The Unofficial Top 32 Guildhall: End of the Mayan Calendar Edition

[Andrew Newton]

Mike Welham wrote:

So did anyone else worry about accidentally hitting the "Submit Post" button instead of the "Preview" button? I had a near-final draft that I wanted to check for formatting and word count, and it made me nervous pressing that "Preview" button. :)

No, but I previewed it, looked something up on Wikipedia to check correct usage, changed a letter, previewed it, added a word I'd been wondering about including since yesterday, previewed it, was happy and submitted it. Then couldn't remember if I'd re-previewed the entire submission before hitting submit. I think I did, and my edits were trivial, but now I don't know, and I can't check - if only to put my mind at rest... Aaargh!

But what's done is done, so I'm not going to worry about it!

[Mike Welham]

Greg Monk wrote:

Hey, all. Just hit the "submit" button, which oddly enough was anti-climactic after several carefully and fearfully pressed "preview" buttons, to do the last-minute tweaking. Note to the wise (or at least the forewarned, if you haven’t already submitted): my entry was 6 words longer here, according to the preview header, than it was in Word. Go figure. Even if the name was counted twice here(once in the header, once in the body), that didn't quite account for it. So, if like me, you are treading the line closely to 400 words, might want to leave a little cushion.

I had the opposite experience--I expected Word to differ from the tool here for word count, and it was exactly the same. I had a few words to spare, so I wasn't too worried about it, but still...

I was glad we got some leeway in the individual sections of the write-up as far as word count went.

[N. Edward Lange]

yeah, i definitely took advantage of flexibility in words per section too. my first round entry got a lot of criticism for being too busy (which in retrospect it really was) so i tried to reign myself in this round- now that its already been submitted i worry that maybe it was too restrained...

i'm with andrew:

Andrew Newton wrote:

Aaargh!

But what's done is done, so I'm not going to worry about it!

[Dan Jones]

Yikes! I keep submitting, and THEN reading advice about how to submit! Grrrr!

Oh, well!

:-)

I'm just glad to finally be a finalist!

[Jacob W. Michaels]

What I think is interesting is my penultimate draft is about 40 words short (which I think is certainly within the parameters, so I'm not worried about that) but I added up the main text-y parts and found I'd used 331 of the 350 words allotted. So I guess I'm just very spare on the name of my organization, its leader and the resources.

Just need to give it one more, last, really-this-time-I-mean-it final look, check the preview, give one MORE actually-ultimate-this-time read, and hit that submit button.

[Andrew Marlowe]

Once I was done I gave it about 17 hours to rest obviously that kind of time isn't available now, but I really didn't need the 17 hours I was worrying at it rereading it over and over again. I finally just had to hit submit button. Most terrifying mouse click ever. We've made it this far (top 3%) we just have to have faith in ourselves.

And again good luck everybody.

[Steve Miller]

Did you guys capitalize:
multinational corporation, military hierarchy, religious cult, assassin's guild;
national, regional, global;
property, valuable assets, castles, or informants
as it is in the Inner Sea World Guide, or did you leave it lower case as it is in the Round 2 Rules Template?

[Mike Welham]

Steve Miller wrote:

Did you guys capitalize:

multinational corporation, military hierarchy, religious cult, assassin's guild;
national, regional, global;
property, valuable assets, castles, or informants
as it is in the Inner Sea World Guide, or did you leave it lower case as it is in the Round 2 Rules Template?

Mine kind of modeled the Pathfinder Society (i.e. a description of the structure), which was mixed case.

[Andrew Newton]

Steve Miller wrote:

Did you guys capitalize:

And just when I'd stopped worrying about it too... I capitalised the first word in each section as if writing a normal sentence. That appears to be the same as the Aspis Consortium in the ISWG:

Structure: Multinational corporation
Scope: Regional
Resources: Real property, other material, and liquid
assets worth tens of millions

I did add a full stop to the end of my Resources section though, which appears to be in error. Bear in mind I have no idea if that's correct or not.

