Are you a talented and dedicated Writer or a great homebrew world-building GM?

[ZAON Netrep]

I am looking for dedicated individuals who are interested in forming a new partnership to continue development on a new Sci-Fi RPG already in progress. The game's goals are to appeal to the RPG mass market yet stay as close to hard science as possible (but always yielding to popular Sci-Fi elements and playability first), all the while aiming for originality. Despite having a nearly press-ready 328-page core rules book, I am very willing to incorporate massive changes to the game rules and setting in order to best suit the new partnership and increase the game's appeal to the RPG mass market based on your input. My goal is to partner with like-minded people who are open to change and who listen carefully to playtester feedback (i.e., potential partners who are not stubborn or overly proud of their own ideas). It is important to be creative, a great writer with skill in spelling, grammar, and usage, and above all someone willing to invest large amounts of their time in the game project as I have and continue to do so. Effort must be equal, else partner shares may reflect actual effort put-in.

If you are interested, you may post here or email me at the address on my beta site. Obviously, you must be over 18, and any partnership arrangement will be separate from the existing ZAON Studios Visual FX company from which RPG intellectual property would be transferred.

BEFORE replying, please take the time investigate our current work and familiarize yourself with the existing (yet open to change based on your contributions) ZAON RPG game system and setting. The complete game and other support material is available here:

http://www.zaon.com/beta

Thank you for your time.

--Justin Winters

[Hino Rei]

Hi. New member here, known everywhere on the net as Hino Rei, real name Jeremiah Bourque. Day job is pro Japanese translation, into English. (douzo yoroshiku.)

I'm replying to this because... lately, with a rather long-term assignment set with a company, an RPG book translation that just plain isn't required to be finished for months from now and leaving me with a lot more free time than I hoped to, I was in the process of getting down to creating an RPG setting and doing serious world building. I'd already laid some groundwork and done some picking at it. Of course, I'd rather do it for cash if possible... and besides that...

A little over four years ago, I essentially gave up on a writing career to pursue Japanese education, cramming as well as I could to learn all the facets I could of the written language, for the purpose of a) playing Japanese video games (and believe me it's as fun as I imagined it would be), b) a serious career in translation, because I wasn't satisfied with average pro work, as a consumer. At any rate.. that was then, this is now. Since late last year my skills have plateaued at a high level, and I'm able to read Japanese very fluidly... so I've been doing a lot of writing.. I certainly believe I'm very good at what I do. I just don't always have the time or inclination to write stories for no reason at all.

In fact, something I've gotten into (very oddly one might think) is writing political articles on the Internet. I've always punched above my weight but this is going pretty far. :) But, all around, my writing just seems pretty good, at least very high non-professional.

The fact of the matter is, I was going to apply myself to a sci-fi setting project anyway on a part-time basis, and had been brainstorming on RPGnet's main chatroom about it lately. It was at the startup stage so no big deal, but I feel like I'm very qualified to do the work that you have described above. Also, my schedule is very permissive at the moment, since like I said, this book (a Gundam RPG for R. Talsorian Games) is simply not going to dominate my schedule. I'm actively looking for other things to do. I also write at 100 words a minute when I'm in the mood to, so I can let inspiration flow very quickly when I'm on a tear.

Sounds good? If so, then please let me know. My e-mail is jbourque@auracom.com and the rest of the info's in my profile. Just to emphasize, I likely fit under both of your categories (writer, world builder). The type of setting that you're developing seems to be the sort I'd enjoy working with. Let's see what happens.

And as a really small aside, I know two people very well who are very experienced in CGI art.. though it looks like you're already set up on that front to your satisfaction. Doesn't hurt to add a footnote though; I'm just glad to know other talented people.

[Lord Iron Wolf]

So what are you actually offering besides a chance to contribute free labor or free playtesting in exchange for flowery language?

[Hino Rei]

This was supposed to be free? ^^; I've enough free stuff to do. I mean gee, I'm working on getting my writing to a consistently professional level, without novelizing my own RPG designs.

