Episode 5: The Saga Begins

It all begins with Greg Stafford. At least, this week’s entry begins with Greg Stafford.

I just got a call from the Great One (no, not Rocky Miavia — Greg Stafford!) who asked me to do some writing for his new Hero Wars game. Unfortunately, I’m only vaguely familiar with Glorantha, so I took a peek at www.Glorantha.com for some reference material.

Oh.

My.

God.

Let me tell you something about that Wheel of Time thing. It’s a fragment of what Greg’s got on his little world of Glorantha. Maybe a particle on a fragment. A molecule on a particle on a fragment.

Eric Rowe once told me that Glorantha was the most complete game world ever. He’s right. Damn right. Go check it out right the hell now. Forget my column this week. Go check out Glorantha. Then, when you’re done, come back here and see what the Little People are doing.

* * *

You done? If you read everything that’s there, you probably missed five weeks of my column, but don’t worry, I’m still here.

Pretty intense, huh? I mean, here I am, about to embark on developing a brand new world to put a nice, happy, friendly little RPG into, when Greg has got the God-King of fantasy worlds right there on line, ready for anyone who wants to take a hack at it.

I feel pretty inadequate right now. I’m gonna need some time to recover. Sheesh.

* * *

(Many hours later…)

Okay, I’m back on my feet. Yeah, Greg’s got one helluva world right there, but he’s had a couple of decades to build it and a whole lot of friends to help him do it.

All I got is me, myself and I. And a few hundred people looking over my shoulder, ready to criticize, scrutinize, analyze, chastise and aggrandize every move I make. Are you ready? ‘Cause I’m not sure if I am.

Let’s go!

* * *

All right. Let’s start with the basics.

We’re here to develop, design and produce a roleplaying game. It’ll be a small press RPG, so we don’t have a lot of money to work with. I’ve already got a financial backer who’s willing to put up money, a financial manager to keep track of the bills, an art director to deal with those pesky artists and a writer/developer/designer whose won himself more than a couple of Origins Awards.

But before we go any further, the first thing we have to do is determine if this venture is gonna make us any money. See, my wife thinks that part of the process is pretty important. I guess someone has to, otherwise, I’ll just be writing myself into debt.

So, I called up a couple of folks, got some estimates and came up with some numbers. Let’s start with the printing costs.

Printing

Before we go any further, let’s start at the step that you can’t ignore: the printer. No matter how many corners you cut, no matter how many people volunteer their work for free, no matter how many ramen meals you stuff down your throat, sooner or later, you’re going to have to deal with a printer.

I want a 124 page book. I want that book to be trade paperback size (that’s around 8”x6”). I want a color cover. I want black and white line art inside — no gray scale. I also want 3,000 copies.

Right now, I’ve got a few options. I’ve talked with a few printers and here are the best estimates:

Printer A says they can do a book that size for $1.71 a copy, but that’s with a 2-color cover.

Printer B says they can do a book that size for around $3 a copy. That’s with a full-color cover.

That means the book will cost (printing alone):

Printer A: $5,131

Printer B: $9,000 (est.)

Now, let’s assume we go with Printer A. I’m rounding up the total to $2 a book to cover them shipping the book to me. That raises our price to $6,000.

The cover price of our book will be $15. That means distributors will buy it from me for $6 a book. That means I’ll have to sell at least 1,000 books to break even.

If I go with Printer B ($9,000), I’ll have to sell at least 1,500 books to break even.

And that’s just the printing costs, folks.

Like I said in Episode One, 5,000 books is an absolute blow-out in this industry. But then again…

Another publisher of a rather popular small-press product (who I’ll name later if he gives me permission) told me that his product has sold over 6,000 in the last two years and he’s going back on press with it because he’s sold out.

This means there’s a small chance that our book will do better than 1000 copies. It’s a small chance, but we’re going to have to work hard to make that belief a fact.

Art

Okay, here’s the tricky part. I’m gonna need someone to illustrate this book.

I’ve got a lot of names in front of me. I’ve got to give each of them a call and tell them that I have $XX budget to spend on art and I want them to do it all. By the way, the reason those two XXs are up there is because I haven’t asked the artists if I can publish the amount I’m willing to spend on them. Some folks are testy about that, and I understand exactly why:

Game Company X: “What do you mean you need five thousand dollars to illustrate our book? You did it for Wick for just two hundred bucks!”

That’s why. Not that two hundred bucks is how much I’m gonna spend, I’m just using random numbers as an example. Get it? Good.