[Jacob W. Michaels]

Steve, I also modeled it after the ISWG.

Andrew, I felt the same way. Just submitted. Now it's a LONG wait until Jan. 31 ... and then Feb. 6.

Of course, this time I'm not going to assume I won't advance (even if I superstitiously feel like I should just make that assumption since it's worked well so far). I probably won't actually stat up any monsters before we learn the twist, but I'm certainly going to start doing prep work so I don't have to cram that all in at the last minute.

Oh, and I have to catch up on my poor, neglected PBP games; put up a fundraising website since I signed up to do that for LLS before I got accepted to Superstar; pay some bills; and hopefully sleep.

[Jacob Kellogg]

Having finally submitted my organization, I'm fraught with random worries: what if I misread the word count (ie, it was really 5XX words and not 3XX words)? What if I missed a horrific spelling error? What if I failed to copy over a paragraph? What if I forgot to type the organization name into the subject line? What if the preview function lied to me and I actually have the formatting all wrong? What if my organization already exists in some supplemental publication that I didn't know about? What if I unknowingly pissed off Ross Byers in a past life and he cackles with glee as he exacts revenge via sabotaging/deleting my entry?

I need a drink.

[Steve Miller]

Thanks gentlemen. I guess the formatting isn't as important this round as are the votes.

[Jacob W. Michaels]

Jacob K., I'm definitely there with you. I had everything done, all ready to hit submit -- and went back to the initial template one last time to make sure I hadn't missed an entire line/section somehow.

[Andrew Newton]

Jacob Kellogg wrote:

What if I failed to copy over a paragraph?

I need a drink.

I've read my entry so many times in Word now I could have done that and my brain would have just filled in the gaps, leaving me blissfully unaware.

Wait, no, it said 394 words, so I can't have missed anything blatant. Missed the point - perhaps. Missed the target - quite possibly. But not a paragraph...

[Mikko Kallio]

I think the template is our primary source and the ISWG covers everything not mentioned in the template. But I'm sure what we actually wrote there matters more than how we formatted it.

Good luck guys!

[Mike Welham]

I'm looking forward to the monster round (assuming I make it that far), but I will wait until the twist is revealed before working on it. Thankfully, they're giving us advance warning, so that will make it nice for preparation, and it will keep me from the temptation of getting on my thread and posting about my organization.

As others have said, good luck!

[Jacob W. Michaels]

Was thinking about the Bestiary 3 and I think I've figured out the twist! The monster's going to have to come from a poem!

If I'm right, I totally call dibs on Custard the Cowardly Dragon.

"Custard the dragon had big sharp teeth,
And spikes on top of him and scales underneath,
Mouth like a fireplace, chimney for a nose,
And realio, trulio, daggers on his toes."

[Jacob Trier]

As one of the few remaining yet to submit (final draft is looking better and better), I can only appreciate all the advice.

And I'm definitly going to be working on my monster submission from the second I hit submit. Being unprepared for the next round because I figured I would never get that far is a mistake I'm not looking to make again.

[Tom Phillips]

Jacob W. Michaels wrote:

"Custard the dragon had big sharp teeth,
And spikes on top of him and scales underneath,
Mouth like a fireplace, chimney for a nose,
And realio, trulio, daggers on his toes."

<golf clap>

[Greg Monk]

Jacob W. Michaels wrote:

Was thinking about the Bestiary 3 and I think I've figured out the twist! The monster's going to have to come from a poem!

I am SO not going to be ok if we have to submit our entries in iambic pentameter!

(Though limerick would be kinda cool:

There was an old monster from Iz...)

[Jacob Trier]

Gah, for no apparent reason, google docs suddenly refuses to delete the two characters to the immediate left of the cursor. What gives?

[Daniel Rust]

Right. Draft written and with the proofers. Editing down from 450 words was a killer. Just a couple of names to amend and I'm done.

*wipes sweat from brow and pours a large whisky*

[Mike Welham]

Jacob Trier wrote:

Gah, for no apparent reason, google docs suddenly refuses to delete the two characters to the immediate left of the cursor. What gives?

