Correspondence editors?

When you hire editors for Dragon and Dungeon, do you allow them to work from anywhere in the nation by correspondence, or do you require that they move to the Bellevue area and report to the office daily?

When you hire editors for Dragon and Dungeon, do you allow them to work from anywhere in the nation by correspondence, or do you require that they move to the Bellevue area and report to the office daily?

You must move here. Wes, for example, moved here from Maryland. Jason moved here from Wisconsin. I only had to move 160 miles, so I had it easy. ;)

Yup; there's a LOT more to the job than just proofreading. It'd be impossible to do without being in the office.

...plus, they'd need someone to sustain them during the next snowstorm....

Thanks for the responses guys. I also posted this question the Dungeon general board. They responded, and I posted this followup question:

"I've read the submission guidelines, and I see that the pay rate for submitted material is 5 cents per word published. Is there any significant increase in pay rate for repeated contributors? Also, can contributors work on irregular articles, like the Core Beliefs series, or are those large articles reserved for full time editors?"

Nobody there has answered that one yet, so I figured I'd try my hand here too. When I say "significant increase in pay rate", what I'm really asking is "Could someone make a passable living simply by being a repeat contributor for Paizo?"

Nobody there has answered that one yet, so I figured I'd try my hand here too. When I say "significant increase in pay rate", what I'm really asking is "Could someone make a passable living simply by being a repeat contributor for Paizo?"

The short answer to both questions is no.

"Could someone make a passable living simply by being a repeat contributor for Paizo?"

if you wrote every article every month, you'd be doing OK. :)

If you wrote every word in Dungeon every month - including the editorial - you'd make about as much as one of the editors... which is to say, not much.

At least, until you shot yourself. Because good lord, that's a lot of writing.

If you wrote every word in Dungeon every month - including the editorial - you'd make about as much as one of the editors... which is to say, not much.

At least, until you shot yourself. Because good lord, that's a lot of writing.

And you'd have to be careful about the gun you could use, since you'd likely have to buy it from a disreputable (i.e., cheap) pawn shop.

"This shotgun is dirty and smells of elderberries. Are you sure it'll fire?"
"Sure sure, kid, I... uh... I cleaned it... uh... yesterday..."
"Well okay..."

buddhaSMASH wrote:

Nobody there has answered that one yet, so I figured I'd try my hand here too. When I say "significant increase in pay rate", what I'm really asking is "Could someone make a passable living simply by being a repeat contributor for Paizo?"

The short answer to both questions is no.

Bah! Not true! I do it! Okay, I don't do it. I almost do it! Then again I eat mostly rats and roaches.

It's all about controlling your expenses. You can't get into whatever new stupid expensive fad comes around you know what I-

GUAYAKI!!!

;-)

A prolific writer could make a living writing for Dragon alone... if he lived in a country where the cost of living was sufficiently low. If your first language is English, I don't think you live anywhere cheap enough.

But a cartographer for DUNGEON, on the other hand . . . well, those dudes practically roll in cash!

Damn. Ok. Well, give me some hope here. Is it at least safe to say that repeatedly getting published as a contributor can help you along the path to being hired as an editor?

If you wrote every word in Dungeon every month - including the editorial - you'd make about as much as one of the editors... which is to say, not much.

At least, until you shot yourself. Because good lord, that's a lot of writing.

That begs the question:

Do you think one day you'll have to quit the DnD business and get a real job?

Do you currently work multipe jobs?

James Sutter wrote:

If you wrote every word in Dungeon every month - including the editorial - you'd make about as much as one of the editors... which is to say, not much.

At least, until you shot yourself. Because good lord, that's a lot of writing.

That begs the question:

Do you think one day you'll have to quit the DnD business and get a real job?

Do you currently work multipe jobs?

Most (if not all, I haven't exactly run through the list) of the editors at Paizo have credits on WotC books. (I think Jason's Dungeonscape is probably the most recent example, unless I missed something this month)

So aside from their "regular" jobs at Paizo, I'm pretty sure they are getting additional freelancer pay from WoTC. That being said, I have no idea how much WotC pays for 128 sourcebook.

So I guess that would qualify as two jobs, albeit two jobs directly related to gaming, which must be pretty damm cool. I like my job, but I like DnD and writing better ;-)

Damn. Ok. Well, give me some hope here. Is it at least safe to say that repeatedly getting published as a contributor can help you along the path to being hired as an editor?

It certainly can't hurt.

But a cartographer for DUNGEON, on the other hand . . . well, those dudes practically roll in cash!

Heh!

I do make a living doing maps, but I work for other companies, too. And even then I'm not exactly wallpapering my house with cash. :)

Well, . . . that's because . . . you're modest, right? And don't like ostentatious demonstrations of your wealth? Or because getting those friggin bills lined up properly in the wallpaper paste is such a hassle? Something like that, right?