So, I’m calling artists this week, letting them know I’m doing a small press project and I’m going to let them know exactly how much my investor is willing to spend on art.

Then, I’m gonna spring a surprise on them.

I’m paying them up front.

Nobody does this in the gaming industry, and I mean nobody. But I have to. I don’t have enough money to pay them when the book comes out. I have to entice them with a different kind of carrot. The kind that sparkles.

I’m paying the artist who illustrates my book before I get the art. I’m a trusting bastard. I could get a pile of crap and be stuck with it. But then again, the artists I’m thinking of wouldn’t do that. They’re professional and honorable men and women who wouldn’t stiff me. We’ll see what happens.

Subject Matter

This is the one you’ve been waiting for.

What’s Wick’s new world?

He’s done vampire hunters.

He’s done samurai.

He’s done musketeers and pirates.

What’s he gonna do next?

 

I’m gonna do Orks.

That’s right. Orks. You know, the green-skinned, one-hit-die beasties that die screaming on the end of your sword. Yeah. Them Orks.

It all comes from a long time ago, when my boss, John Zinser, told us that he was going to run a D&D game in the office. I told him, “That’s fine. But I want to play an Ork bard.”

He gave me a double-take and said, “No way. No way you can play an Ork bard.”

I asked, “Why not?”

He told me, “Because there ain’t no such thing as an ‘Ork bard’!”

That set me to the task of proving him wrong.

And a few weeks later, I gave him 4,000 words that showed him just how wrong he was. We never played that D&D game, but he did admit that if he ever did run it, I’d get to play an Ork bard.

Those 4,000 words appeared in Shadis #24 under the title: “ORK: A New Look at an Old Enemy”.

Well, now’s the time to share my Orks with the rest of the world.

ORKWORLD: The Roleplaying Game

is part of a larger intellectual property. I’ve got an ORKWORLD novel in progress as well as negotiations for an ORKWORLD comic book. It’s big. And it’s gonna be bigger.

Developing Orks as their own race has been a personal project of mine ever since I first played D&D. I hated the fact that Orks were the “free XP” monster. They never got a fair shake. They never got character. They were, are and always will be (in most people’s minds) the quintessential nameless monster.

Well, no more.

In a way, developing Orks as their own race is my way of throwing a gauntlet into the face of hack-n-slash gaming. After all, it’s a lot harder to kill something that you respect. I love Colonel Potter’s line from M*A*S*H: (paraphrasing here) “I think there oughta be a rule in war that you have to sit down and talk with a guy a few minutes before you can kill him.”

I feel that way about Orks.

Besides, it’s got marketing potential written all over it.

The product will only be 10% RPG. The rest will be source material on Orks. How they live, what they believe, what they eat, how they hunt all that good stuff. And what fantasy GM is going to turn his back on a 124 page sourcebook on Orks!?! I mean, doesn’t everybody have Orks in their fantasy game?

That last 10%, by the way, will be the simplest game system you’ve ever seen. Okay, maybe not the simplest, but a game system that’s easy to learn and use.

Very easy.

We’re talkin’ one page of mechanics here.

Too many rules means I gotta sacrifice world development space and I don’t have time for that.

Also, I can make the Orks fit that new “Clan” oriented RPG that’s popular right now. I can make up six different Ork Clans, make ‘em all unique and then let players jump right in and pick their favorite Ork Clan. By the way, if you don’t dig Clan RPGs or if you’re tired of it, I understand. However, one of the reasons Vampire and L5R are so popular right now is for that very reason.

Don’t fix what ain’t broken.

Of course, I could try to find the “next big thing”.

Or, maybe I’ll just play it safe with this one and try the “next big thing” with my next endeavor.

It’s called The Flux.

But that’s all I can tell you right now. You’ll have to wait for that one.

* * *

Over the next few weeks (possibly months!), you’ll see the development of this intellectual property. I’ve already got a whole ton of notes and you’ll watch those notes become thoughts become ideas. Finally, I’ll print the sucker and we’ll see how it does.

For those of you who want a sneak peek at what I’m doing, go find yourselves a copy of Shadis #24. You can get ‘em from your local game store or from AEG.

Anyway, that’s it for this week. Lots of thoughts and nothing concrete. We’ll have more numbers and the name of the premiere artist who’ll be doing the illustrations for the book next week.

And if you have any ideas, comments or questions, you can e-mail me at: orkboss@earthlink.com.

(You’re asking for e-mail you dolt! What are you thinking?)

Ah well. So much for a life.