for a couple of years and then just charged cost. I ran play by mail versions of Matrix Games through the newsletter. Sure I went to some conventions but that was as much because this is my hobby as due to selling. I ran games at regional cons to run games. They were not tied to a product I had for sale. Duh! It took me years to figure out I should link what I run with what I sell!

Along the way all this effort has led me to burn out a couple of times. I could easily have quit but when I asked myself what else I'd be doing I didn't have a better thing to do. Pushing Matrix Games is important to me even though I've never had a hit. Along the way this has lead me to learn a ton of skills some of which are cool (like being able to make board games and hardback books). When I die I will not view this as wasted time.

Right now I continue to make games. I have a yahoo group where we play PBEM Matrix Games. We are about to get a Hercule Poirot murder mystery game going. These are all free and account for a good half of the gaming I do in a year. I attend a few cons for fun (Pentacon this coming weekend in Fort Wayne IN, the Seven Years War Association Con in South Bend IN, Marcon in Columbus OH) and Origins to run games. I only have a booth at Gen Con, where I sponcer three people to run games for me out in gaming rooms.

I know the next step for me is to take my most commercial products and sell them to stores. I know I fear doing this. It is mild social anxiety (one of my fatal flaws) but I move ever closer to that goal. Will that bring "success" I suspect not. A few games catch people's imaginations or get enough buzz to be called a hit. Most things don't so we have to be alternately motivated to do the work.

So about the original question - do con runs sell games? My experience is that they do but not many. Cons are expensive to attend and even big companies shot to break even rather than for a profit. Getting actual play is more elusive than a simple answer. Presistence though is a useful trait - one which I think you have - look at how many posts you've made!

Chris Engle

Thanks for the input, guys, and thanks for answering my question, Ryan.

Chris, you bring up a good point. Looking back, I realize I was really vague in my meaning of using Cons as a platform: I wasn't thinking of the profit-at-Con motivation or running-a-booth when I posted; I was thinking solely about the use of Cons, local or national, for the use of running slots of the games/products in question. I didn't mean to imply using Cons as a way to sell product, because you're correct about them not being good profit-venues. Rather, I think they are seen as a way to build community (or mind-space in the larger community), and then using the community to actually sell the products.

Thart's how I've always viewed them. Nothing wrong with making a profit if you can but breaking even is a good goal for Gen Con and at other cons I'm there having fun as much as I'm pushing product.

Is there anyway you can run your game on line? I've seen people talking about playing on Skype over on the Story Games forum.

Chris Engle

Hello Raven

I also believe that the question of conventions or not is probably only the second concern about the overarching one of community.
I think this discussion needs to take into account three precise points, because this discussion is totally connected to Orx as a product:

1) Elfs and Orx look like they are competitors for the same kind of gamist play with an additional objective of exorcising roleplayers of past AD&D-like frustrations and/or providing slapstick comedy in a fantasy setting. Both are essentially catering to the same demands.
2) Elfs was published before Orx and has a very easy to understand text (Eero seems to say the Orx text is more complicated).
3) I could only find two AP reports on Orx (plus another one which was the report of the first playtest) on the Forge, all written by you, while I've found about ten for Elfs (three by Ron, the rest by others). Both your AP reports have at least some ambiguous notions about the game's ripeness and concerned short one-hour sessions (whereas you imply the game is rather for longer sessions). Only one other player responded to say he was ready to continue testing the game (I'm instinctively thinking: "Oh, the game is not ready.") Ron's AP are enthusiastic and very positive. Plus he manages to get people discussing the game or the session.

You have a high quality competitor and no all-out positive AP to speak of (at least on the Forge). Maybe I'm projecting too much of my attitude on the average indie-consumer, but as far as I'm concerned, I don't even consider buying a game if the author isn't all jazzed and positive about it.

Since you're a well-known and long time Forge contributor, you should start by getting the word out here via enthusiastic AP reports. It's one community you're a part of and you've under-used it, in my opinion.

As mentioned, I really don't want to discuss ORX. It is not the only game in this situation, and talking about it alone does not solve the wider (what I see as a) problem; "Conspiracy of Shadows" or "Fastlane" or something else (to my knowledge) equally overlooked and relatively ignored, which hasn't managed to build itself a community for various reasons, and would have been equally as good to talk about. However, you do make some good points above, though probably not in the way you meant.

