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Hello and welcome to the Weekly 
Scroll Podcast. 

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My name is Ryan. 
And I was born of the maiden of 

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Wisdom, blessed be her name. 
And I'm Josh. 

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I just had a book come out 
called His Majesty the Worm. 

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And hello, I'm really pleased to
be here to talk about it. 

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We're pleased to have you here, 
so. 

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Thanks for having me. 
What what we should have done, 

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which I absolutely didn't do, is
go back and remember what 

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episode you were on last time 
'cause you've been here before. 

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So I'm just gonna look that up 
real quick. 

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That's usually my job. 
Hey, don't forget that. 

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Yeah. 
So, so Josh, yeah, you've been 

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here before. 
You were on, gosh, the end of 

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last year leading up to prior to
this release coming out and 

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then, like, you know, eight 
months later, the book finally 

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came out. 
So when Hunter lets us know what

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number that was? 
117. 117 that's crazy 'cause 

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this is like episode well like 
160 something so it was like 50 

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episodes ago, that's crazy and 
now the book is out it's here 

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it's in my hands it's a it's a 
beefy boy it's a nice shiny 

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beefy boy here I. 
Didn't get physical 1 yet. 

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Not yet, because it's sold out 
twice already, which is got a 

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feeling. 
I had to pay his ticket as well 

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guys so. 
Don't speed or don't get cut. 

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So let's just I mean, so that's 
so so when you were on before, 

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we kind of talked about like the
game leading up to the game, 

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what the game is going to be 
like everything the game is out 

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and at some point, you know, 
we're going to review it. 

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I believe that's going to be the
it's it's not this Friday, but 

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next Friday we're going to be 
talking about it. 

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So today, though, what I really 
want to talk about is everything

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kind of leading up to it coming 
out and how it's felt since and 

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the first question since I just 
said something about it. 

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Gosh, how does it feel to spend 
this much time on a book and 

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it's sell out not once but 
twice? 

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Like the day it drops. 
Yeah, I mean, it feels I, I, 

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people have been so kind to me 
about it and I'm so grateful for

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everyone's, you know, the, the, 
the generosity of spirit. 

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It feels weird like to, to put 
it simply, I've been a guy that 

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has had a book coming out for so
long. 

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I don't, I'm still learning what
it's like to be a guy who has a 

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book out. 
You know, I, I, I'm much more 

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familiar with the sensation of 
saying it's coming out soon. 

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And I have been saying soon for 
three years because this is my 

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first printed book. 
You know, in, in my first 

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project of the size I have, I 
had I, I'm completely ignorant 

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and, and you know, maintain 
most, most, most way. 

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Ignorance is not cured, but like
how long it takes to make 

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something and like physically 
print it on paper and the people

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that are involved and the steps 
that it takes to get it out of 

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Lithuania and into your hands in
whatever state it arrived. 

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Like, you know, that is all new 
information to me so soon. 

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It's been a long time and 
recently published has been a 

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short time. 
So it I'm still I'm still 

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figuring that part out. 
Yeah, yeah, I I got it and 

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listen, it took a long time to 
get, but it's beautiful. 

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I think you made some really 
fantastic choices with with with

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just talking about as a product.
First and foremost, the printing

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is gorgeous. 
For those that are not watching 

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that are on listening on 
podcast, go to YouTube, watch 

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this one. 
But we we're never not going to 

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love a nice foil foil giant logo
on the front honestly. 

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And the the the like village 
dungeon like landscape, you 

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know, kind of very like opaque 
is transparent like background 

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is such a nice touch. 
The ribbon inside the heft of 

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the entire book as far as like 
all of those things, how much 

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because I know so you worked 
with Exalted Funeral in getting 

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this book out. 
How much of those design choices

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for the actual like book itself 
were you being like, this is 

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exactly what I want versus, you 
know, since it is your first 

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book and Exalted does this as 
their whole thing was them being

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like, we think this is like, oh,
good way to go. 

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Yeah. 
So let me credit Pete Orliss, 

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who is my graphic designer. 
Pete's great to work with and 

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anybody that is, you know, has a
bunch of words right now in a 

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Google Doc and it's like, wow, I
wish I had somebody to talk me 

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through some like graphic design
choices. 

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He's just wonderful to work 
with. 

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And he was a long time 
collaborator and long-suffering 

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collaborator because I do not 
have a graphic design 

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background. 
And I could tell as I was like 

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laying the book out, you know, I
could see him like, oh boy. 

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And like, just like really 
breakdown some, some of the 

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essentials because I, I did the,
the layout myself with his, with

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his help. 
I mean, he designed it and then 

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I practically did the page by 
page. 

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So the things that you just like
highlighted and praised were 

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all, all his insights. 
He also, I mean, you know, he 

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has a, he has a, a lengthy 
bibliography. 

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I think I first noticed his work
in the labyrinth adventure game 

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from River Horse, then Milton 
and Caesar last name. 

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Sorry, apologies to Caesar, but 
that that's what like got me 

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turned on to him. 
And so those are all him. 

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When I came to the result, the 
funeral who have been, you know,

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very helpful. 
But like I came to that with 

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that with a finished book, which
was maybe not the right way to 

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do that. 
Maybe I wouldn't do that twice, 

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but it is the journey that I 
took to get here. 

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I had AI had a book in hand and 
I was just trying to find 

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somebody to help me like print 
it and they and they help with 

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that. 
Yeah, and it looks like that. 

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I mean that partnership's 
working out great. 

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You got you're selling out 
multiple times on EF. 

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The the book looks amazing. 
How did how did it feel when you

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found out you sold out the first
time and the second time? 

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Like it was a whirlwind of, of 
like it, it happened so shortly.

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I, I didn't know how to like 
quite process it. 

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There is a lot of, and I don't 
know how interesting this is to 

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people that aren't like involved
in indie publishing, but like 

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there's a whirlwind of like 
physical steps to talk to, like 

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self market the thing that 
you're doing. 

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And like, if you don't like, you
know who's who's going to write?

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So like sending out an e-mail 
and updating the itch page and 

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updating the drive through RPG 
page and posting on socials and 

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asking your indulgent friends to
to, you know, reblog you making 

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update on your blog, you know, 
so like, there's like, like I 

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was consumed in a whirlwind of 
activity, being a social Media 

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Group of team of one. 
And then they were like, hey, we

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sold out Now. 
I was, I was flabbergasted. 

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There's so many, like, buttons I
hadn't pushed yet of, like, news

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releases that I was coined to 
activate to like, try and get 

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some coverage. 
And I, I just ended up not 

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pushing them because, like, what
could I say? 

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Like, hey, you can't buy it. 
You, you know, Yeah, 'cause it 

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was. 
Only three to six hours. 

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Yeah, Yeah, the first one, yeah.
Yeah, like I so I got it. 

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And by the time Hunter even like
woke up and like got my tech 

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message, she's like, bro, it's 
gone. 

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So, yeah, so one thing you said 
you had a finished book when you

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got to EF and part of that, and 
I know we talked about this in 

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the previous episode, but I'm to
be honest, I don't remember half

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of what we said. 
So we'll touch on some stuff. 

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Again, part of that is because 
you itch funded like the entire 

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progress, right? 
That's right. 

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Yeah. 
So I, I, I, I might like the odd

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man out here. 
And again, I, I apologize to 

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people who's like whose main 
interest is in indie publishing.

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I have unfortunately dwell in 
this like dark corner by myself 

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the last little bit. 
So like it's really where my 

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head is at. 
But I, you know, I've worked on 

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his mattresses the worm for 
eight years. 

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I did it on Sundays, just kind 
of like methodically working 

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every Sunday. 
You know, today is a Sunday. 

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It's a working day for me as 
this like side gig and I, I 

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think a lot of contemporaries 
use Kickstarter both as a way to

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crowdfund, but also to market 
their work and more power to 

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them. 
And it, it seems to work well. 

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I, I think the, the main thing 
that you sacrifice for a 

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Kickstarter is like sanity and 
like you're, you're like love 

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and respect of your fellow man. 
And like I, I, I don't know that

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I wanted to give those things up
necessarily. 

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And I Kickstarter almost feels 
like it should be made for 

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people like me, you know, 
somebody without a publishing 

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background or any experience. 
A, a nice way to say like, hey, 

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if you, if this sounds 
interesting, would you, would 

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you throw me a couple bucks? 
And I can like get art and 

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editing and stuff, but the 
practical realities is, is that 

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like, you know, the biggest RPG 
companies on the planet, which 

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is, you know, certainly not a 
large amount of anything. 

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But like in my space, you know, 
the very biggest people that 

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have RPG companies use 
Kickstarter to do their 

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fulfillment. 
And so when I'm a project on 

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Kickstarter and I'm a nobody who
doesn't have art, who doesn't 

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have editing, who doesn't have 
anything, you know, that project

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is not going to do well because 
the the projects that are being 

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funded are projects that are 
essentially laid out, have all 

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their art are complete. 
And they're doing this to to 

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grab names for fulfillment, 
right engage how many copies 

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they need to print. 
So Kickstarter is actually not a

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really good model for I have 
nothing. 

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What what should I what should I
do about that long funding 

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either through it or something 
else seems to be a good fit for 

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somebody in my shoes. 
So what I did was I put out 

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chapters of the book about four 
chapters of the book. 

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They had really rough, really 
rough graphic design, you know, 

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like kind of slapped into a 
layout. 

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And as I mentioned before, like 
I, I don't have a background in 

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that. 
So Pete had to do, you know, a 

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lot of teaching and lifting to, 
to get the book into the, the 

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space that it is, because I, I 
think he did a really good job 

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of it and I think it looks 
really good and I'm very proud 

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of the work that he did. 
But so like absent his help, I 

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just got to slap it into a PDFI 
put some, some free public 

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domain art in there. 
And I, I put most of the 

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00:11:06,400 --> 00:11:10,040
chapters up for, for free or for
pay what you will. 

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There's like a, a couple of them
had a couple bucks, but like you

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could get it for free to set up 
for a newsletter, blah, blah, 

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00:11:16,080 --> 00:11:21,200
blah. 
And people would buy them over 

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the course of months. 
It was a slow burn. 

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And whenever I got a, a chunk of
money, I would buy one thing. 

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So if I got $300.00, I would 
Commission one art. 

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I would be like Zoidberg one 
art, please. 

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00:11:33,840 --> 00:11:36,800
And somebody would give me one 
commissioned piece of art and 

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00:11:36,800 --> 00:11:38,520
then I would like save up enough
money. 

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00:11:38,520 --> 00:11:41,880
And then in a two months and 
three months, I get one of the 

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thing, whether it was an editor,
you know, enough money to get 

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another piece of art or some 
graphic design or whatever. 

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And like I made the book piece 
meal like really slowly using 

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that methodology. 
And I don't, I'm not advocating 

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that people take eight years to 
make projects, but I, I do think

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that like that sort of that sort
of long tail your, it doesn't 

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00:12:06,960 --> 00:12:11,080
publish until it funds is 
actually a probably a good model

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00:12:11,080 --> 00:12:16,520
for somebody in a similar 
situation where Kickstarter, if 

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00:12:16,520 --> 00:12:17,960
Kickstarter is not a good fit 
for you. 

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00:12:21,480 --> 00:12:26,400
Yeah, I it's really interesting.
You know, you, you've been you 

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00:12:26,680 --> 00:12:26,960
again. 
You. 

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It's funded for a really long 
time. 

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00:12:28,280 --> 00:12:30,640
I know that after, I mean, 
Hunter. 

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00:12:30,640 --> 00:12:37,680
Hunter still obsessed with Luke 
Gearing's Game Goes Upon the 

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Coast. 
Wattsy. 

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00:12:39,360 --> 00:12:39,840
Yeah. 
Wattsy. 

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00:12:40,160 --> 00:12:42,640
Yeah, the real Wattsy. 
The real Wattsy. 

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00:12:44,160 --> 00:12:47,240
Especially after that. 
I think that the slow fighting 

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00:12:47,240 --> 00:12:50,720
on itch, a lot of people 
realized how successful it can 

215
00:12:50,720 --> 00:12:53,200
be. 
I know that, like, like Civic 

216
00:12:53,200 --> 00:12:56,440
Sanctum is, you know, John Davis
is doing that. 

217
00:12:56,960 --> 00:12:58,240
Kristen swells. 
Doing their building. 

