Topic: Rolemaster Unified art: what happened?

[pastaav]

How much would your small business need to grow to be able to commission art for $30 000 to cover the five main RMU books?

I don't know where you are getting that figure. $3,000 would probably get you nice covers for all five books; for twice that, you would have your pick of artists.

I simply took your suggested art budget of $6000 for a book and multiplied by 5 to cover all the books. It is a lot of money and I am still curious how much your business would need to grow to support such large investment. My hunch is that you don't answer despite your bold words since making a major roleplaying game is whole different ballpark from your style of publishing.

Why should we at all assume they could predict such sales?

Well, if you run a Kickstarter, it's a cinch.

Maybe...they would have known how much money they could devote for art, but on the negative side of running a kickstarter is that it would raise demands on very different release schedule. Ironcrowns release pace for RMU is something that would generate lots of bad blood in a kickstarter situation. Without a kickstarter we can be sorry it is so slow, but not make any real complaints.

Of course, if the kickstarter had given enough money to be able to pay the freelancers to skip their daytime job the release schedule could be  made much more user friendly but that requires a very different scale of money. Essentially it require hiring the freelancers as full time employee, but only for a very limited time. If the person is really sure they can get their old job back afterward, they might consider it but myself I would require lots more than $100 each hour even complement to accept such offer.

[EltonJ]

I certainly agree with Pastaav.  A kickstarter can be the wrong strategy for Iron Crown Enterprises right now.  When I worked on Phaeselis so long ago, I had no budget and DAZ Studio.  I chose to work on it as a wiki, since publishing through Drivethru was something I couldn't do.  I could do some art myself, being a 3D artist at the time.  i thought of doing a kickstarter many times, but lacked the resources to do it.

[pawsplay]

I simply took your suggested art budget of $6000 for a book and multiplied by 5 to cover all the books.

So you took a number at the top end of what I suggested, then applied the whole budget to cover art instead of the whole book, and multiplied it by five for books that haven't been published yet. Okay.

Anyway, for those saying art isn't the deciding factor... I think this is the first time it ever has been for me. Maybe it's just me. In that case, carry on. That sucks for me, but there are plenty of other games out there.

[pawsplay]

I certainly agree with Pastaav.  A kickstarter can be the wrong strategy for Iron Crown Enterprises right now.  When I worked on Phaeselis so long ago, I had no budget and DAZ Studio.  I chose to work on it as a wiki, since publishing through Drivethru was something I couldn't do.  I could do some art myself, being a 3D artist at the time.  i thought of doing a kickstarter many times, but lacked the resources to do it.

So let me see if I'm understanding this correctly. You decided not to run a Kickstarter, and thereafter failed to publish your game. What are you blaming on Kickstarter?

[pawsplay]

Of course, if the kickstarter had given enough money to be able to pay the freelancers to skip their daytime job the release schedule could be  made much more user friendly but that requires a very different scale of money. Essentially it require hiring the freelancers as full time employee, but only for a very limited time. If the person is really sure they can get their old job back afterward, they might consider it but myself I would require lots more than $100 each hour even complement to accept such offer.

I didn't respond to this before, but I meant to.

There is no reason you have to run the Kickstarter in the middle of project. You can create the whole game, then run the Kickstarter at the end, and buy good art. In fact, that is probably the most common approach these days.

[Dean7777]

Hello there, I am writing here because despite of the game itself that for different reasons we love somehow, it is obvious that the art is very poor in Rolemaster Unified and in my opinion it does few to expand the community of players because a rol game that appeals to the imagination needs the right dosis of appealing art to do so. So simple so real. It's a must, and it's sad that Rolemaster cares of it. The effort to make RMU real deserves it and if an economic effort was needed it would be well paid because once the books are out what can be done? Really, now all seems to be simple in rolegames, Rolemaster should not be never this way because offers and advanced way to play as unique, but,  art should be evocatively superlative!. Salutations

[EvilWilliam]

Hello there, I am writing here because despite of the game itself that for different reasons we love somehow, it is obvious that the art is very poor in Rolemaster Unified

It's really not obvious to me: the art seems suitable for the sort of marketing and the look and feel they were going for.  They do the job of brightening the page, and depicting gaming situations.  Clearly, they didn't want a dark world or a painted look (POD constraints might have featured in the colouring decisions, but that for me gives them an old four-colour comics feel). 