I asked originally: if one couldn't make that community happen, then is there a point? And that IS exactly what happened with ORX. To explain briefly: under-utilization of my resources wasn't the problem, it was having nothing to utilize. AP reports are great to stir up interest if you have AP. And I'm not sure what else I could have done in other venues to greater effect.

The longer explanation is: Ron (or etc) has a diverse group of folks who game regularly with him, or the ability to find them, whereas I've only in the last year found a local group I can play RPGs with, after spending a decade looking (I live in shit-ass nowhere. Until relatively recently, I didn't even have local friends, as I'm not into bar-hopping or shootin' things with gunz). For around something like three of the last four years my gaming was sporadic and limited at best; before that, while regular (once weekly for a couple hours) I was only able to game on-line and my play group only expressed interest in D&D. So getting folks to play ORX such that I could write those APs, especially play over the long-term, wasn't happening, and couldn't happen locally. I'm lucky to have gotten the game playtested as much as I was able to (all online) before I put out the print edition.

I suppose I could have just made up sessions in my head and posted them as though they were AP. Set up a couple of sock-puppet accounts for people who don't exist to create the appearance of buzz. But I suspect that even had I done that (which I wouldn't), it would not have been enough.

I say that because I had to push for reviews (and finally got a few); I was at one point putting a lot of energy into trying to get some air-time on indie-popular podcasts (but never did); I was on other forums promoting the game, mentioning the game when relevant, extending invitations to interested parties to play (and report back), etc. Nada.

I've found three reports I've written here. Two of them were specifically about problems I encountered in play, because one was a playtesting session and the other was an online session. The last AP I wrote, about the Forge Midwest game, was positive and enthused, and yet received the fewest responses (ie: none at all). There are two glowing reviews of the game out there, and two mediocre, all of them linked to on a website full of positive happy shit-faced smile about the game.

(The last I mention because somewhere you saw me going "my game is kinda OK -- wah wah", and that's trumping all the above for you? Well, OK. Dunno. Right now I'm pretty burned out on it and don't care if it is showing, but that wasn't the case for the product's actual lifetime, at least from my perspective. I was pretty passionate about how good and fun it was, to the point I was blinded to or dismissive at the time of some of the flaws that needed fixing.)

So there was a whole bunch of time and energy investment sunk into stirring up interest to no effect. Hence the above wondering and questions. Do I really want to go through all that again, including all the writing and slaving over a hot keyboard and playtesting and begging and crap, if I can't get a community up-and-running in order to drive sales? If the same thing happens with eXpendable (or whatever)--if building a community/getting people to actually play the game is going to be like trying to piss upstream into a firehose--is there a point? (Though maybe here we can refine such to say: "building a community via online interaction".)

My experience thus far is: short of taking a croquet bat to people's genitals, I have no clue how to get them to post about their play experiences or even go forth on their own to attempt to have a play experience. If there is some kind of magic formula that doesn't require a year plus of pointlessly beating one's head against the wall, someone please feel free to share.

I know one way to handle this issue would be to avoid doing anything until you have the interest. But that's...difficult to do. Especially for an unknown. Stolze does this with his Ransom Model products, and Baur does it with Open Design -- but both of them are known quantities to their fans: if they say, "Hey, I'm going to do this thing and it'll be cool. If you want to see it, pay me to do it." And people WILL pay them because they expect it WILL be cool.

This is why I was wondering about convention play originally: if you don't have a community expecting that from you, it seems the best way to generate "this will be cool" buzz is to show people at conventions utilizing brief demos or short playtest sessions, etc. And if it doesn't garner any interest and talk then and there, you are forewarned. I'm not sure how to do that just running around the internet posting about it (which didn't/hasn't worked for ORX). I've noted in a post above that successful posting about other topics, as a thing you become known for, produces a community that you can then use to generate "expected to be cool" buzz about other things you're doing.

There is, of course, on-line play (as mentioned): which one can do if one can't find folks locally...though, to be fair, on-line play is weird.

