This is going to be a short one, as this is very much a postGenCon, OMG I’m so tired but we had such a great convention, sort of post.
Kudos to our whole team: Magic Matt McElroy who coordinated the whole furshlinger thing, and Bouncy Bill Bodden who ran the booth, who both made this the most seamless and effective GenCon booth experience ever. Congrats to both of them for their efforts paying off!
Mike Hollywood pulled together our in-booth demos, and ran a bunch once he got there after his new day job, and I believe we had more demos than ever before. One of those doing demos was Naughty Neall Raemonn Price, who had an experience I suggested we share with all of you:
“The first hour at Gen Con in the exhibitor’s hall is an absolute madhouse. From somewhere in the swarm emerged a middle-aged gentleman and his two daughters, each in their very early teens. At length they told me about their characters and their experiences with Scion, but I couldn’t stay for a demo, so I asked they come back later that day. I missed my appointment with them, but they returned the next day and the day after until I finally had the time.
Seeing young players instantly pick up and grow excited by the possibilities of the system (“Dad! Rolling bad means you get Momentum! See, you’re helping the whole group!”) was immensely heartening. Both daughters demanded pictures with me and Scion posters and told me how much mythology (and myth fiction) they’d been reading just from playing Scion, and how their characters made them feel like true heroes in a world that badly needs heroism.
It struck me that, beyond anything else, this was why my colleagues and I make games – so we can see the sheer joy of players and how much our products change lives. As I’ve said to many of my colleagues, we sometimes have to be reminded that these aren’t just games – they’re an important means for people to speak to their own stories and their own lives, to have a safe place to explore a dangerous world. The demo I ran for that man and his daughters made the entire con for me.”
Also demoing in the booth was Fast Eddy Webb. The game he was demoing, Pugmire, also premiered as a physical book available to non-backers at GenCon50 and sold out mid-Friday, so we borrowed some more from our sales partners at Studio2, and I asked Lovely LisaT to Fedex me a case from home. We sold out both batches mid Saturday, and had to pull out our hidden stash for Sunday.
Which sold out.
Monica Valentinelli, Rollickin’ Rose Bailey, Mirthful Mike Chaney, and Impish Ian Watson were all instrumental in the long months of planning and creating the new backdrop, pins, brochures, and booth video, and much thanks goes to them.
Special thanks to Matthew Dawkins, Dixie Cochran, Danielle Lauzon Harper, and Meghan Fitzgerald, all of whom pitched in either at the booth and in panels, or both. You were all incredibly helpful! (That’s an exclamation mark there, Matthew tells me.)
Matthew could also be found next door to us at the WW booth where they were playtesting his latest work, the V5 Alpha Playtest also written by our friend Jason Andrew. We spent a lot of time sending interested playtesters over to them, chatting, and even squeezed a very interesting lunch meeting out of our respective crazy schedules. More on that in later weeks. Surprising no one, really, WW also announced that Mark Rein Hagen was joining the V5 team. Go get ’em, Mark! (That’s an exclamation mark-post-Mark).
And with that awful payoff to a joke set-up from this blog’s title, I leave you now. You’ll be hearing plenty more about all that happened at the con in the weeks to come.
Note that we are skipping the BLURBS! section this week as most of our creators were very busy at the convention. Keep an eye out for Wednesday when something will go on sale, like always. I’m just too tired to read my own notes and decipher what it is….
Hey, quick question Rich. In the CofD panel you meantioned a Night Horrors: Cryptids book. Did you mean Night Horrors: Enemy Action, or is this a second Demon NH book on its way? Very excited for all the new books announced especially Eternal Flame for Hunter!
The Cryptids book it the Enemy Action book.
Thanks Matt!
Reason to celebrate!?!?!? 😉
Reason to Celebrate: Gen Con is over.
As fun as Gen Con is, and as much as we wish it were longer (if only so we have a chance to actually browse the exhibit hall ourselves and maybe get some gaming in), it’s always a relief to get to pack up and go home.
Here here!
I’ll second that. Wish I could have made it out, but this year has been harsh for us lol. Will be there for 51, though.
Here here. This was my first year working the con. I ran 5 game sessions and it was crazy fun, but man was I really to go home at the end. I was super impressed by the OPP/Nocturnal/WWP both this year. You all did a total knock out job.
I’m glad GenCon went well, Pugmire seems to really be taking off and between that and all the other creative properties Onyx Path looks to be in a good place. I really need to just say to hell with it and go there sometime.
In the meantime, I had a few questions about Werewolf the Forsaken and development. One was answered on the boards.
1. So, we found out Stew has left as line developer for Forsaken. Has a new one been found?
2. How are line developers picked in the first place? I understand not sharing the entire procedure here but are there things you look for? As I understand it from the grapevine, Dave and Rose got theirs for ‘outstanding achievement’ regarding an understanding of Mage and Vampire, as displayed through their Actual Plays, though I imagine having written and worked for OP before that helped too.
Devs are picked in different ways depending on the needs of the books and lines. I became Vampire developer by working as a freelance writer for a year or two, then doing the full-time job interview process with White Wolf. Dave Brookshaw wrote for WW and then OP for several years and was one of our go-to Mage people, so he got picked up to dev MtAw2. Neall Price was a prolific freelancer and one of the biggest contributing writers on Scion 2e when it needed a new developer. And so on.
For skills, I look for developers to be able to think in terms of the big picture of a book or line, clearly communicate a vision to writers, and have a strong, intuitive grasp of the subject matter. The ability to polish others’ work is vital, too.
Thank you, and I’m sorry for overlooking, I don’t really know the structure and figured Rich did that hiring.
I have done a fair bit of it in the past, but with Rose assuming the duties of Development Producer last year, more of that has settled on her.
I had six years’ experience as a writer before I Developed anything. These young upstarts like Dawkins and Fitzgerald are positively *leaping* forward.
Or, it could be that most of that experience was when CCP/Old White Wolf were dramatically slowing down book production.
Thank you, both of you.
Thanks for sharing that story about the man and his daughters. It definitely speaks to me. You guys are awesome.
No mention of Scarred Lands? Come on people!
As Rich said, this is a short post, mostly picture-sharing. Our Gen Con debrief will come later once we’ve all returned home and rested.
I saw that you met there the french teams of Arkane Asylum and Agate RPG. Nice encounter ? Any plan for the future ? I’m really looking forward for more of your product to be translated in french 🙂
So are we going to get to see this Scion material or was it Gen Con-exclusive?
To what Scion material are you referring?
I could’ve sworn there was talk of some new content? Some important announcements or.the like?
Was I mistaken?
Rose said they’d have some previews from Origin and Hero available at the booth. Might be that…
Marin is correct, there was an early sample of (I think) Scion: Origin text available to read. It’ll eventually make its way out to the public. Nothing exclusive.
I can’t think of any other material that might qualify.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure Marin is right.
Thanks for clarifying!
What is going to be published on Wednesday?
My hope is the Huntsman Chronicle Anthology for Changeling the Lost 2E.
That would be excellent!
Another educated guess from me, the PoD for Thousand Years of Nights.
Or both that and Huntsman Chronicle Anthology. You never know,
Maybe Pugmire?
“Bouncy?”
Is that sarcasm, or were parts of me more active than I realized?
We all get an alliterative epithet. It means you’re one of us. (ONE OF US. ONE OF US.)
Don’t take it personally. I don’t think Mike is particularly Mirthful, fr’ex, but your mileage may vary. 😉
I’m already terrified of what mine may be if I’m ever assigned one.
Based on GenCon, right now, it’d be Dauntless Dixie. But we have time, and I sometimes switch them around.