ENnies Categories

[Dextra]

Hello ENWorlders!

Last year's ENnie judges, staff members and some publishers have been discussing this year's categories for the awards, and I thought I'd solicit some feedback from the fans and voters (and besides, it'll give ENnie junkies something to do other than hit "Refresh" every hour to check the vote tallies, or talk about electoral systems).

So here they are. This is a tentative list that seems to change every day. This should be finalized by the end of the week. By the way, if you think a category can be better-defined, please make suggestions.

CORE AWARDS
1. Best Cartography
-This is an award for an individual book containing the best cartography (maps and charts, evaluated for look and usability).
someone please define cartography!

2. Best Art (Cover)
-This is an award for the book containing the best cover artwork. The overall quality of the cover is taken into consideration- the quality of the art, the final look of the cover and how the title and logos are incorporated.

3. Best Art (Interiour)
-This is an award for an individual book containing the best collection of artwork between the covers.

4. Best Production Values
-This is an award for the individual book exemplifying the best production values, from graphic design and layout, editing, paper, binding- all the factors that combine to create the look and feel of the product.

5. Best Writing
-This is an award for the individual book containing the best prose and descriptive text (ie. "cream").

6. Best Rules
-This is an award for the individual book containing the best (innovative, creative, workable) game design and mechanics (ie. "crunch").

7. Best Electronic Product
-This is an award for the best product released electronically (PDFs, software, etc). Products submitted for Best Electronic Product must have been released exclusively in electronic format to be eligible, although small-run (under 50 copies) Print on Demand will not invalidate an entry in this category.

8. Best Aid or Accessory
-This is an award for a product used to complement role playing game play.

9. Best Fan Site
-This is an award for a web site run by fans, for fans, ie. not by a publisher, and not for profit.

10. Best Adventure
-This is an award for a book that is primarily an adventure, adventure ideas or seeds. If under seven entries are received in this category, submissions will be considered for Best Campaign Setting/Setting Supplement or Best Writing as warranted.

11. Best Campaign Setting/Setting Supplement
-This is an award for a book particular to a campaign setting. If under seven entries are received in this category, submissions will be considered for Best Writing, Best Rules, or Best Supplement as warranted.

12. Best Supplement
-This is an award for a product which adds supplementary rules or details to the game. If under seven entries are received in this category, submissions will be considered for Best Rules or Best Writing as warranted.

13. Best Free Product or Web Enhancement
-This is an award for the best free product or web enhancement. A company's entire site could be nominated provided there were considerable updates and content added during the eligibility period.

14. Best d20 Game
-This is an award for the best game using the d20 mechanic. The Best d20 Game winner brings togther art, writing, rules, feeling, playability- everything that makes up a role playing game, rolled up and printed with a d20 logo on the cover. This is open to d20-derived OGL, d20 Licensed games, and products with special D&D licenses.

15. Best Game
-This is an award for the best role-playing game. The Best Game winner brings togther art, writing, rules, feeling, playability- everything that makes up a role playing game.

16. Best Publisher
-This is awarded to a publisher whose body of work submitted from the year was deemed best overall, with other, often less tangible factors taken into consideration. Customer support, quality and frequency of updates of their web site, their accessibility and contributions to the EN and gaming-in-general community will be all part of the qualities of Publisher.

MUTABLE AWARDS
17-18. Best ??? TBA

Up to 2 awards per year will be decided upon and defined by the judges after seeing the assortment of submitted products. Some possibilities include, but are not limited to:
-Best Licensed Product
-Best Periodical
-Best n00B (a newbie is defined as a nominee whose first work(s) appeared in the judging year- this couls be writers, artists, cartographers, publishers)?
-Best d20 Publisher
-Special Award (for outstanding contributions to role playing gaming- this could be another write-in option, and could be an individual writer, publisher, artist, setting, or web site)?
-Best Monster/Adversary Supplement

"BONUS" AWARDS
19. Peer's Choice Award- voted upon by industry professionals including but not limited to those who submitted products for consideration.

20. Fan's Choice Award- this is the winner of the "write-in" category, and the only category in which a publisher/designer can win, even if they didn't submit their works for consideration... so anyone could be a contender. It has been suggested that we should probably automatically eliminate ENP and WotC from the running for fairness sake.