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00:12:58,960 --> 00:13:03,640
Yeah, get up on it. 
And then even like Charlie 

219
00:13:03,640 --> 00:13:06,120
Laskowski is doing, doing some 
stuff too, Like there's a bunch 

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00:13:06,120 --> 00:13:08,160
of people that are realizing 
that this is a, a thing that can

221
00:13:08,160 --> 00:13:09,960
happen. 
And the good thing about itch 

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funding is like if you have 
$1000 goal to get to $700.00, 

223
00:13:13,240 --> 00:13:16,680
you still got $700.00. 
So that's still, you know, on 

224
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your way to the goal. 
So it's a great way to do it. 

225
00:13:18,400 --> 00:13:22,240
And like you said, the I've 
been, I've been, I've been, I've

226
00:13:22,240 --> 00:13:24,920
backed a lot of Kickstarters for
a long time, way too many. 

227
00:13:25,160 --> 00:13:27,120
And it's it's. 
It's. 

228
00:13:28,120 --> 00:13:32,840
Yeah, I think I'm at like 600. 
Something holy crap I'm at like 

229
00:13:33,720 --> 00:13:36,120
50 brother. 
Yeah, listen, I have a problem. 

230
00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:40,000
It's interesting even in the 
even just in the time that I've 

231
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been back in Kickstarter, how it
kind of went from what you're 

232
00:13:41,960 --> 00:13:44,560
talking about, what it could 
have been and should have been 

233
00:13:44,960 --> 00:13:48,400
from like I have this idea like 
give me money, I'll get it. 

234
00:13:48,400 --> 00:13:52,560
Happened to what amounts to a 
pre-order marketplace for a lot 

235
00:13:52,560 --> 00:13:54,960
of the bigger companies, you 
know, even the smaller, bigger 

236
00:13:54,960 --> 00:13:57,920
companies like Free League. 
Free League is not Wattsy, but 

237
00:13:57,920 --> 00:14:00,160
they can still drop a half 
million dollar Kickstarter in 

238
00:14:00,400 --> 00:14:02,560
with a done project with it's 
just basically it's pre-order 

239
00:14:02,560 --> 00:14:07,240
fulfillment, which I think 
Kickstarter even still says 

240
00:14:07,240 --> 00:14:09,600
that's not what you're supposed 
to do, but we make money off it.

241
00:14:09,600 --> 00:14:11,680
So like we're going to let it 
happen obviously. 

242
00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:15,680
So it's a great model to kind of
go with this, especially when 

243
00:14:15,680 --> 00:14:17,440
you're in the position that you 
are in. 

244
00:14:19,600 --> 00:14:23,080
Eight years is a long time 
though, you know, and those 

245
00:14:23,080 --> 00:14:26,160
those things you did put out 
like the the kind of I think 

246
00:14:26,160 --> 00:14:27,760
they're basically like the 
appendices now. 

247
00:14:28,280 --> 00:14:30,320
I they were fantastic. 
I love them. 

248
00:14:30,320 --> 00:14:33,560
The complex version of like the 
name this all chemical book is 

249
00:14:33,560 --> 00:14:34,680
like, I didn't get it the first 
time. 

250
00:14:34,680 --> 00:14:36,240
I think the first time I got it 
was when you were on the show 

251
00:14:36,240 --> 00:14:37,560
last time you were like, oh, did
you click that Bing? 

252
00:14:37,560 --> 00:14:40,520
And I was like, holy shit, now I
got to do this all over again. 

253
00:14:40,960 --> 00:14:44,800
So fantastic stuff is still 
coming out as you were making 

254
00:14:44,800 --> 00:14:47,480
the book. 
Yeah, thanks. 

255
00:14:48,240 --> 00:14:52,080
And it, it was a way to like 
also, and I, I mean, this is, 

256
00:14:52,240 --> 00:14:55,120
this is a really unique journey 
and the book's too big, but 

257
00:14:55,120 --> 00:15:00,160
like, it is as big as I needed 
it to be to like try and clearly

258
00:15:00,160 --> 00:15:05,040
communicate over explain the, 
the sort of way that I play. 

259
00:15:06,240 --> 00:15:10,560
But it was, it was also a way to
like connect with people, you 

260
00:15:10,560 --> 00:15:13,520
know, the, the essential goal of
marketing and marketing is such 

261
00:15:13,520 --> 00:15:17,360
a, a dirty word, such a cringe 
thing to have to do for 

262
00:15:17,360 --> 00:15:21,320
yourself. 
But like, the, the ultimate goal

263
00:15:21,320 --> 00:15:27,320
is like, you know, I know, I, I 
suspect, I hope there's somebody

264
00:15:27,320 --> 00:15:30,680
out there that would like to 
read some things that I've 

265
00:15:30,680 --> 00:15:32,960
written and I'd like to find 
them. 

266
00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:36,240
And I, I, I want to find writers
that I want to read. 

267
00:15:36,480 --> 00:15:40,120
So like, I, I need them to like 
tell me that they exist because 

268
00:15:40,120 --> 00:15:42,520
if they're writing on their 
blogs in secret, they don't have

269
00:15:42,520 --> 00:15:44,880
a, a web thing. 
They never post on Twitter. 

270
00:15:44,880 --> 00:15:48,960
They're never in like a, a 
community of like RPG nerds that

271
00:15:48,960 --> 00:15:51,680
like, and they're never telling 
me that they are writing these 

272
00:15:51,680 --> 00:15:52,960
cool things. 
I don't know. 

273
00:15:52,960 --> 00:15:54,000
And I'm, I'm trying to find 
them. 

274
00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:56,640
They're trying to find me. 
So like, if we can reach through

275
00:15:56,640 --> 00:15:58,600
the void and like connect with 
each other, I'd be really 

276
00:15:58,600 --> 00:16:00,200
excited because, you know, 
there's so much work that I 

277
00:16:00,200 --> 00:16:01,840
admire. 
There's so much work that I'm 

278
00:16:01,840 --> 00:16:05,440
inspired by. 
There's so many like writers 

279
00:16:05,440 --> 00:16:08,080
whose games I love, whose blogs 
I love, whose article I love, 

280
00:16:08,680 --> 00:16:10,480
and I'm, I'm, I'm really trying 
to connect with them. 

281
00:16:10,480 --> 00:16:13,480
So like the, the putting out 
things kind of slowly was also a

282
00:16:13,480 --> 00:16:17,840
way to like, I mean, in, in a 
maybe a sheet of way to put it 

283
00:16:17,840 --> 00:16:21,680
is like to build the audience. 
But like a, a more honest way to

284
00:16:21,680 --> 00:16:25,680
put it is to like connect with 
people who wanted to connect and

285
00:16:26,160 --> 00:16:29,320
like, you know, give them a 
chance to be like, yeah, this is

286
00:16:29,320 --> 00:16:31,800
for me or, or not. 
And, you know, no hard feelings.

287
00:16:31,800 --> 00:16:35,160
There's a ton of things that 
like, yeah, aren't for me. 

288
00:16:35,160 --> 00:16:39,360
My God, I'm a I'm a known hater,
but hey. 

289
00:16:39,480 --> 00:16:41,240
Guys in the room, man, you can't
be worse than. 

290
00:16:42,200 --> 00:16:45,000
That. 
Hey, I'm a known hey, I'm not a 

291
00:16:45,000 --> 00:16:50,120
known hater. 
Listen, I do not shit post on 

292
00:16:50,120 --> 00:16:53,760
the weekly scroll Twitter. 
I do it in private discord 

293
00:16:53,760 --> 00:16:59,680
conversations. 
But you know, the interesting 

294
00:16:59,680 --> 00:17:03,680
thing you say like it, it's, 
it's, it's funny when I mean, I 

295
00:17:03,680 --> 00:17:06,760
started following you after like
the 10th time someone like 

296
00:17:06,760 --> 00:17:08,520
retweeted that. 
Like you have this cool game 

297
00:17:08,520 --> 00:17:09,720
coming out. 
I'm like, it looks cool. 

298
00:17:09,720 --> 00:17:11,440
Just give it to me already. 
And this like two years ago. 

299
00:17:12,800 --> 00:17:17,599
But at what point when that was 
kind of like a constant thing, 

300
00:17:17,640 --> 00:17:21,599
did you kind of feel like it 
went like how much is marketing?

301
00:17:21,599 --> 00:17:24,960
How much is like reaching out? 
Like when did it feel that like 

302
00:17:24,960 --> 00:17:27,400
it was one way or another? 
Because clearly it worked. 

303
00:17:27,400 --> 00:17:29,200
Here's the thing. 
It clearly fucking worked. 

304
00:17:29,200 --> 00:17:32,000
People again, 3 1/2 hours for 
the first time it dropped. 

305
00:17:32,000 --> 00:17:33,320
People followed you for a long 
time. 

306
00:17:33,440 --> 00:17:36,120
We're very excited for this 
project to come out and I don't 

307
00:17:36,120 --> 00:17:39,760
think many people are going to 
be disappointed with with what 

308
00:17:39,760 --> 00:17:43,720
came after waiting this long. 
But like what? 

309
00:17:43,720 --> 00:17:45,400
What was kind of that feeling in
difference? 

310
00:17:45,400 --> 00:17:47,080
I know you said it's kind of a 
dirty word to do marketing or 

311
00:17:47,080 --> 00:17:49,160
difference, but how did it kind 
of feel over the course of years

312
00:17:49,160 --> 00:17:52,040
being like it's coming soon and 
then it's still not not coming, 

313
00:17:52,040 --> 00:17:54,760
but you're still like moving 
forward at the same time? 

314
00:17:56,000 --> 00:18:01,400
It it took as long as it took. 
I, I, I am hard pressed to 

315
00:18:01,400 --> 00:18:04,560
actually think of like a, a 
specific example of something 

316
00:18:05,120 --> 00:18:08,840
that was in my power to like 
make it come faster. 

317
00:18:09,080 --> 00:18:12,080
And Lord, you know, grant me the
wisdom to know the difference, 

318
00:18:12,080 --> 00:18:16,200
right? 
But like I when I, when I think 

319
00:18:16,200 --> 00:18:18,400
about like what was genuine, you
know, it's all genuine and it's 

320
00:18:18,400 --> 00:18:20,720
like, you know, the genuine 
things are, are maybe like a 

321
00:18:20,720 --> 00:18:25,080
little cheesy. 
Maybe I'm like making a a Jack 

322
00:18:25,080 --> 00:18:30,800
chick tracked edit of some 
stupid opinion about DND and 

323
00:18:30,800 --> 00:18:32,800
it's just like a stupid joke 
that makes me laugh. 

324
00:18:32,800 --> 00:18:35,800
But like if I'm posting it, it's
because I'm laughing And thank 

325
00:18:35,800 --> 00:18:39,080
God I think I'm funny because 
like for an audience of, of me, 

326
00:18:39,080 --> 00:18:42,480
like I'm hilarious. 
So like, you know, I'm just, I'm

327
00:18:42,480 --> 00:18:44,680
just, I'm just riffing and I'm 
glad I'm not. 

328
00:18:44,800 --> 00:18:47,440
I, it has been enormously 
satisfying to know that I'm not 

329
00:18:47,680 --> 00:18:51,640
speaking into the void that 
there are people that are 

330
00:18:51,640 --> 00:18:54,200
excited and like have been 
connected with me and been very 

331
00:18:54,200 --> 00:18:57,800
kind and I'm, I'm excited to 
like, I'm excited for them to 

332
00:18:57,800 --> 00:18:59,720
like, I, I want to like see what
they make with it. 

333
00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:03,560
I want to see the stuff that 
they do because I, I know that 

334
00:19:03,560 --> 00:19:07,280
like this is just like the 
groundwork and the, the stuff 

335
00:19:07,280 --> 00:19:09,640
that will be built out of the 
game is the, is the real 

336
00:19:09,640 --> 00:19:12,480
important stuff, their 
campaigns, their, their 

337
00:19:12,480 --> 00:19:16,560
dungeons, the stuff that they 
publish or just show their table

338
00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:19,400
and the stories that they build 
for themselves. 

339
00:19:19,400 --> 00:19:21,840
Like that's, that's the fun 
part. 

