So about three and a half years ago, my best friend (Amber Scott) gave me the crazy idea that I should send some of my homebrew stuff to Dragon. "They need articles," she said. "You have some interesting stuff," she said. "They pay money for it," she said. The last one sold me. So I sent an e-mail to Matt Sernett (the editor of Dragon at the time). Matt wanted to see some of the prestige classes I wrote, a bunch of spells I had, and some of the ideas I had for Class Acts.
The spells article got turned over to Wes. I was certain it was the awesomest article he had ever seen. Then I got the rejection. Wes very easily could've told me a simple, "No thanks." He didn't, though. He took the time to point out stuff - the good and bad. He improved my spell designing simply by being fair and honest. Thank you, Wes. While I never sent another Spellcraft query your way, I didn't forget the lessons you taught me.
The prestige class articles got rejected when the Gaining Prestige article was dropped. *shrug* It happens.
Another idea, another e-mail - this time to Jason Bulmahn. I had this crazy idea about creating "Initiate" feats for the core deities, as well as unique spells. (and we see where some of Wes's help paid off!) Jason catches a lot of flak (some of it from me) about how slow he is to respond to e-mails. But I'll say for the record: when I had an actual problem writing this article, Jason was quick to respond, and full of fantastic help and advice. He gave me more words with which to work, and helped me focus. So despite all the grief I gave you over the article (I can't tell you how many e-mails I sent asking if he was going to publish it), thank you, Jason.
I saved the Class Acts stuff for last. Of the twelve articles I've been lucky enough to have published in Dragon, 10 of them were in the Class Acts section. I had ideas, and I had the ability to write mechanics. But wow was my writing style really poor. I didn't even know what passive voice was back then, let alone how to go about fixing it. It would've been really easy for Mike McArtor to look at the sloppy writing style and just blow me off. But he didn't. Mike worked with me, and taught me a whole lot about the craft of writing. He always made my articles look good once they hit the pages of the magazine, and he was always willing to help me learn. Thank you, Mike. For your efforts to help me get better, and for the friendship we've developed.
I'm sharing all this publicly for two reasons.
First, everybody needs to know the amount of effort and love these guys put into every issue of the magazine. I have no doubts in my mind at all that whatever they touch in the future will be rock solid.
Second, I specifically want Erik and Lisa to know about the quality people they have working under them. And while I'm completely certain they already know that, it's always good to have it reinforced. They're not just good writers and editors; they're good people, and I feel special for having received the opportunity to get to know them over the past several years.
Cheers, fellas! I look forward to seeing whatever you produce in the future. I know it'll be top notch!