I've lost some Patrons recently to two things, both of which I feel I need to address. I'd also like to talk about some decisions I've made about how I'm going to handle content moving forward, as best as I can, and manage expectations in general. Don't worry, this is not a "I'm out!" post, just a discussion pertinent to anyone thinking about supporting my blog, and a broad roadmap for content I'd like to work on and remain focused on, as well as pushing back some stuff I know you guys want to see, and why I'm pushing it back.
For a TLDR, I also have a list of projects that I'm working on behind the scenes for all backers, both to give you a sense of what I'm working on, and to invite feedback on what you'd like to see. It is, of course, not entirely exhaustive
Backers: Patreon and SubscribeStar
COVID 19
The first thing that's hit me has been that I've lost some backers to failing finances due to layoffs from COVID 19. I think this is hitting the GURPS community harder than people realize. At least one big blogger lost his job and is blogging/producing content full time right now to support his family. And I've lost a few backers to this, as has Chris.
I want to be clear about something here: I'm a computer programmer who works in the health insurance industry in the Netherlands, with a permanent contract. You have no idea how hard it is to fire someone in the Netherlands with a permanent contract, and how hard it is to get a good programmer these days. So I'm about as finacially stable as you can reasonably get. Sometimes I use my backer donations to take my wife out to dinner or to buy a game, but for the most part I just funnel them back into Psi-Wars. I use them to buy art and to pay for books (this month's fund mostly went to the Kickstarter).
This is to say: I don't need your contribution. I like it! It's nice! We're making art together! I buy GURPS books with them! You're helping Psi-Wars! But I don't ever want anyone to feel like they must contribute to keep me going. If it's a choice between you and me, please choose you. There are some writers that depend on this income for food. I am not one. If you need to go, go. If circumstances change and you want to come back, I will welcome you with open arms.
Engagement
I've had at least one backer leave because I was not as engaged as he would like. And let's admit it, I am less engaged than I was a year ago, or even earlier this year. It used to be we had at least two polls a month, usually several major polls a year, and lots of content streaming out. Now, I've also seen worse Patreons, but mine could use a bit of a shine on the current content.
A lot of the change has to do with family life. It's not the sort of thing I trot out often, because it's not really relevant to you. I also don't want to this to sound like an excuse. It's an explanation. I have a very active 3 year-old son, who is charming and delightful, but needs constant monitoring so he doesn't rip the curtains from their rails by swinging on them, and an adorable 1 year-old daughter who loves to clamber onto chairs, bounce against their backings while doing her best impression of a very loud duck until the chair tips over and she runs crying to mommy. Also, the fight over toys.
One of the things I've learned about parenthood is the inevitable zero-sum game of time management: every moment I spend here, writing a post, is a moment I don't spend taking my little girl on a bike ride and showing her more ducks (or birds or flowers) or taking my son on a walk through the woods, or swimming in "the big pool" as he calls it, or letting him tell me about his school day.
More than that, my wife is constantly exhausted from the fact that they get up all hours of the night, so any minute that someone can watch the kids is a minute she can sleep longer, or perhaps get a chance to unwind and play. They've been worse than usual (my daughter is really at a point where we should sleep train her by letting her cry, but that wakes up the boy, who then must be helped back to sleep too, so one kid waking up can turn into an hour of putting the kids back to sleep, and this can happen 3-4 times a night!), and with school and daycare out because of COVID, my wife doesn't even get a flicker of time in the day to herself while the girl naps and the boy is at school. Thus, slowly, I've found myself giving her more and more time to sleep, rest and recover and to be herself (like, getting a chance to play one of her favorite games for once).
This naturally cuts down on the amount of time I have to generate content. Again, this is not an apology. This is not meant to make you go "Awww," and be okay with the level of engagement you're getting, it's my explanation as to what's going on, and when it'll be fixed, which is "not soon." My wife is very aware of my writing, and she argues I need it to relax (and she's not wrong), and she does what she can to give me that space, but this level is probably going to be it for awhile. Decide if you want to stick with backing me based on that.
That said, there are some things I can do to improve engagement, which is mainly about focusing on quick wins and what matters, which brings me to:
A Blogging Road Map: Iteration 7
The single greatest thing slowing everything down has been me working on space monsters and their environments, such as the Labyrinth (but also the Skairos, the Eldothic Deep Engines, the Dark Mothers of the Gaunt, etc). I've gotten very lost diving down that rabbit hole, and I've generated pages and pages of unreleased content. Given that, why not release them? I think the core problem here is that I've gotten ahead of myself and this is not what I should be working on right now.
The point if Iteration 7 is to build upon what Iteration 6 laid as a foundation. We have the basics of Psi-Wars, such as the major factions and ideologies. Now we need to move those templates to the Wiki, round out all the major races, work out the major elements of technology, and hit up some of the major planets and factions, all with an eye towards standard Psi-Wars, the 250-300 point gameplay focus.
A lot of you really want to see the 500 to 600-point level, with Templars and Tyrants, Akashic Knights, the Skairos, the Saruthim in their full glory fighting the Anacridian Scourge or the undead minions of Domen Tarvagant. I'd like that too, it'd be a lot of fun, but I think we need to finish this base. If you're going to play an Imperial Knight uncovering a conspiracy that uses a criminal organization as a catspaw, we need to know the stats of your armor, your ship, and the criminal organization and what their ships and gear and vehicles and robots are, as well as the planet they operate on, before we need to think about the structure of the conspiracy or what full-powered Imperial Knights look like.
Given my short time and the need to prioritize, I'm going to focus my attention on this baseline and leave the "Epic Psi-Wars" material for "Iteration 8." I'll still take requests and I'll still talk about it, but if I let myself delve down there, I'll lose focus and things will seem to seize up while I do so. So, for now, it's not the priority. Instead, I'd like to focus on:
- Finishing up military technologies (Trader Tech and perhaps a few other factions)
- Civilian/Spy/Law-Enforcement tech (some vehicles and spaceships that don't get involved in big space battles, but are still important)
- Alien Races (filling out the remaining aliens, and adding more detail to the ones that already exist)
- Factions and organizations (criminal cartels, pirate warlords, corporations, etc)
- Some planets (not all, but a few)
- Answering some long standing issues and questions (like navigation and travel times)
- The Wiki
- Finishing established templates and rules
- Expanding out with a few new templates whose need has become obvious by now, or who need some sort of lens structure to address (the Mechanic, the Psion, the Pirate, etc)
I'd like to get back to polls, but mostly with a focus on "what to do next" and perhaps a few more "Let's build this together," especially when I get back to alien races and organizations. But this should keep us busy for awhile.
Hopefully, you're still enjoying it. I'd like to hear from you one way or the other. I do this mostly for fun, but I do want it to be useful to you, and I definitely want to hear if some of my material is or isn't useful so I can adjust accordingly.
I will have more playtests in the future, but that depends on how much time I can get in large, useful blocks, and given the constraints and issues, they'll have to focus very tightly on timeboxed ideas, such as a singular adventure premise (like a heist) rather than a sprawling campaign idea.
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