Well, whatever works out. I'm coming off a nightmare day yesterday, a real Murphy's Law poster child, and today I'm doing a full recovery. If this ZAON stuff works out, so be it. If not, I'll have my own sci fi fantasy RPG designed soon enough..

[ZAON Netrep]

To clarify, I'm looking for a partner to launch this game with. Partners receive actual shares certificates of the newly-formed corporation. Obviously, those shares are only worth something if the company is. If the company produces nothing or crap product because of a lack of effort put-in by its owners, then the shares are worthless. On the other hand, if your heart and soul goes into it and the RPG is at all successful, there is bound to be profit assuming intelligent spending. Any profit is distributed as dividends to shareholders on a per share basis.

In other words, if you believe in this base RPG concept and seriously want to invest considerable effort in it, then you'll be a co-owner of the RPG company. It is important to note that RPG companies are not exactly money-makers in terms of being alluring investment opportunites. There will be money to be had, but not for a while and it won't be a lot. After all, this is an RPG ;-). We do it as a labor of love and the token monies are just a side benefit. I have my other company as my 'day job'.

Income projections, including pro forma profit and loss statements, were assessed in fourth quarter of 1999 to ascertain business potential. Revenues based on poor-case sales scenarios considering cost of sales demonstrate a variable Gross Profit Margin of 25.8 to 51.5% depending on press run, excluding nominal salaray, full payroll, outside, supplies, advertising, and accounting and legal expenses, plus fixed expenses. At the time of our assessment, a Break-Even Analysis was put at 460 books though advertising and contract expenses were omitted from revenue projections under $20,000. Most of the remaining data is not applicable today due to shifts in market trends, but I do anticipate some profit nevertheless.

[B. Miller]

Originally posted by ZAON Netrep

Income projections, including pro forma profit and loss statements, were assessed in fourth quarter of 1999 to ascertain business potential. Revenues based on poor-case sales scenarios considering cost of sales demonstrate a variable Gross Profit Margin of 25.8 to 51.5% depending on press run, excluding nominal salaray, full payroll, outside, supplies, advertising, and accounting and legal expenses, plus fixed expenses. At the time of our assessment, a Break-Even Analysis was put at 460 books though advertising and contract expenses were omitted from revenue projections under $20,000. Most of the remaining data is not applicable today due to shifts in market trends, but I do anticipate some profit nevertheless.

I have so many questions and comments I shouldn't even start, so I'll just ask three. Is the company incorporated now? How many shares of stock will be offered to the public? And from a manufacturer/wholesale pov, isn't a 25.8 to 51.1 gross profit margin basically suicidal?

[ZAON Netrep]

Originally posted by B. Miller
I have so many questions and comments I shouldn't even start, so I'll just ask three. Is the company incorporated now? How many shares of stock will be offered to the public? And from a manufacturer/wholesale pov, isn't a 25.8 to 51.1 gross profit margin basically suicidal?

The game is currently the intellectual property of ZAON Studios, Inc., which is a fully-incorporated company. However, that property will be transferred to a new corp in order to separate the game materials from the visual effects company that ZAON is now. In other words, a whole new company will be put together just for the RPG. Because consideration is requried for a transfer of property, ZAON may receive a small initial number of shares from the new company (e.g., 10%).

In neither case do I expect that stock will be made available to the public (IPO). Generally, only large companies are able to deal with the admin costs associated with an IPO (securities laws), plus there are also minimum requirements we could not meet to be added to the stock exchange. Besides, companies of this nature are always private companies anyway. Even TSR/Wizards was a private company clear to the end when it reached value over $300 million and was bought by Hasbro (a public company).

Finally, a GPM of even 20% isn't bad for an RPG company (it's not great, but not horrible either). RPG corps have notoriously low overhead. We don't need teams of customer support operators, tech support, in-house legal, in-house manufacturing employees, etc. It's just a couple dudes writing, and a couple more doing art in most cases ;-)

[B. Miller]

I guess the gross profit sounded really low because I presumed that distribution costs weren't factored into it. Thanks for the answers. Site looks great, btw.