I'm a ten(?)-year veteran of it, and the thing is, it isn't at all like tabletop play. It's different, it has some of its own issues (keeping a group together is even more difficult than in tabletop play, people often disappear for long stretches DURING the game but you never really know when they have/will/are, something like three hours of online play is equivalent to one hour of offline play, no tactile sense of togetherness or of table objects, no one else treats it like a real activity either--such as family members since you're "just" sitting at your computer, and etc etc), so for a number of years I've been personally rather turned off to the whole thing as (overall) an exercise in frustration with occasional bits of fun and exceptional result.

This doesn't mean I won't, but these days the thought of it ranks right up there with the thrill of putting hungry electric eels in my pants.

Tangentially: catering to the same crowd/demands? I disagree. Elfs is meant to be funny in-your-face D&D-snerk slapstick along mostly traditional play lines. ORX is dirty, black humor about how much life sucks and you can't win for winning (ironic, that), structured along very different play lines. Also, Elfs follows on the success of Sorcerer, it has a pre-established community (the author's) willing to give it a look and a shot. In comparison, I'm a bum with a sign on the side of the road. I suspect if Elfs had come first, it would have much less than whatever amount of success it has had, and Ron would be in much the same boat with it as many indies are with their games.

But that's neither here nor there. I really don't know if "you didn't post enough AP!" is a valid criticism, at least in the manner you meant it, though it is valid for what it is. Because, no, I didn't--but how could I have? And given that, should I have bothered? Should I bother again? Etc. Etc. Knowing the history better now, does that make sense?

If so, I think we can go to: in what manner was what I was able to do lacking (if it was)? How could THAT have been improved, or what different methods could have been utilized to better effect (and within reason for hobby publishing rather than as a full-time business)?

-----

PS: I apologize if this discussion feels a bit all-over-the-place. I'm using this to think-out-loud and bounce ideas, and so I really appreciate the feedback, and some stuff seems to be cohering. I know some folks are probably trying to see where I'm coming from -- if I'm coming from anywhere, I'll know it when I get to where I'm going. Hopefully this OK with the mods and kosher with site rules, with this not being taken as navel-gazing or anything of the sort.

PPS: I wanted to mention something else tangential. The print edition of ORX was honestly a mistake because the text really wasn't ready; it went to print because I'd spent years on it at that point and wanted all that time to have gone somewhere, plus it all the cool kids were doing it (nor did I see the prospects for getting more feedback improving anytime soon, which I was correct regarding).

Hello Raven

I'm an ass, I forgot to say how much I appreciate you talking about this in the first place and how you give detailed replies. This is a lot of food for thought for me, and I want to make sure that it's clear that I admire your honest and open discussion about a dissatisfying result (which I count as just as useful as accounts of very successful publishing.) I'm sorry I didn't say that upfront.

Let me state that I stand corrected where I had to be corrected. Nevertheless the distinction between Elfs and Orx wasn't that clear to me (and I might argue that from what I read in your AP reports, there was a good deal of slapstick humour, but hey, as you said, it's not the point)

What you say about online play is pretty much how I feel about the thing as well, so probably reports about online play are not as appealing as those about table top play. I understand that your situation was difficult, but alas, I think it has a major impact on everything, one that can't be ignored. I'm glad to hear you've found a more stable group and I hope you'll be able to do more for eXpendable. In my opinion, that's the first condition that has to be met to even start designing a game.
Or put it another way, as far as I know, all the very successful (I know, it's a vague notion) indie titles have been played a damn lot by their authors before going on sale. Their authors also play other stuff a good deal.

It's true that what I say does not even start to describe why Conspiracy of Shadows and Fastlane have had a hard time, but then again, I don't know their numbers and design history, whereas for Orx you have been quite detailed. As far as I know, Conspiracy of Shadows is going on to a third edition, so is it really that bad?

If you are trying to generate AP giving free stuff away always helps. I believe the guys who did Diaspora did this with some funky fudge dice. Maybe every month you could pick a random AP and give them a free set of dice?

The other thing I can think of is keep the people who have bought the game interested in it with say a newsletter encouraging play and questions, as well as articles from other fans.

greyorm wrote:
AP reports are great to stir up interest if you have AP. And I'm not sure what else I could have done in other venues to greater effect.