340
00:19:21,840 --> 00:19:24,920
The words on the paper are just 
the foundation to get them to 

341
00:19:24,920 --> 00:19:26,360
that. 
And I, I can't wait to 

342
00:19:26,400 --> 00:19:29,360
participate in other people's 
games and see the stuff that 

343
00:19:29,360 --> 00:19:31,160
they make for it because that's 
the stuff that I'm, I'm really 

344
00:19:31,160 --> 00:19:36,200
looking forward. 
To one thing you said so beyond 

345
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:38,760
social media, beyond like even 
like quote UN quote marketing 

346
00:19:38,760 --> 00:19:42,240
the book or whatnot, you blog 
you blog quite frequently on 

347
00:19:42,240 --> 00:19:47,120
rise of Comus. 
What the with your blog 

348
00:19:47,120 --> 00:19:51,400
specifically, Like how much is 
talking about His Majesty of the

349
00:19:51,400 --> 00:19:52,640
Worm? 
How much is talking about 

350
00:19:52,640 --> 00:19:55,960
TTRPGS? 
And like, were you blogging 

351
00:19:55,960 --> 00:19:58,720
prior to starting His Majesty of
the Worm or did it kind of like,

352
00:19:58,720 --> 00:20:01,720
did one, you know, be the 
impetus for the other or vice 

353
00:20:01,720 --> 00:20:03,800
versa? 
Yeah, good question. 

354
00:20:03,920 --> 00:20:08,560
If if I'm anything, I, I think 
the, the, the, you know, the 

355
00:20:08,560 --> 00:20:11,720
title that that best applies to 
me is I'm, I'm just a Blogger, 

356
00:20:11,720 --> 00:20:13,960
right? 
And like one of my blogs got big

357
00:20:13,960 --> 00:20:16,560
enough that it became a book 
that you could buy. 

358
00:20:17,440 --> 00:20:23,320
I'm also the editor in chief of 
Knock magazine, magazine of old 

359
00:20:23,320 --> 00:20:27,640
school gaining Bric a brac And 
you know, I, I, yeah, nice 

360
00:20:28,480 --> 00:20:30,440
minor. 
Ryan pointed to his. 

361
00:20:30,440 --> 00:20:31,920
I was like, I got to point to 
mine. 

362
00:20:31,920 --> 00:20:37,440
He's not going to go on. 
The shelf so and you know, that 

363
00:20:37,440 --> 00:20:42,800
community of blogs like made the
old school scene which like 

364
00:20:43,400 --> 00:20:47,640
lived and died and like, you 
know, it's carried on in, in in 

365
00:20:47,640 --> 00:20:52,440
all of our hearts, you know, and
I, I, I very much believe in 

366
00:20:52,440 --> 00:20:59,360
blogs as a way to get ideas out 
there and then pass them around 

367
00:20:59,360 --> 00:21:03,040
like a memetic plague. 
I am so interested in ideas that

368
00:21:03,040 --> 00:21:06,360
I've seen on blogs that like 
somebody threw out as just like,

369
00:21:07,960 --> 00:21:13,360
you know, a midnight idea, it's 
300 words and they, they didn't 

370
00:21:13,360 --> 00:21:15,080
do anything with it. 
They just had to get it out. 

371
00:21:15,120 --> 00:21:17,120
And that's one of the things 
that blogs are good about 

372
00:21:17,160 --> 00:21:19,560
thought exorcism. 
This idea is bothering you. 

373
00:21:19,680 --> 00:21:24,400
And like, if you, if you're not 
careful and if you're unlucky, 

374
00:21:24,560 --> 00:21:26,920
you're going to start writing 
something about it and you're 

375
00:21:26,920 --> 00:21:30,440
going to waste 24 hours of 
writing time into an idea that 

376
00:21:30,440 --> 00:21:33,320
like you're never going to 
really take to fruition, but you

377
00:21:33,320 --> 00:21:36,120
got, So you have to get it out, 
just write A blog about it, get 

378
00:21:36,120 --> 00:21:38,480
it out of there and it will 
leave you alone. 

379
00:21:38,520 --> 00:21:41,920
And but then it can like go 
around and start infecting other

380
00:21:41,920 --> 00:21:44,200
people. 
And like I've seen these ideas 

381
00:21:44,800 --> 00:21:49,320
on on blogs, like come out of 
somebody's head, somebody says, 

382
00:21:49,320 --> 00:21:51,520
wow, that's really cool. 
They build the concept out. 

383
00:21:51,720 --> 00:21:56,360
Somebody hates it, but and like 
and like writes a an inspired 

384
00:21:56,360 --> 00:21:59,720
treatise against it, but that 
inspires like kind of more like 

385
00:21:59,720 --> 00:22:04,760
nuanced, better takes about it 
and like it improves the the the

386
00:22:04,760 --> 00:22:07,040
resource. 
It improves the discourse and 

387
00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:09,480
improves the theory. 
It makes better games. 

388
00:22:09,880 --> 00:22:14,200
And then like I see them 
published, like I then later 

389
00:22:14,760 --> 00:22:17,560
either the original poster or 
somebody very disconnected from 

390
00:22:17,560 --> 00:22:19,920
them, like comes out with the 
game. 

391
00:22:19,920 --> 00:22:22,040
So like mouse Ritter, right? 
Mouse Ritter is an incredible 

392
00:22:22,040 --> 00:22:25,080
game, great community around it,
very inspiring. 

393
00:22:26,160 --> 00:22:29,480
And I'm a big fan. 
You know, I, I, I have the, the 

394
00:22:29,480 --> 00:22:31,360
box set, love it, love playing 
it. 

395
00:22:32,360 --> 00:22:34,880
You know, some of some of those 
ideas, the, the, you know, the, 

396
00:22:34,960 --> 00:22:39,520
the character sheet with the 
little like gluable items, like 

397
00:22:39,520 --> 00:22:43,880
makes you feel so mouse like, 
because like, yeah, my guy is 

398
00:22:43,880 --> 00:22:48,000
only he's just a little guy. 
His sword is a needle and his 

399
00:22:48,560 --> 00:22:53,800
shield is a a button and like I 
can only carry 6 items because 

400
00:22:53,800 --> 00:22:58,720
I'm just like a little guy and 
like you know that I, I saw that

401
00:22:58,840 --> 00:23:03,000
blog post get blogged for the 
first time on Last Gasp Grimoire

402
00:23:03,320 --> 00:23:07,600
15 years ago at least. 
And then it like found its way 

403
00:23:07,600 --> 00:23:10,760
into like the printed word and 
like get evolved from there. 

404
00:23:10,760 --> 00:23:14,720
And I'm so interested in that. 
I love the like the exchange of 

405
00:23:14,720 --> 00:23:18,960
ideas that happened there. 
So to actually stop gushing 

406
00:23:18,960 --> 00:23:22,880
about blogs and answer your 
question, I was, I was inspired 

407
00:23:22,880 --> 00:23:26,640
to blog because at the end of 
the G+ era, people were doing it

408
00:23:26,640 --> 00:23:30,320
so much. 
You know, I, I don't think I 

409
00:23:30,320 --> 00:23:33,560
blog even like a tenth, not 
100th of what they do because, 

410
00:23:33,560 --> 00:23:36,000
you know, we were went back and 
looked at some of the like some 

411
00:23:36,000 --> 00:23:39,400
of me and my friends, like at 
the classic era, like Midden 

412
00:23:39,400 --> 00:23:44,280
Merck, like per year, like there
are 600 posts on that blog. 

413
00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:46,400
That's like two blog posts a 
day. 

414
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:49,880
And I'm, you know, maybe I'm 
like just vomiting out my brain 

415
00:23:49,880 --> 00:23:51,640
ideas like onto Twitter in a 
different way. 

416
00:23:52,040 --> 00:23:56,920
But like they, there were so 
much exciting ideas happening at

417
00:23:56,920 --> 00:23:58,400
the time and I was like, I want 
to get in on this. 

418
00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:02,560
Then G+ died and like I was, I 
was kind of still blogging. 

419
00:24:02,840 --> 00:24:05,120
It was a good way to like get 
out some of my ideas that I was 

420
00:24:05,120 --> 00:24:07,800
like working on. 
And it's like I, I get the ball 

421
00:24:07,800 --> 00:24:11,920
clay out onto the table and I 
mold it around and I've always 

422
00:24:11,920 --> 00:24:15,000
made games just for me and my 
friends and His Majesty the 

423
00:24:15,000 --> 00:24:19,400
wormers, an attempt to like let 
it jump the table and like 

424
00:24:19,400 --> 00:24:24,000
actually let somebody else play 
the way that we play on our on 

425
00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:26,920
our weekly games. 
So it was just my attempt to 

426
00:24:26,920 --> 00:24:31,360
like get some of the blog posts 
that I was already doing into a 

427
00:24:31,360 --> 00:24:34,600
format that could be shared more
easily. 

428
00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:41,080
Because G+ died in when the OSR 
died. 

429
00:24:41,080 --> 00:24:43,000
So 20. 
Was it 6 or was it? 

430
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:45,680
Did it finally die like 19? 
Was it all the way back in 16? 

431
00:24:46,640 --> 00:24:48,560
I don't this is Google bull. 
I don't. 

432
00:24:48,560 --> 00:24:53,240
I don't have that. 
This is Google bull because 

433
00:24:53,240 --> 00:24:55,960
eight years ago is like. 2019 
you're right, you're right. 

434
00:24:56,240 --> 00:24:57,800
You're right. 
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

435
00:24:58,560 --> 00:25:01,320
So that means, like, prior, 
that's like three years before 

436
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:03,280
G+ died. 
You were already working on His 

437
00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:07,560
Majesty the Worm. 
I mean, I guess you can see it, 

438
00:25:08,280 --> 00:25:11,760
I guess you can see its origins 
there. 

439
00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:14,200
I don't know when the 1st post 
was that I made it, but it 

440
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:17,160
wasn't, it wasn't the first 
thing that I was doing. 

441
00:25:17,160 --> 00:25:19,360
You know, like the very first 
things that I were doing were 

442
00:25:19,360 --> 00:25:22,880
kind of just like making like 
OSR hacks, which is like a 

443
00:25:22,880 --> 00:25:26,760
coming of age, right? 
That everybody that has a blog 

444
00:25:26,760 --> 00:25:28,880
does, you know, they take the. 
Axe and they. 

445
00:25:29,520 --> 00:25:34,520
Put the house rules they like in
it and like at some point I it 

446
00:25:34,520 --> 00:25:38,480
it it, you know it, it morphed. 
It diverted wildly. 

447
00:25:39,200 --> 00:25:42,680
Yeah, wildly diverted it. 
Diverted wildly into a much more

448
00:25:42,680 --> 00:25:46,000
interesting and unique decision 
making system. 

449
00:25:46,760 --> 00:25:48,240
Right. 
Thank you. 

450
00:25:49,360 --> 00:25:51,400
I would the. 
Last, not the last thing. 

451
00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:53,480
If we happen to tangent back to 
blogs, then I'm definitely down 

452
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:55,600
to keep talking blogs. 
But one thing you said is like, 

453
00:25:55,600 --> 00:25:57,680
you know, reaching out, finding 
other blogs, finding bloggers 

454
00:25:57,680 --> 00:25:59,640
and stuff like that. 
So I'm not asking like your 

455
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:03,440
three favorite or the best blogs
ever, but for for because we had

456
00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:07,200
prismatic on recently too. 
Like if if people want to kind 

457
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:10,600
of like, you know, get into your
brain a little bit and like read

458
00:26:10,600 --> 00:26:12,240
the kind of things that you're 
reading as far. 

459
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:14,520
And at one point you said like, 
you know your favorite game 

460
00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:16,960
stuff too, like if you had like 
three or four blogs and like 

461
00:26:16,960 --> 00:26:18,560
three or four games, that kind 
of goes. 

462
00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:21,560
If you want to know Josh a 
little bit, like these are the 

463
00:26:21,560 --> 00:26:23,200
kind of things just check out. 
What would you say? 

464
00:26:24,280 --> 00:26:27,160
Yeah, great question. 
It would be really hard to like 

465
00:26:27,400 --> 00:26:30,600
rank them and it would be really
hard to like narrow the list 

466
00:26:30,600 --> 00:26:34,280
down to a very short amount. 
Prismatic Wastelands, a 

467
00:26:34,440 --> 00:26:40,160
phenomenal Blogger, big fan. 
Like there's a there's a such a 

468
00:26:40,160 --> 00:26:43,320
joy in his post that I really 
like Mindstorm. 

469
00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:47,480
Another like great Blogger. 
Some like really interesting 

470
00:26:47,480 --> 00:26:49,560
ideas coming out of there. 
I like his games too. 

471
00:26:50,720 --> 00:26:53,320
My favorite OSR blog might be 
Goblin Punch. 

472
00:26:54,560 --> 00:27:00,440
The wealth of ideas that he has 
like made my brain have new 

473
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:05,560
types of wrinkles. 
Like just fundamentally like 

474
00:27:05,880 --> 00:27:08,560
incredible ideas in terms of 
like game designers. 

475
00:27:08,560 --> 00:27:14,160
I think that Chris McDowell of 
Bastion Land, I mean, I remember

476
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:17,320
was following his blog back when
it was like Suga game. 

