Tuesday 18 June 2013

A Thought on Scale

I am the Warden!!

For those of you paying attention to my struggling Kickstarter, you can imagine I'm feeling disappointed. That's not to explain my lack of Video Updates over the past few days, the majority of those were due to prepping and planning for the LUG Con games run over the weekend. (If you haven't had a chance to check them out yet, you can find them on the BRG YouTube page.) As for this morning, I have to admit that I was sitting at my desk ready to fire off another recording session, but didn't have the want or will to do it. It is a bit frustrating to see something you've planned on for close to two years come to a halt.

And then I remind myself that this is not the only way to publish. Killshot came to be its current inception because of Kickstarter, yes, but that is not the only way it would be possible. The same goes for Reloaded - it does not need a Kickstarter to become a reality, but the current version did depend on it to make the process simpler and less risky. With signs and indications this is not going to happen, barring an incredibly generous benefactor, I've begun to think about a Plan B approach. Then a Plan C.

When I first started to get last year's project ready and posted, I was given an ominous warning. "Not all project make their goal, but that doesn't mean they fail." I've been keeping that sagedom to heart over the past few days as I've begun to stand back and study the black box. What I've been coming up with has grown beyond the mere reach of this particular project, but to the very heart of how I've been conducting business.

Is it possible I'm trying to hard to reach for something that's beyond my grasp at the moment?

By that, I mean the concept of publishing a 250-page volume designed to create a campaign and indulge the gaming pleasures of countless others the world over. Am I asking too much of myself and the few regulars aware of my work? It's a question that goes beyond Killshot and it's something I'm quite seriously considering. Is it possible that I need to try something a bit "smaller?"

In this context, smaller does not mean less. It means slighter in scale. Rather than publish an entire core rulebook for a new system, should I be focussing on single adventures and supplements? Right away, the knee-jerk reaction is to work on open licensed material from other publishers and designers, but that's not why I created BRG, no sir. The Ruler is for completely original material, particularly in game mechanics, so that's forbidden. Now the question becomes "How do I publish 'smaller' products without playing in someone else's puddle?"

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the true question.