The longer explanation is: Ron (or etc) has a diverse group of folks who game regularly with him, or the ability to find them, whereas I've only in the last year found a local group I can play RPGs with, after spending a decade looking (I live in shit-ass nowhere. Until relatively recently, I didn't even have local friends, as I'm not into bar-hopping or shootin' things with gunz). For around something like three of the last four years my gaming was sporadic and limited at best; before that, while regular (once weekly for a couple hours) I was only able to game on-line and my play group only expressed interest in D&D. So getting folks to play ORX such that I could write those APs, especially play over the long-term, wasn't happening, and couldn't happen locally. I'm lucky to have gotten the game playtested as much as I was able to (all online) before I put out the print edition.

...

There is, of course, on-line play (as mentioned): which one can do if one can't find folks locally...though, to be fair, on-line play is weird.

I'm a ten(?)-year veteran of it, and the thing is, it isn't at all like tabletop play. It's different, it has some of its own issues (keeping a group together is even more difficult than in tabletop play, people often disappear for long stretches DURING the game but you never really know when they have/will/are, something like three hours of online play is equivalent to one hour of offline play, no tactile sense of togetherness or of table objects, no one else treats it like a real activity either--such as family members since you're "just" sitting at your computer, and etc etc), so for a number of years I've been personally rather turned off to the whole thing as (overall) an exercise in frustration with occasional bits of fun and exceptional result.

Hey all. I apologize for the lack of response, so I just wanted to pop in and say I really appreciate all your input, I am thinking about it all, and I will get back to this thread ASAP. I've had booku computer problems the last week (ie: I had to reinstall my entire OS...twice), as well as continuing connection problems with the Forge. I'll try to get to it this weekend.

I think the issue comes down to burnout.

You've worked hard. You've written a game. You're living out in BFE. There are no gamers around or those that are are only playing D+D and on line your work is not getting recognized.

I think that sums it up.

I've hit that burn out wall in gaming three or four times in the last twenty years. Others have had significantly more success than I've had and I feel envy. It sucks and I've taken whole years off of writing due to it. Sometimes that's what you've got to do. Working hard banging you head against the wall will not make a door.

All that said, everytime I've burned out I come back. It is possible to create a small group to talk games with and the energy from that group can help project me into outreach efforts to the wider world. I don't control the outcomes but I can try different approaches when I hit the wall. Each failure can lead to growth. When I die I will not look on this effort as wasted because it was better than drinking and shooting (I'm with you on that!)

For now you need to get more of your social needs met. If game making helps that then cool. If it doesn't - well hose it for a while.

When you come back work on projects that jazz you, they are the only ones worth bleeding for. That is the only reason I keep on working on Matrix Games. I insanely believe in them. Success is slow and if it ever really happens will be fifteen years after my ego wanted and expected it. So it's not about ego - it's about discipline and lifestyle.

Vent your spleen and accept my sympathy the life of most game makers is not easy. There is no magic reciepe for success.

Chris Engle

Christoph wrote: I'm an ass, I forgot to say how much I appreciate you talking about this in the first place and how you give detailed replies. This is a lot of food for thought for me, and I want to make sure that it's clear that I admire your honest and open discussion about a dissatisfying result (which I count as just as useful as accounts of very successful publishing.) I'm sorry I didn't say that upfront.

Let me state that I stand corrected where I had to be corrected. Nevertheless the distinction between Elfs and Orx wasn't that clear to me (and I might argue that from what I read in your AP reports, there was a good deal of slapstick humour, but hey, as you said, it's not the point)

It's true that what I say does not even start to describe why Conspiracy of Shadows and Fastlane have had a hard time, but then again, I don't know their numbers and design history, whereas for Orx you have been quite detailed. As far as I know, Conspiracy of Shadows is going on to a third edition, so is it really that bad?

Dan wrote: Your description of the shortcomings of online play sound like they refer to text-chat-based play. Have you tried playing over Skype? I don't have any good in-face tabletop experiences to compare to, but I've had several enjoyable Skype based games.