477
00:27:17,320 --> 00:27:19,080
Is that right? 
What was it? 

478
00:27:19,200 --> 00:27:23,840
Because before he like had his 
like www.bastionland.com, it was

479
00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:27,400
like it was a blogspot address 
and I was I was following it at 

480
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:32,760
that point and like, I mean that
guy again, like takes ideas down

481
00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:35,400
to their sort of like essential 
elements. 

482
00:27:36,280 --> 00:27:41,480
He he finds a vein of ore in the
ground and makes mithril out of 

483
00:27:41,480 --> 00:27:47,480
it just like super smart. 
And I by by even like starting 

484
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:52,800
that list, like I have omitted 
so many people that were equally

485
00:27:52,800 --> 00:27:57,360
fundamental to my, to the way 
that I, I wish I could approach 

486
00:27:57,360 --> 00:28:00,040
games And like there's so much 
stuff that I didn't write in his

487
00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:01,560
match to the forum that like 
people ask me about. 

488
00:28:01,560 --> 00:28:02,560
I was like, where's magic 
weapons? 

489
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:05,000
Where's this stuff? 
And I'm like, man, I, I don't 

490
00:28:05,000 --> 00:28:07,440
have a new idea about that. 
Like you're going to, if you 

491
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:11,920
just go to the blogs that I have
in my like sidebar and read 

492
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:15,480
their, their posts. 
That's what that's what I use. 

493
00:28:15,480 --> 00:28:17,920
Like I'm going to steal their 
content and put into my game. 

494
00:28:18,120 --> 00:28:19,920
That's what you should do. 
I'm not going to have anything 

495
00:28:19,920 --> 00:28:23,520
new to say there. 
So please don't look to me as 

496
00:28:23,520 --> 00:28:27,880
like any sort of authority. 
Like, I just like, get stuff and

497
00:28:27,880 --> 00:28:30,360
put it in your games because 
that's what I'm doing in mind. 

498
00:28:31,920 --> 00:28:34,520
I wish more people would just 
spread that kind of stuff 

499
00:28:34,520 --> 00:28:36,320
around. 
One thing you said kind of early

500
00:28:36,320 --> 00:28:41,320
on, I don't remember what it was
about, but like, not everything 

501
00:28:41,320 --> 00:28:45,440
has to be for everyone. 
And just know if you're reading 

502
00:28:45,440 --> 00:28:48,320
a book or if a book comes out, 
you're not necessarily the 

503
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:50,280
target audience and it's not for
you. 

504
00:28:50,280 --> 00:28:52,560
You're allowed to just put it 
down and shut up about it. 

505
00:28:54,200 --> 00:28:56,800
So how would I? 
I can't go online and complain 

506
00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:59,960
about it then, right? 
I shut the shut up and just put 

507
00:28:59,960 --> 00:29:01,560
it down. 
How would I want? 

508
00:29:02,280 --> 00:29:05,840
Well, people like us get to talk
about it, but no. 

509
00:29:06,560 --> 00:29:10,400
But that's such a good thing to 
say because like, we read a lot 

510
00:29:10,400 --> 00:29:12,640
of books, we read a lot of games
and stuff like that. 

511
00:29:12,640 --> 00:29:14,760
And if more people were just 
like, I don't need to write a 

512
00:29:14,760 --> 00:29:17,520
chapter on this, just go find 
the 50 other BX games that do 

513
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:20,440
the exact same fucking thing, I 
would be so much happier to just

514
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:22,640
be like, OK, I'll just do this 
one my way because I'm going to 

515
00:29:22,640 --> 00:29:24,200
do it anyway. 
Was wasting paper. 

516
00:29:24,480 --> 00:29:26,720
That would be it's it. 
It feels like that's such a good

517
00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:28,720
way to do it, but I feel like, 
like you said, like. 

518
00:29:28,720 --> 00:29:32,240
Wisdom of omission. 
Everyone in their mom is has a 

519
00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:34,760
coming of age. 
This is my version of BX. 

520
00:29:34,760 --> 00:29:36,920
It has to come out and you know,
you're it's, it's it. 

521
00:29:36,920 --> 00:29:39,360
I feel like everyone just 
constantly hits that point where

522
00:29:39,360 --> 00:29:42,040
they have to, they reinvent the 
wheel over and over again. 

523
00:29:42,040 --> 00:29:46,600
So to each their own. 
But with, with time and wisdom, 

524
00:29:46,680 --> 00:29:49,680
or with time comes wisdom. 
And I, I would love to be able 

525
00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:51,800
to just be like, just just do it
however you want. 

526
00:29:51,840 --> 00:29:54,520
Like DND has been out forever. 
Just do it that way. 

527
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:56,280
It's such a, it's a good way to 
think about it. 

528
00:29:56,680 --> 00:29:59,240
And the book is big enough. 
We didn't need, we didn't need 

529
00:29:59,280 --> 00:30:01,080
50 more pages on magic weapons. 
Big enough. 

530
00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:04,720
Yeah. 
This is what what did we clock 

531
00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:08,480
in here at the end? 
It's 392 pages. 

532
00:30:08,840 --> 00:30:12,400
Not 400. 
Though 8 1/2 by 11, you know, 

533
00:30:12,400 --> 00:30:14,360
it's a it's, it's beefy, it's a 
beef boy. 

534
00:30:15,080 --> 00:30:20,480
You you're neglecting of course 
the initial pages, which have a 

535
00:30:20,480 --> 00:30:22,640
different numberings of. 
The Roman numeral ones. 

536
00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:27,120
Yes. 
So it's including the end pages 

537
00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:30,720
that are like into the the 
covers of the book that you 

538
00:30:30,720 --> 00:30:33,480
know, it's four hundred 412 
pages. 

539
00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:37,400
Where you at a point where 
you're like it's only 398. 

540
00:30:37,400 --> 00:30:39,640
I must add 10 more pages if you 
can hit 400. 

541
00:30:40,960 --> 00:30:44,640
Well, books have to be a thing 
that I learned. 

542
00:30:44,800 --> 00:30:48,800
Books have to be having a number
of pages divisible by 4:00 

543
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:51,680
because of the way that the 
pages like lay in the books. 

544
00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:55,040
So you have to like wherever you
are, if you're not in a number 

545
00:30:55,040 --> 00:30:57,680
divisible by 4, you got to, you 
got to get there unless you 

546
00:30:57,720 --> 00:30:58,600
that. 
And that's why you see those 

547
00:30:58,600 --> 00:31:00,920
like, you know, you've, you've 
had a book before and it's just 

548
00:31:00,920 --> 00:31:04,960
like white paper on the back of 
like, that's, that's what, yeah.

549
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:06,600
Yeah, yeah, just filling those 
pages in. 

550
00:31:06,800 --> 00:31:09,040
I love getting those books where
I'm like, oh, you want it in 

551
00:31:09,040 --> 00:31:11,360
there, but you put this extra 
page in here because you 

552
00:31:11,360 --> 00:31:13,560
couldn't start a new chapter 
without that extra page right 

553
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:14,640
there. 
So those are always fun. 

554
00:31:14,640 --> 00:31:16,400
Yeah. 
Exactly I. 

555
00:31:16,400 --> 00:31:18,960
Love that each one of these. 
Books is like a ream of paper, 

556
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:23,280
you know it's just like 400 and 
something 8 and 8 1/2 by 11 

557
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:25,640
sheets of paper. 
Like that's just the the block 

558
00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:27,600
of paper I just bought. 
Office Depot, man. 

559
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:30,360
Yeah, totally. 
Yeah. 

560
00:31:30,360 --> 00:31:33,440
Hot tip, if you have an office 
and the PDF you can just make 

561
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:35,960
this at home guys. 
There you go. 

562
00:31:36,080 --> 00:31:39,000
I mean it is pretty for the most
part it's very printer friendly 

563
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:41,840
aside from some of the darker 
art pages. 

564
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:45,320
It it's extremely printer 
friendly as far as the layout 

565
00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:46,920
and stuff goes. 
So yeah. 

566
00:31:47,040 --> 00:31:50,040
But make sure you use your 
company's ink so you're not 

567
00:31:50,040 --> 00:31:54,680
spending the money. 
But yeah, so, so Exalted 

568
00:31:54,680 --> 00:31:58,200
Funeral, you, you had this book,
you spent eight years making it.

569
00:31:58,200 --> 00:32:01,120
You, you have it all done. 
And then you're looking for a 

570
00:32:01,120 --> 00:32:03,560
way to get it printed. 
How did that kind of come about?

571
00:32:03,560 --> 00:32:05,600
Did you reach out to them? 
Did they reach out to you? 

572
00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:08,800
What was what was it like to 
kind of get that partnership up?

573
00:32:08,800 --> 00:32:13,080
And. 
Going it, it was good fortune on

574
00:32:13,080 --> 00:32:15,800
my part, and it was also some of
what I was talking about before 

575
00:32:15,800 --> 00:32:19,000
where I had like been talking 
about the book for a long time 

576
00:32:19,400 --> 00:32:21,720
and like had said it was coming 
soon. 

577
00:32:22,600 --> 00:32:27,760
I had reached out to a couple 
printers publishers previous and

578
00:32:27,760 --> 00:32:31,080
I'd gotten a couple rejection 
letters, which I think is just 

579
00:32:31,240 --> 00:32:34,600
part of the, you know, that's 
just part of the experience. 

580
00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:39,400
And I, I remember, you know, get
having gotten five or six and I 

581
00:32:39,400 --> 00:32:43,040
like just tweeted like help and 
somebody that was connected with

582
00:32:43,080 --> 00:32:47,040
EF like reached out to me and 
said, like, if you're actually 

583
00:32:47,040 --> 00:32:51,040
looking for a publisher, like 
we'll do it. 

584
00:32:52,080 --> 00:32:57,880
So it was, it was because I was 
shouting into kind of community 

585
00:32:57,880 --> 00:33:03,000
spaces for so long that I had 
enough interest that they, that 

586
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:04,680
they reached out, which I was 
very lucky about. 

587
00:33:05,960 --> 00:33:08,720
I was, you know, that there's 
nothing to say about that except

588
00:33:08,720 --> 00:33:10,080
that's my good fortune. 
I. 

589
00:33:12,280 --> 00:33:15,920
Wish I was really for you and. 
For them, you know, I'm sure 

590
00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:17,800
they didn't make nothing, you 
know? 

591
00:33:20,600 --> 00:33:24,320
Well, I think it's good for both
of us that like we came into the

592
00:33:25,040 --> 00:33:28,680
to the product and the, the, the
major costs were the printing 

593
00:33:28,680 --> 00:33:31,720
costs instead of other 
development costs because those 

594
00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:33,240
were covered by the the long 
funding. 

595
00:33:35,080 --> 00:33:38,040
One thing you said early on a 
while ago, I have to make, I 

596
00:33:38,040 --> 00:33:39,320
have to actually take a quick 
pause. 

597
00:33:39,560 --> 00:33:42,080
So I have the PDF up and for 
those that didn't notice this, 

598
00:33:42,080 --> 00:33:44,320
I'm going to scroll through it 
real fast and look at the page 

599
00:33:44,320 --> 00:33:45,800
numbers. 
This is like what? 

600
00:33:45,800 --> 00:33:48,360
I love this so much. 
It's such a good feature, but 

601
00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:52,160
the little guy spins around. 
For those in podcast land, you 

602
00:33:52,160 --> 00:33:55,280
can't see this so by the book so
that you can see the little guy 

603
00:33:55,280 --> 00:33:57,960
that surrounds the page numbers 
spinning around. 

604
00:33:58,720 --> 00:34:00,400
Good. 
Nice fucking touch, dude. 

605
00:34:00,440 --> 00:34:03,520
Like the little things, you 
know? 

606
00:34:03,760 --> 00:34:06,040
Eight years in, you expect 
little touches like that. 

607
00:34:06,040 --> 00:34:07,160
And you did a damn good job. 
Thank. 

608
00:34:08,120 --> 00:34:09,480
You. 
Yeah, I did that by hand. 

609
00:34:09,480 --> 00:34:12,040
Every page had a guy. 
Every single one just twisted 

610
00:34:12,040 --> 00:34:12,679
every. 
Single one. 

611
00:34:12,800 --> 00:34:16,320
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
I don't remember what I was 

612
00:34:16,320 --> 00:34:18,320
saying. 
Oh, you said that you wouldn't 

613
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:22,360
necessarily go into the process 
with like a done book. 

