Valhalla Calling: Adventure Designers Wanted
Sound the horns of Valhalla! Adventure awaits, and you might be the one who provides this adventure to a multitude of stalwart heroes!

Valhalla Calling is the newest and most awesome contest from Kobold Press. If you have an idea for a Pathfinder Roleplaying Game or AGE System adventure that you’d love to design and see published by Kobold Press, write and submit a 400-word pitch for a 32-page adventure.

A panel of industry professionals will pick five finalists from these submissions, and the voting public will choose the winner from among those five. That person will hear the call to Valhalla, which will come in the form of a design contract to write a 32-page RPG adventure module.

Learn more Kobold Quarterly.com.

It's pretty much a "skip directly to the finalist round of RPG Superstar" sort of contest.

I'm really, really, really looking forward to reading these pitches!

Was there any reason for it overlapping with RPG Superstar? Seems a little odd for it to do so.

This is the time of year when we can make it fly; the alternative was to wait until May of 2013.

Fortunately, because it is shorter than Superstar, I suspect we'll have people who enter both.

I'm really, really, really looking forward to reading these pitches!

Well, why wait? You have your first submission = )

So I've been told, and having an entry on Day 1 is awesome!

For practical reasons, the other judges and I are holding off until we have our first 25 or 50 entries before diving in.

But we'll get there soon enough. Once there are 100 submissions (or by December 15), off we go!

Will progress on the number of submissions be broadcast?

Yes, I suspect we'll announce when we have 10, 25, 50, etc submissions on the Kobold Press Facebook page.

Maybe on the blog as well, though that is up to web editor Miranda.

I'll start writing tonight.

Yes, I suspect we'll announce when we have 10, 25, 50, etc submissions on the Kobold Press Facebook page.

Maybe on the blog as well, though that is up to web editor Miranda.

Maybe you could post the number of slots remaining here too - as a way both of informing prospective pitchers, and raising the profile of the competition. :)

Not sure I want to raise the profile of the competition too much; there's already a community of people who are likely to submit something.

Fortunately, people who are already familiar with how Kobold Press authors turn into Paizo designers and staff will understand that winning Valhalla Calling is a huge step up for a freelancer.

I expect the first wave of submissions to hit after the weekend, and then another bunch after the Thanksgiving holiday. I'll definitely update with that news on the Kobold Press site.

Ok, just a quick update on entries: there are 37 pitches submitted, and there's room for 63 more.

The December 20 deadline is creeping up!

62. ;)

And we're at roughly 51 submissions, so over the halfway mark. There's 9 days left until the December 20 deadline.

With just 50 competing submissions, someone stands an excellent chance of picking up this publishing contract and getting their work out into the gaming world. Could be you!

I would expect a rush of entries towards the end as people hone their pitches. Don't submit entry number 101!

Already in! Good luck everyone!

Just to make sure I understand this correctly. Placing the adventure proposal in Midgard is optional, correct? As I currently understand it, it's quite possible to write an adventure that doesn't necessarily assume a specific setting.

The rules are very clear: placing the adventure in Midgard is an option you have, but it is absolutely not a requirement.

Submissions of generic, any-fantasy-setting adventures are absolutely fine, and Kobold Press continues to publish a fair bit of setting-free material (like the Monsters of Sin series).

So, yes.

If one were to win this contest, would it make them illegible to participate in RPG Superstar?

If one were to win this contest, would it make them illegible to participate in RPG Superstar?

The adventure wouldn't be a hardback with your name on it, and you wouldn't be working full-time for the industry (I believe those are the 2 things that make one inelligible), so you'd be fine. It would just be a professional credit under your belt, and the chance for other publishers to eye your writing abilities.

And in addition to that, the deadline for this competition is 2 days after the Superstar deadline.

So, it's not possible to win Valhalla Calling contest before Superstar. You are eligible for both even if you win the VC contest.

Christina's right, though, winning it would be a great credit that would likely get you work at other publishers.

Look where it got me!

*drives off in Ferrari*

Any chance we might see a smple submission to get an idea how to write up the proposal?

The rules are very clear: placing the adventure in Midgard is an option you have, but it is absolutely not a requirement.

Submissions of generic, any-fantasy-setting adventures are absolutely fine, and Kobold Press continues to publish a fair bit of setting-free material (like the Monsters of Sin series).

So, yes.

Heh, that's what I figured. Unfortunately I'm just one of those people who sometimes need to have things spelled out twice.

Anyway, thanks for the confirmation. :)

Any chance we might see a smple submission to get an idea how to write up the proposal?

The options are intentionally fairly wide open: this is not like a Wondrous Item, which has tight formatting requirements. Instead, you need to sell the premise of the adventure as a writer and as a designer in your own style. Everyone has their own theory on how to do this, but I'd point you to a couple possibly relevant resources:

• The contest rules themselves spell out the required text elements. Pretty basic: title, system, description.
  
• A few such sample pitches are up on the Kobold Forums for review by patrons of the Midgard Tales project (if you weren't a project backer, this link won't work). These are real pitches for adventures in that anthology.
  
• There's a discussion of "How to Pitch" in the Kobold Guide to Game Design. Won the Gold ENnie in 2012.
  
• Here's the thread on the Kobold Forums about Valhalla Calling.

Hope that helps!

Let's make sure more people see this.

Valhalla Calling: Last Call!
It’s December 19, 2012. That means that if you haven’t already submitted a pitch to the Valhalla Calling contest, you’re just about out of time! The contest deadline is on December 20th (tomorrow), so if you feel the call of Valhalla, you have less than a day to do something about it!

For more information, take a look at the contest rules

And that's a wrap! We have 90 entries to the contest in hand, and the judges will begin reviewing them tonight.

The Top 5 pitches will go up for a public vote as soon as the judges conclude their cajolery, bribery, and knife fights!

I may explode with excitement.

Awesome - 90 is a good round number and I expect to see some great adventures among them!

It looks like the finalists are up and I'm among them!

Mine is "Seventeen Steps of the Dancing Master"

Also, we have "Poisoned Winter" by Michael Lane,

"The Cursed Collection of the Archmage Moor" by John "Ross" Rossomangno,

"Hangman's Hill" by Heine Stick,

and "The Crown of Charon" by Sersa Victory.

You can vote here.

Good luck to my fellow finalists! :)

Damn! Been working on an adventure (and setting) for a while, but just saw this...and the cut-off date has passed already. Good luck to you folks that submitted!

Congratulations to the finalists. :-)

Good luck Jeff and Ravenmantle! Five really strong pitches.

@yeti1069 - if you aren't already, subscribe to the Kobold Courier email newsletter. All the cool things happening in the kobold warrens gets mentioned there.

Yeti1069, the odds of us doing another such competition are pretty good, though it will probably be 6 to 12 months before we run it again.

For the newsletter, you can also sign up in the black box at the bottom of every page (including the link michaelane provided), and it is FREE.

Class is in session, folks! The Top Five submissions for Valhalla Calling are here. Check them out, then head over to the forums for feedback and judge's critiques here.

Anyone who has ever wanted to submit a premise of an adventure for publication should pay close attention. We're revealing all the secrets right in the KQ forums!

Congratulations to the top 5; and thanks Brandon for the amount of feedback you're giving.

The winner has been announced! Sersa Victory has won the contract for the "Crown of Charon" adventure for Pathfinder.

Details here.

Huzzah! I look forward to portraying it on the store blog!