I was a judge this year and am happy to answer any questions you guys want to put to me. Some questions I will decline to enter because our deliberations were confidential. But I can certainly lay out my own reasons for supporting most of the choices our panel made.

And RPGPundit, the fact is that the ENnies do affect sales, corporate reputations and fan opinion. That's why so many of our winners print the ENnies logos on their products and why so many winners, the most recent case being the publishers of Shadowrun 4E let us know how much an ENnies win has helped them to reach the fans and improve their sales.

All of us on the panel, as well as the board members, are hopeful and excited about WOTC re-entering the competition but, even without them, the ENnies have continued to generate good industry buzz and pull in an ever-growing base of fans who vote on the awards. And I want to thank you, in your blog posts and here on The RPG Site, for contributing to our ever-increasing profile.

Fusangite:

My hat's off to you guys. That was an enormous load of stuff you had to wade through - insane actually. Thanks for all your hard work!

-clash

Quote from: DeniseI've long ago given up on trying to fathom the minds of the judges.  Even after getting access to the Judges' Forum, I still don't get it.
At this point all I can say is that the judges were chosen by the fans for some reason, and that if fandom doesn't like their decisions, they choose different judges next year.

As long as it´s basically an ENWorld Circus Maximus poularity contest to become a judge, you´ll have ENWorld/Circus Maximus-cool-kids group-think.

That´s just the way it is.

Quote from: SettembriniAs long as it´s basically an ENWorld Circus Maximus poularity contest to become a judge, you´ll have ENWorld/Circus Maximus-cool-kids group-think.

That´s just the way it is.

EN Worlders made up only approximately 40% of the voters for the judges for 2007.  The Gen Con EN World RPG Awards are NOT an ENW popularity contest.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.

ALL (online) gamers are invited to vote for the products.
ALL (online) gamers are invited to vote for the judges.
ALL (online) gamers are invited to submit themselves as judge candidates.

I make every effort every year to spread the word, but there's only so much I can do.  If you don't like it, then vote.  Get your friends of similar mindset to vote.  Run for judge, even!

Denise,

I appreciate your efforts, and I´m not complaining.

@Fusangite: So, why is Ptolus only in the honourable mention and not a nominee for best d20 product?

Quote from: SettembriniAs long as it´s basically an ENWorld Circus Maximus poularity contest to become a judge, you´ll have ENWorld/Circus Maximus-cool-kids group-think.

I'd challenge you to explain the election of Master of the Game/Jeramy Ware. He had no profile on ENWorld whatsoever when he ran for the position; he was much better known on RPG.net and, much more importantly, with gamers he played with locally in his home town, whom he mobilized very effectively.

The other thing is that your criticism is reasonable if we were using multi-member plurality voting, as we have in the past. But under STV (the voting system for judges that we introduced last year), our current voting system, you can win, as was the case with Jeramy, with the majority of voters not knowing who you are. You're shooting for 20% of the vote now, not 50%.

This year, ENW/Circvs made up about 60% of the voters. Under a plurality sysyem, this would have meant that this group controlled the fate of every one of the five panel positions. Under STV, it means that this group controls 60% fo the panel positions.

For evidence of this, see the defeat of Chris Gath/Crothian who was an absolute shoe-in under the old plurality, ENW based system who was defeated by a significant margin.

Most importantly, Jeramy and I placed highest in the judge election because, instead of resting on our online profiles, we mobilized our own voter bases, making sure that the people with whom we have gamed, discussed RPGs and attended conventions with turned out to vote, whether or not they were registered members of any RPG forum. Of the four gaming groups of which I am part in Toronto, only two people even read any fo the gaming forums. And the rate of forum reading by my former gaming associates who live in Vancouver is even lower. And it is largely because of my efforts to turn out non-forum members that I placed second.

And that, finally, is what I want to stress. If you work hard during the election period to identify potential voters both on- and off-line and then keep track of whether they have voted, sending them reminders if you doin't hear from them that they have gone to the online voting booth, anybody can win. That´s just the way it is.

I worked very hard last year to develop a voting system for choosing judges that opened-up the group of potential judges to all of online fandom. And I think I have done so. If you have further suggestions for how to open this up more, in a democratic fashion, I'm all ears.

Quote from: SettembriniSo, why is Ptolus only in the honourable mention and not a nominee for best d20 product?

All I can personally say on this front is that my decision to rank Ptolus 6th in Best D20 had very little to do with Ptolus and a great deal to do with the quality of the other products on the list.

I considered Helios Rising to be a better setting book that Ptolus because I felt it was more creative and innovative and also because it asked and answered questions about the setting it described that I was more interested in than the questions Ptolus answered.

Similarly, I found that Warlords of the Accordlands gave me a sharper and more complete picture of a setting than Ptolus did. Instead of the cosmology/mythology having one cool/interesting aspect, as did Ptolus did, I found that Warlords offered many. I also found that the adventures and adventure hooks provided in Warlords were less railroady than Ptolus was. (Not that I consider Ptolus to be a big offender in that area; it's just that Warlords was even less so). Also, and this is a matter of personal taste, a lot off Ptolus's schtick is the routinization of magic and the way that people have adapted it into their everyday consciousness. I find such a world less exciting than a place like the Accordlands where it seems like people are most interested in striving for magic that is beyond their reach. The insufficiency of magic seems like a more engaging (for me) theme for making magic commonplace.