614
00:34:22,360 --> 00:34:25,719
Like, why what? 
Why was that not necessarily 

615
00:34:25,719 --> 00:34:33,719
ideal? 
Well, we, I think I should start

616
00:34:33,960 --> 00:34:38,120
earlier in getting the advice of
a publisher. 

617
00:34:38,639 --> 00:34:41,600
There were, there was some 
pieces of feedback because they 

618
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:46,480
did an editing round and I was 
constrained in my ability to 

619
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:49,480
take kind of the largest pieces 
of feedback because the book was

620
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:54,679
already laid out and I wasn't 
going to make major changes that

621
00:34:54,679 --> 00:35:00,320
would affect large parts of the 
layout at that stage. 

622
00:35:01,360 --> 00:35:04,080
The book would have been 
probably improved if I had been 

623
00:35:04,080 --> 00:35:07,520
able to benefit from their 
expertise earlier. 

624
00:35:08,960 --> 00:35:13,720
But we were, you know, it, it'd 
become less plastic as things 

625
00:35:13,720 --> 00:35:15,200
like layout and art were added 
to it. 

626
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:21,400
So I, I would start earlier. 
Maybe it is, you know, it's kind

627
00:35:21,400 --> 00:35:25,280
of a chicken egg situation. 
Like if I had had less book, 

628
00:35:25,280 --> 00:35:29,200
would they have reached out to 
me when I said help on Twitter? 

629
00:35:29,720 --> 00:35:34,760
I I don't know, but you know, 
that was that was the situation 

630
00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:37,280
where I was in where I was an 
unpublished, you know, mostly 

631
00:35:37,320 --> 00:35:40,840
unknown. 
Not that I'm not that I'm known 

632
00:35:40,840 --> 00:35:42,600
by any stretch of the 
imagination now, but like. 

633
00:35:43,800 --> 00:35:45,480
You're you're known in the niche
man. 

634
00:35:45,600 --> 00:35:48,560
Like as far as as far as 
everyone we knows, they know 

635
00:35:48,560 --> 00:35:49,560
you. 
So that's what. 

636
00:35:50,280 --> 00:35:53,480
The people that matter, Ryan and
Hunter are are are. 

637
00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:56,760
Hey, you're more. 
Popular than we are, you know. 

638
00:35:56,840 --> 00:35:58,440
Way more. 
Yeah, absolutely. 

639
00:35:58,840 --> 00:36:00,800
Oh, no, it's all, it's all 
Twitter bots. 

640
00:36:00,800 --> 00:36:05,880
You know, it's just all like 
Elon Musk's hoarding on. 

641
00:36:06,600 --> 00:36:09,240
His several million 
personalities that he uses to 

642
00:36:09,440 --> 00:36:11,480
beef up his public image. 
Exactly. 

643
00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:19,240
So I think it's interesting that
you would like to have started 

644
00:36:19,240 --> 00:36:21,840
working with them earlier, like,
you know, ideally in like an 

645
00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:23,760
earlier stage of this process to
affect it. 

646
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:27,120
Because this feels like it's 
more singularly your vision 

647
00:36:27,240 --> 00:36:32,120
because you didn't have anyone 
else's hands in it really until 

648
00:36:32,120 --> 00:36:35,200
later on. 
And kind of not related to the 

649
00:36:35,200 --> 00:36:38,040
statement I just said, but it 
looking back at this process, is

650
00:36:38,040 --> 00:36:40,520
there anything else that you 
feel that you would do 

651
00:36:40,520 --> 00:36:43,680
differently next time? 
Well, yes and no. 

652
00:36:43,920 --> 00:36:48,120
So, you know, when I came to 
them, I did have the editing. 

653
00:36:48,120 --> 00:36:54,400
You know, the benefits of 
editing from Melody Watson, 

654
00:36:55,280 --> 00:36:57,040
another person I, I really 
recommend. 

655
00:36:58,280 --> 00:37:01,080
She was great. 
I think she also edited Lancer, 

656
00:37:03,200 --> 00:37:08,360
you know, so it's I, I got I, I,
I knew that I couldn't do it 

657
00:37:08,360 --> 00:37:11,880
just by myself. 
So, you know, again, it was just

658
00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:14,760
with slow funding. 
I, I, I tried as, as best I 

659
00:37:14,760 --> 00:37:20,320
could to, to get somebody that 
wasn't just me looking at it and

660
00:37:20,320 --> 00:37:23,800
helping me think about it, the 
book and, you know, taking the, 

661
00:37:23,800 --> 00:37:30,080
the texts that I had as a, as a 
new reader, fresh eyes and, and 

662
00:37:30,080 --> 00:37:31,520
helping me understand how it 
read. 

663
00:37:33,480 --> 00:37:39,200
And I think I could, would have 
also benefited from that, just 

664
00:37:39,200 --> 00:37:42,160
having more, having it happening
earlier. 

665
00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:48,600
And I, I know that Exalt 
funeral, you know, that like I 

666
00:37:48,600 --> 00:37:50,880
said, they did in that in the 
past, I took as much as I could 

667
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:55,280
because I, I, my, my stance on 
the subject is if I'm going to 

668
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:58,760
ask for feedback, I need to be 
committed to getting it. 

669
00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:03,120
I can't say, please give me the 
feedback and then ignore it 

670
00:38:03,120 --> 00:38:07,440
because even if some of the 
feedback is difficult or painful

671
00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:14,040
or complicated, I, I, I've 
committed to it. 

672
00:38:14,040 --> 00:38:20,480
And you know, the, your editors 
are invaluable and, and you need

673
00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:25,560
to treat them like that. 
So if I had been less committed 

674
00:38:25,920 --> 00:38:29,160
with every round of feedback and
less committed to, to the page, 

675
00:38:30,200 --> 00:38:32,840
it would have probably 
benefited, you know, it just 

676
00:38:32,840 --> 00:38:36,120
would have benefited and, and, 
and that is what it is. 

677
00:38:38,680 --> 00:38:40,840
You know hindsight, you know 
2020 and all that. 

678
00:38:40,840 --> 00:38:43,920
You know it is what it is. 
It's a learning experience for 

679
00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:45,960
me for sure. 
Yeah, I mean, I don't feel like 

680
00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:49,680
it's it's hard also to critique 
yourself on if I was you, it'd 

681
00:38:50,040 --> 00:38:52,080
be hard to critique myself on 
this process because it just 

682
00:38:52,080 --> 00:38:55,000
ended up going so well and I so 
you sold out multiple times and 

683
00:38:55,000 --> 00:38:57,040
the books really great so. 
Yeah. 

684
00:38:57,040 --> 00:38:59,240
Thanks so much. 
But, you know, at the same time,

685
00:38:59,240 --> 00:39:02,080
yeah, I mean, how many people 
can say that, like something 

686
00:39:02,080 --> 00:39:03,760
like this is the first thing 
that they ever put out you? 

687
00:39:04,200 --> 00:39:05,960
Know what I mean? 
Like, I think there's a lot of 

688
00:39:05,960 --> 00:39:09,480
people that would be very happy 
regardless of like Evie, I think

689
00:39:09,480 --> 00:39:11,160
it's it's, it's always going to 
be one of those things like the 

690
00:39:11,160 --> 00:39:13,320
artist, the writer, everyone is 
going to see like the million 

691
00:39:13,320 --> 00:39:15,120
flaws that no one else sees and 
the thing they put out 

692
00:39:15,120 --> 00:39:18,600
themselves. 
But again, I think, you know, 

693
00:39:18,840 --> 00:39:20,400
for this is a dream for a lot of
people. 

694
00:39:20,400 --> 00:39:23,600
I hope it feels that way to have
this thing that you spent so 

695
00:39:23,600 --> 00:39:27,160
much time on turn out this well 
and be in your hand, Not only in

696
00:39:27,160 --> 00:39:30,040
your hands, but in like many, 
many, many other people's hands.

697
00:39:30,920 --> 00:39:34,880
That I so, God, the, I've been 
right. 

698
00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:38,080
Like I said, I've been writing 
RPGs, you know, just in, like 

699
00:39:38,480 --> 00:39:40,440
just in Google Docs, just in 
Word docs. 

700
00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:43,720
I mean, like I, I was writing 
RPGs when I was a kid. 

701
00:39:43,720 --> 00:39:48,240
I, I, I think it's such a, such 
a medium that is, that invites 

702
00:39:48,520 --> 00:39:51,720
everybody's writing 
participation, whether you're 

703
00:39:51,720 --> 00:39:54,960
writing your characters and 
writing their back stories or 

704
00:39:54,960 --> 00:39:59,080
like coming up with like, you 
know, new powers or abilities 

705
00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:01,600
for, for classes or you're, 
you're writing games or 

706
00:40:02,040 --> 00:40:06,280
campaigns or world building. 
You know, it invites you in to, 

707
00:40:06,520 --> 00:40:11,400
to write with the book. 
And I that's, you know, the 100%

708
00:40:11,400 --> 00:40:15,280
of my appeal about RP GS. 
I love, I love that fact that I 

709
00:40:15,280 --> 00:40:16,880
don't know that anything else 
has. 

710
00:40:17,240 --> 00:40:19,920
That kind of like low level of 
entry for creative 

711
00:40:19,920 --> 00:40:22,440
collaboration. 
So I've been writing forever. 

712
00:40:23,040 --> 00:40:25,560
It is. 
And that is my goal, right? 

713
00:40:25,560 --> 00:40:33,120
Like, I think that I would 
become very sad as a person if I

714
00:40:33,120 --> 00:40:37,800
mean, I just, I don't think I 
would enjoy it if my goals were 

715
00:40:39,080 --> 00:40:42,400
based on, you know, number of 
copies sold. 

716
00:40:42,400 --> 00:40:45,560
I'm enormously flattered that 
people like the game. 

717
00:40:45,560 --> 00:40:48,000
I, I hope they have fun with it.
I can't wait to see what they're

718
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:50,960
they're making with it because 
I'm very, very eager and excited

719
00:40:50,960 --> 00:40:53,520
to see it. 
But like my, my goals are like 

720
00:40:53,600 --> 00:41:00,120
I, I love writing games. 
I, I had tried to make something

721
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:04,840
that allowed like my ideas, like
jump from my table to yours. 

722
00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:08,760
I, I hope that there's something
there that, that you can take 

723
00:41:08,760 --> 00:41:12,560
and use and, and put into your 
games practice. 

724
00:41:13,600 --> 00:41:16,120
And I, I can't wait until you 
send it back to me, kind of like

725
00:41:16,120 --> 00:41:19,360
I was talking about with vlogs, 
Like I want to see that resonate

726
00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:22,920
and, and come back to me. 
But I'm also enormously pleased 

727
00:41:23,160 --> 00:41:25,840
to be at a table with my friends
and have a book that I can open 

728
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:29,560
and flip through and like get 
the answers and like, I, I want 

729
00:41:29,560 --> 00:41:31,640
fewer barriers between them and 
me. 

730
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,240
And when I am, I'm, I'm a pretty
analog kind of guy. 

731
00:41:35,240 --> 00:41:40,040
And I've been obliged to use a 
computer to like read the rules 

732
00:41:40,040 --> 00:41:42,280
and like look up stuff during 
the games. 

733
00:41:42,280 --> 00:41:45,280
And now that I can close my 
laptop and act, just have the 

734
00:41:45,280 --> 00:41:50,160
book between me and the, the six
people at my table, I'm 

735
00:41:50,280 --> 00:41:51,760
thrilled. 
I'm thrilled to have that 

736
00:41:51,880 --> 00:41:58,560
feature that it's very exciting.
My table's SO my table so the 

737
00:41:58,560 --> 00:42:01,120
opposite. 
I have my big screen TV on a 

738
00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:05,000
rolling stand so I can put it 
behind me and I like will send 

739
00:42:05,000 --> 00:42:07,840
the map to that and I'll zoom in
on part so they can't see the 

740
00:42:07,840 --> 00:42:10,000
whole map. 
And I have a laptop up and I 

741
00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:12,800
have a tablet for taking notes 
so. 

742
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:18,200
I, I do like doing that stuff 
too, but like I, I also kind of 

743
00:42:18,200 --> 00:42:21,520
hate like things between like I,
I, I want to, I get up and I 

744
00:42:21,520 --> 00:42:23,240
talk my hands as if you were on 
the stream. 

745
00:42:23,240 --> 00:42:25,840
You can see I'm gesticulating 
right now, not to make a point, 

746
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:29,720
but just like I'm, I, I have a, 
a lot of physical actions that I

747
00:42:29,720 --> 00:42:32,240
like, like to do when I'm 
jamming and I, I want to be able

748
00:42:32,240 --> 00:42:36,440
to do them kind of like without 
smashing, you know, expensive 

749
00:42:36,720 --> 00:42:38,280
machinery. 
Knocks the laptop over. 

