Branstorming for ENnies 2003 -- improvements, changes, etc

[Orcus]

I just am not sure that I want to peek behind the process. That gets us into a whole realm I dont think I want to go.

I'm not familiar with EarthShadow (sorry ), so I dont want to speak for him or her. But I dont think ES meant to attack Morrus or the judges, Colonel. The tone of the post was more frustrated than distrustful as I read it. And I dont think anyone here is attacking Morrus or the judges. I think everyone did a great job.

But back to the question of showing the results...

I can certainly see WotC winning all the categories they won for. I can see WotC running away with all but one of the categories. MoP is great. CoC is really great. LotIF had a great cover. Dungeon/Polyhedron is pretty hard to beat. So all those make sense.

To me, the tightest race should have been Setting. Both Rokugan and Scarred Lands should have really given OA a big run for its money. In my humble opinion, both SL and Rokugon are better than OA. But regardless of that opinion (and even if opinions differ on this) I would imagine most people would agree that based on quality of content the votes should have been pretty close in this category. So if the results were tight, that would reaffirm my belief that this is not a popularity contest (or not a runaway popularity contest). But if the voting in that category is all WotC by a landslide then that would concern me. But then again, maybe my choice of this award as a "litmus test" of the voting is not universally agreed.

Hmmm. I still dont know about showing results.

Clark

[Colonel: I applaud your edit of your prior post. Well done.]

 

[ColonelHardisson]

I just am not sure that I want to peek behind the process. That gets us into a whole realm I dont think I want to go.

I'm not familiar with EarthShadow (sorry ), so I dont want to speak for him or her. But I dont think ES meant to attack Morrus or the judges, Colonel. The tone of the post was more frustrated than distrustful as I read it. And I dont think anyone here is attacking Morrus or the judges. I think everyone did a great job.

I think you're right, but it's tough to be sure sometimes.

Anyway, if I was going to guess - and since I really have no idea how many voted were cast or anything, so this is just as a fan - I'd guess WotC got an overwhelming number of votes. To be frank, I, personally, expected that, and that's why I tried to point out the importance of the nominations when I could.

 

[EricNoah]

There were tight races, and then there were races that weren't so tight. Some races were as close as a couple of percentage points. Some were around 5-6 percentage points. There were a couple of races where the winning entry got near 50% of the vote.

I can say that we had somewhere around 2500 votes total. I don't know how this compares to Origins or other awards. But it's certainly comparable to the most popular polls EN World has run in the past.

I too don't think it's proper to show the detailed results -- this is about celebrating excellence, not figuring out who got "last place" or whatever.

I did propose announcing the runner up for each category at the ceremony, but Ryan felt that would be out of place. Certainly now I think going down the list (who was third, fourth, etc.) wouldn't be particularly helpful.

 

[Lady Dragon]

I think Rokugan was more or a true campaign setting where as OA was half Setting and half rulebook. I think pobably most people who voted for OA would have voted for Rokugan if OA had not been there.

It really is tough decision that awaits Morrus and the other judges. How to still include WoTC and yet make it fairer for the small publishers to compete. And as I said earlier in this thread I do think seeing the actual tallies would help to determine how much favoritism WoTC got. It is possible that they won some catagories with only say 25% of the overall vote.

But think how proud a small publisher would feel to actually beat WoTC head on and if you take them out of the equation that won't happen, heck it may have already happened I didn't see any of WoTC adventures even getting nominated and at least Lord of the Iron Fortress was submitted since it won for the art catagory.

 

[XCorvis]

Maybe there could be an honorable mention "award" that is optional - that is, if the 1st and 2nd most popular books were within a certain range of each other, the 2nd would get a "kudos" award. So in the case of the 5% difference in votes, there would be an honorable mention, but in the 50% difference, there wouldn't be. Just tossing out an idea...

 

[EricNoah]

But think how proud a small publisher would feel to actually beat WoTC head on and if you take them out of the equation that won't happen, heck it may have already happened I didn't see any of WoTC adventures even getting nominated and at least Lord of the Iron Fortress was submitted since it won for the art catagory.

Indeed! Andy Collins was our contact for the ENnies submissions and he (I believe) gave Russ the goahead to let folks know that they did indeed submit two adventures that didn't make it to the nomination stage. So you've got Necromancer Games, Malhavoc Press, Thunderhead Games, Fiery Dragon, Monkeygod, and Privateer Press who "beat WotC at their own game" this year. Likewise several companies beat out WotC in the Best Cartography category. And we all saw Ambient win Best Freebie. So it's definitely already doable...

I have to say I'm liking more and more the notion of WotC joining forces with GenCon and ENWorld to play a role in the process and participate. I wonder who we have to convince?

