Ubercon XII Aftermath!

Way, way back in the fall of 2005, WEGS Copper was unveiled at Ubercon VI. Six cons later, this little con holds a special place in my old gaming heart. It's the kind of con where you get to know everyone that volunteers, and can recognize all the folks who wander about the gaming areas. It's got that hometown feel (if your hometown is Geekville, USA).

I always have a blast hunkering down to game here. The rpg room is a mid-sized conference room, half of which is dedicated to the mysteriously important RPGA activities (a partition is put up so they have their own private playing space). The other half (the non-D&D-ers) holds about eight tables hosting a mix of classic rpg events and small press games. A good chunk of the events are run by game designers or small press publishers. It's one big mix of gaming goodness. There are plenty of other rooms jammed with misc. gaming activities (card, board, minis), but I tend to stick around the arena I know.

I ran three WEGS Old Skool events: Tale of the Trojan Pig, Minotaur Meat (the next installment of the Badderlands series) and WEGS Sucks! (a vampyric event). Trojan Pig is an intro level game whereas Minotaur Meat steps up the role-play aspects of the game. WEGS Sucks! is a short and brutal scenario designed to be a total party kill (destroy all players), which we clearly state before the game begins. You gotta set expectations in a TPK setting!

All scenarios were a blast to run with a great mix of new/returning WEGS 101 players. Not suprisingly, WEGS Sucks! ended 1.5 hours early. Once the Vampyr Lord appeared with his soul draining sword and started pounding on the Goblin Warrior, the other players ran off the battlemat...

Shortly thereafter, the Goblin Warrior was no more.

A great end to the con!

Pirates and Copper...

I've been working like mad getting the content of the Pirates Of Penzantium completed. Right now, the full book is conceptually in place. I've got about twelve chapters (the same as Old Skool) and looking at about 60 pages. These are text doc pages, not layout. With art and formatting that will probably grow to about 75 pages. I am trying to keep this book slightly smaller than Old Skool, but it might end up being the same page count. Hard to say right now. One lesson learned from last year's publishing endeavors is to have the rough text proofed prior to layout. This allows much quicker editing and all the art doesn't get in the way of the proofer (it's easy to be distracted by all cool art and special formatting). It's just as critical to proof again once layout is complete as the manipulated text can easily get messed up. What I found last year was that there was a ton of errors, stupid errors, that I should have caught pre-formatting.

The second bit of news is that WEGS Copper has been shelved until Pirates is complete. Pirates is the priority right now. As all 12 of you who read this blog should know, Copper is the advanced version of Old Skool. While Old Skool has a small and loyal band of followers (the aforementioned 12), I just don't think it's critical to release; from a timing standpoint it has no urgency - yet. Pirates allows me to open another channel into the system while at the same time expanding the WEGS 101 rule set. Pirates has the potential to hook a new type of player and provide existing Old Skoolers a whole new way of playing, whereas Copper is really focused on the experienced Wegshog. The big bonus to Pirates is that I will have two introductory books to sell at conventions, not just one. Setting up at a booth with a single product for sale is very lame. Just ask me, I've been doing it for month's now. Embarrassing, man! My hope is that folks passing the table will now say:

Two products... Wow, that's a game company!

Crackin' Copper, Part 2

Spent some time this week trying to organize WEGS Copper. I have two versions: (1) the actual text document in MSWord, and (2) the layout in InDesign. Trying to wrap my mind around the differences in the two docs and get them back in sync. As all 12 of you who read this blog know from prior posts, Copper was near-ready for print. At that point in the publishing process, I cut the strings that bind the two versions together and finish all the loose ends in the InDesign layout. The docs generally don't get too far out of sync. This weekend my plan is to get both versions to jive, then begin edits once more. I also have a Pirates of Penzantium playtest with the home Hogs and an in-store demo at a local store. A WEGS-ish weekend all-in-all.