750
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:41,360
Yeah, yeah. 
Yeah, no, I for a long time I 

751
00:42:41,400 --> 00:42:46,160
had, I had built, I'd use like 
the mounting holes in the back 

752
00:42:46,160 --> 00:42:48,920
of ATV and actually like built 
like feet for it to stay on so I

753
00:42:48,920 --> 00:42:51,960
could lay it flat. 
And then had like put like 

754
00:42:52,320 --> 00:42:55,840
correct a size like gridded maps
on the TV so they could be like 

755
00:42:55,840 --> 00:42:57,160
live and shit. 
That was fun for. 

756
00:42:57,200 --> 00:42:58,720
That's so cool. 
That's so cool. 

757
00:42:59,520 --> 00:43:01,640
Yeah, it was a bitch to carry 
when you were playing in your 

758
00:43:01,640 --> 00:43:04,880
apartment, though. 
I'll tell you what couple things

759
00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:08,880
so we're not going to talk about
about the game like content a 

760
00:43:08,880 --> 00:43:12,080
ton, but I did have a couple 
questions about like the I don't

761
00:43:12,080 --> 00:43:13,960
know why I don't feel I don't 
know what I'm going to call it. 

762
00:43:13,960 --> 00:43:15,920
So like I don't want to ask like
why tarot? 

763
00:43:15,920 --> 00:43:20,480
Because guess what, on page this
one on the introduction page, 

764
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:22,520
there's the thing that says why 
tarot and it explains it. 

765
00:43:23,240 --> 00:43:26,440
My question is not why tarot, 
but when tarot like at what 

766
00:43:26,440 --> 00:43:29,960
point in His Majesty the worm 
did you go? 

767
00:43:30,240 --> 00:43:33,600
You know what? 
Fuck dice, we're going tarot. 

768
00:43:33,600 --> 00:43:36,560
It's. 
A great question. 

769
00:43:36,720 --> 00:43:42,160
I feel in like an earlier in an 
earlier game just for be My 

770
00:43:42,160 --> 00:43:44,360
friend, I had used tarot cards 
for like a magic system. 

771
00:43:44,360 --> 00:43:47,760
It was kind of like, you know, 
the Deadlands magic system uses 

772
00:43:47,800 --> 00:43:49,800
poker hands and I thought that 
was so cool. 

773
00:43:49,800 --> 00:43:51,600
And it was kind of like it was 
kind of the same thing. 

774
00:43:51,600 --> 00:43:58,560
It was, you know, the year 2005 
and so steampunk was big and 

775
00:43:58,560 --> 00:44:02,160
tarot and like 1800s and stuff. 
I, I liked it a lot. 

776
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:05,080
I thought they were cool looking
and there there's an air of 

777
00:44:05,080 --> 00:44:08,640
mystique, you know, which I say 
in the, in the introduction, I 

778
00:44:08,640 --> 00:44:10,400
think they're more interesting 
to look at than other types of 

779
00:44:10,400 --> 00:44:14,960
cards. 
I think the, the time that I 

780
00:44:14,960 --> 00:44:18,720
like kind of latched onto it as 
a, as a resolution mechanic 

781
00:44:18,760 --> 00:44:20,760
instead of dice. 
I was sitting around the table, 

782
00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:25,320
I was playing, I think we're 
paying Pathfinder, but we could 

783
00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:28,320
have switched to 5th edition at 
the time with my college 

784
00:44:28,320 --> 00:44:30,120
buddies. 
You know what, we graduated 

785
00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:34,280
college and like still we got 
together for like monthly DND 

786
00:44:34,280 --> 00:44:41,480
games and we would, there's like
a lot of us and we were, it was 

787
00:44:41,480 --> 00:44:43,400
a blast. 
You know, we'd make chicken 

788
00:44:43,400 --> 00:44:49,320
wings and drink beer and play 
DND and you know, it's just real

789
00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:52,600
beer and pretzels kind of fun. 
But you know, there was like six

790
00:44:52,600 --> 00:44:56,640
or seven of us and sometimes, 
like as we like got kids, 

791
00:44:56,640 --> 00:45:00,240
sometimes our kids joined. 
And God, like I would I would 

792
00:45:00,240 --> 00:45:03,600
sit there waiting for like an 
hour between like my turns in 

793
00:45:03,600 --> 00:45:07,920
combat, right? 
And there's nothing there's 

794
00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:10,640
there's no cure that I know of 
for that. 

795
00:45:10,640 --> 00:45:12,760
We could be the most disciplined
people in the world. 

796
00:45:12,760 --> 00:45:16,440
And just physically speaking out
loud, I cast a spell. 

797
00:45:16,560 --> 00:45:18,560
Here is the role, here is the 
defense. 

798
00:45:19,120 --> 00:45:21,560
This is what happens. 
Like takes a long time when you 

799
00:45:21,560 --> 00:45:23,320
have that many people sitting 
around the table like chugging 

800
00:45:23,320 --> 00:45:28,720
beer and eating, eating wings. 
And like, I was sitting there 

801
00:45:28,720 --> 00:45:32,640
just thinking like, you know, if
we could all make actions at the

802
00:45:32,640 --> 00:45:36,400
same time, this would be more 
fun because I'd have to wait 

803
00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:38,240
less. 
Well, how could I do that? 

804
00:45:38,640 --> 00:45:41,760
It's like, well, I guess if we 
had cards that determine what we

805
00:45:41,760 --> 00:45:44,960
could do, there could be 
different like stages of combat.

806
00:45:44,960 --> 00:45:48,000
And like, I just sat there like 
musing about like rules because 

807
00:45:48,000 --> 00:45:50,880
I had so fucking long to like 
wait. 

808
00:45:51,200 --> 00:45:55,120
And that was when I think I like
grabbed onto cards and I just 

809
00:45:55,120 --> 00:45:57,080
think tarot cards more 
interesting than than playing 

810
00:45:57,080 --> 00:45:58,600
cards. 
So that's, I think that's when 

811
00:45:58,600 --> 00:46:01,280
it was born, yeah. 
That's pretty cool. 

812
00:46:01,280 --> 00:46:04,200
I will agree that those those 
combat turns in five East and 

813
00:46:04,200 --> 00:46:07,840
stuff can take an insane amount 
of time. 

814
00:46:08,080 --> 00:46:10,880
And I, I, I think the tarot 
cards really add like a weird 

815
00:46:10,880 --> 00:46:15,200
esoteric, like arcane feel to 
playing the game that I really 

816
00:46:15,200 --> 00:46:16,960
appreciate. 
Yeah. 

817
00:46:16,960 --> 00:46:20,080
I mean, I mean, if you imagine 
in the 70s and like you're 

818
00:46:20,080 --> 00:46:23,360
starting to play DND and you're 
like, yeah, let's take out our 

819
00:46:23,360 --> 00:46:25,320
dice. 
This dice has twenty sides. 

820
00:46:25,320 --> 00:46:30,440
You're like like, and now it's 
very, it's very rote like we're 

821
00:46:30,440 --> 00:46:35,920
we're very used to the normal 
like platonic sided dice. 

822
00:46:36,200 --> 00:46:38,520
And Tara still feels kind of 
weird, like it gives it kind of 

823
00:46:38,520 --> 00:46:40,280
like a weird feeling. 
And it, you know, there's 

824
00:46:40,280 --> 00:46:43,440
nothing about the the 
iconography of the tarot in it. 

825
00:46:43,440 --> 00:46:45,160
It's not like you have to be in 
this Clio to do it. 

826
00:46:45,160 --> 00:46:46,640
It's just in the brand of 
another generator. 

827
00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:49,400
But they still look kind of 
weird and are pretty to to look 

828
00:46:49,400 --> 00:46:52,400
at and like fun to play with. 
They're just like fun. 

829
00:46:52,400 --> 00:46:53,680
They're gameable. 
They're toyatic. 

830
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:56,920
When you do a good job too, 
again, we're not going to dig 

831
00:46:56,920 --> 00:46:59,120
too deep in the mechanics, but 
like you even have a thing where

832
00:46:59,120 --> 00:47:00,760
it's like you don't have tarot. 
Here's how you use regular 

833
00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:02,120
cards. 
Like if you need things that 

834
00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:04,720
aren't 20 sided dice, like 
here's are different ways to 

835
00:47:04,720 --> 00:47:07,360
like do all the things. 
So it's not like you necessarily

836
00:47:07,360 --> 00:47:09,720
have to, but it's definitely one
of those things where like, 

837
00:47:10,880 --> 00:47:12,800
like, thanks for not just doing 
like AD 20 rollover. 

838
00:47:12,800 --> 00:47:14,720
You know what I mean? 
Like, I'm so glad that I don't 

839
00:47:14,720 --> 00:47:17,400
have to read another like 400 
page D20 rollover. 

840
00:47:17,400 --> 00:47:19,400
So like it's, it's, it's a 
wonderful mechanic. 

841
00:47:19,400 --> 00:47:21,720
I'm excited to to talk about and
diggle blood into it. 

842
00:47:22,400 --> 00:47:24,840
But like you said, you know, 
there's a lot of stuff there at 

843
00:47:24,840 --> 00:47:28,800
the book that is it's different 
and not just for the sake of 

844
00:47:28,800 --> 00:47:30,040
different. 
It's different because it's like

845
00:47:30,040 --> 00:47:32,280
interesting and it fits the 
game, which is always really 

846
00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:34,680
nice to see. 
It's not just like here's here's

847
00:47:34,680 --> 00:47:37,800
my version of the redundancy, 
you know, and again, we'll talk 

848
00:47:37,800 --> 00:47:41,280
about that a little bit more in 
two weeks. 

849
00:47:44,560 --> 00:47:45,880
I've actually started writing on
questions. 

850
00:47:45,880 --> 00:47:48,440
This is how the this, so for 
those that don't know this, this

851
00:47:48,440 --> 00:47:51,600
is how the episodes go. 
We start with nothing and then 

852
00:47:51,600 --> 00:47:58,120
this is how it looks as we go. 
So as we said, and eventually, 

853
00:47:58,120 --> 00:48:00,440
you know, it doesn't matter that
it took as long as it did for it

854
00:48:00,440 --> 00:48:03,640
to come out, but eight years, 
when was it actually like when 

855
00:48:03,640 --> 00:48:05,400
did you feel that you were 
pretty much done though? 

856
00:48:05,400 --> 00:48:08,920
Because I know it's taken 
probably it sounds like nine 

857
00:48:08,920 --> 00:48:11,760
months to a year to actually get
it into print. 

858
00:48:11,760 --> 00:48:14,520
So when were when were you like 
besides a couple small tweaks 

859
00:48:14,520 --> 00:48:17,200
here and there, when was it 
done? 

860
00:48:18,720 --> 00:48:21,920
I, I, there, there were probably
a couple times just again, based

861
00:48:21,920 --> 00:48:25,720
on my like ignorance of the 
process, how long it would take 

862
00:48:25,720 --> 00:48:29,360
and kind of how much more work 
needed to be done, where like I 

863
00:48:29,360 --> 00:48:31,520
thought like, I'm done. 
And like, you know, the, the, 

864
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:34,080
the text, you know, the maybe 
the first time that like, I 

865
00:48:34,120 --> 00:48:37,800
thought the text was really, 
really finalized and we started 

866
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:40,160
layout and layout took six 
months. 

867
00:48:40,560 --> 00:48:42,520
I had no idea it was going to 
take that long, but it, that's 

868
00:48:42,520 --> 00:48:45,400
how long it took me. 
And I'm not in a race with 

869
00:48:45,400 --> 00:48:47,040
anybody else, right? 
It's just like, this is how long

870
00:48:47,040 --> 00:48:51,720
it takes me. 
Joshua Crawl at the time that 

871
00:48:51,720 --> 00:48:57,480
like the, the, the Indesign book
was ready was the end of last 

872
00:48:57,480 --> 00:49:00,000
year. 
So it it took, I mean, and I, I,

873
00:49:00,000 --> 00:49:03,640
I didn't touch it for that long,
but that's how long it 

874
00:49:03,640 --> 00:49:07,560
physically took. 
Took seven, almost eight months 

875
00:49:08,200 --> 00:49:12,880
of like dear exalted funeral. 
Here is the book Love Josh. 

876
00:49:13,120 --> 00:49:15,640
That's how long it takes to like
physically print something and 

877
00:49:15,760 --> 00:49:20,480
and ship it from the printers 
and put it into warehouses, you 

878
00:49:20,680 --> 00:49:23,520
know, and mail it out to people.
That's just, that is something I

879
00:49:23,520 --> 00:49:26,080
didn't know. 
And now, now I know. 

