Branstorming for ENnies 2003 -- improvements, changes, etc

[EricNoah]

More chairs!!
Course next year it's a whole new set-up, so there ought to be room, better sound, laser effects, clowns with balloons, etc.

Indeed, more chairs. And more microphones. But no clowns other than Russ...

 

[EricNoah]

But I sure do see how it would be hard to do a best editor award. I have seen manuscripts that needed only a little cleaning up, and I have seen others that needed tons of editor work. Lets say both final products were equally clean, how could the judges know that frankly one editor had a way harder job than the other and did a much better job?

Well, my brilliant suggestion was that for every entry submitted for Best Editor, that the company must also submit the original manuscript for comparison. Monte didn't like that idea.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

I like the idea of looking into how to expand the awards to accomodate special cases - the Everquest RPG is a great example. We may see more such uses of the OGL, and to include them in the consideration process makes sense to me. I'd even like to expand the scope to include permutations of earlier editions of D&D - and yes, I'm talking about HackMaster specifically. Maybe simply say the awards cover all things d20 and D&D.

I want to say something to all the d20 publishers that are checking in on this thread - I'm not exaggerating or blowing smoke up your arses by saying that I was very impressed by how good the material we saw was. It really was on par with WotC's stuff in concept and writing. The reason I would rather WotC remained in the competition is because you guys really can compete with them. Maybe not in market penetration/name recognition, but in quality. I know it's naive, but I really held out hope that some of the d20 publishers would take some awards in categories in which they directly competed with WotC. I know that the popular vote was really lopsided...I wish it wasn't like that. It shouldn't have been like that. I've been a supporter of Necromancer and Fiery Dragon, to name two, from early on, simply because the stuff they make is just that good. There are a number fo other companies I feel the same way about. I hope that despite the problems that all of you guys get a deserved boost in sales.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

Dammit, that post I just made makes me seems like such a fanboy. But I'm sincere about it, so I won't take it back.

 

[EricNoah]

I was very impressed by how good the material we saw was. It really was on par with WotC's stuff in concept and writing. The reason I would rather WotC remained in the competition is because you guys really can compete with them. Maybe not in market penetration/name recognition, but in quality.

Same feelings here, bigtime.

 

[der_kluge]

Same feelings here, bigtime.

Right, but I think we already established that it's not entirely the 'quality' of a product that wins, but has more to do with name recognition. Small publishers can't compete with that, even if their product is better than a WoTC one in the same category.

 

[Orcus]

Yeah, thats kind of the problem.

Clark

 

[EricNoah]

Which is why I'm leaning toward favoring solutions that minimize that effect. Things like the Peoples Choice/Critics Choice, or a weighted "academy" vote, stuff like that.

 

[der_kluge]

Caveat: I'm a freelance writer for Thunderhead/Mystic Eye Games.

I agree with Clark - these should be the D20 awards, and WoTC doesn't produce D20 products. They produce D&D products, which use the D20 engine, but they don't use the OGL and don't include OGC (unless it's in the SRD), which is slightly different.

And yes, it would exclude things like Ravenloft, and Kalamar if we made the Ennies D20 awards, which is why we need a separate category for "Best licensed D20-Compatible product", and you'd see "Ravenloft", and "Kingdoms of Kalamar" in those settings.

Everquest RPG would be in a category all by itself right now, but that might change by next year. It wasn't out to be considered for these awards, anyway.

The Thunderhead Games' folks agreed - we could win more awards if only we had a Spine Design Team!*


* the WoTC folks, when accepting awards, on at least two occasions thanked the members of the Spine Design Team. Which, is exactly what you think it is - a team who does nothing by design the spine of a book. Apparently, it's a two-person team, but the fact that they have a *team* to do just that speaks volumes about the resources that WoTC utilizes to produce a book. The average D20 publisher probably has 25% the amount, if not less. We simply can't afford it!


On the other hand, however, I'd love to be in the same category with a WoTC product, and then BEAT them! That would rock. So, if WoTC is excluded, it might lessen the quality of it a bit.

 

[Leopold]

I'm against any weighted votes after the judges selection, the ENnies have to stay a fan award, not some professional award.

Also on the topic of WotC always getting the first place, expand the award to have a gold ENnie for the first, and a silver ENnie for the second, with company allowed to have only one award per category.

This is what was done with the olympic games, at the beggining there was only a first place, then two, and curently three.

i disagree with this method. If you only have 5 people you are basically handing out award to the top 3. This is like the Acadmey awards. Give this ONLY to the best of the best. Don't reward 2nd place or 3rd place. Give the award to those that won clearly. This will make the awards more of a 'serious' tone and not something where 'everybody' wins.