campaign journal

[jmccann]

Hello,

I have asked something similar months ago (years even?  Not sure when) on the OD&D 74 boards and did not get a favorable response.  I'll see if the response here is different.

Forums like this one, and blogs, some of which are run by a number of members of this board, generate a huge amount of interesting prose - in our case rules, entire games, interesting snippets of history, discussion of literature and movies, and on and on.  But a lot of the content is ephemeral and fleeting.  I would like to propose publishing a journal largely containing contributions from members of this board.  The material would have to be longer and better thought out and arranged (not interested in republishing blog posts).  I think there is easily enough material here to support at least 2 issues a year. 

Rule sets, scenarios, discussion of gaming history, anything like that could be fair game. 

What do people think?

[waysoftheearth]

I'm interested to hear a bit more about what you have in mind jmccann...

What do you mean by "Journal"? Are you talking about hard or soft copy? Or both?

What audience do you have in mind...?

[Admin Pete]

jmccann I am interested in this and would like to have you expand on exactly what you are looking for. As to "The material would have to be longer and better thought out and arranged", I am quite open to having anything of mine that interests people edited to meet the requirements, although I don't believe my writing skills are up to doing the edit myself. There are a lot of people already posting a lot of good things on here, so I would like to hear from the membership who is open to having their stuff published in this way.

[robkuntz]

In what way is the content "ephemeral and fleeting". If anything it is well organized into sub-forums and more easily accessed than print products. Grouping selections for PDFs issuance would make those more accessible only if they had a platform to expose these. If your intent is to elucidate upon general topics then the board seems to be doing that already; and that only can grow (or fall) by participation which is an accurate gauge of interest. That said I look forward to your thoughts.

[jmccann]

I will respond briefly to the questions so far, and a little later I will post again with a more careful description of what I am thinking of, and what motivates me to consider this.

waysoftheearth: I am thinking both pdf and physical. Audience would be people interested in the intersection of wargames and older styles of D&D and similar games, including ways to play such games on the internet by email, PBP etc.

@the Perilous Dreamer: I am not thinking of directly republishing content as written here. I agree there are lots of people posting worthwhile material here.

robkuntz: fleeting as in not likely to survive long in its current form. Many forums have come and gone. People lose interest and leave the web, taking their blogs down. Forums have crashes and data is lost. One forum I frequent has some kind of issue where threads older than a certain date have all the posts except the first one. That is frustrating. Sometimes the information can be found on the wayback machine, sometimes not. I have gaming materials dating back decades. I have been following websites related to gaming since the 90s (and FTP, usenet, and gopher before that) which are lost forever. Occasionally I will download a file or part of a website, but it is a pain.

This is a separate question from organization and discoverability. I agree that forums and blogs have some good features for propagating gaming materials. It is just that I think a periodically printed, carefully edited journal has some other good features. I'll expand more on this a bit later, right now there seem to be some domestic tranquility issues upstairs (it is getting close to bedtime for the kids).

[jmccann]

I'll explain a little more about what I have in mind with this journal
idea.

There are a lot of great discussions on forums, and many interesting
blogs. People can easily find others with similar interests and
anyone can be heard. Ideas at various stages of development are easy
to find. These are great attributes of forums and blogs. There are
downsides of these communications channels though. Depending on
moderation, there may be people with little to add, or even malicious
people, interfering with discussion. Forums and blogs disappear.
Ideas may be half-baked. You may have to wade through many posts of
no or peripheral interest before finding a post of interest.

Magazines and books are different. They usually (not always of
course, especially with self-published material) contain more
sustained and focused text. The material is expected to be more
developed. There should be less chatter and peripheral nonsense. A
file or book that you own and control is probably more reliable than a
forum or blog which is under someone else's control.

My idea with the journal is not to replace in any way the function of
forums and blogs, which a journal cannot do. It is more to work with
authors to bring some of the discussions to a polished state which can
be presented in a more permanent, stable form as a journal article.
Instead of having to wade through many posts of varying quality,
trying to follow who quoted whom and ignoring questionable
contributions to a thread, people can read a more highly developed
form of the ideas behind the threads. Dross will be removed, leaving
only paydirt (ideally).

To be a little more specific about the contents of the journal,
material should relate to long running campaigns, typically with a
wargaming slant. Topics could include abstract discussions having to
do with running campaigns, actual rule sets, reports on running
campaigns, reviews of games, discussions of interesting historical
material. People could advertise their campaigns. Really anything
that could be relevant to campaigns.