Hopefully, those characters won't transfer to the submission form (or, at worst, you can delete them if they're in the submission form).

[James Raine]

Thanks for entering RPG Superstar—good luck!
Your submission was received 2 minutes ago
Come back January 31 to view this round's entries and cast your vote!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[Jacob Trier]

I've switched to word for the final touches. Right now, I'm more or less waiting for my wife, who teaches High school English, to proffread and for last-minute feedback from my go-go guys.

I plan on submitting within the hour.

[Mike Welham]

James Raine wrote:

Thanks for entering RPG Superstar—good luck!

Your submission was received 2 minutes ago
Come back January 31 to view this round's entries and cast your vote!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

+2 points for use of a meme. :)

[N. Edward Lange]

i also followed the ISWG pattern (and just capitalized the first word). if anyone's looking for a way to distract themselves from anxiously fretting over their submission that its too late to change (other than obsessing about what the twist for round three will be), i posted a revised version of my item, just to practice/try to learn from my feedback... i'd really appreciate any critiques anyone has time for!

good luck in round two!

[James Raine]

I did that for my item too. Mostly text cleanup and clarification, but it's good to be on this stuff.

[Eric Morton]

Mike Welham wrote:

+2 points for use of a meme. :)

Wait, there are points? Why am I just learning about this now? :P

[Chris Shaeffer]

Phew, just submitted! I'm glad I wasn't going to the wire. I feel pretty good about it, but I wasn't able to get it proofread. :p

Daniel Rust wrote:

*wipes sweat from brow and pours a large whisky*

Are all game designers raging alcoholics? :3

EDIT: I just hope my organization isn't "blah" or "meh." Still, I've gotten further than I ever expected!

[Jacob Trier]

This just in: Naming is hard.

[Thomas LeBlanc]

Jacob Trier wrote:

This just in: Naming is hard.

I agree. Once I had a name, the rest of the organization seemed to fall into place. The first couple orgs I worked on had names I was not comfortable with. The 7th name/org was a charm.

[Chris Shaeffer]

This is true. I was initially trying to name the thing last, but it was a HUGE speed bump when writing. And I couldn't even do a tentative name, because it bothered me so much.

I just had to spend two hours shuffling names around until I was happy. Only then was I able to focus properly.

[Mike Welham]

Same here with regards to name. I had about 4 iterations of a name before I finally settled on something.

[Alexander Bennett]

Submitted. Looking it over one last time I started having flashbacks to late last year when I looked back at the early submissions and thought "Oh right, I really liked this," but completely forgot about them cause for one reason or another they didn't make it to he next round.

Was it good enough? No clue, I feel like they purposely make this round extremely difficult, forcing us to work with very new rules or things that don't really have rules.

Now to run errands, eat food, and kill that damn Drow in tonight's game.
-Xander

[Andrew Newton]

Chris Shaeffer wrote:

I just hope my organization isn't "blah" or "meh."

Likewise. I had no expectations of getting through round 1 so I created Sticky Pugfoot as much for my own pleasure as for the competition. Now I'm through I really don't want to mess up, so I toned my organisation back a bit. They were still fun to write, but they were my 'safe' option. I just hope they're not so safe they're boring...

[Jacob Trier]

RPG Superstar wrote:

Thanks for entering RPG Superstar—good luck!
Your submission was received 4 seconds ago
Come back January 31 to view this round's entries and cast your vote![/qoute]

A full one hour and nine minutes to spare...

[Jacob Kellogg]

Andrew Newton wrote:

Chris Shaeffer wrote:

I just hope my organization isn't "blah" or "meh."

Likewise. I had no expectations of getting through round 1 so I created Sticky Pugfoot as much for my own pleasure as for the competition. Now I'm through I really don't want to mess up, so I toned my organisation back a bit. They were still fun to write, but they were my 'safe' option. I just hope they're not so safe they're boring...

