Quote from: VengerSatanis on September 06, 2024, 02:43:17 PMYou guys think there's a market for that?  If you know of a resource (like a web page with some details on getting started), let me know.  I'll look into it, and then... maybe?

There's always a market for smut! Why the internet is for porn!, didn't you hear that cartoon song from way back decades ago? All you need is your own fan website and a section for people to share their fiction writing. My goodness will people share the most misbegotten things with the world. Just be sure you have them restricted to PG-13 on the board section (personal liability reasons) and then any of the most talented pull aside for a submission opportunity.

Eh, I don't know the full details on how to make money from this. But the slash fiction community seems indefatigable. Having a few memorable characters garners shipping and all the horrors that arise from such abyssal depths.

Hmm... On second thought I don't know if I should direct you down such a primrose path. You seem far too well adjusted and stand up of a guy. It could be quite the moral hazard.

Quote from: Opaopajr on September 11, 2024, 09:45:05 AMThe secret around all that is the Bi- prefix. Instant seal of approval. It could be bisexual, biracial, biromantic, bicurious, bifocal, bicycle... doesn't matter, provides instant shielding.

  Fulton Sheen was biritual. Does this mean I could get away with quoting him on RPGNet?

Very good to read it is not an end of creative endeavors, but rather a change on the business side.

Do You Believe In Unlikelihoods?

If you stop by this thread again Venger:
I really enjoyed the POD supplements for Alpha Blue I received from Amazon POD a while back!

Along those lines could you, Venger, perhaps also include the three THOT books (THOT Audit, THOT Police, A Credit For Your THOTs) in your new POD roundup? Either a combined book or just make them as they are POD, either on Amazon or drivethru.  The same POD type as 'The Last Alpha Blue Supplement' (the one with the Predator, Alien, Office Space parody cover) would be great! 

Quote from: Brigman on September 06, 2024, 10:44:28 PMHey!  Speaking of which.

Does this mean Inappropriate Characters is back on?

Nope, that's one of the many things that I just don't have time for... especially now that I'm coming back and trying to pursue this again... still... whatever.

Quote from: S'mon on September 07, 2024, 05:11:41 AM

Quote from: VengerSatanis on September 06, 2024, 02:58:14 PMYou can't have gonzo and then rein it in to the point where it's not gonzo, anymore.  At that point, you're trying to serve opposing masters.  And good luck with that, as Jordan Peterson would say.

For me you can adventure in a gonzo setting & still have immersion, with some willing suspension of disbelief.

Absolutely!  That's one of the central themes of my upcoming book.  There's no reason why gonzo shouldn't be fully immersive.  In fact, I find that genre to be especially immersive... given how I design and run the game.

Quote from: crkrueger on September 07, 2024, 12:03:31 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit on August 25, 2024, 11:01:10 AMIt's true that his politics were more present in his RPG products than you'd ever see in my products.  Of course, some people with very left-wing politics might not buy my games either, but as the OSR tends toward either conservatives or people who don't care about politics in any way, my games (which do not have overt modern-day political statements in them) still sell well.

I think that the smutty side of Venger's work might actually have hurt him a bit more with the OSR crowd than his politics; a lot of people who would otherwise have liked his games and probably like his current politics might have for moral reasons been turned off (pardon the pun) by the sexual content in Venger's products. That, and I can imagine some conservative and Christian OSR gamers might even have some qualms about buying a product from a guy named "Satanis".

If he makes a comeback in a few years, he might want to change his nom-de-plume to "Venger Jones" or something like that.

That's a good observation.  Something full of sex by a guy named Satanis who had a popular leftist viewpoint and used PbtA would have done a lot better.

Venger's content profile and political profile didn't match very well.

Personally, I would have preferred an unflinching S&S line with less outright comedy.

Edit:  Well, glad to see he's back.