I think it's kind of disappointing that the only designs that ever have a shot of working out are the ones designed by people who are also well-connected enough to get the help they need to kick things to the next level. A potential solution would be forming AP or playtest groups with other designers for mutual benefit, but that requires finding other designers who are interested and a good match, which is probably even harder than finding players.

MatrixGamer wrote: Vent your spleen and accept my sympathy the life of most game makers is not easy. There is no magic reciepe for success.

greyorm wrote:

Dan wrote: Your description of the shortcomings of online play sound like they refer to text-chat-based play. Have you tried playing over Skype? I don't have any good in-face tabletop experiences to compare to, but I've had several enjoyable Skype based games.

I have not tried playing over Skype. That was just starting to come into vogue when I was leaving the on-line play scene. I may have to try it out at some point; do you know of any good places where folks arrange those sorts of on-line games?

Dan wrote: I don't know if there are any good places. Both of the groups I'm a part of came from contacts made on the discussion forums for The Gutter Skypes, an Actual Play podcast based on Skype gaming. I see posts in the RPG.net Gaming Gathering forums about setting up Skype groups, and that may work, too.

Hi guys,

I just posted this comment in another thread, and I realise it would be more useful if it were answered here.

Once I've got a game, assuming I can't take on the US conventions (nod to Eero), what should I do now?

That's the question.  Here's the backup:

Luke Crane wrote: I announce on my forums and others that we have a new book coming out. I encourage folks to speculate on what it is.

I announce the nature of the produce 30-45 days later. I put it on the front page of my website. I announce it on other forums.

15-30 days later, I put the product up for presale. Depending on the product, preorders get a PDF when they order and then wait 30-45 days for the actual book. I never put up a preorder until the book is at the printer.

I also make sure I do this around the same time every year, once a year. I release one product a year and my fans know it. They can rely on it.

I attend conventions, demonstrate the product and personally sell it to interested folks. At conventions, if there's a busy dealer's room, I get a table and hang banners and sell from there...Last year I went to Dreamation, Origins, Dexcon, Connecticon, Gen Con, PAX and Draconis. It was a light year for me. At the height of my effort, I was doing just under one a month.

Sebastien,

Have you done the con circuit in Ireland? Have you made yourself a fixture and feature of those cons? Do the organizers know you and welcome you? Do fans attend specifically for your games?

You can get a lot of momentum in your own backyard. I didn't travel too far for my first run at the conventions. Hell, I started demoing in a game shop right here in town.

-L

That's a great place for this question, Sebastian. Sadly, Northern Minnesota is basically a lot of trees and hills and a couple itty-bitty conventions a year hours away from fuck all anything (ie: "Dude, I'm having a convention! Like, ten people showed up! Whoo! Success!" or "Dude, I'm having a con...oh, snowed out. Nevermind.").

Now, you've said you hit the local circuit, so can you build a decent home audience? Get that audience out there helping you push the game on-line (being vocal/active/participating fans)? Maybe find/gain a member of that audience overseas, someone who already runs the con circuit in some area of the US, who is willing to run your game at conventions?

I'm in the same boat as Sebastian, though my game is a bit off from being done. I live in Sweden and while I plan to hit the local cons when the time comes, I'd love to have a larger con presence. Unfortunately, it looks like the only solution is to hit up UK and US cons, with UK being cheaper and closer to me.

Actually, I've not done the Con circuit, yet. Not as a developer.  I've started plugging at the games societies in the universities, and I've got a playtest scheduled with the con directors of one of the conventions in January, but it's just the start of the process.  From what I can tell, you guys think that is enough to get started with, so I'll go at it and tell you how I get on.

I'm also meeting with some designers in London (fingers crossed) in January, to maybe run a game of HfL.  I know that some of them are "loud" fans, as in they're likely to contribute an online voice if they see something they like, which makes me extra excited and extra nervous. I'll follow up if I learn anything useful (failure or success).

Maybe find/gain a member of that audience overseas, someone who already runs the con circuit in some area of the US, who is willing to run your game at conventions?

northerain wrote:
I'm in the same boat as Sebastian, though my game is a bit off from being done. I live in Sweden and while I plan to hit the local cons when the time comes, I'd love to have a larger con presence. Unfortunately, it looks like the only solution is to hit up UK and US cons, with UK being cheaper and closer to me.