I think the naivity is deliberate: if it's not your cup of tea it's not.

[DerGraumantel]

Ok, I will also say my piece.
* Some of the art is fine.
* The page making/layout is the real problem. Drop shadow on the tables? All art is in a box? Those fonts? Most rules are not fitted tightly to the page size.

When I look at the FRP Core Rules, I see great art by Wayne Reynolds, Paul Jaquays, Kent Burles and Angus McBride set in the right place. Nice Header fonts. One profession per page. One race per page. Most rules tightly formulated to fit exactly on a double page, which makes later referencing easy. Ok, also tons of not so great art:)

I get that Fenlon/Charlton ICE was a real company and not a hobby project, I mean these guys run Catan now($$$).
Still the design elements and decisions made are not optimal. The best art should be the art for the races and professions, since that is what comes into contact with most people.

Many of these pieces are, how to put it, horrible, only the Dwarves and the Hvasstonn seem usable. Maybe black and white art would have been the way to go.

The layout looks like something done in Word by 9th grader before co-pilot came out. Many rules cross a page border, the Orc stats are for example on the next double page after the description. In the professions the laborer and the thief are on top of each other on one page, while the warrior monk and the scholar get a column each. The chapter on stats starts in the second column of a page. I could go on forever...

I get this is a labour of love and I don't want to be mean. I still have to point these things out, since Rolemaster really means a lot to me (just found War Law for a good price:)

[pastaav]

I simply took your suggested art budget of $6000 for a book and multiplied by 5 to cover all the books.

So you took a number at the top end of what I suggested, then applied the whole budget to cover art instead of the whole book, and multiplied it by five for books that haven't been published yet. Okay.

I never been talking about just the cover art and I cannot comprehend how you think that ICE could assume any level of sales before all 5 books are out. Of course they must budget for art for every book in case the first books doesn't start to sell very well because the system is incomplete.

We now know that the core book sells strongly with the current art and that Ironcrown probably could have aimed for more impressing/expensive art, but hindsight is 20/20. They did not have a crystal ball and made the commercial descissions they dared to make. There are plenty of arguments in the thread about why those descissions was not as trivial as you claim.

I suggest you reread the thread and think about you have something really new to add to the matter or if you are just rehashing the same argument.

[pastaav]

There is no reason you have to run the Kickstarter in the middle of project. You can create the whole game, then run the Kickstarter at the end, and buy good art. In fact, that is probably the most common approach these days.

They could have done that and I would be among those that this day complain that I cannot run RMU at all while we wait for the last book to be finished.

We are having this discussion because Ironcrown made the hard commercial descissions to do partial releases. Something that comes with a lot of risks and has forced them to do a number of tradeoffs. Time will tell if was the right choice and none of your objections are objectively sure to the decissive from what we know now.

[EltonJ]

I certainly agree with Pastaav.  A kickstarter can be the wrong strategy for Iron Crown Enterprises right now.  When I worked on Phaeselis so long ago, I had no budget and DAZ Studio.  I chose to work on it as a wiki, since publishing through Drivethru was something I couldn't do.  I could do some art myself, being a 3D artist at the time.  i thought of doing a kickstarter many times, but lacked the resources to do it.

So let me see if I'm understanding this correctly. You decided not to run a Kickstarter, and thereafter failed to publish your game. What are you blaming on Kickstarter?

No, I'm not blaming kickstarter for anything.  I just didn't have the resources to publish using kickstarter.

[Elrich Maltah]

* The page making/layout is the real problem. Drop shadow on the tables? All art is in a box? Those fonts? Most rules are not fitted tightly to the page size.

To be fair, most art from previous editions of RM was in boxes, too. Drop shadows on the tables are fine to me, and maintain consistency with the shadows around the art. I'll give you the point about the fonts, though. I've had trouble getting used to them.

the Orc stats are for example on the next double page after the description.

Same for humans: both likely unfortunate victims of maintaining alphabetical sequencing while having too many variations available.

In the professions the laborer and the thief are on top of each other on one page, while the warrior monk and the scholar get a column each.

The professions in the early RM2 companions were like that, too.