Five Fingers, interestingly, was there, at least in part, because of its brevity. It wasn't just that people felt like they had a feel for the setting when they closed the book. They had it immediately, within the first few pages. When I was reading the book, I was reminded of Italo Calvino's great book Invisible Cities in which the author is able to convey the whole idea of a fantastic city in the space of a page and a half. I think, also that the idea of a place's history being essentially written into the physical landscape itself was a powerful one.

Ultimate Power, on the other hand, was a completely different kettle of fish. As one judge put it, the book "completes" Mutants and Masterminds, giving GMs and players much-needed flexibility to design almost any set of powers. Instead of souping-up hero powers, this book had the courage to offer nothing to those seeking to get more powerful by buying more books and, instead, focused their volume on empowering GMs and players to convert basically any super-powered character from film, novels or comic books into M&M terms.

Etberpunk: Upload was very close, in the running to the other Scope book for this setting that Goodman released. It was almost a toss of a coin as to whether Etherpunk or Mysteries of the Occult was the better of the two. I loved both books and felt that they, together, filled-out the Etherscope universe in terms both of fluff and crunch.

I felt that all five of our selections were, in one way or another, more innovative than Ptolus, more important in completing their product line than Ptolus or were simply better settings than Ptolus was.

As for why Ptolus made Product of the Year and some of these works did not, let me offer a few general comments about the judging process that may be helpful:
(a) sometimes, when a couple of products are neck-and-neck for 5th place in a category and we end up awarding one an honourable mention instead of a finalist, the next time that happens to the very same product, we often favour the one that narrowly lost the last time we were forced to almost toss a coin to see which one won.
(b) late in the selection process, as time for negotiated consensus runs down, we sometimes have to fall to majority voting to see which product wins. Because we couldn't reach consensus on every category, some categories are more characteristic of majority rule and others of a consensus amongst all the judges.
(c) in any voting system, no matter how fair, the length of a list matters a lot. This is even true when negotiating a consensus. Lists of 10/12 products look a lot different than lists of 5/6 products and have very different properties. Being the seventh-best or ninth-best in a judge's mind matters a lot in the Product of the Year category whereas it is irrelevant in the other categories we judge.

I hope that this answers your question.

Quote from: fusangiteI'd challenge you to explain the election of Master of the Game/Jeramy Ware.

A promise to playtest games.  As it happens, though, I'd happily vote for him again - he brought the process to the public.  I'd encourage others to do so as well.

QuoteMost importantly, Jeramy and I placed highest in the judge election because, instead of resting on our online profiles, we mobilized our own voter bases, making sure that the people with whom we have gamed, discussed RPGs and attended conventions with turned out to vote, whether or not they were registered members of any RPG forum. Of the four gaming groups of which I am part in Toronto, only two people even read any fo the gaming forums. And the rate of forum reading by my former gaming associates who live in Vancouver is even lower. And it is largely because of my efforts to turn out non-forum members that I placed second.

I'm glad you both have a lot of offline friends, but I hope you can understand how this would be discouraging to those of us relying on folk who post online rather than going to all of our local friends and relatives.  But you're absolutely right - this is an election and whatever votes you can get are worthwhile.

Quote from: C.W.RichesonA promise to playtest games.

Sorry. I totally forgot to mention one of the most important things: how people conducted the campaign -- not only was the playtesting promise a factor; other promises and aspects of election campaign style made a difference. I know, for instance, that ICE's Rasyr attacking the ENnies and giving me the opportunity to be their strident defender swung a bunch of votes my way.

I do think that the intelligence, honesty and respectfulness with which candidates answered questions in the froum threads made a difference in how some people voted, including me. How I ranked candidates I did not know was based solely on the quality of the ansers and the promises made in these threads.

Also, I think that local Con-organizing and activity made a big difference and came very very close to pushing one of the organizers of Montreal's Royal Con over the top.

QuoteAs it happens, though, I'd happily vote for him again - he brought the process to the public.

This is now strong incumbents are made .

QuoteI'd encourage others to do so as well.

Obviously this will be an important issue in the up coming campaign. I look forward to more election promises of this ilk as things move forward.

Quote from: DeniseALL (online) gamers are invited to submit themselves as judge candidates.

Including people from outside the USA?

Quote from: JongWKIncluding people from outside the USA?

IIRC there are special rules if you're outside the U.S.  I think if there are any customs fees or anything else you have to pay them.  I'm sure you could head over to the ENWorld thread and find out real quick.

Two of the judges this year were outside the US.

-clash

Quote from: JongWKIncluding people from outside the USA?

Yes!
This year we had two Canadian judges.  In past years we've had at least one judge in Europe IIRC.

There are publishers around the world sending in their product.  Judges are responsible for paying for any duties or taxes incurred (though we encourage publishers to emphasize that the product sent is a sample and has no retail value so as to reduce any financial burden on the judges), by the way.  

Physical location doesn't play a part- abillity to read and communicate in English as well as being online are necessities, though.

Quote from: fusangiteAnd RPGPundit, the fact is that the ENnies do affect sales, corporate reputations and fan opinion.

Sure, but to what degree? I'd put good money down that the majority of roleplayers don't know what the ENnies are.

Seanchai

Quote from: SeanchaiSure, but to what degree? I'd put good money down that the majority of roleplayers don't know what the ENnies are.

So would I. I would also contend that the majority of role players haven't heard of most of the games in the awards, and that, even after WOTC enters, most gamers will not hear of the awards.

Sure it would be great if the awards were as well-known in the hobby as the Academy Awards are among movie-goers. But I don't think that's a realistic goal.