Cards

Target Date & Seeking Artists for Card Game Kickstarter

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Over on Twitter I launched my public quest for an artist for my card game for a Kickstarter launch in the first quarter of 2020. You can listen to the companion podcast episode here.

I then reposted the link to that Twitter thread across my social media. You can read the entire thread below this article.

I find that I prefer interacting on Twitter, mostly because I have a growing following on Twitter that is approaching 900, and I expect to be over 1,000 by the end of April. I curate a positive atmosphere and mute and block nonsense and those who spread it. I prefer to talk about games and fun and be supportive of the fun and efforts of others.

There have been several re-shares on Twitter, but my first response was on MeWe.

I want to give it some time before I narrow down to an artist or artists. A cool idea is to have multiple artists so I can have multiple versions of the deck, with a newer artist for the base funding level, and more well known artists at higher funding levels. This is only at the idea stage, and the realities of time and base funding available pre-Kickstarter.

Target Date

The first quarter of 2020 means that I want to launch sometime between January 1 and March 31, 2020. Since January is the bulk of my busy time at work, I will probably avoid January. It all depends on how well things come together and how well a hopeful new hire is at dealing with the chaos of our busy time of year. One of my colleagues resigned and their last day is this coming Friday. Hopefully we get a new person hired that is a former user, so we only have to teach them the support tech stuff. That’s a wrench I wasn’t anticipating and has thrown off my pacing on some of my blogging, podcasting, and publishing efforts.

Planning & Research

For my first Kickstarter, I am focused on doing all I can to maximize success. I am fully aware that any major misstep or miscalculation on my part will have a major impact on whether I can hope to have future Kickstarters. I have ideas for more things to Kickstart, including more card games, board games, and RPG supplements.

I have backed 69 projects and have learned what I like and don’t like about how a Kickstarter is handled. I want to emulate Kevin Crawford [Affiliate Link] of Stars Without Number [Affiliate Link] and other successful Kickstarters. I want to plan adequately and have the work done ahead of time so that I am merely waiting for the funding to arrive so I can pull the trigger on initiating production, etc. Kevin has graciously shared his checklist and method and the spreadsheet he uses to track art from artists. I plan to put all of that to use.

I have studied the top ten card game Kickstarters as of a year ago to see what pledge levels they used, how many, and which ones yielded the best results. I have sought advice from others who have ran successful Kickstarters, and read all I can find online.

My plan is to have all the work completed that is needed to begin production. I hope that the amount I have set aside to buy art is enough to have the art done and ready to go. The Kickstarter will pay for production, editing of the rules, layout of the rules and the cards to be print ready, and bonuses for the artists. Plus any other costs I identify. Shipping will be a separate charge that is applied once the cards are ready to ship.

Stretch goals will be directly related to fulfilling a production of a card game. If you want T-Shirts, you can get them from my Teespring store. If it isn’t part of the end result of holding a card game in your hand that you can play, then it will not be a stretch goal.

It should be clear that I plan to avoid all the things I know have sunk or greatly delayed Kickstarters full of promise.

If things don’t come together for a first quarter launch, I will only launch in a later quarter if my time line allows for completed production and delivery by November. My busy time at the day job starts in November and runs into and even through February. I don’t want the headache of dealing with work and trying to juggle a Kickstarter. Of course, if I hit a million dollars, I can quit my job and put all my focus on games. I’m not yet sure how much it would have to be for me to quit the day job, but that’s my dream to make my next job more about fun and doing things I love.

Play Testing

Between now and launch of the Kickstarter I will be tweaking the cards for the third iteration of the test deck and play testing as often and as much as possible. My plan is to have this iteration of the deck in my hands before the end of April, by mid-April if possible. I’ll then set up play tests at nearby game stores and take it with me to conventions. Ideally, I’ll have more than one deck and have multiple groups playing on their own without my having to explain it. After I used my new short rules at Gary Con XI, I learned that I have the rules pretty tight, I just need to re-arrange the order of explaining a couple things. Players picked up the game with minimal questions from those rules.

Suggestions

I am always open to suggestions from those who have been there, done that. Anything to help me avoid faux pas is welcome.

To all who have played my card game and made suggestions, I have noted all of them, and applied them where they make sense. My game is the better for it, and I thank you for freely offering those suggestions.

To all who have offered help with things, I will be contacting you soon to discuss the things you offered your assistance.

Some suggested that one of the cards for which I did the art, that it should stay in the game. Others suggested I should have a stretch goal of a Larry Art Version. My concern about that is it might hurt things, but I might consider it. What do you think?

Thanks!

I want to thank all the play testers at all the cons and other locations I’ve played my card game. In some ways, I still can’t believe I made a game that works, AND that people actually like! Also thanks for keeping certain details under wraps to help build suspense.

Many thanks to all those who are interested and shared on social media all my mysterious postings about it.

Local Artist

The picture used in the blog header is from artist Lindsay Poulos from Grand Rapids, whom I interviewed on Episode 86 of my podcast. She is under consideration for doing one version of the art for the card game. You can see her share of the picture on Instagram. Lindsay has experience doing art for board games.

My granddaughter is obsessed with Elsa & Frozen and I commissioned an ink drawing of Nikola with Elsa taking a selfie. Lindsay colored it to give it that last bit of punch. Nikola loves it.

And Now for Something Completely Different

I launched my newest PDF for March, No Really, It’s Me.

This is the first adventure of my monthly PDFs published on DriveThruRPG.

The player characters are doppelgangers who have replaced an adventuring party and must go back to town and convince other adventurers not to return to the dungeon.

Are you looking for a quick scenario idea that you can easily craft to your own style?

Check out my first adventure PDF which is a quick overview of an outline for one of my four hour convention games.

