Looking for Industry Information for Business Plan

[Najo]

The main style guides I am looking for our game mechanic guide documents that WOTC uses in-house. Sounds like they keep a tight lid on them, I was hoping that I could find someone who could help me speak to the right people about gaining access to them legally.

As for the other style guides, thank you for the advice. We have similar plans already, I just would like to see if WOTC does anything differently.

BTW, do you have a portfolio of your work? I haven't started my artist search yet, but I would love to see it!

Nate

 

[afreed]

The main style guides I am looking for our game mechanic guide documents that WOTC uses in-house. Sounds like they keep a tight lid on them.

What sort of content are you looking for? I've seen the style guides for several major d20 companies (though not WotC), and there's nothing special in them--just points on in-house formatting, policies on word usage and grammar, advice on voice, and so on. It's very useful to have a style guide to reference, but any good editor should be able to work one up for you. If you're worried about D&D terminology issues (are spell schools capitalized, do you succeed 'at' or 'on' a check, etc.), it's slightly more time-consuming to check, but it's hardly a secret.
If what you're looking for is more like design advice (e.g., how much damage should a spell do at each level, how many encounters should there be in an adventure), then I don't know of any compiled source--aside from the core rulebooks, there are the Dragon and Dungeon guidelines at rulebooks, there are the Dragon and Dungeon guidelines at Paizo's site, but these are really the sort of issues that you just have to get a feel for.
I'm not sure why you're concerned about how WotC handles matters internally. What's important is that you have a system that works for you--there's no secret information involved, so it's just a matter of deciding on your needs.
Hope this helps you.

 

[Najo]

What sort of content are you looking for?

In-house game design guidelines. We have collected all of the game design articles printed by WOTC, any guidelines in their printed books (such as both 3.0 and 3.5 DMG, the 3.5 MM and the info on spells in Tome of Blood), advice given online by WOTC employees, then recently the Dragon and Dungeon guidelines (recommended by Matt on SeanKReynolds site). Our material has been tested over and over again by outside playtest groups as well as our own internal gaming groups, and we compare all our design and balance to every product WOTC releases. These last documents recommended by Matt were very helpful, and gave most of what we wanted to see to confirm our work. It would be nice to see the official design documents WOTC uses, but I am confident we are as close as a 3rd party publisher can get just short of those guides.

Thanks,

Nate

 

[jmucchiello]

Our material has been tested over and over again by outside playtest groups as well as our own internal gaming groups, and we compare all our design and balance to every product WOTC releases.

Then stop beating the horse and just release the material. If your playtest groups haven't complained about balance and your designers are happy with the balance, then, guess what? It's balanced. Release those puppies and start another project. WotC does not have any magic documents that, if you read them, you could then tell that your material is balanced. If they did, they would never release broken material. You can't throw 16 ton weight in the rules forums without hitting a dozen people who find issue with something they release.

Balance is a bugaboo. Nobody released material where everything is perfectly balanced with everything else. It is not possible. The number of permutations approaches infinity. You have playtested (apparently more than once), your designers have stamped their approval on the material. You are done. Lay it out and send it to the printers (or RPGNow or whereever you are distributing it) and get some sleep. Wake up the next day and start working on new material.

 

[Pramas]

Itwould be nice to see the official design documents WOTC uses, but I am confident we are as close as a 3rd party publisher can get just short of those guides.

WotC doesn't share those documents. Quite of lot of man-hours go into putting them together and updating them as the game changes. They are considered assets and thus won't be given away. If WotC wanted d20 companies to have them, they'd have released them with the SRD.