My goals have been delayed due to the OGL fallout. Now that things have settled down a bit, I'm looking ahead to 2023.
Your Turn: What are your gaming goals for 2023?
Get Ready for the Future of OGL
For the first month of 2023 it seemed like there would be no future for the OGL, at least for small publishers. With Wizards of the Coast releasing the license into the Creative Commons, I'll begin converting all my books to use that new license. Monster books are likely easier to convert to the new format, species books are much looser (and thus require less conversions), while class books will probably be the most challenging. I've written many subclasses that are going to need to be revised. The winds of change will also dictate if we call compatible editions "5.5E", "6E" or "1E". Players and sales will absolutely dictate what the reality is, it's more a question of figuring it out as soon as possible.Build the RPG Community
I was recently reappointed to the chair for the Committee for the Advancement of Role-Playing Games (CAR-PGA) and plan to continue hosting guests throughout the year on our YouTube channel. Similarly, we just launched two new columns for the EN World Columnist program focusing on Paizo and the D&D Adventurers League. Both of these initiatives will expand the conversation around tabletop gaming, and that will be more important than ever as D&D enters the next phase, with new movies, a 50-year anniversary in 2024, and the D&D documentary scheduled for release. My son and godson have also both joined D&D groups, and I'm trying to support their nascent interest in the hobby without overwhelming them. As you can imagine, my son has been gaming since he was four-years-old, so this is pretty exciting to see.Teach Myself Layout Software
I've long gotten requests for print on demand of my products and it's high time I did something about it. I have experience with layout and design software but it's been a very long time since I've produced anything with it. This year I plan to invest in the software and start producing POD versions of my digital products.Publish the Next Adventures in Welstar
My players are currently running through the Clockwork Carillon, a gameshow-style romp through gnome-built challenges inspired by classic video games. The adventure is now complete at over three hundred pages and my players are playtesting it. In fact, the book is so big I published 5E Foes: Video Game Bestiary as a separate product. I plan to clean all up the adventure for publication and release it separately and as part of a steampunk bundle, along with 5E RPG: Steampunk Adventures and the aforementioned bestiary. I hope to have that all completed by June at the latest. The fourth adventure in the series has a working title of The Hellspire. It involves Infernus. I hope to have the sourcebook, 5E RPG: Infernal Adventures, to set the groundwork for that adventure.Launch a New Podcast
I already manage a monthly interview session for the CAR-PGA, and my wife has successfully launched several professional podcasts, so it was just a matter of time before we joined forces about a topic we love. That topic is old horror movies, inspired by a collection of 50 public domain movies that we only recently got around to watching. Now we will, with an episode dedicated to each one of them, in a podcast series titled 50 Date Night Screams. I plan to create a villain inspired by each of these movies and publish the book as 5E Foes: Gothic Villains (it will draw on content from 5E RPG: Gothic Adventures). It's not going to be easy (some of these movies are really, really bad), but it definitely should be fun.Your Turn: What are your gaming goals for 2023?