If this does well, I will eventually add all of my existing convention scenarios to my growing list of PDFs.

Twitter Thread Below

I have the entire thread below after the link to the thread on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/followmeanddie1/status/1109473668688723968

My plan is to Kickstart my card game in 1st QTR of 2019, so I need to work on arranging the art now. I’m interested in artists who are obviously good and experience with card art is a plus. If interested please add a comment with a link to your portfolio, and your rates. 1/n

It is a fantasy theme. I’ll discuss details of number of pieces, payment terms, etc. via Direct Message/email. References for timely delivery is crucial. My plan is to have art and details of production ready so can deliver by Nov. 1st. My preference is for a single artist. 2/n

This is so it all looks like it goes together.

Also needs to be digital so ready to layout the card it goes with. Please ask questions for clarity and cure my ignorance if needed. I want to do this right, since a flop will ruin chances of future Kickstarters. I have ideas for more, so there is a chance of future work. 4/n

You can do original in physical media and scan, whatever your best workflow. NOTE: I set aside part of my annual bonus so payment is available before the Kickstarter. I want to be fair and exposure is a bonus, not payment. 5/n

If you are within a couple hours of Kalamazoo, MI I would like to meet to show the game. Otherwise we can do an online meeting. I work a 9 to 5 job in Eastern time zone, so meetings around that. 6/n

There will be an NDA until the KS is about to launch. You’ll be free to say you’re working on an upcoming KS for my card game, but no details. I think those are the pertinent details. I look forward to having to make a tough choice between multiple artists. 7/n

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Gary Con XI Recap

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Gary Con XI in 2019 was yet another awesome experience! Here’s the companion podcast episode.

I rode with Steve Fridsma, from Grand Rapids, MI who I met last year. We were supposed to play in two AD&D [Affiliate Link] games, but the first one was unexpectedly cancelled, so I offered to run the
Gamma World [Affiliate Link] scenario I was running the next day, and some of the players elected to do that and we had a blast. Then we played in Chgowiz’s AD&D [Affiliate Link] game the next day. We kept in touch on social media and tried to coordinate rides that included one of my con roommates, but the travel days didn’t work out.

Steve and I arrived Wednesday right around check in time and I unloaded my bags to my room ASAP then picked up my badge and GM packet. We again got a lot of books, some duplicates of others. I may use them for a giveaway.

I had my card game and notebook with me, and met up with Steve and some others who wanted to play my game, and drummed up some interest from some others. We had a UX designer, architect, and game designer among that play test. This is rules that are basically the rules I had as of the end of play testing last year at Gary Con X. The deck had a few tweaks from last year, 5 cards were swapped out for some other cards to add some more interest to the game. Most importantly play text deck number 2 fixed the font color and placement of the numbers and added some explanatory verbiage to some cards. This group had lots of great suggestions.

After the game, Thaddeus Moore asked me to sign his copy of
The Front [Affiliate Link], as Mark credited me as proofreader. This is the first time I’ve ever signed a book in my life, other than to indicate it was my book.

Thursday morning I ran a scenario for The Front [Affiliate Link], a WWII RPG based on The Black Hat 1st edition [Affiliate Link] , by Mark Hunt. See here for The Black Hat 2nd Edition [Affiliate Link] . Mark joined in the game and had a copy of the rules from Lulu for everyone. Mark signed them all, and since Thaddeus got me started, I did the same.

With Mark there, we did a lot of belly laughing and had a great time! Mark and the other players had a laser focus on the objectives to “win” and we were done early. The players didn’t care as they had a blast. I now see a need for a few more modular encounters/events to bulk up this scenario to take up more of the slot. I plan to start publishing my con adventures on DriveThruRPG [Affiliate Link] , but it won’t be my scenario for The Front [Affiliate Link].

Thursday evening I sat in on a seminar by Satine Phoenix and Ruty Rutenberg which was different aspects of GM issues.

I then got in some more card game play testing and had a lot of fun. Some events I don’t recall which day they happened as I was so busy with running or playing and visiting, I didn’t keep track of what day I did which thing.

Friday morning I played in The Brazen Mask of Zenopus by Zach Howard of the Zenopus Archives blog. It was the Holmes Blue Box Basic, which is what started me on this whole RPG journey. I had not played those rules since the final AD&D book, the DMG came out over 35 years ago. It was a cool scenario that used characters from a book Dr. Holmes wrote. I played the hired help, two vikings, Olaf & Haldor. The dungeon in the back of the Basic rules was used, with some changes due to the passage of time.

We worked together and managed to avoid the death of all characters, and avoided a situation that could have been a TPK. For the first time in play, I encountered a purple worm and Olaf was swallowed! How cool is that! The halfling, Boinger was also swallowed. It was entirely a bonus that the worm was killed and the party cut both of them free, so that they lived to continue the adventure with minimal injury.

We found the baddies and had the boss fight and so not to spoil it we were within a few bad dice rolls of disaster, but we made the crucial rolls needed and prevailed. I really enjoyed it and would play a game with Zach again!

Friday afternoon I ran my DCC funnel, A Fungus Among Us. I had seven players, two of whom had played funnels before. One teenage boy, a young woman, and two fellows that I am pretty sure were older than I. I am used to being the oldest one in the game in recent years, so this was great. The father of the teenager made decisions and dice rolls that had three of his four 0 level characters dead in less than an hour into the session. He then had his last stay out of the way, and he survived the final encounter. Of course in the boss fight at the end, my poor BBEG had a fumble that had him on his back and unable to attack for a round. His attacks that hit only had minimal effect. The two older gentlemen must have double-booked their time as they could only stay for half the session. The remaining players did well, and lost a few more of their characters. Everyone survived with at least one character.

