Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="JohnRTroy" data-source="post: 4535250" data-attributes="member: 2732">You would be wrong, he was very proud of his work.&nbsp; He wouldn't have engaged in this if he didn't think it would work.&nbsp; I knew the man personally and had discussed a lot of these issues over the last 18 years.&nbsp; He certainly wasn't embarrased by the castle.To be honest, sales were not of primary concern for Gary, more than ownership of material.&nbsp; He was always willing to take less of a front-rate and instead worked on getting sales cuts.&nbsp; This is why he never worked &quot;for hire&quot; much after he left TSR--ownership and creative control was more important to him.&nbsp; This is why most people who worked for him did so &quot;on spec&quot;, and why you didn't see a lot of &quot;big names&quot; working with him on his post-TSR projects.Gary was willing to leave D&amp;D behind and did so, creating two new game systems.&nbsp; I think the desire to do Castle Greyhawk came from 2 big insights Gary had in the early part of this decade.&nbsp; First, he discovered via the Internet that there was a good core fan base of the 1st Edition D&amp;D game system that still existed.&nbsp; Secondly, I think he was convinced that now with the OGL--ironically a concept he thought was &quot;dumb&quot; from the publishers standpoint and something he'd never do himself--he could legally publish his work without having to go through TSR/Wizards.&nbsp; He dabbled with dual-stat stuff to help with popularity.&nbsp;&nbsp; I should know--I was the guy who had to take the damn Hall of Many Panes 3.0 stats and convert them to 3.5 format.&nbsp; (Not a fun task, and I apologize for any conversion mistakes that came from that).Gary was a pretty prolific writer.&nbsp; I think the big problem was a lot of the stuff was sketchy notes and most of it was in &quot;his head&quot;.&nbsp; Two key things hurt the project--first, his own illness forced him into part-time status--before he used to work 60 hours a week on writing and writing research.&nbsp; Secondly, Rob Kuntz was supposed to help, but disagreements and Rob's own reliability issues forced him out of the project.I think those two things hurt it beyond recovery.&nbsp; I liked Yggsburg, but I wasn't into the expansion project--I suspect it was a way to keep people interested because the Castle at the speed would take a few years before somebody could publish something of value.&nbsp; Also, note that Gary's always intended to rewrite as part of the editing process before publishing.&nbsp; I've contributed to his projects in minor ways and almost all the time he'd edit things so stuff would get through the Gygax filter.&nbsp; Jeff's stuff would have been sent back to Gary for clarification.&nbsp; But that can't happen now.&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f641.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":(" title="Frown&nbsp; &nbsp; :("&nbsp; data-smilie="3"data-shortname=":(" />In short, like I said before, CZ to me will be looked about by fans as the &quot;Giant Rat of Sumatra&quot;, something who's dreamed ideal will probably be better than the reality.&nbsp; I actually hope Gail and the others stay focused on getting Gary's pure work published and table CZ.&nbsp;&nbsp; I can guarantee you LA will be handled well, one of Gary's trusted authors for LA, Jon Creffield is working on that stuff, and there are some good manuscripts coming that haven't seen publication in a decade.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="JohnRTroy, post: 4535250, member: 2732"] You would be wrong, he was very proud of his work. He wouldn't have engaged in this if he didn't think it would work. I knew the man personally and had discussed a lot of these issues over the last 18 years. He certainly wasn't embarrased by the castle. To be honest, sales were not of primary concern for Gary, more than ownership of material. He was always willing to take less of a front-rate and instead worked on getting sales cuts. This is why he never worked "for hire" much after he left TSR--ownership and creative control was more important to him. This is why most people who worked for him did so "on spec", and why you didn't see a lot of "big names" working with him on his post-TSR projects. Gary was willing to leave D&D behind and did so, creating two new game systems. I think the desire to do Castle Greyhawk came from 2 big insights Gary had in the early part of this decade. First, he discovered via the Internet that there was a good core fan base of the 1st Edition D&D game system that still existed. Secondly, I think he was convinced that now with the OGL--ironically a concept he thought was "dumb" from the publishers standpoint and something he'd never do himself--he could legally publish his work without having to go through TSR/Wizards. He dabbled with dual-stat stuff to help with popularity. I should know--I was the guy who had to take the damn Hall of Many Panes 3.0 stats and convert them to 3.5 format. (Not a fun task, and I apologize for any conversion mistakes that came from that). Gary was a pretty prolific writer. I think the big problem was a lot of the stuff was sketchy notes and most of it was in "his head". Two key things hurt the project--first, his own illness forced him into part-time status--before he used to work 60 hours a week on writing and writing research. Secondly, Rob Kuntz was supposed to help, but disagreements and Rob's own reliability issues forced him out of the project. I think those two things hurt it beyond recovery. I liked Yggsburg, but I wasn't into the expansion project--I suspect it was a way to keep people interested because the Castle at the speed would take a few years before somebody could publish something of value. Also, note that Gary's always intended to rewrite as part of the editing process before publishing. I've contributed to his projects in minor ways and almost all the time he'd edit things so stuff would get through the Gygax filter. Jeff's stuff would have been sent back to Gary for clarification. But that can't happen now. :( In short, like I said before, CZ to me will be looked about by fans as the "Giant Rat of Sumatra", something who's dreamed ideal will probably be better than the reality. I actually hope Gail and the others stay focused on getting Gary's pure work published and table CZ. I can guarantee you LA will be handled well, one of Gary's trusted authors for LA, Jon Creffield is working on that stuff, and there are some good manuscripts coming that haven't seen publication in a decade. [/QUOTE]

Verification