Sebastian wrote: That'd be a dream come true. E.g., I've no idea how to get that kind of gig, except by pure fluke.

I'll drop in from time to time with an update on the progress.  Merry Chrimbo everyone!

Sebastian.

Greyorm,

I'm going to be a bit blunt and maybe an ass about this but the question remains: Did your game ORZ suceed or fail?

Just because you put out a game doesn't mean anyone has to play it. Just because people buy the game doesn't mean people will be excited enough about it to gather others to play it. (I know, I've been there more than once.) My first game (Embers of Empire SFRPG) I put my heart and soul into. I sold two copies. I realize now that EoE is not playable. The good part of it is that it gave me experience on writing a game and allowed me (after another aborted game--60+ pages) to write another two games that are near release. Will they sell? I don't know. I only know I did my best and the public will decide if I produced a good game. Its reception is beyond my control.

My advice is to get away from your game for 6-12 months and then reevaluate it. In the meanwhile, write another game using what you've learned from this one.

Best of Luck, Keith

Greetings Keith,

I'm confused because I'm not sure what is it you're trying to ask? I would have thought the answers to your question obvious, given the details throughout the thread, so that makes me think I'm not understanding what you're trying to ask about.

Other than that confusion, all fine things to keep in mind, especially your suggestion that an author get away from the work for 6-12 months (though I'd suggest someone do that after the first draft is done, rather than post-publishing). That's certainly something I do quite a bit with much of my work. However, whether that works for a given individual, and the actual length of time one puts it in the drawer for, is really personal preference.

I don't know if it will work, but I'm going to try to build a community via podcasting. I'm launching a new podcast, Designer vs. Reality. It will have AP recordings of playtests of my game (and possibly other designers' games, if a situation arises where that makes sense). I'm hoping that listeners will be inspired to playtest my game with me over Skype, which will provide content for more episodes of the podcast, which will attract more playtesters, etc. The big trick will be to get that virtuous cycle working, which will require both entertaining episodes and a critical mass of volunteers.

Hi guys,

Before Christmas I mentioned that I'd throw in some updates about my progress in con attendance/networking.  So far, I've only had the chance to attend one convention, Warpcon in Co. Cork, Ireland. Nevertheless, I think I've learned a couple of things, so I thought I'd share.

First of all, before I attended the con I met up with gaming contingents from some of the other convention directors in Ireland. That way, once I arrived at Warpcon I found that I recognised some of the attendees. If you've never attended a convention as a designer, I'd strongly recommend getting involved with the gaming societies at your local university. I set up playtests in three Irish universities, and when I finally ran the playtests in Warpcon I was delighted to learn that the convention organisers had heard reports about me from the gaming societies.

Also, and this was a lesson harshly learned, in one case I found out that I'd stepped on somebody's toes. In one playtest report (for one of the university gaming society playtests), I gave my opinions on a subset of the playtesting participants. It wasn't a positive opinion and it was later read by a member of that society. Suffice is to say that, even though I stand by that opinion, I shouldn't have posted it publicly. It was a schoolboy error, and one I wish I could take back. Unless you're an idiot like me, this is something you would probably never do. Common sense. But if you are an idiot like me, never say anything bad, however true at the time, about any gamer. It's not clever, funny or useful.

I've been invited to attend some new cons for more playtests, I've been asked to send some info via email to interested gamers, and I've been invited to run the game in two of the big conventions in Dublin city (as slotted events). People seem quite excited by the game and although there are still just a handful of people who know of the game in Ireland, I think with more convention attendance I can hope for a little more community.

I'll be back in April to give an update on more Irish networking/convention news.

Thank you for the update, sir! One thought about the error you mention making:

It's not clever, funny or useful.

Okay, that's a valid point.  If someone at the table ruins your playtest, I think it's okay to announce that in your report. It will help other designers to understand a) that things can be outside of your control (which is comforting to hear from another designer) and b) more about the true failures of the mechanics (vs. the social failures).