Friday night I saw, Eye of The Beholder about the artists of TSR who formed the image most of us have of what D&D is. I backed the Kickstarter and had seen the film online. Several of the artists were there and there was a Q&A. Just before the con they sent out a note that the CDs and other things were in the shipping process, but I didn’t have my CD waiting for me. and my CD was waiting in an unexpected location when I got home.

Friday night I ran more play tests. I finally remembered to have my 5 x 7 index cards with the quick rules on one side and what the cards to on the other. I made the players read it to ensure they could learn the rules from that, since most people will learn a game that way. I also have index cards I cut to playing card size with bullet points of the steps of one’s turn and what the cards do on the back. Of course, they identified typos of words that I spelled right, but were in the wrong context. They also identified things I need to clarify. So the cards worked, but need some improvement.

Saturday morning my schedule was clear. I met up with Ray Otus of the Plundergrounds podcast and Coddy Mazza of the No Save For You podcast. Ray’s first Gary Con was last year, but we never crossed paths. This was Cody’s first. We played my card game in the open gaming area and a father and 13 year old son joined us. The son was the youngest play tester yet, so I was really interested in his reaction. Ray and Cody loved my game, and had some suggestions. The boy liked it and thought the placeholder art was cool and thought I could just use that. He also will have a credit as a play tester so he will have some extra cool factor with his friends when he gets home.

Ray, Cody, and I did a joint podcast on Ray’s Plundergrounds and they both were too kind about what they thought of my card game. You can catch that episode here.

Saturday afternoon I ran my Boot Hill [Affiliate Link] scenario, A Posse For The School Marm. I had a lot of players who had never played it, but they all had fun. One character was injured and stunned by dynamite. Another got one bad guy and almost got the last one, but he shot her character in the chest for a mortal wound. She thought it was epic and fitting to go down fighting. She later told me that she hadn’t played an RPG in 30 years and I made it easy and walked them through what to do and she felt comfortable and welcome at the table. Also they said up front that they had another game and would have to leave early. They ended up not leaving early because they were having so much fun. Her husband is not much of a gamer, but he had a blast. I just love hearing that sort of thing.

Saturday night was supposed to be a showing of The Dreams In Gary’s Basement by Pat Kilbane, but unfortunately he was sick and it was cancelled. I backed that Kickstarter and have been cheering it on since I met Pat at Gary Con VIII when he premiered an early showing of a few interview snippets. You can read about that here.

Saturday evening I went to a party to see the teaser and a behind the scenes of Peter Adkinson’s Chaldea. It is a series of videos to highlight a campaign world setting of Chaldea. Very cool effects. Met some new people, and a player from my Gamma World [Affiliate Link] game last year and he was gushing about that memory, which is so cool!

Matt Mercer was at the con and was in the lounge, I was able to tell him a Vecna story and congratulate him on the Kickstarter and get a picture with him. Unfortunately, someone from the party who I only met at the party was drunk and not taking the hint to give people space. I was asked to escort him away from the celebrities since I knew him better than some. The fellows social intelligence was gone and he obviously wanted to communicate something, but was unable to do so beyond repeating an innocuous platitude.

Unfortunately, he was stumbling into people and flopping his arm into them. He did not react well, but we got him out of the lounge and then out of the building. We had to call for security to ensure he didn’t try to drive or something. I heard nothing more about that, but if you go to a con, don’t go past your limit to control your motor skills or communication ability. That’s how you get banned from cons. I don’t know if it got to the level of the con knowing about it or not, as I was no longer privy to the situation. I have not witnessed anything like that at a con. In the current environment, I was disheartened to witness such a thing. Please don’t drink and be stupid, it is not fun to witness nor to be the problem person who sobers up and finds they’ve got a bad reputation. I almost didn’t report this, but I don’t want to whitewash a bad situation.

I also told Vecna stories to Joe Manganiello and got a picture with him. I showed him my shirt that says, Follow Me, And Die! and he said it and then said, “Nice!” I knew he’d get a kick out of that.

Another thing that occured at the con was rumors. Someone told me X about so and so. I will not repeat that as that does no good. I will only repeat facts I can verify or I witness personally. Rumors of game stuff and game personalities always occur, sometimes there is a grain of truth, but I won’t spread something I can’t verify.

Sunday I did not sign up for any games. I was in the lounge all day apart from moving my bags from the room I shared with my normal con roommates, to that of my ride.

I played my card game at least a dozen times. One player from earlier in the weekend really latched onto the game and has probably played more than anyone but me, and knows the rules as well or better than I do. She played nine games on Sunday, and was teaching the new players and we worked on how to cut the deck in half. Since there are an odd number of some cards we did a large half and small half deck. We played one hand with the large half deck as a two player game and it feels like the full deck and is faster. One game is not enough, but it does tell me I have the numbers of each card right.

After all the play testing and suggestions for little things to improve the cards, I know I need a third play test deck and more play testing. I don’t have an artist lined up, since the rules and cards are not locked in. Unfortunately, my hopes of Kickstarting this year are not realistic. I want to avoid rushing things, as I want to do it right. I will do all I can to make launching during the first quarter of next year. This means that I need to go to more cons and FLGS’ for more play tests. Once I have a new test deck and play it a few times I will know if the cards need any more game play tweaks or only need art. The rules are really close, and I think we have to options for play, one that will be perfect for learning the game. Two player play may be as simple as a half deck, but more play test will tell.

If you are interested in knowing when the Kickstarter is launched, you can click this link to join the mailing list. It is ONLY for announcing the Kickstarter launch, and possible future launches.