880
00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:31,400
And the last, not the last. 
There's plenty more questions, 

881
00:49:31,400 --> 00:49:35,080
but the last one that fits on 
this post it note is it it's so 

882
00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:36,400
it's a it's a book. 
It's a big book. 

883
00:49:37,160 --> 00:49:40,960
Was there ever in your mind? 
Because clearly, like you said, 

884
00:49:40,960 --> 00:49:44,480
you, you did layout, you did all
of this stuff, obviously is one 

885
00:49:44,480 --> 00:49:45,560
big book. 
Was there every time. 

886
00:49:45,560 --> 00:49:47,280
You're like, man, maybe this 
should be three books. 

887
00:49:48,360 --> 00:49:50,600
Yeah. 
Well, so the thing that I always

888
00:49:50,600 --> 00:49:55,320
had hoped my vision for the 
project, you know, until until 

889
00:49:55,320 --> 00:49:58,720
the until I started talking 
about talking to Exaltive 

890
00:49:58,720 --> 00:50:02,120
funeral, which is like at a time
that I had a pretty finished 

891
00:50:02,120 --> 00:50:04,960
book. 
I want to do a box set. 

892
00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:06,640
And the reason that the 
appendices are called the 

893
00:50:06,640 --> 00:50:09,320
appendices is because they were 
going to be separate books that 

894
00:50:09,320 --> 00:50:13,120
you can sit out on the table. 
The, the practical, again, the 

895
00:50:13,120 --> 00:50:17,320
practical realities of printing 
that many books, putting them, 

896
00:50:17,640 --> 00:50:21,200
which takes, you know, human 
labor to put into boxes, seal 

897
00:50:21,200 --> 00:50:26,760
the box and cellophane. 
The, the, the cost of that as an

898
00:50:26,760 --> 00:50:31,560
MSRB was like $200.00. 
And some people might be excited

899
00:50:31,560 --> 00:50:33,960
about the book, but like they're
not $200.00 excited about that. 

900
00:50:33,960 --> 00:50:37,480
And so like the cost of that was
just, was just prohibitive. 

901
00:50:37,720 --> 00:50:41,680
Now, I did spend $200.00 on the 
Dolman wood box set and I'm very

902
00:50:41,680 --> 00:50:46,200
excited about it. 
But I, it's a, it's a, it's a 

903
00:50:46,200 --> 00:50:51,880
big book, but I, it, it is one 
book for, for cost saving 

904
00:50:51,880 --> 00:50:56,320
measures, trying to get it kind 
of as affordable as, as 

905
00:50:56,480 --> 00:51:01,040
practical realities allow. 
If I could have, you know, at 

906
00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:04,560
some point, maybe I could have 
like split this up into three 

907
00:51:04,560 --> 00:51:07,520
books, kind of like dungeons and
Dragons. 

908
00:51:07,520 --> 00:51:10,640
That does it, you know, like so 
in, in the, in the book, you 

909
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:15,520
know, you have the jams guide, 
you have a tutorial dungeon, you

910
00:51:15,520 --> 00:51:18,960
have the player facing rules, 
you have magic and alchemy, you 

911
00:51:18,960 --> 00:51:22,400
have a bestiary, you have rules 
to make new kinds of creatures. 

912
00:51:22,760 --> 00:51:26,920
You have a, you know, a dungeon 
creation procedure, you have a 

913
00:51:26,920 --> 00:51:31,440
city creation procedure. 
There's it's a complete game. 

914
00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:36,000
And I, I remember when I was a 
teenager and I bought, I 

915
00:51:36,000 --> 00:51:38,400
mentioned deadlines earlier. 
I bought the deadlines player 

916
00:51:38,400 --> 00:51:41,040
guide and as a teenager, my 
discretionary income was, was, 

917
00:51:41,080 --> 00:51:43,080
was very small. 
I'd saved up for it. 

918
00:51:43,080 --> 00:51:44,680
I was really excited about it 
and I still couldn't play the 

919
00:51:44,680 --> 00:51:46,360
damn game because I didn't have 
the G Ms. guide. 

920
00:51:46,360 --> 00:51:49,600
I remember being so upset about 
that, like, this isn't a 

921
00:51:49,600 --> 00:51:51,720
complete game. 
I thought, I've, I've been, I've

922
00:51:51,720 --> 00:51:53,000
been tricked, I've been 
swindled. 

923
00:51:53,760 --> 00:51:57,120
I, I, I, I've been duped and I, 
I wanted to, I wanted to give 

924
00:51:57,120 --> 00:51:59,840
people a complete experience. 
So at some point maybe I could 

925
00:51:59,840 --> 00:52:03,440
have split it up, had AG Ms. 
guide, had a Monster Manual, had

926
00:52:03,440 --> 00:52:06,920
a player's guide. 
I, you know, maybe those that 

927
00:52:06,920 --> 00:52:10,800
like PDF costs would have been 
closer to like what people had 

928
00:52:10,800 --> 00:52:13,280
expected, You know, each of 
those PDFs could have been 20 

929
00:52:13,280 --> 00:52:15,560
bucks or something. 
But like, I, I wanted to give 

930
00:52:15,560 --> 00:52:19,560
like a more complete experience.
And so I I opted to keep the 

931
00:52:19,560 --> 00:52:25,440
books together. 
I mean it, capitalism sucks and 

932
00:52:25,640 --> 00:52:28,320
if we could all just have like 
our ideal projects, It's 

933
00:52:28,320 --> 00:52:31,400
interesting the number of times 
that we've seen we we've gotten 

934
00:52:31,400 --> 00:52:33,480
that answer or they're like, I 
wanted to do this differently, 

935
00:52:33,680 --> 00:52:36,320
but it would be too much money 
for anyone to actually pay for 

936
00:52:36,320 --> 00:52:38,000
because they might think it's 
great. 

937
00:52:38,240 --> 00:52:39,320
But yeah, like you said, it's 
not. 

938
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:41,480
They might not think the first 
thing I ever did is like 2 to 

939
00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:43,360
$300.00 great. 
You know, Dolman would. 

940
00:52:44,040 --> 00:52:46,800
I mean, how long is, you know, 
that's something that's been, 

941
00:52:46,840 --> 00:52:50,280
you know, a thing forever and 
and people can in their minds at

942
00:52:50,280 --> 00:52:52,720
least justify, you know, 
spending that much money on a 

943
00:52:52,720 --> 00:52:54,600
book because again, I didn't 
too. 

944
00:52:54,760 --> 00:52:56,920
I'm very excited for it. 
Very excited for it. 

945
00:52:57,480 --> 00:53:01,200
But but yeah, it it it's, you 
know, it, it sucks when you go 

946
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:03,120
like I would have loved to put 
color in this book, but you 

947
00:53:03,120 --> 00:53:05,920
know, money, you know, it, it 
sucks. 

948
00:53:05,920 --> 00:53:12,680
So I will say for a book, it's 
for a book this big, it did a 

949
00:53:12,680 --> 00:53:15,280
good I'm I'm excited to talk 
about it. 

950
00:53:15,280 --> 00:53:17,320
We're we're we're we're, I can't
wait till we get to the review 

951
00:53:17,320 --> 00:53:21,960
and go over it. 
But what does the future look 

952
00:53:21,960 --> 00:53:25,600
like for first, let's say His 
Majesty the worm. 

953
00:53:25,600 --> 00:53:27,880
So I know you said that you're 
excited to have other people 

954
00:53:27,880 --> 00:53:30,360
making stuff for it. 
Are you planning any type of 

955
00:53:30,360 --> 00:53:34,320
jams or anything like that? 
Or like, obviously there's a 

956
00:53:34,320 --> 00:53:38,480
very permissive like license in 
the front. 

957
00:53:38,480 --> 00:53:41,480
I think you pretty much just say
like just don't steal the art, I

958
00:53:41,480 --> 00:53:43,240
guess. 
But like, please make stuff is 

959
00:53:43,240 --> 00:53:46,480
what like the beginning page 
pretty much says what what does 

960
00:53:46,480 --> 00:53:48,480
that look like to you? 
Like what are you hoping for? 

961
00:53:49,440 --> 00:53:54,760
Yeah, I mean I great question. 
I am excited to see what people 

962
00:53:54,760 --> 00:53:56,960
can make with this. 
I am hosting a jam in September 

963
00:53:58,000 --> 00:54:02,600
to start working on some 
dungeons together. 

964
00:54:02,600 --> 00:54:07,760
So as you get the book and 
digest it, I would love to like 

965
00:54:07,760 --> 00:54:12,800
work with others to create 
content that you can use to 

966
00:54:12,800 --> 00:54:17,200
start making your mega dungeons.
So you know, the my, my, my 

967
00:54:17,200 --> 00:54:19,320
dirty little secret about making
mega dungeons is the reason I 

968
00:54:19,320 --> 00:54:24,200
say that it's easy is because 
there are so many people already

969
00:54:24,200 --> 00:54:27,240
that have like made really, 
really cool dungeons. 

970
00:54:27,480 --> 00:54:30,080
And your work is curation, not 
creation. 

971
00:54:30,320 --> 00:54:34,040
So take stuff that exists and 
like, you know, I, I'm not going

972
00:54:34,040 --> 00:54:36,400
to use almost any RPG product 
without any tweaking. 

973
00:54:36,400 --> 00:54:39,440
So like, take stuff that exists,
put it together in a way that 

974
00:54:39,440 --> 00:54:43,520
makes sense to you, change the 
bits that are like interesting 

975
00:54:43,520 --> 00:54:45,480
for you to change and and start 
running the game. 

976
00:54:45,480 --> 00:54:48,600
So I'd like to, you know, hold a
jam and make some dungeons 

977
00:54:48,600 --> 00:54:52,480
together as my is my hope. 
And we can, as everybody 

978
00:54:52,480 --> 00:54:55,440
contributes to like one dungeon 
and we have enough 

979
00:54:55,440 --> 00:54:57,440
contributions. 
Like you can also take that 

980
00:54:57,440 --> 00:55:01,680
stuff from the jam and like 
start curating your mega dungeon

981
00:55:01,680 --> 00:55:03,040
and and running the game for 
your friends. 

982
00:55:04,520 --> 00:55:06,040
I also have a dungeon coming 
out. 

983
00:55:07,360 --> 00:55:12,280
I soon TM I'm in play destiny 
right now. 

984
00:55:12,280 --> 00:55:16,600
I'm playing destiny right now. 
It's called the castle 

985
00:55:16,600 --> 00:55:20,640
automatic. 
When it is done, I will publish 

986
00:55:20,640 --> 00:55:22,400
that as like an official. 
You know, His Majesty, the worm 

987
00:55:22,880 --> 00:55:24,440
license product. 
But as you said, you know, the 

988
00:55:24,520 --> 00:55:28,280
the the license is permissive. 
I I hope that there's something 

989
00:55:28,280 --> 00:55:30,280
here that tickles somebody's 
brain and they would also like 

990
00:55:30,280 --> 00:55:32,560
to make it. 
I'd love to see what you guys 

991
00:55:32,560 --> 00:55:37,640
make. 
And are you so say, say this, 

992
00:55:37,720 --> 00:55:40,000
this exists, right? 
It does not say that. 

993
00:55:40,000 --> 00:55:43,240
We we say because it does. 
It's in our hands years down the

994
00:55:43,240 --> 00:55:46,160
road, right. 
And you like you see this, you 

995
00:55:46,160 --> 00:55:48,680
see that people make a thing. 
You realize, oh, maybe I could 

996
00:55:48,680 --> 00:55:49,920
have tweaked it this way a 
little bit. 

997
00:55:50,200 --> 00:55:52,560
Are you the kind of person who 
is like, this is this is a 

998
00:55:52,560 --> 00:55:54,160
thing, this is His Majesty the 
worm? 

999
00:55:54,440 --> 00:55:56,600
Or are you the kind of person 
that's going to go, I'm already 

1000
00:55:56,600 --> 00:55:59,960
got 2 E on the mind? 
Like where, where, where is, is 

1001
00:55:59,960 --> 00:56:02,800
that in the mind at all? 
Is that or is that a seed you're

1002
00:56:02,800 --> 00:56:06,000
trying to like push away and let
the game exist as it is for now?

1003
00:56:06,000 --> 00:56:07,800
And I know it's it's fresh. 
I mean, the game is just out 

1004
00:56:07,800 --> 00:56:11,360
now, but I mean this, I'm sure 
you've thought about things. 

