Dragon Warriors

For instance I currently have four adventures on the go, most of which I'm writing with others but whilst I'm certainly looking to get SK to publish them I'm happy enough to put them out for free........better art would be good though....maybe we could ask Jon Hodgson for a whole heap of abandoned sketches.

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co-author Fury of the Deep
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide
co-author Cold Fury
co-author Cadaver Draconis
co-author Ordo Draconis 1 and 2.

It seems to me that the notion of creative control is an oxymoron. More to the point, it seems counter-productive if one wants to allow for the development of a vibrant gaming community. I don't see how the most creative people will be drawn to a rigid, strangulating development scene. Not when they can work with nearly complete freedom within the OSR. Neither do I understand how the DW community is strengthened by keeping such people away.

I'm sure that opening the game up could lead to the creation of mediocre to poor quality DW-compatible products. But so what? We're not forced to buy them, nor to treat them as "official" for whatever that means. I'm also sure that the current scheme prohibits the creation of products that could provide us with great, inspiring new adventures and content that we'd never see through "official" channels, and draw more attention and players towards DW.

As with anything else in life, 80% of what's produced will be average at best, but the other 20% will be exceptional. I'd rather open things up and get more exceptional material produced (most of which will naturally rise in prominence over time) rather than keep things tight just to minimize the amount of filler.

I'm starting out with DW in actual play with my gaming group for the first time this Sunday. As much as I like DW's ruleset on the surface, the reason I'm starting this campaign isn't for the system or even for Legend. It's because I feel empowered by Sleeping Gods and some of the other adventures and supplements. Naturally, I hope the campaign goes great. At whatever point this campaign ends, I'd be sad if a dearth of additional content for DW led me to abandon the game. Unfortunately, I suspect that that is probably a common path for Dragon Warriors players to take.

Hopefully there're enough adventures out there to keep your players amused for a good few sessions. In addition to the published adventures available from SKG, be sure to check out these resources, too:

http://www.libraryofhiabuor.net/adventures.html

http://cobwebbedforest.co.uk/library/ad ... davemorris

Enjoy!

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Cobwebbed Dragon (Lee)

https://www.cobwebbedforest.co.uk/
https://www.dragonwarriors.uk/
https://twitter.com/CobwebbedDragon
Now on YouTube!

There is nothing stopping the production of new fan-produced content other than the standard terms in the Serpent King Games Fan Policy.

For a whole lot more content, don't forget to check the Dragon Warriors Wiki (see links).

Dragon Warriors Wiki
http://dragonwarriors.wikifoundry.com/

Dragon Warriors Wiki Adventures
http://dragonwarriors.wikifoundry.com/p ... adventures
http://dragonwarriors.wikifoundry.com/p ... ario+Ideas

Serpent King Games Dragon Warriors Fan Policy
http://serpentking.com/?p=310

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Show me the mythic legends, mighty heroes and mysterious faerie creatures!

Is that an accurate way to characterise the situation though? I'd suggest that the proliferation of products under the OGL, for instance, is mainly a result of the high profile of D&D and its huge "installed user base"

DW doesn't possess that, and it is difficult for me to see how opening up commercial development would revitalise the game given the small number of potential customers. Only diehards like us will bother to write stuff because we love the game. We realise that we'll mostly be selling our work to fellow enthusiasts numbering in the hundreds or low thousands.

An analogy might be given as follows: IOS vs Android. IOS apps continue to outsell and outnumber Android equivalents in spite of their more "strangulating" development scene. This is largely because Apple beat Google to the punch in releasing a fully-developed smartphone and operating system, and in general terms had a superior product for so long that it has proven very difficult for the android app market to catch up, even though the hardware and operating systems are now at basically at parity.

Cheers,

-Kyle

I quite agree that D&D as a whole (and probably every single edition of D&D) has a larger base of players than DW, and almost certainly always will. That doesn't preclude DW from gaining market share, so to speak.

So long as DW fans are prohibited from being able to work commercially, and are thereby largely prevented from publishing physical books, or from hiring artists or cartographers or professional layout people, or (gods forbid!) from making a few coins while exploring creative avenues that SKG isn't going to pursue, the generation of the kind of content that excites new players and reinforces the existing fan base is going to be very limited, at best.

I think it's fair to say that other games that do not subscribe to open licences continue to bumble along with much larger followings than DW (think about Warhammer, RuneQuest, Ars Magica, Pendragon, GURPS, Lone Wolf, Tunnels & Trolls, and so on).

This conversation also got me thinking about Ordo Draconis - a commercial publication that, from what I hear, sold very well and it's a shame that it folded. Should SKG be considering allowing fan publications, it could be an interesting toe-in-the-water to allow a third issue to be produced by the community. An open call for authors (on a profit-share basis) on popular role-playing forums would be good PR for DW, if nothing else - I'd even go so far as to say we should prohibit stalwarts from this forum contributing to it, to ensure that we get fresh blood involved, although that might not be that popular an idea... .

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Cobwebbed Dragon (Lee)

https://www.cobwebbedforest.co.uk/
https://www.dragonwarriors.uk/
https://twitter.com/CobwebbedDragon
Now on YouTube!

Does anyone remember who was the 'owner' of Ordo Draconis?

I have too many projects on the go at the moment so consider me 'forbidden'.

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co-author Fury of the Deep
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide
co-author Cold Fury
co-author Cadaver Draconis
co-author Ordo Draconis 1 and 2.

You and me both!

I've still not contributed to your Thousand Island document (although for what it's worth, it is still on my list).

_________________
Cobwebbed Dragon (Lee)

https://www.cobwebbedforest.co.uk/
https://www.dragonwarriors.uk/
https://twitter.com/CobwebbedDragon
Now on YouTube!

His name was Stephen Dove but I lost his contact details in a massive hard drive crash a few years ago. Does anybody else know how to contact him? I suppose we could trawl through the old email discussion group; on a quick scan I could not find an address however.

Cheers,

-Kyle