However, I also think it's dangerous, especially if you're dealing with gaming societies. If one guy gets cheesed off, and that guy spells out your playtest report's slander to the rest of the society, not only can you lose a significant wing of gamers, but it's also likely that they will infect at least one convention (it's all very incestuous in Ireland). So, to to new designers, on the subject of slanderous playtest reports, make sure you're careful. You never know who might read it.

As to my faux pas, it wasn't really a case of any direct slander, but, I suppose, from a breach of trust. When I left the playtest I never indicated to the host that I was disappointed with some of his players. He read the playtest report, maybe expecting something positive, and therefore would have encountered my distaste with some distaste of his own. Had I explained to him (before I left his company) that I'd been disappointed with his players, I don't doubt that we would be more friendly now. Instead, by commenting the way I did, I upset his expectation. If I was him I'd feel deceived. He has my sympathy.

Thanks for following the Warpcon playtests, and thanks for your encouragement. I'll be back soon.

That makes a lot of sense, Sebastian.

Thanks for sharing that (I wasn't sure if I should even comment on it at first, but I'm glad I did now).

I promised to update my progress as far con attendance (and community). Since the last entry, I attended Itzacon, Leprecon (in Ireland) and Conpulsion (in Scotland). The results are exciting.

Itzacon

In Ireland, the gaming scene is incestuous. Every time I go to a convention I have more friends than last time. At Itzacon, I bumped into a friendly face, one Alan Jackson, the co-ordinator of Conpulsion, with whom I had a chance to play an awesome [URL=http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=29380.0]playtest[/URL].

Leprecon

During Leprecon I was busy with real life, so I couldn't attend for the whole weekend. However on the Saturday, a couple of friends went in my stead, and managed to run a playtest session of Hell for Leather with Shane of the [URL=http://theadventuringparty.libsyn.com/]Adventuring Party[/URL] (Ireland's best gaming podcast). This lead on to a mention on the podcast, of course. Happy days!

At Leprecon I met up with a few of the guys from the Irish Games Association (IGA), including Andrew Coffey, the Gaelcon convention co-ordinator. We were both in a rush, but we managed to speak, and he was enthusiastic about promoting Hell for Leather. He told me to get in touch with a couple of people at the IGA. This would lead on to a few conversations and an eventual meet with the special events co-ordinator, Feargal Fanning.

Now I have a demo table pencilled in at Gaelcon at which I can sell my game (without paying a traders fee), along with two HfL special events and a deal with the charity auction (yet to be figured out).

Leprecon, in many ways, opened the doors for me to the trading community in Ireland.

Conpulsion

Lastly, there was Conpulsion. This was an amazing event. I met up with Gregor Hutton, Joe Prince, Malcolm Craig, Neil Gow, Iain McAllister and others. Not only did I get a chance to demo my game (and get an audio AP thanks to Pooka), but I playtested Joe Prince's Hell 4 Leather (notice the digital difference), playtested Hammer Falls (Pooka's game of awesome dystopia) and wound up as a pseudo chairman in the most educational and inspiring talk of my gaming career.

Let me clarify. At the end of the convention, all the big cheeses sat around a low table. There were around fifteen of us. Malcolm Craig, Gregor Hutton and Joe Prince included. The guys started spinning stories, chatting industry, and so on. It was extraordinarily educational. And then, out of the blue, Gregor says "so I heard you had some questions to ask me...go ahead..." I nervously pulled out my notebook (I had come prepared) and started seeking advice. I was asking about bundling, distribution, printing, and so on. Suddenly there were a dozen experts giving me (ME!!) advice on how to prepare and sell my game. It was like I'd gone to fanboy heaven.

Anyway, enough of my spunky happiness.

Since then, Gregor has helped with layout, Malcolm has helped with editing, I've arranged to promote some of the guys' stuff in my book, I've got some more advice about retail, and so on, and so on.

Other Stuff

The contacts I've made in the Irish community have allowed me to run a playtest in UCD (for the second time), introduced me to a couple more of the players behind the con scene, and set me up for a fun, hospitable and welcoming experience for future conventions.

In short, if you're a newbie to this, get your game ready and go to every convention you can find. Even if you never print your game, you're going to meet some wonderful, supportive people.