There would be a paper edition as well as an online edition.
Initially the online edition would probably be free, and the physical
copy would be very cheap. I would probably shoot for 16 pages or so
initially, with a fanzine type publication. It would be nice to
develop it to a stage where it would be of high enough quality, with
enough material each month, including suitable art, to justify a
higher cover price. Realistically, that may never happen.

The publication pace would be slow, even if there are many
contributions. I would not want to publish more than 4 times a year.
Initially I think I would try to publish 2 or 3 times a year.

These are my current thoughts on this. I'd like to get people's
reactions and thoughts.

[robkuntz]

I see this forum as an idea generator which, by individual inclinations (or "slants" ), take no preferred course; idea parts are used in whole, in part or as revised. And their very nature in most instances provides for this granular approach or for one to adopt ideas whole cloth, with variations or exclusions of same. To me this will always be the essence of the philosophy of the game as intended: The GM/designer takes parts or wholes and fills them into their own structured processes

Print projects deal with codifications of wholes into a set form, thus the conceptual process is always moving to defined points as expressed by a single author--thus a single style. This is what makes the granularity of less-than-codified forms so powerful as a self-generating system that adheres to the paths of variance (real design processes as individual states). The rise of the game brought with it a new territory that divided design states into two absolute categories before unrealized in game design: 1) granular thought that can continue to change due to time and reflection; and, 2) the closing down of this to a primary definition by the individual author. Whereas example states of this might provide whole-cloth end points in articles in print, if that is the only "polish" that is added then the processes, individual or general, will be dismissed during the end-point result, whereas this exists in forums as ongoing thought which makes impacts (or not) in real-time.

Unless print products move to primary discourse on processes that were taken in reaching the end product all they can offer are whole-cloth examples. In my estimation this leads the issue of individuated design to otherwise adopting whole-cloth such matter, or not.

I would champion a journal which takes the former course of developing upon the philosophical intent of why and how such related matter was brought into being, but yet I still see the forum as superior to that due to real-time exchanges.

[jmccann]

Now I think we have come to the nub of the matter. I don't understand
how quoting works on this site (note to admins if they are paying
attention: quoting in any other than the simplest way seems difficult
here. It seems broken compared to e.g. OD&D 74 where I am able to
format multiple quotes in a post, even multiple authors, quite unlike
this site), so I will respond to your post paragraph by paragraph. I
will prefix your paragraphs w/ the initials RJK.

RJK: I see this forum as an idea generator which, by individual
inclinations (or "slants" ), take no preferred course; idea parts are
used in whole, in part or as revised. And their very nature in most
instances provides for this granular approach or for one to adopt
ideas whole cloth, with variations or exclusions of same. To me this
will always be the essence of the philosophy of the game as intended:
The GM/designer takes parts or wholes and fills them into their own
structured processes.

There is nothing here I disagree with. I was not present at or near
the birth of what you refer to as "the game" and hence am not able to
discuss "the philsophy" you mention, however this fits with my
conceptions of how this may have occurred.

RJK: Print projects deal with codifications of wholes into a set form,
thus the conceptual process is always moving to defined points as
expressed by a single author--thus a single style. This is what makes
the granularity of less-than-codified forms so powerful as a
self-generating system that adheres to the paths of variance (real
design processes as individual states). The rise of the game brought
with it a new territory that divided design states into two absolute
categories before unrealized in game design: 1) granular thought that
can continue to change due to time and reflection; and, 2) the closing
down of this to a primary definition by the individual author. Whereas
example states of this might provide whole-cloth end points in
articles in print, if that is the only "polish" that is added then the
processes, individual or general, will be dismissed during the
end-point result, whereas this exists in forums as ongoing thought
which makes impacts (or not) in real-time.

And here is the point at which I think we most disagree or have a
divergence of thought, or place a different relative value on
attributes of the online communications channel versus those of the
print channel. I am in agreement that the online format results in a
very interesting discourse which is of great value. But I am in my
conception of this journal placing a greater value on sustained
exposition and argument than you seem to. I think the primary
difference between our positions as I understand them is that I would
like larger, more carefully argued grains than you favor. Like you
though I am quite interested in the design process. The longer form
of articles in a journal compared to forum posts would allow authors
to expound upon design choices in a more deliberate manner than forums
and blog posts allow.