Crackin' Copper

As I sit here typing, WEGS Copper is spitting furiously out of my printer... This is the first time I've printed Copper in over 10 months! This copy is just for proofing purposes, so I set my printing options to "Draft Quality", then pushed print. When the printer is set to this mode, it rapidly spits the pages out, off the tray, and into a unsorted pile on the desk... I sit here with one eye on the chaotic, anti-paginated pile that is mounting. One page just got caught up in the feed, almost a jam, but luckily averted by my Eli Manning-esque printer-jam diversion play. Just ran out of paper at page 23 (Chapter 3, On Arks & The Ark Kard). Resume printing. Crazy gear-grinding noise. Pages a-spitting again. {INSERT ART - DUNDWELL} note on page 2... Done! Now I just have to sort the pages in their proper order... 209 pages in all. My weekend plans are to compare this document to the pdf master version that was completed in April 2007. It was at that time that I pulled the plug on Copper and put all my attention on getting WEGS 101 Old Skool to print. Gonna be a fun weekend.

On a different note, I just got a shipment of plastic card cases today that fit the WEGS 101 Skill Deck perfectly. The Skill Deck just went on sale on the website this week (though I did sell a couple of decks at Dreamation). These decks have already brought a whole new perspective to WEGS 101 game play. Players can use these decks to build multi-class Arks and take the game to a new level. The thrust of Copper is similar in that it strips away the regimented Ark skill list (i.e. only Mages get Mage spells). The skill deck allows players to explore multi-classing on their own, before cracking Copper.

(There's an FAQ on the website that briefly details this concept)

Happy New Year!

I unplugged completely from GameWick the last few days of 2007. When I checked my email this morning, I had a note from a WEGS fan from the great state of Illinois:

Dear Larry,
Thanks for a great Holiday season. We have been getting the most out of WEGS101 and are anxiously awaiting the release of Copper. We had a question arise around the Molten Storm mage spell. What defines a group? We first assumed that the basic ASQR and ESQR rules applied and worked it like an area spell. However, there was a dissenting opinion that a wider area could be affected so long as the SPS+D6 limit on targets was not exceeded. I allowed this, provided that all targets were in adjacent squares. Can I get an official ruling?

Happy to say, the ruling was spot on with how I would have called it! This fan played at GenCon 2006 and had to wait a full year for WEGS 101 to be released. It's great hearing that folks are playing WEGS and having a good time!

2008...

Let the good times roll, folks!

Uber Flashback!

During the first week of November, WEGS is returning to our "home" con - Ubercon. I'm working on a press release for a local paper, and had to dig up some facts on WEGS. This Ubercon will be the official two year anniversay of launching WEGS games. I first unveiled WEGS at Ubercon in 2005 (seems a lot longer ago though... ). The game was then being called WEGS Copper.

Here's the original promo blurb I ran:

"An Ubercon premiere! Ages 16+. Rules taught! Familiarity with rpgs helpful. Join us round the gaming table for an introductory session of WEGS-Copper, the entry level for the Wickedly Errant Game System. WEGS is an old school sword and sorcery rpg that revels in the "let's get a game together tonight" mentality. Flavored with an air of whimsical high-fantasy, the rules are energized by an errant rule system which encourages players to take risks and, most of all, have fun. Players should do all they can to defy the odds because there's never any knowing what's going to happen next in the Wegsworld. It's all a matter of odds and gods - the odds of making the roll, the gods of chance. Come join us for marvelous adventure!"

I still use little bits and pieces of this for my current press releases - but, boy, has the system changed! There was a solid year of playtests and then re-writes all the way up to July of this year. With WEGS 101 now behind me, I'm focusing my energies on getting Copper to print.

And Ubercon is so close now, I can smell it...

Only a few weeks to go!

Crackin' Open Copper...

This past week I've been crazy with emails from folks looking for WEGS advice. Seems that there were at least three games running this weekend. These were the first official WEGS 101 games that have taken place without me... Cool stuff!

I also cracked open WEGS Copper Players Notebook this week to assess how much work that book needs. Copper is the version of WEGS I had wanted to release at GenCon last year (as all 12 of you who read this blog religiously might recall...). Luckily that did not happen, allowing me to circle back and kreate WEGS 101 as the first official WEGS offering instead. Lots of detail on this tale can be found blogged out below...

Copper was put on ice in its near-completed state about a year ago and is sitting pretty at 210 pages right now. It needs a solid re-write and, just maybe, a little content. It's jammed with art. Copper is the next level for players, allowing them to custom-build the Ark of their desires. Whereas WEGS 101 really limits folks to stay within their Arketype (not really allowing much in the way of player options), Copper tears that wall down completely and folks can mix/match the hero of their dreams.

It also gives folks a little taste of the things to come...