 

[baileyrecords]

What's the "to and from" dtates of eligibility? And what about... "Best Original Soundtrack"?

 

[Crothian]

June 1st of 2004 to May 31 of 2005. I just don't think there are enough Soundtracks for that category, but I'm sure it could fit into Best Aid or Accessory.

We are soon going to issue the press release to really start this going. The final crossing of T's and dotting I's is going on.

 

[baileyrecords]

Hmmm... too bad I was an "industry novice" last year and didn't submit the CyberNet Soundtrack then. It was released on May 11, 2004. I didn't know about the ENnies at the time but probably wouldn't have had stuff in order by the deadline anyhow. Oh well... next soundtrack, possibly.

Thanks!

- Stratos

 

[Pramas]

I don't have any specific comments, as these categories look pretty reasonable. I just wanted to say thanks for not gutting the number of categories. The Origins Awards did that this year and I don't think it helped them at all. Just one of many reasons we opted out of participating in the Origins Awards this year. Yay, ENnies!

 

[Rasyr]

Questions

Does item #15 exclude d20 products?

Do the other categories (specifically 10-13) include both d20 and non-d20?

The reason that I ask is that EN World is a d20 website and the vast majority of people who frequent this site are d20 players primarily. This means that the winners will, more often than not, be d20 products as opposed to products from other systems. In short, it gives a noticible bias to d20 products if d20 products and non-d20 products are grouped together in the same categories. There is no real way to get around that.

Other than that quibble, I do like the list of categories though.

 

[Crothian]

This year aside from the specific d20 only category, all gaming products are competing side by side. Yes, En World has a strong d20 following and this is a concern. We are hoping to get some more fans of other systems to come vote in the awards. For instance Hero Games last year gave the ENnies some really good support on their site and even had some people post reviews over here of their games.

Nothing has been entered yet, so this is just pure speculation on my part; but I can easily see some of these categoreis not having any d20 products nominated. This was a strong year from games outside the d20 market and hopefully many of those companies will choose to particiapte. Again, pure guessing on my part and I very well could be wrong.

 

[Psion]

They weren't gutted but they were certainly pared down. (To be honest, I wanted to pare them down further).

As for the d20/non-d20 issue -- I can forsee it being a complaint after the fact. But I think that some overstate the d20 focus of ENWorld. I have seen plenty of folks here talk of GURPS and HERO, Tri-Stat and... some other game that sounds like a musical instrument... Ukelele? Lyre? Mandolin? I forget.

 

[Rasyr]

Yes, En World has a strong d20 following and this is a concern.

That is mainly what I wanted to point out, that this is a concern. Especially after a number of folks posted (after the ENnies last year) things to the effect of "I know nothing about non-d20 games so I didn't vote for them".

Personally, I think that having the judges come up with a small paragraph about a given product to be placed on the voting site (like an extremely tiny capsule reveiw - say 100-200 words). They could split up the writing of the paragraphs among them, and then post them anonymously) would be a good idea, however, it would be an added burden to these already overworked guys, so that is its downside.

As for the d20/non-d20 issue -- I can forsee it being a complaint after the fact. But I think that some overstate the d20 focus of ENWorld. I have seen plenty of folks here talk of GURPS and HERO, Tri-Stat and... some other game that sounds like a musical instrument... Ukelele? Lyre? Mandolin? I forget.

ROFL!!

Anyways, I do think that it is better to talk about this possible issue beforehand, rather than wait for complaints after the fact. Recognizing it as a potential problem, perhaps someway could be found to help alleviate it, at least to some extent.

Perhaps linking to reviews of the nominated products, where available, or the synopsis idea I mention above if there is no review available. Something that can help to educate the voters about products that they are unaware of. I think that would be the key, however it is accomplished.

 

[TerraDave]

Catagories seem good...if WotC doesn't submit materials, they can only be voted for in the fan catagory (unless they are excluded)? Also, for non-d20 companies to be in, they must also submit to the judges for any but the fan catagory, right? (any chance of GURPs, Exalted, or WoD stuff getting to the judges, do they want to get all this stuff?)