Talking Crit: Two hours of fun

I was on the Talking Crit livestream with Erik Tenkar and “Bad Mike” last night. The overall topic was “the state of gaming and lessons learned on Kickstarter.” We covered a lot more than that.

• My old Firing Squad interviews, and transcripts of video streams
• COVID shots and the return to in-person gaming; especially the North Texas RPG Con
• The conversation turns to GURPS at about 17:30 in: “I’m really glad to see GURPS getting some attention. It is a great game that seems marginalized by the community.”
• Mission X comes up around 18:30
• The benefits of focused rules and setting around 23-24 minutes
• The importance of shared expectations in game play and game writing at 24-26 minutes
• The depth and quality of GURPS sourcebooks at 28 minutes (interview with Ken Hite mentioned); goes through 40 minutes
• Taking inspiration from reality not having to make sense when writing fantasy histories at 30-33 minutes
• Erik shows off Dark Lord’s Doom and David’s other solos at 40:30; conversation turns to TFT
• Erik likes the counters in my books at 41 minutes
• Why RPG books are a sensually tactile experience: paper choices and weights in print books 42-48min
• Erik brings up the Character Collections Kickstarter at 48 minutes
• At 55-60 minutes we talk about converting the Character Collections book to 5e and Swords & Wizardry
• My daughter makes an appearance and shows off her drawing skills at 59-1:01
• Why “backer count” instead of “dollars” for stretch goals on the CC Kickstarter? 1:01 through 1:08
• “Boolean humor” makes its second appearance
• GameOn Tabletop as an alternate? 1:04-1:06
• New to TFT Pledge Level at 1:08
• I show off the TFT Legacy Box at 1:10; it stays on camera for the next hour
• Kickstarter Link in the edition: 1:11
• Viking Shields, at least briefly: 1:10:30 to 1:13 or so
• Dragon Heresy stretch goals and print runs 1:13 to 1:14
• Starting at 1:16 we talk about Kickstarter, trends in the industry, common mistakes, paying folks, art team, and more
• Shipping and common KS mistakes discussed at 1:26
• The importance of audience size at 1:34 to 1:38 – projects viable at 500 vs 1000 vs 1500 backers
• The Pit of Despair that is shipping and international shipping and charging shipping in Backerkit 1:39 to 1:42
• How much done before you launch a Kickstarter: 1:42
• Kickstarter as venture capital vs pre-orders; why no long tail; Darwinian future of the industry 1:42-1:50
• Hard lessons about starting out: 1:50 – 1:53

We roll on for another 15 minutes or so after that, but the key bits are above.

In the Character Collections project, I’ve been asked a few times about the backer-count driven stretch goals; I’ve bolded the two sections where I talk to that, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. But if you’re curious as to why I’m trying “backers” instead of “dollars,” you can find some answers there!

If you’re looking for other conversations with me:

• I was on Nerdarchy’s Live Chat Revivified #215 right before the project launched
• Look for me on RPG Ramblings with Jeffrey Jones this weekend. Looks like his latest was with my friend Tim Shorts. Go listen to that.