When I say that "[t]opics could include abstract discussions having to
do with running campaigns, actual rule sets, reports on running
campaigns" I am very interested in conscious design choices. For this
journal, the design choices that went into a published rule set would
be the focus. A scenario would be presented not solely for its play
value but for what it might show about the author's approach.

RJK: Unless print products move to primary discourse on processes that
were taken in reaching the end product all they can offer are
whole-cloth examples. In my estimation this leads the issue of
individuated design to otherwise adopting whole-cloth such matter, or
not.

I think most who participate in this forum are in their campaigns more
interested in synthesizing a new experience from components than they
are in simply playing out a published scenario. The primary focus of
the journal would be aligned with this approach.

RJK: I would champion a journal which takes the former course of
developing upon the philosophical intent of why and how such related
matter was brought into being, but yet I still see the forum as
superior to that due to real-time exchanges.

The real-time exchanges of the forums are certainly of great value.
The internet makes possible an entire range of highly valuable
discourse. But I think there is value in the sustained, deliberate
writing of a carefully edited journal as well, and it is this that I
hope to be able to present in the journal.




Edit: Admin - I placed each of the RJK quotes in quote for you with the preview quote. I hope you do not mind!

[waysoftheearth]

Apr 23, 2015 23:28:06 GMT -5 jmccann said:

I don't understand
how quoting works on this site

I am not a site admin. However...

When you click the "Quote" button you are immediately redirected to a post form containing the quoted text.

Proboards has two post editors; one being the Preview editor, which allows you to edit a styled-text view of what your new post would look like, and the other being the BBCode editor which shows the only the plain-text and BBCode markup of your new post.

On this site, all posts will open the "Preview" editor by default, where it is difficult to edit quotes (and any other BBCode) correctly. This is rather annoying.

On odd74, all posts will open the "BBCode" editor by default, which is probably what you are accustomed to.


You can control which editor you are looking at by toggling the two tab buttons ("Preview" and "BBCode") at the bottom left of the post form.

Or, to fix it once and for all, you can set your personal preference (for this site) so that it always opens in the "BBCode" editor by default.
See here: www.proboards.com/user-guide/profile-preferences/default-editor

[Admin Pete]

Apr 24, 2015 5:33:48 GMT -5 waysoftheearth said:

Apr 23, 2015 23:28:06 GMT -5 jmccann said:

I don't understand
how quoting works on this site

I am not a site admin. However...

When you click the "Quote" button you are immediately redirected to a post form containing the quoted text.

Proboards has two post editors; one being the Preview editor, which allows you to edit a styled-text view of what your new post would look like, and the other being the BBCode editor which shows the only the plain-text and BBCode markup of your new post.

On this site, all posts will open the "Preview" editor by default, where it is difficult to edit quotes (and any other BBCode) correctly. This is rather annoying.

On odd74, all posts will open the "BBCode" editor by default, which is probably what you are accustomed to.


You can control which editor you are looking at by toggling the two tab buttons ("Preview" and "BBCode") at the bottom left of the post form.

Or, to fix it once and for all, you can set your personal preference (for this site) so that it always opens in the "BBCode" editor by default.
See here: www.proboards.com/user-guide/profile-preferences/default-editor

Exactly right waysoftheearth (thank you for the assist) and the BBCode is what we are all used to, but I have not yet figured out how to set that as the site default as I am new to the admin role.

[The Archivist]

RJK: Unless print products move to primary discourse on processes that were taken in reaching the end product all they can offer are whole-cloth examples. In my estimation this leads the issue of individuated design to otherwise adopting whole-cloth such matter, or not.

RJK: I would champion a journal which takes the former course of developing upon the philosophical intent of why and how such related matter was brought into being, but yet I still see the forum as superior to that due to real-time exchanges.

I would be quite interested in reading a journal that met these criteria about the why and how.

[robkuntz]

@ JMCCANN: Though I am busy with other matters today I will attend to your thoughts and our ongoing discourse in an upcoming post.

[robkuntz]

Okay. I don't believe we diverge too much. I just don't believe that ongoing discussion in a granular fashion, at-the-moment realizations, can be forwarded through a quarterly magazine. Where and how would discussions take place due to the lag-time in publishing the inquiries? In the forums? The author would be predisposed to couch such matter at hand in such a way to frame the forthcoming questions and answers.

Though I recognize your first sincere point for preserving content--a noble and salient plan--I cannot see a print magazine as being superior to forums for discussion, especially those that can can take off from idea parts almost immediately and thus create an instantaneous flow of granular, rising thought.