Post Reddit AMA Jitters

That’s right, it’s like I’m back in Nam, knee deep in the rice paddies, and the we’re being hit from all directions- Eddy’s down! We all knew he’d be the first one, didn’t we?

So, for those of you who have No Idea WHAT I’m Talking About: the Onyx Path crew did a Reddit AskMeAnything session last Thursday that was just a crazy 4 to 6 hours of questions and comments being fired at the bunch of us who could log in: Ian Watson, Rose Bailey, Joe Carriker, Eddy Webb, Matt McFarland, Justin Achilli, Matt McElroy, John Morke, I think Dave Brookshaw got on there but by then I was shell-shocked and I’m sure I’m missing some folks. And if you can be shell-shocked in a good way, that’s what I was, because trying to keep up with the Reddit interface was exhilarating even while it seemed we’d never get to all the questions. We are definitely doing more of these, and at different times of the day, too. If I missed following up on any conversations, please accept my apologies and that it wasn’t deliberate. Many, many good points were made and answered- more info about Demon: The Thing and Exalted Third Edition  than I’d seen, but we were supposed to answer honestly on an AskMeAnything so we did. Sometimes we all rushed to answer a general question and keep things rolling and the poor asker got four of us all saying the same thing essentially , but in our own ways. Here’s the link: http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/17mu3l/we_are_onyx_pathwhite_wolf_amaask_us_anything/

Also, while that was going on, the Deluxe Hunters Hunted II Kickstarter passed its first Stretch Goal and we’ll be adding a section on the Inquisition, those most ferocious of mortal vampire-hunting organizations, fueled by the fire of zealotry, first as a PDF and possibly right into the book as added content if we pass the next goal. But that raised a difficult decision that I thought I’d take right to the KS community: would you rather we add more extra content like Project Twilight, or the Arcanum, or a Hunter Fiction Anthology? I’m letting backers let us know what Stretch Goals they want next, and will announce once we get right on top of the current goal. Yeah, its kind of a stunt, but more importantly, I think it illustrates the difference in publishing with KS added into the mix- we can directly ask the folks who’ve already proved how much they want the product what would make it better for them- and then add it.

Besides the above, Eddy and I also talked about the community reaction to his Bloody Rites of Bloody Blood book outline (Of Blood). Some folks had their own ideas of what the book was going to be about, and Eddy says he was glad to be able to use the blog to describe the book he was envisioning and get folks to understand what kinds of cool info was going to be in there. Better now than when the book goes live, particularly because Eddy was really able to explain the value we place on the direction he’s going while letting folks know that other directions would also make fine books. I dunno, for some reason there’s a thing with gaming fans, and maybe it’s all fandom, that makes us think that a choice different than ours is somehow peeing on our ideas- instead of just being a different choice. I guess we take the stuff we care about personally.  http://whitewolfblogs.com/v20/2013/01/29/blood-ritual-rites-of-the-bloody-blood/ Nevertheless, some great ideas in there, and Eddy is already tweaking the outline and a couple of the writers, so far, Jason Alexander and Matthew Sanderson, have already starter threads and blogs of their own.

Some other internal CCP stuff, all pretty routine, and I let him know that I mailed out 37 freelancer checks over the weekend, so that’s pretty good.

And here is more information about some of the books folks were asking after:

–  God Machine Chronicle (nWoD) is in Layout and some art is being CCP Approved.

–  Strix Chronicle Fiction Anthology (VtR) Strix is into Editing.

– Mummy the Curse – I sent out links for all of the Reward Tier free PDFs, as well as a preliminary version of the Mummy: The Curse PDF. While this version will soon be Updated to the actual version containing all the Backer names (and if you are a Backer, but still haven’t returned the all-important Survey, please get it in by Friday), a beneficial side effect of getting an early version out is that we are hearing about areas where the info isn’t as clear as it could be, as well as where we missed genuine mistakes during layout and editing. So we’ll be altering the text and layout to resolve those issues- brought up to us by our eagle-eyed fans. Thanks! Ace Developer CA Suleiman is currently re-blocking out the MtC release schedule in order to add in all the cool Rewards from the Kickstarter.

– Exalted 3rd Edition:  I continue working with my old friend Maria Cabardo, one of the most talented designers and art directors in the business (or any creative business actually-Google her) on integrating the Devs ideas with a bunch of brilliant artists that she works with as well as on a new Exalted logo and map. Our intention is to have some smashing new pieces ready for the EX3 Kickstarter in February. The DEVs are currently head down and deep into the Charms section. Lots of stuff on the Reddit AMA about EX3.

– V20 Hunters Hunted 2 layout is going in for CCP Approval. The Kickstarter for the Deluxe edition has already done wonderfully well, and we’re excited to see what additional Stretch Goals will be revealed (see above for how you can determine the added material for the book).

– V20 Anarchs Unbound is in post writing Development. I think Justin has been posting some things, on the WWBlogs.

– Deluxe Werewolf 20th Anniversary Edition  Kickstarter Classic PDFs went out to backers of the Kickstarter. Mike Lee is half-way through his novel. W20 to the indexer. Aileen is working on the Storyteller Screen to the template provided by the printer and Wallpaper. Bill is preparing the W20 Anthology outline for prospective writers.  Putting the W20 KS Stretch Goal projects into the schedule.

–Deluxe Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition has been confirmed for September-ish 2013 and Phil Brucato has started assigning writers and has started writing his part. Time to talk about the art.

– W20 Changing Breeds is also in Art Direction and Editing.

– W20 Rage Across the World is in Art Direction, Mike just had an artist have to drop their piece because of a scheduling demand from their day job- check out the W20 CB blog notes: http://whitewolfblogs.com/w20/

– Guildhalls of the Deathless (MtC) is being written.

– Conventionbook: Progenitors (cMtA) is in Editing, art is going to CCP for approval.

– Mage Translation Guide has begun being written.

– W20 Book of the Wyrm is being written and red-lined.

Reason for Drinking: To warm up.