The chapter on stats starts in the second column of a page. I could go on forever...

The section of stats is not actually the start of a chapter. It's a sub-section, as indicated by having a number after the decimal (2.5). Apparently this isn't a problem for sections 2.6, 2.7, or 2.8?

[Dean7777]

Symbaroum as a thematic game is a good example that traps you in a singular visual evoking way, cannot Shadow World be as good as this one in the same way? Cannot be Rolemaster be dressed with an art that make it be in a highest level? what will you do with it if it was in your hands? With all the great work done in all these years with the system, art just has to be at the same level... still has to show up to the world again. Really I would like to see it

[5th Knight of Xar]

Unfortunately for those not happy with the art for RMU, the books have been published, the remaining books most likely have the art commissioned and finished.
Nothing we discuss in here is going to change that, no matter the amount of complaining.

[DerGraumantel]

Symbaroum as a thematic game is a good example that traps you in a singular visual evoking way, cannot Shadow World be as good as this one in the same way?

So true, Symbaroum is a really god example, since it also has this nice dignified slender realistic look, that could fit very well for Shadow World. The book was a joy to read and look at. Just imagining a Loari elf in that aesthetic would be great. All that Renaissance meets dark magic flair. But alas, insight needs to come before improvement and if the ICE guys think "god is in his heaven, all is right with the world" there is no chance of improvement.

[pastaav]

Free League Publishing that made Symbaroum is a good example of successful Kickstarter business. For our current discussion I think the most interesting observation is that even Free League Publishing despite their many successfull Kickstarters don't do every project with Kickstarter. There are no free lunches and it takes resources to run a Kickstarter so the circumstances need to be right for the endeavour to be successfull.

Eventually there is bound to be a updated version of RMU with additonal errata applied and it would surprise me if we don't get a Collectors edition. Using kickstarters for these might be a option, but I can understand that ICE are not keen on promising anything about it. If they can get better art without the aid of Kickstarter they will be in much better commercial position.

The sales of the current books will by nature slow down if ICE announce there will be a better version coming out at a later time. Running a Kickstarter would be a dead giveaway that a new version of the books is coming.

In the best scenario the release of the fifth book of the main RMU set will be also giving us revised versions with improved art ready for the previous RMU books. Improved art as the same time as the game becomes playable without having additional material from the previous editions would a great for sales.

The greatest threat to achieve that scenario is slow sales of the current books so ICE doesn't have money for the art. It would be commercial madness for ICE to give any signal that you are better of waiting for an improved version unless the new version is very close to getting released.

As for the idea of running Kickstarters to gauge interest in different Shadow World books you should perhaps move that discussion to the Shadow World part of the board so it is not missed by SW users who have not made the switch to RMU.

[5th Knight of Xar]

Free League Publishing that made Symbaroum is a good example of successful Kickstarter business. For our current discussion I think the most interesting observation is that even Free League Publishing despite their many successfull Kickstarters don't do every project with Kickstarter. There are no free lunches and it takes resources to run a Kickstarter so the circumstances need to be right for the endeavour to be successfull.

Eventually there is bound to be a updated version of RMU with additonal errata applied and it would surprise me if we don't get a Collectors edition. Using kickstarters for these might be a option, but I can understand that ICE are not keen on promising anything about it. If they can get better art without the aid of Kickstarter they will be in much better commercial position.

The sales of the current books will by nature slow down if ICE announce there will be a better version coming out at a later time. Running a Kickstarter would be a dead giveaway that a new version of the books is coming.

In the best scenario the release of the fifth book of the main RMU set will be also giving us revised versions with improved art ready for the previous RMU books. Improved art as the same time as the game becomes playable without having additional material from the previous editions would a great for sales.

The greatest threat to achieve that scenario is slow sales of the current books so ICE doesn't have money for the art. It would be commercial madness for ICE to give any signal that you are better of waiting for an improved version unless the new version is very close to getting released.

As for the idea of running Kickstarters to gauge interest in different Shadow World books you should perhaps move that discussion to the Shadow World part of the board so it is not missed by SW users who have not made the switch to RMU.

You guys should check in on the ICE Discord server, they've already stated there will be no kickstarter campaigns (and no use of AI) for their books.