Wednesday night, my roommates and I went to the same restaurant as last year and while waiting for a table, someone behind us saw my Follow Me, And Die! T-Shirt and asked if I was the guy behind the blog. I believe his name was John Zach from Atlanta (He messaged me on social media to correct me. I then recalled that I used the mnemonic that his name is the same as my youngest son’s.). I didn’t think to get a picture together. A couple other people told me they liked my blog and/or podcast. Erik from the Chicago area, as I recall said he’s been reading my blog for the last seven months. I did have the presence of mind to get a picture with him.

I got pictures with many others and posted a lot of them on social media. I need to find time to make an album to share to make it easier to have all the pictures in one spot. Not sure when I’ll get to that.

I had a blast at Gary Con and I will be back next year!

I will have my card game there from hopefully the final pre-Kickstarter test deck and can play with those who want to see what it’s all about. I will have it at every other con I attend.

If you will be at Gary Con next year, or any other con this year that I attend, be sure and say, “Hello!” I’d love to meet you and get a chance to game together!

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Spontaneous Generation

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In the real world, the idea of spontaneous generation, where maggots and flies come from rotting meat was disproved and replaced by the actual method of like creatures spawning like creatures. That is called biogenesis. [Catch the companion podcast here.]

However, in a fantasy world, spontaneous generation can be real.

So normal creatures that die spawn maggots and flies.

Monstrous and magical creatures would spawn something more fantastic.

For example, if a dragon is slain, suppose the creatures spawned from it are carrion crawlers and purple worms.

Not ever creature needs to do this, but once you have one creature do this, if the players make the connection, they will burn every dead body ever encountered. Perhaps some creatures only spontaneously generate from the ashes of their cremated bodies.

Some creatures will have more rapid spontaneous generation than others. The more powerful a creature, the more rapid and impressive spontaneous generation could be.

There are a couple of ways I see of handling this.

One option is to specify a certain type of 2 or 3 creatures that are generated when a specific creature dies.

The other option is to generate a table of the kinds of things that can be spontaneously generated. Perhpas there is only a chance of it happening, or the onset of the new creature is variable, etc.

It occurs to me that this is one way a seemingly inaccessible dungeon manages to re-populate.

Perhaps only certain creatures have this happen.

I can imagine a table where after d6 minutes or hours the creature either dissolves into slime and sludge or blows away as ash in the wind or generates 1 to 3 random unrelated creatures. This limits the efficacy of collecting parts. Get them now or they won’t last long enough for you to come back.

This is an idea to keep in the back of your mind for when weird things get mixed together. Like when the players mess with the experiments on the wizard’s workbench. Perhaps some horrid beast is created by messing with wizard’s experiments. It could be some “regular” monster, or some hideous creature created by the 1e DMG table for randomly generating creatures from the lower planes.

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Building An Encouraging And supportive Community

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I have been honored by some of my Twitter followers for my positive presence there.

On Twitter, I have been mentioned as one of the positive influences in the OSR, more than once in the last week.

I know that I am not perfect, and fail far too often for my liking at being a good person. It is far easier to present your best side online: Don’t try to argue with people, or discount their opinions or experiences.

I’ve tried to win arguments online, and one day a few years ago, realized it was a waste of effort. I might still write a rant about something to get it out of my system, but I rarely post them now. The things that bother me usually are not worth bothering other people about them.

However, this week has been quite the eye opener to the TTRPG crowd. We can learn from this, someone who is a horrible person online is more likely to be a horrible person.

We can’t stop people from being horrible. Their dysfunction, or whatever it is, can’t be cured with online discourse. Only someone with authority in their personal lives whom they truly respect has a shot at making that impact. Unfortunately, for some of these people, they are either their own echo chamber and masters of manipulation, or those who agree with their brand of nonsense flock to them forming an echo chamber.

An echo chamber is a good thing when it reinforces positive traits and experiences. However, the negative version of that is often that people in those negative groups don’t see or hear the dissonance as they are on a different channel. Their twisted ideas of right and wrong and self-justification shield them from the rest of the world.

My concern is how can we learn from this and keep those new to the online TTRPG experience safe from those who seek to cause trouble and outrage to promote their own agenda or products?

I want to focus on the positive. Making a sign saying stay away from X on every social media page only serves the purposes of those who seek any publicity. They fully believe that any publicity is good publicity. Please don’t feed the trolls.

I’m not about making a blacklist and curating it, that never ends well as those always end up influenced and controlled by those with the wrong motivations.

If we follow anyone online who is horrible to others, please unfollow them. Don’t mention or re-tweet their nonsense. Let their influence wain. Maintain a long memory so that in a few years they don’t make a sudden comeback sneaking in with a new crowd. This same problem exists among the charlatans and false prophets that are nearly all TV and radio preachers. Those that get exposed as frauds fall from sight, and in ten or fifteen years show up again.

Screenshot, Block, Report, and Ignore

Where physical safety and mental and emotional well-being permit, I recommend to screenshot and report those causing you grief online, then block, and ignore them. If they are the lowest level of jerks, this is usually enough. I blocked the most surly of the TTRPG people from all my socials a few months ago, and my feeds suddenly became brighter and more encouraging.

Online interactions need to be efficient. It is better to block someone at the first sign of nonsense and re-think it based on the experience of others than to put up with nonsense. All online communities of TTRPG people should oust anyone who displays disrespect to others. Make it clear that such behavior is not tolerated. Allow X number of chances, but whatever line you set, stand firm and expel and block them when they cross it.

Help and Encourage

For the very few that will learn from their mistakes, help and encourage them in their efforts to change. Keep the reins in check, however, in case they are not genuine in their change of heart, or not resolute in their determination to change.

Be the kind of person you want your online experience to be. If you want a fun and engaging online experience, be fun and engaging.

