Oh, you are much to pessimistic Brian. IMO the fan scene has taken over the
production of Gloranthan products in the moment to keep this game alive. If you
take a look on all the material which has or will be published in 1998 you will
see a lot. The RMM Megacorp will come with Best of Tales and ToRM # 18 this year
and has published # 17 already. Questlines II, Ye Booke of Tentacles, Enclousure
# 2 and RQA # 6 arised this year (the european print of RQA is just in progress
as well as the print of TT # 4, which will be both sold on Convulsion), as well
as Tradetalk # 3, 4, 5 and 6 (the last two will be published in September and
December). And last not least the next issue of Book of Drastic Resolutions.
>
> On a more serious note, it's pretty hard to mistake all the signs:
>
> - - Recent Glorantha-cons ill-attended and poorly reviewed
>
Oh, no. Where you are living? We have had a nearly sold out Con 'Tentacle over
Bachrach' with 130 attendees. Convulsion # 4 is sold out with more then 200
places. Okay, the LA was bad visted, but do you think this is the full sign of
a dwindling fan scene. No it isn't. USA is not the world.
> - - Prominent digest personalities posting less and less (MOB, for example)
> or disappearing entirely (Sandy)
>
Hey, these guys are very busy. For me it is the same I can't talk on the digest
or even read all the stuff very often, because I'm very busy doing TT.
> - - Issaries Inc. efforts floundering
Try to be a little more patient. We are waiting here in germany now for a new
Glorantha games for nearly 10 years now and we have a good fan scene. Okay, it
is very difficult to find new people for this game, but we are trying our very
best.
>
> - - LARPS proliferating, RPG campaigns dying off
>
> - - Commericial publications halted, fan-published materials fading fast
Which fan material you have in mind?
>
> All these factors point towards a dwindling fan base, a seemingly
> impossible result given the loyalty of RQ/Glorantha fans through the
> lean years, but nevertheless, although many digesters will no doubt
> deny it, the promise of Hero Wars is not enough to sustain this
> community...people want RuneQuest *and* Glorantha, together...and although
> remaining Glorantha-only fans may be fanatical, in the gaming business
> quality of customers means nothing beyond a certain point; it's quantity of
> customers that counts.
I'm selling now 1.300 issues of Tradetalk in Europe and the rest of the world (the RMM has a much better selling rate with ToRM) and I didn't know much other fan publication which are so specific on one world like Glorantha, which sells so much. The fan scene will find new fans if we try to support this games on conventions, games shows, commercial games fairs etc. That is one of the main reason we have founded the Chaos Society for with 220 members round the world (in more the 20 countries).
RQ AND Glorantha together are dead - IMO that is fact, but who cares? RQ Slayers will dying as soon as it will published but I don't think this will happen to Heroes Wars. See on this digest, the people are dicussing only about Glorantha and not RQ. I want to play on Glorantha and the rules are not so important for me.
IMO it is much to early to speak of a dying Gloranthan game yet.
Cheers
Ingo
Powered by hypermail