Melancholy and the Infinite Mehness
So I'm up for an award at Gen Con for Scion Ragnarok. Well, okay the book is. But I wrote a good chunk of it so hey!
Which is awesome and cool. Unfortunately, another book I just wrote came out as well and the responses have been...mixed. Many people seem to actually like it but a few errors and perhaps a misjudgment or two crept in.
And of course that's most of what many folks are talking about. Which is fine...come to bury Jack and not to praise him and all. But it's kind of a buzzkill as well.
RPG writing is a curious beast. It pays pretty bad for writing gigs. And it's not a ton easier to get jobs and keep them coming with the big companies than with some other fields. For example, despite being now an award-nominated writer my schedule is currently pretty much clear for projects. Add to this that at least online many fans (and some other writers) have expectations that would make a utilitarian economist fall on his pen and it's not always easy to be super up about the process.
Which is a rather tough pill to swallow. On one hand you get the message "Wow, your stuff is so good we're going to put you up for an award at the biggest gaming con!" on the other you get "You made these two mistakes out of tens of thousands of words written! How could you? Are you crazy? What's wrong with you?" and so on. And while the accolades make the deadlines and weak money mostly worth it, the criticisms also sometimes hit a bit hard. Especially given I've been doing this for over 10 years off and on (during law school and much of my marriage it was more off than on, but even then I got some work out).
But anyway, Gen Con and a possible award are coming up. So bonus!
Which is awesome and cool. Unfortunately, another book I just wrote came out as well and the responses have been...mixed. Many people seem to actually like it but a few errors and perhaps a misjudgment or two crept in.
And of course that's most of what many folks are talking about. Which is fine...come to bury Jack and not to praise him and all. But it's kind of a buzzkill as well.
RPG writing is a curious beast. It pays pretty bad for writing gigs. And it's not a ton easier to get jobs and keep them coming with the big companies than with some other fields. For example, despite being now an award-nominated writer my schedule is currently pretty much clear for projects. Add to this that at least online many fans (and some other writers) have expectations that would make a utilitarian economist fall on his pen and it's not always easy to be super up about the process.
Which is a rather tough pill to swallow. On one hand you get the message "Wow, your stuff is so good we're going to put you up for an award at the biggest gaming con!" on the other you get "You made these two mistakes out of tens of thousands of words written! How could you? Are you crazy? What's wrong with you?" and so on. And while the accolades make the deadlines and weak money mostly worth it, the criticisms also sometimes hit a bit hard. Especially given I've been doing this for over 10 years off and on (during law school and much of my marriage it was more off than on, but even then I got some work out).
But anyway, Gen Con and a possible award are coming up. So bonus!
posted by Jack at 9:46 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home