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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mcrow" data-source="post: 4395400" data-attributes="member: 29117">Hello, I'm Mike Crow a long time gamer that would enjoy the opportunity to be an ENnies judge for the 2009 awards. I was born and raised in Minnesota where around the age of 12  I was introduced to gaming by my best friend with my first session of AD&D 2nd Edition.  Since being introduced to RPGs I've played many different games including: Savage Worlds, Hero system, Hard Nova, Star Cluster 2, Roma Imperious, and almost all versions of D&D. I enjoy reading games almost as much as playing them and at one time had a collection of over 400 gaming books. I think that my exposure to many different games and systems would be an asset for the judging panel.   I've written reviews  for multiple sites including EN World, The RPG site, Amazon, Game Wyrd, RPG Now and RPG.net. I characterize my reviewing style as fair, thorough and honest with an aim to help the potential buyer by giving them all the info they need to make their decision. I believe that reviewing games, for the past few years has given me a more analytical mind than I had before becoming a reviewer.  As an ENnies judge I will make sure that all games that I believe to be of the best quality are brought to the attention to the judging panel. I'll do my best to make sure the best games (regardless of popularity, obscurity or hype) are available for the RPG community to vote on.              Judge Questionnaire  1. When did you join the RPG hobby and what inspired you to become involved and stay with it?  About 1989, I was 12 years old at the time. The thing that kept me involved was the total stimulation of my imagination. I could think of nothing more interesting and stimulating than playing a hero on an epic adventure or creating exciting, eye-widening worlds to explore.   2. Since you joined the hobby, what roles have you played (e.g. vending, professional writing and publishing, freelancing, reviewing, convention organizing, homebrewing, playing, GMing, etc.)? I've been a reviewer the last few years and did some play testing in the past. As for playing I've been playing for the past  18-19 years, many different  games and homebrewed worlds both as a PC and GM.   3. The ENnies require a major commitment of time and mental energy. What resources do you bring that will help you discharge these responsibilities? Will your gaming group or other individuals be assisting you?  Does your family support you? Fortunately I have a wife that supports me in my "Geeky things", as she states it. She would help make sure that I have the time needed to do the job properly. My gaming group would be some of the people that would help me play-test some of the games. It would be impossible to play them all but I would get to play some of the games for first hand experience.  I'll try to pick out games that I think need to be played to give me the best idea of how to judge them and play as many of those games as possible. Most of those games would likely be one shots, but some might have multiple sessions.  4. Judging requires a great deal of critical thinking skills, communication with other judges, deadline management, organization, and storage space for the product received. What interests, experience and skills do you bring that will make you a more effective judge? With my background in Medical Labs and their tendency to have a procedure in place to keep work flowing, I'd probably come up with an organization and procedural scheme to make sure things are done on time and progress can be tracked. Also, in my everyday jobs I deal with deadlines regularly so this will be no different. Lots of reading + lots of caffeine will be one solution.  5. What styles and genres of RPGs do you enjoy most? Are there any styles or genres that you do not enjoy? Which games best exemplify what you like?  Do you consider yourself a particular system’s, publisher’s or genre’s “fanboy/girl”?   I like more traditional, less experimental systems and have a little bit of preference for Sci-Fi and Horror games but also enjoy westerns and fantasy. Some games that could sum up my preferences are All Flesh Must Be Eaten, Coyote Trail, Cold Space, and Roma Imperious. Many of my favorite games have very strong settings.  6. What system do you think is best designed? Is it the one you play most? That's a tough one to answer because often what works best for one genre or setting doesn't work so great for another. However, I think Basic Roleplaying, Harp, VS Engine, and Unisystem are some of my favorites.  7. What games have you played in the past year?  List up to 10 RPGs you have played the most. D&D 3.5, Roma Imperious, Hard Nova, Call of Cthulhu, D&D 4E and Exalted 2E. 8. Briefly summarize the criteria you will use for judging products in the different categories. How will you deal with comparing products of vastly disparate lengths, medium (PDF vs. print), or mechanics to prose ratios? Will innovation and originality play a major role? I think it is important to distill the games down what a category is judging it on. For instance: Best Rules should be judged solely on the rules, the way the book looks, how popular it is and hype shouldn't matter. The book could be a handwritten notebook wrapped in a newspaper and should still win "best rules" if it's rules are the best. Lengths and formats are difficult to handle but being longer, shorter, PDF or print will not greatly affect my judging of them. My thought is that greatly written game of 60 pages is a better game a 300+ page monster of a book that is only of average quality and the same goes for PDF VS Print. There have not been that many innovative games published lately but I don't feel that a game needs to be innovative to be a good game. Of course if there were a truly innovative game in the judging pool, it would get notice but no more so than a game that has an highly original setting or just simply well written and designed.   9. How will you judge supplements or adventures for game systems whose core rules you are unfamiliar with or you believe are badly designed? What about for systems that are out of print? If I knew someone who owned a copy of the rules I'd ask to use their copy. I would also ask people who are more familiar with the rules to explain the basics to me. In the case that a copy of the rules cannot be found or I felt the system was poorly designed I would judge the supplement based on how well the supplement enhances or expands the original system or setting as best I can.  10. How would you like to see the ENnies change (categories, policies, etc)?  What should remain inviolate? I think the categories and policies that are in place are pretty good, though some more thought should be put into whether or not games should be limited in the number of categories they can be nominated for. </blockquote>

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