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Just a few thoughts as they come to me (I am trying to read through the whole thread in one sitting):

I definitely think the awards need to remain a fan award. Morrus has already expressed frustration over the publishers' tendency to co-opt ENworld for their marketing purposes, and giving them any input into the vote is just another step in the wrong direction.

I don't agree with excluding/categorizing companies according to their success or market penetration-- or their lack thereof.

I think there's merit to dividing some categories into Open categories and Licensed categories (or, d20 vs. D&D).

I don't think you need 1st place, 2nd place, etc. awards. I think the nominations themselves cover that angle quite well. If you think it's necessary then only nominate three entries, not five.

In general I think the real merit is in being nominated. Yes, after the nominations, it becomes a popularity contest-- but if this is a fan award, why is popularity a bad thing?

These awards don't exist for the publishers, they are for the fans. I think the publishers need to be content with a nomination from the judges and not sweat the popularity contest portion of the award.

One last comment: A while back, I can't remember if it was here or on one of the OGL forums, one of the publishers made a comment about over-estimating the importance of the internet in d20 marketing. If the internet is a subset of gamers, and ENworld is a subset of that, and those who actually VOTE in the ENnies yet another subset of that...? You see where I am going?

Does "ENNIE WINNER!" really carry that much more weight than "ENNIE NOMINEE!" Do you actually envision Joe Gamer picking up one book or another off the game store rack because it has an ENnie award seal on it? Do you envision a distributor carrying one product or another based on the ENnies?

I am not saying this because I don't personally value the ENnies. I would have been thrilled to be nominated. I would have been thrilled to get an honorable mention. (Heck, I would have been thrilled to get mentioned at all!)

But whether you are looking at the ENnies as a marketing tool or just for bragging rights, I can't see raising a fuss. I don't understand WHY it is a problem that WOTC swept the popular vote, or stands to do so again in the future. Was there some problem with the judges' nominations or the popular vote? Was some grievous error committed?

Wulf

 

[Dextra]

two-hour nap later...

I'd like to say that the whole WotC budget thang really doesn't come into play here for me much. It's not much of an issue. What is the issue is market penetration and saturation. WotC is everywhere. All the other products... well, it's difficult to find them in stores sometimes, and the smaller publishers have significantly smaller print runs. Which means less people familiar with their product, less people voting for their product, no matter how excellent it is. The ENnies are a popularity contest. And it's a pretty rare and special product that can take on WotC.

I'm in the rather unique position of being a small publisher who actually beat WotC head on. How does it feel? Pretty darned impressive. Winning anything at all came as a total shock, since there was so much truly excellent product out there, WotC's included, and we were the new kids on the block. P-Hole had only been out for under four months when voting started, so lots of people must've really liked it. I'm still shocked.

I like the submitted ideas of
a. having a people's choice and a critic's choice. I pity the panel of judges for having to make those choices though, picking the nominees must've been hard enough!
and or
b. having a first place entry and runner-up entry.
c. having it sponsored by WotC (if it could be arranged)

I really don't like the idea of limitting entries. I'm pretty certain that most publishers would only submit the products of which they are most proud and wouldn't submit lesser quality stuff. Besides, think of the swag the judges are scoring! DAMN, that's a lot of free stuff!

Good luck Morrus and Eric trying to sort this one through!

But think how proud a small publisher would feel to actually beat WoTC head on and if you take them out of the equation that won't happen, heck it may have already happened I didn't see any of WoTC adventures even getting nominated and at least Lord of the Iron Fortress was submitted since it won for the art catagory.

 

[EricNoah]

Wulf I think you're right on as to the potential "value" of the ENnies to a publisher. It's probably not much if anything w/regards to added sales and whatnot. Except possibly to companies that publish online-only, where possibly ENWorld visitors are their chief customers rather than this tiny piece of a tiny part of a tiny slice.

I guess that goes back to a question I asked earlier (but only of WotC) -- what do publishers "do" with an ENnies win or nom?

 

[RangerWickett]

Well, one of the options that I think might be good was this one:

In each category, ask two questions. First, have the voter click on a tab for each of the products in that category that they are familiar enough with that they consider themselves informed. Second, ask them to vote for which one they think is best out of those.

Then, calculate the 'number of votes' in this way: "Number of votes for product" divided by "Number of people who felt qualified to judge."

So say the ABC Press's Book of Crossdressing and WotC's Flumphs of the Multiverse[/u] are both nominated for best interior art. Of the people who vote, 50 say that they have seen the interior art for the Book of Crossdressing, and feel qualified to judge. Of that, 40 people vote for it.

In comparison, 1000 people say that they have seen the interior art of Flumphs of the Multiverse, but only 200 people vote for it. Normally, the WotC book would win, with 200 votes vs. 40. However, ABC Press's book impressed 80% of those who read it, while WotC's book only impressed 20%. Thus, ABC would win.

Just a thought. How does it sound?