I'll be back in a few months (in November, I guess) to throw in some feedback about building community. Just to clarify, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. I'm just trying to go to things, meet people, talk to people, help people and, at every opportunity, let people help me. I don't know if it's working, really. I'm not here as any kind of authority on this. If you have experiences from conventions that could help us to learn how to communicate better, let me know.

Oh, which reminds me, I've learned to: make sure you run your game in the most public place possible, make sure your game is loud (meaning obvious, meaning colourful/noisy/nicely dressed) and make sure you have some people with you who love your game more than you do. I'm terrible at selling my game because (1) I'm sure people don't want to hear me talk about something I've done and (2) I don't know if what I've done is any good at all. But my friends are incredibly vocal and welcoming. This means I can focus on getting people to enjoy a demo while the guys focus on recruiting. I couldn't do this without a wingman. Seriously.

The last time this thread was active, I promised to return with some updates on my progress (?) with the building of community in Ireland and abroad. I recently came back from Gaelcon and, although it was a dismal failure, I think I've got some things to share.

Gaelcon

I spent a lot of time talking with the convention organisers. They were very supportive. They gave me my own stall for free and arranged for a floor space to demo my game and run special events.

I spent nearly all of the four days of the convention at my stall or nearby and I sold four books. It was a total waste of time. Now, there are a lot of whys and why nots, but in the end, they're irrelevant. What I'd like to share here are the positive things that I learned and some of the negative things that I'd avoid next time.

Networking gets you stuff. By being nice to people and offering help, I was able to save myself €100 for the stall. I may not have sold anything, but I didn't make a loss. So that, in it's way, is a success. If you're newer than me to this business, my advice is to try to contact and meet (and drink with) the convention organisers whenever you can. If you're enthusiastic and genuine, I think that these gamer organisers will do their best to support you (especially if they know you haven't got any money/credentials).

Manning a stall is probably not a good way to sell a new indie game to an Irish audience. I knew that Irish gamers were stuck in their ways, but, somehow, I thought that my game was going to change it all. Hahaha! I was/am an idiot. So, I've learned that if you have a gut feeling about your audience, listen to it, and don't believe that you will be able to change your audience. You've got to change for them. So, if you think you've got a hard sell indie game, then manning a stall probably won't get it sold. You need to convince people through play. I reckon.

If you do have a stall (and this is particular to the small conventions in the UK and Ireland), do what Graham Walmsley did at Indiecon this year. Be there for 90 minutes a day at 10:30, 15:30 and 18:30. Leave a sign telling everyone that you're playing games and go and enjoy yourself. Maybe, by playing new games, you'll meet some awesome people who MIGHT want to peek at your work.

Lastly, if you don't sell any of your game, it might be because your game is flawed/shit. That's what I've come to learn about my game and, even though it hurt, the lack of sales and interest helped me to nail the coffin shut on my suspicions. That nail has helped me to become a little more realistic about my expectations for the game and, therefore, how much support I should be giving it going forward. So, even if it sucks, there's still something you can learn. Some people call that the bright side.

Lucca

This is a funny little story. I got in touch with some Italian gamers at Gente Che Gioca, because most of the Hell for Leather Facebook group was made up of Italian fans. Gente Che Gioca is an Italian version of Story Games, more or less. I asked if someone over there would like to sell a couple of copies of the game for me at Lucca (and earn a profit for themselves, of course).

A couple of people replied, including Claudia Cagnini of Narrativa. She put out a thread to ask if anyone would be interested and, if so, to sign up for a copy. That way we'd know how many books I should ship.

In that thread, I told everyone that not only would every book be signed, but that I would also write a rude dedication. I have some great Italian friends, and if there's one thing I know about Italians is that they love blasphemous, shocking humour. Like me. Twenty people signed up for the book, I shipped those to Italy, and all of them sold at Lucca.

The guys over in Italy are great supporters. I'm so happy I got in touch. So, if there's a lesson to learn, it might be "fortune favours the bold." I sent one little message and it ended up accounting for more than a fifth of my total sales.

In summary, I think a lot of this building of community comes from just turning up at things and having fun, but some of it comes from being bold and the most part comes from someone else pimping your shit. The only way that happens, of course, is by accident.

I won't be contributing any more to this thread, as I think I'm totally under qualified. But I'd love to get some feedback.