MidSouth Con in Review
Hello All.
This past weekend was MidSouth Con and I’ve not been so tired since the end of Con Season last year. Late nights and early mornings can sure make a guy sleepy.
I was on some panels with nifty authors about Pitching Your Work for Publication and I did a pretty exhaustive SWdemo for a few locals, Jeff and Brandon, whom were at the con for illumination and exploration into other systems. They also gamed with me on Saturday with their buddy, Keith, who is also local and who is doing some work for Eden Studios. Small world, huh? We’re going to be trying to get a game up before too long as there is also a new hobby store opening up. Yeah!
Saturday, I talked with the brilliant, Travis Taylor, who is a living, breathing Buckaroo Bonzai whom I exchanged some thoughts with about gaming, science, and his writing with Baen Books. As he’s got numerous degrees in astronomy and physics and science and all kinds of other things, he’ll be an invaluable resource for bouncing off my hypotheses. I look forward to reading his books, even though he can’t beat me at pool. ;)
Sunday, I got to hang out with a former local, John Jacob Miller, who is writing the Knights of the Old Republic for Dark Horse. The set up is really, really cool and to talk about the intricacies of modern comics and graphic novels was truly illuminating. After breakfast, I checked out Adam Shaw’s newest venture with his wife and friends, Delicious Elixer. They’re working on a bunch of neat stuff, including Hip Hop Ninja, the Blue Faerie Detective Agency, and random madnesses. Adam, you may recall, did a bunch of the work for the upcoming RunePunk.
The highlight of the con for me was getting to sit on a panel with Rich Burlew of Order of the Stick fame and co-author of the Player’s Guide to Eberron. He’s a very articulate and pleasant guy with a keen sense of humor and a great imagination. We had standing room only, perhaps 60 or so people in the room? I’m not exaggerating. Also joining us was Jeff Crook, another local, who’s written a lot for Wizards of the Coast, including multiple Dragonlance novels and work on RPG material for the Forgotten Realms.
The Panel’s Topic was entitled “How to Break into the RPG Industry” and we hit them from top to bottom with facts about d20, the OGL, the state of the industry, options including licensing, working for corporations, working for middle and third tier companies and print versus PDF. We then fielded questions and shared what we could. Rich and I thought the panel went well and we had a pretty good rhythm going and either Jeff thought we handled it alright or we were too busy talking that he couldn’t get a word in. If you’re reading this Jeff, you’ll have to let me know, won’t you?
After the panel, I wanted to talk with Rich for a few, but I suddenly found myself barraged with a goodly number of people, five or six, that all were talking to me at the same time. I felt a bit overwhelmed and fielded some more questions and told them I’d be happy to talk with them for a bit longer, but we’d have to take it into the hallway as the next speakers were setting up.
So, I handed out flyers with contact information and spoke with a pleasant young lady of nineteen, M, who is preparing to brave the field and it’s nice to see fresh faces and I hope I gave her some insight and direction. I also spoke with Jeff Crook at length from the panel and discussed the possibilities of getting together on a few things in the future.
I then joined Rich in the dealer room and talked to him for awhile, before I went to closing ceremonies whereby I convinced the convention coordinator to auction the last Red Bull off and he did. It went for $40, but with matching contributions and other craziness, they collected over $300 from me opening my big mouth. They almost skipped over Rich when announcing the guests and I had to whisper to the coordinator not to forget Rich. So, look at that, I added value and earned my keep at the Con.
I look forward to Origins now and am going to hit it much harder tomorrow.
Regards,
Sean
P.S. I also am really hammering out the Iron Dynasty Player’s Guide and I’ll be posting up some other nifty RunePunk facts very soon!
