Advice Sought: The Fate of My Life As a Grog?

Sodales,

So it's been about a year since I posted anything significant on my blog, My Life As a Grog, a site that collects some of the cut-files, unused material and other ArM5 material I wrote for the various fanzines and/or while working on official titles such as The Cradle & the Crescent, Tales of Power, Faith & Flame and Between Sand of Sea.

The ArM5 line has officially ended with the amazing Dies Irae but there still appears to be life on this forum and I remain impressed that my friend and oft time inspiration Timothy Ferguson keeps pumping out his weekly Games From Folktales podcast linked to his long-standing blog.

So what to do with the somewhat aging Grog?

I'd like it to be as user friendly and relevant to new and existing Ars Magica players as possible - there's still some good material on it that I'm proud of but I'm wondering if the format needs a lift?

I'm interested in your thoughts either in this thread or in the comments over at the blog itself...

Regards,

Lachie

I’d like to suggest that you keep the content rolling every now and then, if only to provide support for what will come next. The peripheral material not written by the games publisher allow others to find and appreciate different views.
I’ve always found your material excellent, I read everything you publish there.

Thank you for your kind words of support.

I may well post occasionally now as recreation for life has settled down somewhat - likely mostly linking pieces however.
(there are some old files I rediscovered that may see the light of day eventually albeit rough around the edges)

But I am wondering whether I could organise the material somewhat better?

I like the material about Italy and the Middle East. I'm sure it could be arranged in a format more friendly to people less familiar with Ars, but I'm not one to prescribe the best way to do it.

If you are thinking of more material - more jinn and more naranj usable by people playing using TC&TC would always be helpful.

I think my better articles are usually the second or third try at anything, so you might want to revisit a lot of it, with more plot hooks. Rewrites have less research, so they are a bit easier.

I'd love for you to continue it. It's kind of like being in a lighthouse, and seeing the other lights, up and down the coast.

I remember the last time the game went into estivation. Some people keep the lights on until the game finds a new direction. I was the youngest person the last time. The jokingly-named Secret Masters, trying to keep it all ticking over until something happened to let the metagame start again. I was doing a Cornwall online game as a testbed for some new rule ideas - strange I'm back there again. 8)

The mistake we made, IMO, was keeping it quiet and secret. We shouldn't have kept things secret. We need to let people see the lights. I don't want any of them to go out - even if people who tend them are tired, or burned out. If you need help, ask. I know you've been giving help to others, so if you need help now, tell us.

Please don't kill it. I get that you can't always have something for it, or even a regular schedule but I'd prefer sporadic updates to none.

Reorganise as makes sense to you and don’t worry about others too much. Readers will find it.

Hmm that's good practical advice actually Timothy and thanks also to Deednay for the encouragement. Maybe as I reorganise a bit I'll get a bit more inspired and feel everything is a bit more relevant I guess?

So "Points of Light" eh? Now where have I heard that before LOL

Yeah I get that about keeping the lights visible yes.

And yes I was burned out for personal reasons, but that has passed and I return as it were from Twilight with scars but a greater understanding...

Thank you all,

Lachie

I agree with Timothy. :slight_smile:

-Ben.

Thanks all, giving me some ideas and inspiration!

Lachie

Yes looking at the site there's a lot of material there that could be easier to find, maybe I'll write a few posts linking together the materials by theme even, although I'd note the Italy material is less developed and there's no specific ArM5 supplement to link into.

For those that wanted a sporadic update, I did find one of the Guardians of the Galaxy inspired characters and have scheduled it to post tomorrow so be sure to check it out - it's whimsical but I think captures the spirit of the character enough...