1005
00:56:11,360 --> 00:56:14,960
So what are the thoughts like? 
You know, I have a lot of ideas 

1006
00:56:14,960 --> 00:56:17,200
for, for projects and things 
that are interesting to me. 

1007
00:56:18,280 --> 00:56:22,640
I, I am lucky to have the, the 
space to like have a creative 

1008
00:56:22,640 --> 00:56:24,960
projects. 
And I also know that, you know, 

1009
00:56:24,960 --> 00:56:28,240
given the long tail that it 
takes any creative project like,

1010
00:56:28,280 --> 00:56:30,320
you know, the things that I'm 
interested in today might not be

1011
00:56:30,320 --> 00:56:32,360
the things that I'm interested 
in in two years. 

1012
00:56:32,640 --> 00:56:35,400
I feel pretty committed about 
getting this extra, this dungeon

1013
00:56:35,400 --> 00:56:40,480
out to try and support the, the 
game and, and help people, you 

1014
00:56:40,480 --> 00:56:43,280
know, get it to the table and, 
and get it in front of their 

1015
00:56:43,400 --> 00:56:44,400
friends. 
After that. 

1016
00:56:44,400 --> 00:56:49,120
I, I, I, I'm really just, I 
guess we'll see it will we, we 

1017
00:56:49,120 --> 00:56:51,040
will have to see there. 
What like we're interested in. 

1018
00:56:51,200 --> 00:56:54,760
We have a couple knocks also in 
the wings. 

1019
00:56:54,760 --> 00:56:58,920
So that's also taking like a lot
of time and like creative brain 

1020
00:56:58,920 --> 00:57:01,960
power. 
So I'm I'm also excited about 

1021
00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:05,400
those coming out. 
I totally, yeah. 

1022
00:57:05,480 --> 00:57:08,320
I I, I know that you do knock 
and even said you do knock. 

1023
00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:10,120
And I don't know how I forgot to
write down knock. 

1024
00:57:10,120 --> 00:57:13,880
Like, what the heck? 
Like knock like how how the heck

1025
00:57:13,880 --> 00:57:16,240
did that come about? 
And obviously we'll, you know, 

1026
00:57:16,240 --> 00:57:18,400
we'll, we'll keep waiting for, 
for all those each time they 

1027
00:57:18,400 --> 00:57:19,400
come out. 
They're always gorgeous. 

1028
00:57:19,400 --> 00:57:23,560
They're always beautiful. 
But yeah, I guess how like you 

1029
00:57:23,560 --> 00:57:25,360
do knock. 
Tell us about how the heck that 

1030
00:57:25,360 --> 00:57:29,040
happened. 
I mean, again, there's just good

1031
00:57:29,040 --> 00:57:30,760
luck. 
You know, the, the Mary Mushman 

1032
00:57:30,760 --> 00:57:32,000
are doing a lot of things right 
now. 

1033
00:57:32,000 --> 00:57:33,320
They have a lot of cool 
projects. 

1034
00:57:34,240 --> 00:57:36,240
You know, the Black Sword hack 
has been a big success. 

1035
00:57:36,920 --> 00:57:42,000
They just, they're continuing to
put out some really cool old 

1036
00:57:42,000 --> 00:57:44,840
school adventures. 
That was their most recent 

1037
00:57:44,840 --> 00:57:47,400
Kickstarter. 
They have a new game coming out,

1038
00:57:47,920 --> 00:57:50,520
Dungeon Ink. 
There's a, there's a free to 

1039
00:57:50,520 --> 00:57:56,040
play sample on the website. 
And so like, like, like many RPG

1040
00:57:56,080 --> 00:57:58,400
outfits, it's also, these are 
all labours of love. 

1041
00:57:58,400 --> 00:58:01,680
These are all passion projects 
and it's a very small team, 

1042
00:58:01,680 --> 00:58:04,400
right? 
So the, the Mary Mushroot men, 

1043
00:58:04,640 --> 00:58:09,040
Olivia and Eric, you know, are 
expanding their focus and doing 

1044
00:58:09,160 --> 00:58:11,320
a lot of different things. 
So they brought me on board to 

1045
00:58:11,320 --> 00:58:16,880
help with Knock because I have 
some experience in the space and

1046
00:58:16,880 --> 00:58:20,680
some experience as an editor. 
So I, I'm, I'm lucky enough to 

1047
00:58:20,680 --> 00:58:23,720
get to like do my favorite 
thing, which is play with logs 

1048
00:58:23,720 --> 00:58:24,920
and play in the old school 
space. 

1049
00:58:26,480 --> 00:58:32,400
So to free them up to to do kind
of like an expanded lens, a 

1050
00:58:32,400 --> 00:58:34,760
widened lens of old school 
stuff. 

1051
00:58:35,840 --> 00:58:39,080
Yeah, very, very excited. 
You know, the mirror Mushman are

1052
00:58:39,080 --> 00:58:43,120
they're there's like three or 
five. 

1053
00:58:43,120 --> 00:58:45,000
Again, we're not going to list, 
we're not going to like I'm 

1054
00:58:45,000 --> 00:58:46,600
going to list, but we're not 
going to like rank or do 

1055
00:58:46,600 --> 00:58:48,160
whatever. 
People like the Mary Mushman 

1056
00:58:48,160 --> 00:58:52,560
people like games omnivorous, 
the people that like really lean

1057
00:58:52,560 --> 00:58:56,040
into the the kind of like, I 
don't want to say art housey. 

1058
00:58:56,040 --> 00:58:59,880
It sounds pretentious, but like 
fuck it, I am those the people 

1059
00:58:59,880 --> 00:59:01,800
that are like pushing those 
envelopes and such good, 

1060
00:59:01,800 --> 00:59:06,360
creative, almost unassuming ways
like this is it. 

1061
00:59:06,360 --> 00:59:08,560
This is what it is and it just 
feels so good whenever it comes 

1062
00:59:08,560 --> 00:59:11,960
out. 
Are are got some of the 

1063
00:59:12,040 --> 00:59:13,680
highlights, at least for me in 
the space. 

1064
00:59:14,000 --> 00:59:18,480
And like as soon as I heard that
you were now going to be doing 

1065
00:59:18,480 --> 00:59:21,240
that, I'm like, this is like 
such a good match. 

1066
00:59:21,240 --> 00:59:23,000
And my next question was going 
to be like, what's the future 

1067
00:59:23,000 --> 00:59:24,600
look like for Josh? 
And like we already entered it 

1068
00:59:24,600 --> 00:59:27,000
like you're you're you're doing 
knock and everything now. 

1069
00:59:27,000 --> 00:59:29,400
So super excited to see how 
that's coming out and what's 

1070
00:59:29,400 --> 00:59:32,480
going to happen with with the 
Mary Mushman and and with that 

1071
00:59:32,720 --> 00:59:35,920
beyond knock, though, like what 
in this space is that? 

1072
00:59:35,920 --> 00:59:37,640
Is that your focus right now as 
the game's out? 

1073
00:59:37,840 --> 00:59:40,880
Breathe for a little bit and 
then and work on knock. 

1074
00:59:42,400 --> 00:59:46,000
So I have a couple issues of, 
you know, we're always putting 

1075
00:59:46,000 --> 00:59:48,280
together a couple issues at a 
time. 

1076
00:59:48,640 --> 00:59:50,560
It's kind of like putting 
together like a puzzle piece. 

1077
00:59:51,240 --> 00:59:55,480
Maybe something is a good fit 
for one issue that might not be 

1078
00:59:55,480 --> 00:59:57,480
a good fit for for the current 
issue. 

1079
00:59:57,480 --> 01:00:00,320
And you, you have to kind of 
like see where things are going 

1080
01:00:01,040 --> 01:00:02,800
to go. 
So yeah, I mean, like I again, 

1081
01:00:02,800 --> 01:00:07,520
I'm only working on Sundays, but
really focused on getting 

1082
01:00:07,720 --> 01:00:10,560
Knockout next and then after 
that the dungeon. 

1083
01:00:11,520 --> 01:00:14,680
I'm going to be hosting the game
jam in September and at at that 

1084
01:00:14,680 --> 01:00:18,160
point I've, I don't have enough 
spice to see the future that far

1085
01:00:18,160 --> 01:00:19,480
away. 
So we'll, we'll have to see, 

1086
01:00:19,520 --> 01:00:20,280
right? 
Yeah. 

1087
01:00:23,880 --> 01:00:28,360
Listen, I got a if we I could 
talk to you all day, which means

1088
01:00:28,360 --> 01:00:31,560
you're I hope, I hope you will 
come back again in the future. 

1089
01:00:32,240 --> 01:00:34,880
But we got a we have to stop 
because we don't stop. 

1090
01:00:34,880 --> 01:00:37,480
We're going to go all day. 
Like I said, if I start a second

1091
01:00:37,480 --> 01:00:39,440
post it note I'm going to make 
you be here for another hour. 

1092
01:00:40,840 --> 01:00:44,600
But the game is out, it exists 
in the world, it is sold out 

1093
01:00:44,600 --> 01:00:47,480
completely. 
There's going to be more, 

1094
01:00:47,480 --> 01:00:49,320
though. 
Yeah, we we have a second print 

1095
01:00:49,320 --> 01:00:57,400
run in, in, in, in motion. 
And prior to that, like if if 

1096
01:00:57,400 --> 01:00:59,880
you weren't physically able to 
get the book, where can people 

1097
01:00:59,880 --> 01:01:03,160
find information about you, 
information about the game, the 

1098
01:01:03,160 --> 01:01:05,520
PDF for the game right now so 
they can still play it since it 

1099
01:01:05,520 --> 01:01:07,440
does exist in the world work and
they find all those things. 

1100
01:01:08,280 --> 01:01:11,600
Yeah, the games website is his 
magic to the worm dot games. 

1101
01:01:11,600 --> 01:01:15,240
It has links to all the places 
that you can buy it all the kind

1102
01:01:15,240 --> 01:01:17,600
of usual suspects. 
It has link to my blog. 

1103
01:01:18,080 --> 01:01:21,840
It has you know, it has my 
e-mail if you want to get in 

1104
01:01:21,840 --> 01:01:26,040
touch. 
I'm rise rise up Comus on most 

1105
01:01:26,280 --> 01:01:28,600
social media. 
So if you want to chat about 

1106
01:01:28,600 --> 01:01:31,080
anything, I would love to chat 
and I would love to come back 

1107
01:01:31,080 --> 01:01:33,400
Brian and chat some more here. 
Always. 

1108
01:01:33,440 --> 01:01:34,760
That's like those. 
Completely. 

1109
01:01:34,960 --> 01:01:38,800
Come, come play a very small 
part of a mega dungeon with us. 

1110
01:01:38,800 --> 01:01:41,920
We'll, we'll chat a little bit 
more, especially after we review

1111
01:01:41,920 --> 01:01:44,160
the game and stuff like that. 
Always super welcome. 

1112
01:01:44,520 --> 01:01:50,160
It's always very nice to have 
you here on the show as, as Josh

1113
01:01:50,160 --> 01:01:51,320
said, check out all those 
websites. 

1114
01:01:51,320 --> 01:01:53,600
We'll make sure that everything 
is listed below so you can find 

1115
01:01:53,600 --> 01:01:56,520
that a little bit easier. 
Definitely go to exalted and hit

1116
01:01:56,520 --> 01:02:00,680
the the you can always do that, 
like notify me e-mail from them 

1117
01:02:00,680 --> 01:02:02,240
and it, it's, it works really 
well. 

1118
01:02:02,240 --> 01:02:05,320
I've definitely randomly they 
had like night yeast at like 

1119
01:02:05,320 --> 01:02:08,880
2:00 in the morning pop up, but 
I snagged a second one with that

1120
01:02:08,880 --> 01:02:12,360
notification system. 
So definitely grab hit that so 

1121
01:02:12,360 --> 01:02:14,880
you can get this book if you 
were unable to get it the first 

1122
01:02:14,880 --> 01:02:17,720
two times that it sold out. 
Once again, Josh, thank you so 

1123
01:02:17,720 --> 01:02:20,240
much for being here. 
Really appreciate it and you'll 

1124
01:02:20,240 --> 01:02:21,440
definitely see him in the 
future. 

1125
01:02:21,440 --> 01:02:23,640
So thank you so much. 
Thank you, guys. 

1126
01:02:24,520 --> 01:02:25,320
Thank you everyone. 
Out there. 

1127
01:02:25,480 --> 01:02:27,720
Thank you so much. 
We will see you all later. 

1128
01:02:27,720 --> 01:02:28,280
Bye.