Modify Your Behaviors

I grew up with a strong sarcasm inherited from my father. I have struggled to keep it in check, as it is not always well received. A lot of my sarcasm is of the dissing or casting shade variety, and I find when I type it out, it doesn’t feel right, so I delete it before sending. Unfortunately, it is far too easy to let my mouth spew the stupid thoughts that springs to mind when face to face.

I have said things that have caused fresh acquaintances to look at me with questioning looks. Those first impressions are hard to overcome. It is the same online. If we spew venom and so forth online, that will be the first impression others have of us.

I try to be genuine to who I am and the way I am in real life, but I have found online, at least with a text based interaction, I more easily catch myself and say a lot less things that cause athlete’s esophagus.

Be Helpful

I like to help others, one reason I’ve had a tech support job for 21 years now. I was also a volunteer firefighter/EMT, and have mentioned a few times, was a pastor for ten years.

I don’t always have something helpful to add to a conversation. I’ve seen some posts by people I follow online about personal tragedy or personal connection to recent events in the news. I want to say something to them, but my words are inane and pointless. Nothing I say can fix it. So I click the like or heart emoji, and maybe post a gif.

As Thumper said, “If you can’t say sumthin’ nice, don’t say nuthin’ at all.”

Honesty

Honest criticism of a game product should be proper criticism. That includes what you liked, and for what you didn’t how would you fix it or improve it?

A hospital chaplain once told me, “The truth hurts, bullshit kills.” [I had to take a unit of chaplain studies long ago, and was on the oncology floor of a hospital two days a week. I chose the oncology ward to deal with my own issues involving disease, death, and dying.]

At the same time, the truth does not need to be delivered in a cold and cruel or heartless manner. One can pick their words to speak the truth direct and true without being intentionally hurtful. For example, a victim of an online jerk deserves more careful phrasing than the online jerk. The jerk needs the most direct and concise explanation of what the issue is. If they are unteachable, block them.

Group Honesty

As a group, the TTRPG online community needs to be aware of the jerks who give TTRPGs a bad name. Publishers need to vet individuals and ensure their online presence is not that of jerk supreme before enshrining their names and ideas in various products. If someone is hurtful in one group, they must not be allowed to skulk around at the fringes of other groups.

There are those who claim allegiance and even that they are leaders and authorities on what is and isn’t OSR. The do it yourself mentality of the OSR is, “Oh, Yeah? To heck with you! I’ll do it my way!” and we ignore the jerks. Unfortunately, our ignoring the jerks has led to much chaos and trouble for those we failed to warn or shield from the crap. This has led to the jerks being the “face” of the OSR to many. Which has led to the OSR being generalized as a bunch of jerks.

I am part of the OSR, or consider myself as such. I found the OSR back in 2007 or 2008 when I started looking for game opportunities online. I started this blog in the summer of 2009. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel that I was able to do anything about the online jerks I encountered. I’m still not sure what I can do. How do you rally others to a cause who are content to let it slide?

They don’t want the hassle of dealing with things when they “poke the bear.” Other than anonymous reporting, how does one deal with such jerks? I’d have to unblock them and allow their nonsense into my life and wait for something worthy of reporting. [It should go without saying one should only report with evidence so that something is more likely to be done about them.] I really don’t want to do that, as I’ve got enough things in my life causing me stress. Some of the things I have mentioned online or on my podcast.

Input/Advice

What tried and true methods of dealing with online jerks actually works? I’m looking for proven methods to:

  • Reform their behavior.
  • Keep their nonsense from bothering others.
  • Prevent the like minded from drawing encouragement to do likewise.
  • Help those harmed by the jerks to prevent them leaving the hobby.
  • Making this hobby a warm and welcoming place to meet like minded people who want to play!

Conclusion

I grew up when it was normal for it to be hard to find other players. If not for Roll20, I would not get to play regularly. I try to be a positive influence on the games I am in, both as a player and GM. Excluding people from the table to me is so antithetical to the idea of RPGs that I just can’t comprehend it.

Everyone who is a fan of TTRPGs should feel welcome to “pull up a chair at the table” and never have to worry about being judged or excluded as long as they are there to engage with the game and have fun. I invite you to help make that goal a reality.

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GitHub Project For G+ Links In Blogs

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Bloggers who use Blogger were given the biggest disappointment yesterday when all the G+ comments for all Blogger blogs were deleted by Google. I have a blogger account, but it is just a link to my blog and lists each post from this blog. I never used blogger for my RPG blogging.

Those of us who don’t use Blogger still have time to preserve our G+ comments.

Thankfully, I only had two comments from G+, both from the same person. I used the Internet Archive to make an archive of his G+ page. I then added a note at the end of the two articles involved:

[EDIT: Google is deleting all G+ comments to non-blogger blogs. Below is one of two G+ comments on my blog I want to save. 02/06/2019]

  • I then pasted in the comment,
  • The Date,
  • The Commenter’s name,
  • and the link to the G+ site.

I left the link text as the original G+ page, but I used the Internet Archive URL for the link. (See the Internet Archive page in this repository.)

G+ Links

All bloggers, including those using Blogger, still have time to handle those G+ links that still exist on their blog posts.

Internet Archive

The Internet Archive, AKA Wayback Machine, has a way to request that a public URL (link) be archived.

https://web.archive.org/save/

Where the above link is modified where the link to archive is used in place of <URL>

For example, the G+ page for Follow Me, and Die! would look like this:

REQUEST LINK: (The following should be one line.)

https://web.archive.org/

save/https://plus.google.com/+Followmeanddie

RESULTING LINK:(The following should be one line.)

https://web.archive.org/web/20190206103057/

https://plus.google.com/+Followmeanddie

Each time you use a request link, you get a new resulting link, that has the data and time as part of the URL. You do not need to generate a new request if the page has not changed since you last generated it.