Add me to your ranks, as well. Having also not expected to advance, I put in zero advance prep on my organization. And having my item's main flaw being a lack of clarity in the description, I focused on that with my organization and now fear my interest in clarity may have left me with a "meh" (but clear!) entry.

So how many of us does that make who have potentially "blah"/"meh" organizations? This might be a boring round for the spectators! ;)

[Jacob W. Michaels]

Strange, Andrew, I went the other way: The organization I submitted is a bit more gonzo than my usual wont. My recollection from last year is people generally preferred something that erred to the "that's cool!" side than opposite, so I pushed myself that way a little bit.

As for names, I'm fine with naming organizations. I can usually find one that are good enough I can write up the group and then tweak it (though it leaves me obsessively looking for references to the original name as I go on). I HATE naming NPCs, though (in this case, the leader).

I started looking through my old files for one I liked, at which point I realized -- true confession -- just how often I pull names I like from books that I don't think my players have read (thank you Jim Butcher, Jennifer Fallon, Michelle West...). I found one I liked -- Teraknian -- and then went, no, can't use that, it's already from a Paizo product!

[N. Edward Lange]

i didn't use that phrase, but i'm also nervous that my entry may have been blah... i liked it when i thought of it, i liked it when i hit submit (though even then i had a nagging doubt about the name...), now that i'm just waiting i'm not sure how much i like it =/

[Jacob Kellogg]

Jacob W. Michaels wrote:

Strange, Andrew, I went the other way: The organization I submitted is a bit more gonzo than my usual wont. My recollection from last year is people generally preferred something that erred to the "that's cool!" side than opposite, so I pushed myself that way a little bit.

Crap, you're gonna steal all our votes!

[Jacob Trier]

Seriously, Jacob and Jacob...one of you is going to have to switch avatar. To my bleary eyes, it looks like one of you is having a conversation with himself.

[Thomas LeBlanc]

Question: Who here only likes to GM? Only play? Or if you both GM and play, what is the ration?

My preference is to GM 1 day and play 1 day a week.

[Mike Welham]

Yeah, the second thoughts about my organization kicked in this morning (thank you brain for waiting until this morning, though).

I'll have to wait to see what the judges have to say when we see the organizations go up on the 31st.

[Mike Welham]

Thomas LeBlanc wrote:

Question: Who here only likes to GM? Only play? Or if you both GM and play, what is the ration?

My preference is to GM 1 day and play 1 day a week.

I like a mix. In my group, we tend to play through arcs, where one person GMs until they reach a good clean break in their campaign, then another person takes over. Regrettably, we only get to play once every two weeks, so the transition from GM to GM is fairly slow.

[Thomas LeBlanc]

Jacob Trier wrote:

Seriously, Jacob and Jacob...one of you is going to have to switch avatar. To my bleary eyes, it looks like one of you is having a conversation with himself.

That is a bad idea. I am used to seeing Jiggy's avatar.

[Mike Welham]

Alternately, we could all switch to the same avatar. :)

[Jacob W. Michaels]

Jacob K., I sure hope so. I'm trying to figure out whether it's good or bad I'm not getting any comments on my wondrous item. I'm very jealous of those of you in the 20s and up!

Jacob T., for what it's worth, it's confusing to me too! Maybe I'll look around and see if I can find another one I like.

Thomas, I most GM these days. We had a group going regularly but then the GM's wife started bailing on us. So I started another campaign, intended to be a solo one, for the fourth person in our group and our GM joined in as a player. Now that's become our main campaign.

I enjoy playing, and wish I got to do it a little more, but on the other hand, as a DM, whenever I have a character idea, I can just work him/her in as an NPC.

[James Raine]

Hahaha. It should just be text that says, "THIS IS THE RPG SUPERSTAR TOP 32 AVATAR".

[Jacob Kellogg]

Mike Welham wrote:

Alternately, we could all switch to the same avatar. :)

YES!

"Cartoony Lizard-Nerd: Official Messageboard Avatar of the RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32 Contestants"

Let's do it! C'mon, guys!