[ZAON Netrep]

Thanks... And, the GPM doesn't mean too much anyway depending on print formats. Basically, it's just the cost of sales (which is mainly printing costs of the book) versus what we're selling them for before subtracting other operating expenses.

The GPM can be manipulated by choosing to go softcover instead of hardcover, using cheaper paper, etc., as well as by choosing to sell the book for something higher than $19.95.

[B. Miller]

Yes, I know.

[ZAON]

I'm still interested in talking with talented writers.

Incidentally, realtime discussion forums (similar to these here at rpg.net) are now online at our dot-org site: http://zaon.org

The game can be downloaded from our beta page at the dot-com site: http://www.zaon.com/beta

--Justin Winters
ZAON

[Mythlander]

You and I must have differing opinions on “press ready” because what I downloaded sure didn’t meet that criteria. :D

The layout is, in a word, horrible. The text quality varies wildly, and the design flow is counterintuitive. Sections discussing “Mathematical Probabilities,” as an example, serve no useful function. Parts read like an accounting textbook. Also, and you might take this as either a complement or a slam, the mechanics, aside from the use of a d12 in the resolution mechanic, scream Rolemaster (non Standard System version). (As a disclaimer, I actually like the Rolemaster mechanics, sans charts.)

The discussion board has twelve people on it, including yourself, so I’m not entirely sure what’s going on there. (I realize it is new.)

The straw that really broke the proverbial camel’s back, however, was reading your writer’s guidelines. You go to excruciating detail describing formatting, content, and presentation for submission, even discussing the legal points (and the ZAON pages are dripping with legal text everywhere you look) and then, under compensation, you switch to a flippant and pretentious tone, not addressing the issue at all. As a published author with multiple credits, most in science fiction games, why would I be interested in working for ZAON when you can’t give a straight answer in a professional and courteous tone? (“Rates range from .04 to .06 cents per word and are negotiated based on writer’s experience.”)

Yes you need writers (and a copy editor, and a layout guy, a developer, and some graphic artists) but I’m not sure how you’re going to attract anyone with a work for hire agreement like the one described above.

In closing I’d like to make some positive comments:
* I like the scope—enough that I’m going to actually sit down and read thoroughly what’s there.
* You appear to have a business plan in place. As someone with an MBA that earns high marks from me. Kudos to you!
* The computer graphics/renderings are pretty amazing. I remember you posting them awhile back on the old RPG.net boards.

Feel free to ignore my comments—I’m simply providing some feedback. More later if you’re interested, once I read everything carefully.

[ZAON Netrep]

Mythlander,

Thanks for your reply and your criticisms and compliments. I can see how my use of 'press ready' was probably inappropriate. My apologies. We felt that the game was pretty far along though, as we state in a few places, we have not bothered with copy editing at this point. To do so would be counter-productive from a business standpoint since sections are being rewritten as playtesting continues.

Our vBulletin board is brand new and has only been up for around a week and most of that time has been spent conducting tests on it. We're just now getting around to promoting it, so we're hoping membership will naturally grow there, shortly.

Also, please accept my apologies on the section dealing with compensation. That section was written some time ago and was aimed at amateur outside writers. The deal proposed above has nothing to do with that type of compensation; rather, it's a full or partial partnership in the company with all of the benefits and drawbacks thereto.

May I inquire as to what your professional writing credits include? Any in sci-fi?

[Mythlander]

Thank you for your thoughtful and measured reply to my quick-and-dirty post. I realize I shared more honesty than you were probably expecting. (“Here, drink from this fire hose!”)

I’ll drop you a personal line regarding the other matters, as I must strive to protect my online alter-ego in order to continue my battle against crime and injustice on RPG.net. ;)

Regards,