Hello and welcome again to RPG Superstar 2014! I'm Sean K Reynolds, host of this year's RPG Superstar competition, designer at Paizo, and a judge for the previous four RPG Superstar competitions.
So far after a full week since the Round 1 submission period started, we have about 200 wondrous items in the hopper, which is about on par for previous years. Given that we usually have a surge of entries at the start and end of the Round 1 open call, I expect we'll have about as many wondrous items this year as we did last year. Here's some quick advice for everyone who hasn't submitted an item yet.
- When I was an RPG Superstar judge, I wrote a series of long posts about "design traps" you should avoid when designing your wondrous item submission. Although I'm not a judge this year, the public voters and the official judges are aware of these "traps," so I suggest you read about each of them.
- Remember to use the standard magic item stat block format presented in the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook. The submission tool uses the message board interface, so you can use [b][/b] for bold and [i][/i] for italics. The Round 1 rules actually include a properly-formatted magic item stat block template—you can save yourself a lot of work by copying it to your favorite word processing program, writing your item into template, and (when you're 100% ready to submit it) paste it into the submission form. Just remember to hit the Preview button to see how it looks, and only hit Submit Post when you're sure it looks right!
- Don't let your inexperience talk you out of submitting an item. We've had people as young as age 9 make it into the Top 32, and people who've never played Pathfinder before. Give it a shot!
Also, last year, about 5% of the items submitted to the competition were by women (based on the gender info the author provided in the Paizo.com message board profiles). I'd really like to see that number go WAY up! RPG gaming has been a male-dominated hobby for a long time, but in my 18 years in the game industry I've seen a steady increase in the number of lady gamers. If you are female, or know any ladies in or outside your gaming group, please encourage them to create a wondrous item and submit it to RPG Superstar this year. Of course, feel free to encourage any gamers you know to write something for the competition, too!
Remember, the deadline to submit your item is January 1, 2014 at 2 PM Pacific time! Open voting for all Round 1 items begins immediately after the submission deadline.
Thanks, and good luck!
Sean K Reynolds
Designer, RPG Superstar Host & Former Judge
