WotC Seeking Your Setting Proposals (was "Big Wizard announcement")

[Darraketh]

I think part of the point of the one page submission requirement (in addition to making the submissions manageably easy to read) is that they don't want extensive detail or intricately networked together political/religious backgrounds with dozens of statted up NPCs, prestige classes and home brewed rules.

What they appear to want is a framework. A jumping off point. Even a 100 page setting bible is a very minute amount of material: a campaign setting painted in very broad strokes at best. I think people submitting very long running, complex and intricately designed settings will not do all that well in the contest.

Excellent observation. If I understand this quote, from the instructions, correctly; "Such a setting may serve as a vehicle for novels, roleplaying games, card games, miniatures, and other entertainment products." Then the broad approach may leave room for the development of these other products.

I could be wrong.

 

[Darraketh]

The more I write, the more my setting submission is starting to read like a movie trailer with its "bullet points" of what to expect when it releases. Concise, to the point, filling the viewer with interest and anticipation... anybody else taking this dramatic route?

That's a nice approach. As for myself I see the blurb on the back of a boxed set.

 

[Orcus]

"I have never ... not ONCE ... ever had a problem reading 8 point. In fact, I've seen some WOTC books (the FRCS comes to mind) with a smaller font than that in final product and I love them. So that little test you suggested is useless on me."

OK.

I'm not trying to call anyone stupid. If you like 8 point font and want to use it, go for it!

But dont confuse the point used in a final printed product with the point you should use in a professional, presentable submission.

Sure, there are products in 8 point (or smaller) that we all love and can read. But that isnt the question here. The question is what point size is acceptable in a professional, presentable submission. That is different from a final printed product.

I am trying to help you. You probably should avoid 8 point font. But I can't make you. If you like it, use it. More power to you. And if you get picked, feel free to email me a "neener neener" email.

Good luck everyone!

Clark

 

[Orcus]

As for the "movie trailer" idea, that is right on. You have 30 seconds to encapsulate a 3 hour movie. Same thing. You have 1 page to encapsulate a whole game world. Find the highlights, the theme, the feel. Show me the hero, show me a core action and conflict. Come up with a tag line. Every movie has one. That is your answer to question 1.

Clark

 

[Olidammara]

As for the "movie trailer" idea, that is right on. You have 30 seconds to encapsulate a 3 hour movie. Same thing. ...

Clark

I'm not sure I'm clear on that. Are you saying our submission should take 30 seconds to read, or 3 hours? And how are we going to know how fast each judge can read our richly detailed text?

 

[Zappo]

"are you frightened by the fact the New Year's Day in year 2000 will be a friday 13 ?"

Really?

 

[Duvall]

Re: Question for Zulkir.

Anthony, is 8.1 pt. Ariel going to be a problem? If so, let me know and I'll trim it down and resend it. It didn't look bad at all to me but I get the feeling there might be some concern on your end.

I'm going to offer this up from the perspective of someone who was once a graduate teaching assistant and had to grade piles of papers and someone who has had to plow through stacks of resumes in his professional life. Don't use anything below a 10 point easily readable font. Revise revise revise until your submission fits one page.

When you have a huge stack of papers to go through, your eyes get tired and people get an instant attitude about a paper that requires them to squint or work harder just to read it. You are just looking at one page with your eyes. Go read today's Wall Street Journal front to back, then pick up your submission again and ask yourself, "Is this easy to read?" So unless your Ethos Sentence has the punch of a good Shakespearean quote, then I would reconsider using 8 point fonts.

 

[SteveMND]

30 seconds or three hours to read? C'mon, Oli. I like a good attempt at humor as much as the next guy, but aren't the continual tongue-in-cheek comments getting a little old? Especially in a thread which is about to top 20 pages...

Steve M

 

[seasong]

10 point font!?

10 point fonts? Wow. I was shooting for 14-pt Times New Roman (although I finally broke down and went with 12-pt).

Now I feel like I might be too succinct

 

[CrimsonHawk]

I am trying to help you. You probably should avoid 8 point font. But I can't make you. If you like it, use it. More power to you. And if you get picked, feel free to email me a "neener neener" email.

Orcus,

I'm sorry if I implied that you were not helping us. That was not my goal when I ranted like that. In fact, if you're who I think you are (considering your nom de guerre), then you're probably one of the best people to advise us on matters of what publishers want.

Instead, my goal was to point out that you came off as condescending when you did talk about the [/i]nt sizes[/i] (and only the font sizes. It's not that you weren't helping us. It's that it felt like I was stupid for needing that help.

In fact, I did steer away from 8 point fonts in the end (before I even read you post, in fact). My original proposal used it, but when Anthony insinuated that smaller fonts might weaken a proposal's chances, I went back, rewrote my proposal, used larger fonts, and remailed my proposal.

The next morning, I read your post, which to me read like "You're all a bunch of effin' morons for not thinking of this yourselves."

The help, in and of itself, was fantastic and well-needed. And, no, if I do get accepted, I am not going to send you a nastygram about your incorrectness. Because you're not incorrect.

I guess I just let the words "Use Common Sense" crawl under my skin and wriggle around. I grew up with my dad constantly chastising me for not using my head, even after I thought my course of action through for several hours. And I have a pet peeve against people who do the same.

I let that pet peeve guide me when I responded to your post.

For that ... I apologize.

=====O
Dale W. Robbins