In another life, another universe I was a hardcore liberal / libertarian... but then I woke up (pun intended) to Communism, pedophilia, terrorism, and transgenderism.  At that point it was either go MAGA or bust.  So, yeah... stupid politics kind of fucked up my entire world.

Quote from: Kuroth on September 13, 2024, 03:18:12 AMVery good to read it is not an end of creative endeavors, but rather a change on the business side.

Do You Believe In Unlikelihoods?

If you stop by this thread again Venger:
I really enjoyed the POD supplements for Alpha Blue I received from Amazon POD a while back!

Along those lines could you, Venger, perhaps also include the three THOT books (THOT Audit, THOT Police, A Credit For Your THOTs) in your new POD roundup? Either a combined book or just make them as they are POD, either on Amazon or drivethru.  The same POD type as 'The Last Alpha Blue Supplement' (the one with the Predator, Alien, Office Space parody cover) would be great!

I had always intended that after writing the 4th one that never happened, partially because the artist who did the first 3 covers got a day job and stopped making art... or perhaps that was just some lame excuse.  It was to be called THOTs and Prayers.  I'll give you a tentative maybe, hoss! 

Quote from: VengerSatanis on September 13, 2024, 08:13:19 PM

Quote from: Kuroth on September 13, 2024, 03:18:12 AMVery good to read it is not an end of creative endeavors, but rather a change on the business side.

Do You Believe In Unlikelihoods?

If you stop by this thread again Venger:
I really enjoyed the POD supplements for Alpha Blue I received from Amazon POD a while back!

Along those lines could you, Venger, perhaps also include the three THOT books (THOT Audit, THOT Police, A Credit For Your THOTs) in your new POD roundup? Either a combined book or just make them as they are POD, either on Amazon or drivethru.  The same POD type as 'The Last Alpha Blue Supplement' (the one with the Predator, Alien, Office Space parody cover) would be great!

I had always intended that after writing the 4th one that never happened, partially because the artist who did the first 3 covers got a day job and stopped making art... or perhaps that was just some lame excuse.  It was to be called THOTs and Prayers.  I'll give you a tentative maybe, hoss! 

That's great to read!  Whatever you choose, the work on Alpha Blue in the past is much appreciated!  Don't do things that drag you down, even the Thot books, if that is the case.  Onward my friend!

Oh, you could have said the Space Dungeon Master is meant to write a full 4th adventure to complete the campaign, using their own devious ribald!

Quote from: VengerSatanis on September 13, 2024, 08:08:19 PMIn another life, another universe I was a hardcore liberal / libertarian... but then I woke up (pun intended) to Communism, pedophilia, terrorism, and transgenderism.  At that point it was either go MAGA or bust. 

Many people are saying that, these days.

Is VengerCon still going to happen?

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on September 06, 2024, 03:04:12 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on August 25, 2024, 11:01:10 AMThat, and I can imagine some conservative and Christian OSR gamers might even have some qualms about buying a product from a guy named "Satanis".

Being Jewish, that stuff is neither here nor there for me. I just glanced at the stuff and it all seemed what we in Australia call "try-hard" - meaning someone who is visibly trying hard to present themselves as more competent than they are, in an embarassing way. In this case it's try-hard edgelord. It just didn't interest me.

Conservative Christian gamer here (albeit rarely OSR). I can kinda see what you mean with the try-harding. VS's username doesn't turn me off at all; in fact I would say it's reasonably tame. What I've seen of VS's content isn't even that oversexed from my point of view, but because it is a thing, it leads us to an inevitably awkward conversation.

You can't discuss sex content these days without mentioning the part pornography plays. Porn is not natural sexuality; it's hotwiring your brain to deliver a hard drug without the need for delivering pharmaceuticals. As such, it acts less like sexuality and more like consuming a hard drug. I think a lot of the behavioral problems my generation has (including unnecessary sex changes) is at least partially because few people appreciate the Jekyll and Hyde dynamic between sexual intimacy and pornography use.