GitHub Project

I am by no means a master coder, but I know SQL, and I know how I want to handle the issues with my blog. I like to help others, so I am sharing my process and inviting anyone who wants to participate to step up. Anyone who is a better and faster scripter than I is welcome to build a script to do this. NOTE: I am looking for cross-platform solutions, i.e. a single solution that will work on any Operating System (OS)

Here you can find my minimal, in-progress project that I started this morning before work.

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RPGs

Good Luck If You Linked To Anything On G+

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I have a BA in history, which means I have training on how to do research and cite my sources.

Following along with my training, even RPG blogging, I link back to my sources online.

When writing about RPGs, especially “OSR” topics, I found a lot of great ideas, discussion, and all around inspiration on G+.

It occurred to me a couple of days ago that I should see how many things I linked to on G+ and try to copy those things and add the source to my blog posts, so the information is not lost to the mists of time.

I use an extension on my blog that lets me do a search and replace on things across my entire blog. It has an option to do a “dry run” and for the free version show how many instances of a given phrase it finds before it replaces it.

Great . . . .

I searched for the key part of the URL for G+: plus.google.com.

Here are my results for a few of the tables:

  • Comments – 2
  • Links: 4
  • Posts: 867!

Comments

The comments are from the same person and link back to his G+ page. I copied the long text in the about page and the graphic to a google doc. That was easy!

Links

The links are to the Follow Me, And Die! G+ page. OK, I can screenshot it or something and provide a nostalgia page or something.

The other three are to the Metamorphosis Alpha, the Swords & Wizardry, and Tenkar’s Landing G+ community pages. I can use G+ Exporter to grab those and post to a page or site for historical purposes, but that’s a whole other ball of wax.

Posts

The 867 posts are links in 157 actual posts. Counting this post, I now have 780 posts.

I can go into the database and search for the unique links and go from there.

I’ve got some ideas of how I can hack together a crude solution. I’m not the best script coder, but I plan to do my best to copy what’s on the other end of all these links. But first, just in case, I’m going to grab my favorite G+ discussions that stand out in my mind

Unfortunately, trying to preserve this background history of my RPG life during my time on G+ is going to sidetrack me from other things.

Conclusion

Unlike blogs and websites, there is no archive of all of G+. Google is just going to delete it. It would be really cool if Google and The Internet Archive could work out a deal.

If you have a favorite G+ discussion, get it now — if you can find it.

[UPDATE: I just found that if you use the Evernote web clipper and tell it to use the default option of Article, it will save the entire G+ thread. NOTE: It is literal about what is copied. Be sure to unhide all comments with the view x previous comments link, if any.]

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RPGs

Simpler Tools, Just As Cool

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As an RPG content producer, I’ve spent a lot of money on fancy tools, some that require more money when versions are updated, etc. Check out episode 77 of my podcast where I discuss this topic*.

Several years ago, I was very big into Linux and free and open source software. I’m still a proponent of free and open source software, I just had issues in the past finding Linux based solutions for some of my workflows.

I have a pretty powerful Windows 7 Pro desktop that I dual boot Linux Kubuntu. The same system flies on Linux. For example, I used Gimp for image editing. Gimp takes forever to load on Windows, yet opens quickly on Linux. On Linux it isn’t lightning fast, but it’s noticeably faster than on Windows. Also my C:\ drive, where Windows and most programs are installed is a solid state drive. Linux is on a partition of my hard drive.

I’m looking at going back to my roots in computing. By that I mean more plain text and more reliance on the keyboard rather than the mouse. I started with a TI-99 4/A when my Dad bought our first computer. All programming on BASIC was plain text. When I went to college, I studied computer science for the first three semesters and was in the first freshman class that did NOT have to use punch cards.

Way back in the mid 80’s I used WordStar a text based word processor with tabs for bold, underline, italics, etc. It was perfect for formatting any kind of paper I had to turn in in college.

VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet was a text based interface. I never used it, but saw plenty of people use it.

Later, in the mid 90’s I had what may have been the last DOS based version of MS-Word when my Dad got a new PC with Windows 3.0 and gave me his old one. I didn’t like the idea of a mouse back then, and have used one so long now that it’s second nature.

However, I’ve been doing some research on the tools I use for producing my content in all it’s forms. I’ve used Linux off and on for 15 years. Most of my work is done on Windows, but there are many programs that I use that are cross platform, like Libre Office, Gimp, Inkscape, Audacity, Discord, Chrome, and more.

I draft a lot in a text editor, NoteTab Pro, but it’s fancy GUI programmable text editor with lots of bells and whistles I have used for 20 years and an update for whatever comes after Windows 10 or the ability to work on it, may be lost. I have no way of knowing. There is no single tool that does all that this text editor can do, and I’ll never find it, short of learning to code and build my own text editor. Rather than invest that sort of time, I’m looking at finding tools with the power to do the jobs I need.

I’ve used the vim text editor off and on over the years, and it has a lot of power built in. It is the default text editor on many Linux distributions. Linux follows the Unix philosophy for programs, do one thing and do it well. The ability to send the output of one program to another allows one with the basic default tools in Linux to make scripts to do all the things you want or need to do. If there is a new computing challenge you need to overcome on Linux, you have a good shot of hacking a chain of scripts together to do what you want.

That all leads me to what my last week of research into topics parallel to my production of various RPG related content

In the past I’ve looked into moving to Linux to avoid the whole issue with Microsoft. I kept avoiding it because of my addiction to my favorite text editor, NoteTab Pro, that I’ve used nearly every day for 20 years. I take notes, draft games ideas, keep lists, campaign notes, adventure prep, and more. I’ve built thousands of little helper scripts that help me do my day job and also help me with personal tasks. I’m even credited in the help file as a beta tester, since I helped beta test so many updates over the years. I was very active on the mailing lists for at least a decade. I even started a mailing list for how to use it on Linux via Wine, so I can have it available until I figure out how to replace it.

This all started when I started digging in to Markdown, the text markup language used to change a text file into web pages, or more impressively, a PDF. The tools to do this are free. Right now, I’m using a $20 program, Serif Page Plus, that is not supported, and a very fancy replacement, Affinity Publisher, is in beta. I have no idea what it will cost, but it just keeps getting more and more bells and whistles. Markdown can’t do all I want to do, but I’m versed in mark up from the WordStar days back in the mid 80’s, and HTML in the late 90’s to present. All you need is a text editor, vim has syntax highlighting for it, so that’s a plus. Vim is also free. Pandoc the interpreter for converting Markdown to other formats is also free.

Markdown can’t do two column PDFs, which is what I have been producing so far, in all my PDFs. There are some clunky ways to get it to do that. But it can format tables and handle a lot of things.

For even more power, there is LaTeX, which has even more fancy formatting options and can do two column layout. There is even a LaTeX plugin called RPG module that someone designed to format a PDF like an old school module. While the level of formatting in it is not yet fully in my grasp, I am slowly getting there.

I found a great very fancy graphical editor, Texmaker, for working with LaTeX, and through YouTube, tons of videos by people showing how to do the basics and some more complex things.

Then I found a guy on YouTube who’s doing all his stuff on Linux via almost 100% terminal based programs. He even records video and audio with the same camera and microphone I use. All I need is an easy to use video editor, and I can probably move to Linux nearly full time. I have a couple of programs that are Windows only, and Wine does not support them, so some sort of Linux program to take their functionality needs to be located.

The internet runs on Linux, Microsoft is even doing things with Linux, and there are rumors it may add Linux to Windows.

  • I have an Android phone which is based on linux.
  • So I’ve already recorded episodes straight to my phone.
  • Linux is based on unix
  • Mac OS is based on unix.
  • iPhone is also based on unix.

My prior efforts to move to Linux had lots of reasons not to. Programs have improved so much in the last several years, that it makes less and less sense for me to stick with Windows. This is especially true of consumers who only use their computers for the internet, email, social media, and office suite products. Linux is faster than Windows and you don’t need all the crap that most big name computer sellers throw on there. Viruses are less of an issue. Unless you have a very niche program that you have to use, there is little reason for most users to stick with Windows.

NOTE: Computer games tend to be one reason, many would stick with Windows. I’m not a computer gamer, as I lose track of time and I’m not productive if I get lost for hours on end.

The other reasons that I will need to dip into Windows for personal projects is for taxes. I haven’t researched lately, but last I checked about 7 or 8 years ago, there was no computer based tax software for Linux. Of course, one can use the online option many tax companies now offer.

Another is genealogy programs. I have a Windows based genealogy program called Legacy that has some helpful tools and I have a lot of data clean up to do before going with Linux. There is a great cross platform genealogy program with a Windows port, called LifeLines. Current development is here. It has a lot of power and flexibility.

Of course, the biggest reason I will keep using Windows every day is that’s what we have to use at work. However, many of the tools I use on Linux, I also can use on Windows. Since they’re free, and I don’t have a locked down laptop, I can install software that helps me get my job done.

I’m starting with trying to format the text of my first PDF to get it in to a two column layout and polished tables. The great thing is, I can make separate files for different pieces and call them as I need them. For example, the title page has very little that changes from one PDF to another, and the OGL only changes slightly in the last section where one credits other works and adds their new title. I’ve got lots of notes and ideas for how to improve my workflow. Trying to use a graphical editor to make it look like what I want it just a challenge. I’m going to dust off my general mark up skills and make something that looks better, and I can easily modify the look. I can also easily use the same source document to make web pages, PDF, or any other format I want or need.

I also have in mind to use GitHub for collaboration on projects. GitHub uses Git, which was written by Linus Torvalds, the guy who started and still oversees Linux development. I haven’t finalized anything, it is more of a long term project to dig into once I am producing my monthly PDFs totally via plain text with markup tags.

The looming demise of G+ and their announcement that all consumer G+ accounts will be deleted after April 2, 2019 has really driven home the point that I need to be more responsible with my data and present it on my blog and sites I control, and use social media to direct others back to my blog. I also know I need to revise the look of my blog, and I have lots of ideas for that.

I have 3 games to finish prepping for Marmalade Dog, here in Kalamazoo, MI in a couple of weeks, and three more games to prep for Gary Con. You can bet, I will be making those preparations in Linux so I maximize the proficiency of use of my new tools.

Above, I mentioned Discord. I have played in regular Roll20 games and used the Linux version of Discord and it works just like the Windows version.

Roll20, since it is browser based, works just fine on Linux.

If you don’t have any need for a program that is only Windows and it won’t run right via Wine, there is little need to stay on Windows. Linux is great for extending the life of old hardware. Since Linux is so fast, i.e. efficient, compared to Windows, it is a lot faster.

You can even download iso files of most Linux distributions and burn them to a CD, or put on a thumb drive to try them out. I’d recommend against dual booting as it limits the usefulness of your computer. If you really want to run Windows and Linux, I’d suggest installing Linux as the only OS on your system, and find a free virtual machine software, and install Windows to a virtual machine. That will give you access to your Windows based programs, and is even more secure as you can deny the virtual machine internet access.

*I recorded this episode via Linux using Audacity, which is the same program I use on Windows.