Also, pornography use can limit creativity because it overloads the dopamine circuit.

VS doesn't make a lot of content which appeals to me personally because I am not really an OSR player, but very few RPG products do fit my tastes, anyways. I do think he isn't getting good marketing mileage out of the sexual content, in part because this is generation "addled by pornography."

Quote from: VengerSatanis on September 13, 2024, 07:58:40 PM

Quote from: Brigman on September 06, 2024, 10:44:28 PMHey!  Speaking of which.

Does this mean Inappropriate Characters is back on?

Nope, that's one of the many things that I just don't have time for... especially now that I'm coming back and trying to pursue this again... still... whatever.

Yeah, I just read your blog.

QuoteBasically, I really wanted to keep doing hardcovers, but couldn't because of all the boxes in our basement.  Instead of just doing what I should have done after Chartreuse Shadows, go the print-on-demand route, I convinced myself that I could dig my way out of this hole by releasing only PDFs and selling hardcovers here and there on the side. 

Well, that didn't work.  So, to Hell with my expectations.  Venger Satanis is not too good for pod.

I used to work in book publishing. I think that marketing RPGs via hardcover books was a mistake from the beginning. You wind up with a lot of cram culture, the implication that a bigger book is better (it's usually worse), a ton of technical debt between editions, and printing hardcovers with art is crazy expensive.

Like, the nearest analog to RPG hardcovers is university textbooks, and those start at $150. By the time you hit books which are the size of your average RPG, they tend to be $300 or more. Everything about the RPG printed book business is wrong if you squint when you look at it.

But the ridiculous costs of university textbooks are because you have a captive audience there. People who must buy the book for their class. It's especially vile when the book was written by the guy teaching the course, instant moneymaker for him.

Quote from: Fheredin on September 16, 2024, 03:00:07 PMLike, the nearest analog to RPG hardcovers is university textbooks, and those start at $150. By the time you hit books which are the size of your average RPG, they tend to be $300 or more. Everything about the RPG printed book business is wrong if you squint when you look at it.

Now here's the irony...

From The Acaeum on the printing of the Monster Manuel and subsequent books:

QuoteAbout the publishing of this print (the first hardback RPG manual ever printed), again from Gygax: "It was no problem finding a printer that could do a stitched binding and school-book cover material, as I wanted the AD&D volumes to be as nearly indestructible as could be managed.  Later on the Blumes changed that to save a nickel or two on each copy printed... as if we weren't making enough as it was. (Acaeum note: this occurred with the Fourth Beta print).  Crown Books wanted me to write a special introductory game book exclusively for them, but that was a no-go.  Simon & Schuster contacted me about book trade distribution, but they were going to take a year to set it up, so I wasn't too thrilled.  Then I got a phone call from Mildred Marmur, then the VP of Sub-Rights Licensing at Random House.  They flew me out to NYC the next week and were ready to begin distribution in a month's time.  As the remainder of the deal I negotiated assured TSR cash flow and other great benefits, I signed my name up there in their offices on the second day of our meetings.  Having Millie as an advocate was a lot of help in cutting a great deal for TSR.  Both of her sons were D&Ders!"

https://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/setpages/monster.html

Quote from: RPGPundit on September 18, 2024, 12:56:40 PMBut the ridiculous costs of university textbooks are because you have a captive audience there. People who must buy the book for their class. It's especially vile when the book was written by the guy teaching the course, instant moneymaker for him.

That's half true. Past beyond $200 absolutely that's usually the cause. But it's also true that textbooks try to justify their fees with all sorts of illustrations, tables, and pictures (naturally, some are stock art, but usually not all.)

The thing to bear in mind is that the art which tends to accompany most RPGs is on par with some of the very most expensive illustrations of photographs used in textbooks.

I am not saying that RPGs should charge $500 per book. But I think the market would be notably more sensible if it were something between $100 and $150. However, these are prices that most GMs and players just won't accept, which means the industry itself has to change eventually.