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RPGs

The End of An Era

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Click here to listen to the podcast version.

Yesterday Google updated what is going on with the end of G+ and this afternoon, G+ pages started showing a yellow banner labeled: “Your Google+ account is going away on April 2, 2019. Learn more.“

I’m saddened by this. They come out and finally state it plainly that all of G+ will be gone. I and others were hoping that they’d just make G+ a read-only archive, like they did when they saved Usenet from the great bitbucket in the sky.

Even though I was a gmail user from the early days of the original beta, I didn’t get onto G+ immediately, but once I learned all the cool information your could find and the interaction one could have with all the other bloggers adn content producers on G+ I was hooked.

I am saddened that some of my favorite interactions and discussions on G+ will be lost.

This has caused me to be more regular in blog posting, adn I have plans to do more.

I’m sick of Google giving us something cool, not building or managing it well, then taking it away. If G+ made the kind of money YouTube makes it would be here as long as Google.

I just recently found a cool browser add on for sending website information to Google Keep. I guess I need to send all that data to a google doc and download it.

I’m a technophile and I will continue to use technology. I’m not jumping into anymore cool betas from Google or anyone else for that matter. I plan to find the tools that will let me do what I need to do online and stick with them.

I bought the G+ Exporter program for $20 and have backed up most of the communities I am a member of. It isn’t current as Google started the cat and mouse of blocking them. I did download the Holmes Basic community and made it available to Zach of Zenopus Archives. I’ll do the same for any other G+ Community I’m a member of.

I used it to pull down my own online groups for my old Metamorphosis Alpha campaign, and my AD&D game on Roll20, and the Wed Night AD&D Game and Sunday morning AD&D game.

G+ had some very nice features, it’s a shame Google didn’t do social networking well and lied to themselves as much or more as they lied to others.

There are lots of efforts to keep gamers in touch. Some went to FB, others to Discord, some to various other federated platforms, and a bunch went to MeWe. I’m getting tired of how busy MeWe the MeWe page is. I’m active on Twitter, Discord, MeWe, and a bit on FB, and now I’m trying to do more with Reddit.

I know that whatever I do, I need to keep my content under my control as much as possible, I need to do the backups, and I need to promote my content to the places of my choice. I’m still posting on G+. I originally said that I’d be posting til the lights go out. I’m not so sure now, but there are a few still on G+ also posting, so I guess I’ll keep it up. I’m about ready to pare back what I’m involved in on MeWe and reduce the number of Discord servers I’m on. I even have an unused Discord for my Patrons.

I need more focus to produce content and make it look presentable.

G+ was fun while it lasted, in spite of the occasionaly dumpster fire. Nothing shuts up the idiots, so block and ignore made my G+ feed pleasant. I pro-actively blocked those people on MeWe.

If anything changes about my online interactions, I’ll be sure to get the word out.

Google’s January 30th Update

Shutting down Google+ for consumer (personal) accounts on April 2, 2019
January 30, 2019

In December 2018, we announced our decision to shut down Google+ for consumers in April 2019 due to low usage and challenges involved in maintaining a successful product that meets consumers’ expectations. We want to thank you for being part of Google+ and provide next steps, including how to download your photos and other content.

On April 2nd, your Google+ account and any Google+ pages you created will be shut down and we will begin deleting content from consumer Google+ accounts. Photos and videos from Google+ in your Album Archive and your Google+ pages will also be deleted. You can download and save your content, just make sure to do so before April. Note that photos and videos backed up in Google Photos will not be deleted.

The process of deleting content from consumer Google+ accounts, Google+ Pages, and Album Archive will take a few months, and content may remain through this time. For example, users may still see parts of their Google+ account via activity log and some consumer Google+ content may remain visible to G Suite users until consumer Google+ is deleted.

You can read the full statement here:

https://support.google.com/plus/answer/9195133?hl=en&authuser=0

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Writing

Leap of Faith

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He glared with impunity as he leapt from the cliff, falling from his foes and denying them their vict’ry — making the most obscene gesture in his culture, scratching his elbow.

It was debated among so called scholars whether it mattered which elbow. Some claimed the left was the rude gesture, others the right, and a few said it just didn’t matter. Visitors in this area were castigated if they were ever caught scratching their elbow in public. The appropriate method to avoid offense would be anything but using one’s fingers. Vigorous rubbing with the palm of one’s hand, a tree, or nearby building could be used — and no one complained. And no one had any clue why it was considered rude or when it started. All they could agree on was that it was the worst insult you can give someone.

His foes looked on, first amazed, then insulted as he clearly and distinctly scratched first his left elbow and then his right. Then he crossed his arms and scratched both elbows.

It was at that moment that the seam of his satchel, weakened by a recent glancing blow gave way. Suddenly all the coins he had so recently liberated fell away as he so sadly realized what had happened.

His escape plan was going perfectly til just now.

NOTE: I woke up with the phrase, “He glared with impunity as he leapt from the cliff.” Then the idea of a rude gesture and scratching one’s elbow. I don’t know what I was dreaming about, but it was too good of an opening to not quickly dictate it into Evernote.

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RPGs

If You Like Something Say Something

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Over a year ago, I created the hashtag, #IYLSSS, If You Like Something Say Something, to promote small creators on Twitter.

For small creators, such as the artists/cartographers, designers, editors, layout people, small publishers, and others — spreading the word is worth as much, if not more than money.

Tell the creator & tell others that you like something they did.

It gives them encouragement and informs others of something they didn’t know about.

I haven’t used that tag as often as I should.

I made a graphic to explain it.

It’s short enough to fit on Twitter and other space limited sites, and of course, works with any website that supports hashtags.

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Ramblings of an Old Gamer