An international network of researchers into all aspects of role-playing games

David Millians, Editor

Paideia School, 1509 Ponce de Leon Avenue, Atlanta, Georgia 30307 USA

millians.david@paideiaschool.org

LETTER FROM THE CHAIR

Hi All,

As promised, we’re finally have an online election of our board members, as we’re obligated to do each year. The director is then picked from the board members.

Four members have put forth their nominations, including the three existing members (myself, David, and Ted) and an additional application from Hawke. To ensure a fair voting system, votes are copied to all three existing board members. Please note that as per article 5.1, “there shall be five Directors if, at the time a call for candidates is made, there are more than 12 active members, and three otherwise” so as long as the board members all get at least one vote, they will be elected to the board. To vote, visit this page https://car-pga.org/board-voting-2022/

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: an organization is only as healthy as its membership’s willingness to vote. I hope you’ll exercise that right by taking the time to sharing your endorsement. We’ll close voting at the end of March and announce the results in our April newsletter.

In other news, we’re continuing our virtual panel series with CAR-PGA member, artist, game designer, and professor Tim Hutchings. He has published the solo role-playing game Thousand Year Old Vampire. He also launched the Play Generated Map and Document Archive. Tim currently teaches game design at Bradley University. Check out our discussion here: https://youtu.be/HkA3KN_BKEo

We have some exciting guests lined up in the coming months. I look forward to the results of your vote!

Sincerely,

Mike

Committee Chair

FEBRUARY 2022 STATUS UPDATE ON OUR RPG ENDEAVORS

By Hawke Robinson

These are just a few highlights from the many things we have going on. These cover highlights from both the non-profit 501(c)3 non-profit charity RPG Research, and the for-profit RPG.LLC (RPG Therapeutics).

As usual, all of RPG Research’s staff are unpaid volunteers, including me. And at RPG.LLC my employees are paid by the hour and I do not personally pay myself or directly profit as I put all revenue into helping grow the RPG.LLC company and increase the benefits to the employees, and the company donates  a portion of remaining profits directly to RPG Research.

We’re still finalizing negotiations on a lease for the RPG Community Center and experiential learning historical RPG Museum. If all goes well there should be a mid-to-late February or early March move-in date, as I get all the insurance and other requirements in place. It is a major fixer upper, and will be about 3,000 square feet between the two buildings when they are fixed up and usable (you can see some photos on the site): RPG Community Center: https://rpgcc.org RPG Museum: https://rpgmuseum.org 101 North Stone Street, Spokane, WA, USA.

It is going to be challenging as a major fixer-upper. We negotiated low rent in trade for significant fixing up. On a three-year lease (could still fall through, but looks promising as we continue negotiations). We hope by then we’ll have enough in donations and grants to build or move to a new, much larger, facility, or build a whole new facility.

For the lease monthly rental, it will be triple net (NNN) plus rent of: $1,500/mo the first year, $2,000/mo the second year, and $2,500 the third year, but we are very much going to have our work cut out for us, and we will REALLY need a lot of donations to help cover rent, renovations, expensive insurance, etc. This is also in a very rough part of town, close to the people we serve, but we are very concerned about theft and will have to put a lot of security upgrades in place before moving many of our assets to there.

We really need to get our donations to the non-profit cranked up this year.

I also had to put myself as personal guarantor on the lease for rent and liability because RPG Research doesn’t yet have a large enough donation pool, long enough, for anyone to lease anything to the nonprofit otherwise. We hope this will change with the dedicated space, and a number of grants should hopefully be possible for the following years.

Additionally we will be able to park both RPG Trailers and the RPG Bus in the fenced rear lot as 3 additional “rooms” as well. Think RPG Mobile like Book Mobile: https://rpgmobile.com

We have around 1,750 square feet of the basement of my house packed to the ceiling with our community, research, and museum materials, and running the online programs from up to 8 separate studio broadcast rooms, in addition to going to schools, libraries, parks, and community centers for in-person community programs like our Drop In and RPG programs at Spark Central for the past 4+ years.
https://spark-central.org/events

We’re nearing completion of the second edition of the RPG Professionals Workbook, Level 1:
https://smile.amazon.com/Role-Playing-Professional-Level-Training-Workbook/d
p/B08P3SBV51

We are also midway through work on the RPG Professional Level 2 books, and in the early phases of Levels 3 through 5 (of 20 levels).
https://www.rpgresearch.com/learning-pathways

We are working on multiple self-training handbooks for each level as well, to compliment the workbooks. Basically, 1 workbook per level, and a self-training handbook for around 4 sections per level (between 16 to 24 sections per level).

Also one of our volunteers, Terrance MacMullan, a professor at Eastern Washington University, recently on DragonTalk and a recently promoted to Dean with summer programs on RPGs, is in the early stages of creating an Interdisciplinary RPG Major degree program at the university. If they follow the standard degree format that will be somewhere around 60-80 credits of general requirements, and 45-80 credits of Major-related courses. We’re not sure how much we will be directly involved, but he did recently reach out for possibly including me in the program development in one form or another. We’ll see how that evolves, it is a very lengthy process. We hope that RPG Research’s RPG Professionals Diploma program and/or RPG.LLC’s Certification program can be reasonably close to in-line/complimentary to such a degree program, much the way the Therapeutic Recreation degree programs at universities prepare students to meet and pass the CTRS.

Meanwhile, since 2016, an increasing number of our RPG presentations and workshops earn Continuing Education Units (CEUs) through the National Council on Therapeutic Recreation Certification (NCTRC) and American Therapeutic Recreation Association (ATRA) for Certified Therapeutic Recreation Specialists (CTRS).

We are also trying to put together a collected research works book volume set covering our past 30+ years of research.

Our level 1 training sessions currently take place 3 days per week (PST/PDT) Sundays 12:30 pm to 4:30 pm Saturdays 8:00 am to Noon Mondays 6:30 pm to 10:30 pm.

Level 2 and 3 training sessions on Wednesdays 7:00 to 11 pm.

Drop In and RPG community and online sessions on Saturdays 1:00 pm through 7:00 pm.

You can see an extensive list of our programs, some on hold until we can open up the new facility, here:
https://www.rpgresearch.com/schedule and https://www.rpgresearch.com/rpg-museum

When we get moved into the new community center (when it is fixed up enough), we will resume the weekly Saturday American Sign Language (ASL) study groups, and ASL gaming groups. http://spokaneasl.com/

We will also have a dedicated section for visually impaired and blind gaming (we have all the equipment, just need the dedicated space).

We are very close to hitting volunteer number 200 at RPG Research across 6 continents. We hope some day we can get continent 7 (Murdoch Station anyone?), and we hope maybe even some day beyond, such as the International Space Station (ISS), Lunar, and Mars, such RPG programs could be great for such environments. Those are literally shooting for the stars goals, but we think it will be highly beneficial to people involved with those endeavors and that it is within the realm of possibility soon. It might be someone else that beats us to it, but sooner or later we think it will happen there as well. 🙂

On the for-profit side, I now have 6 employees at RPG.LLC / RPG Therapeutics, and a slowly growing weekly client base, with the occasional large contract, such as last year’s PBS contract where we had a major impact on their television, community, and online programming, as well as having caused a sea-change in their internal corporate functioning thanks to our RPG and accessibility workshops. We are hoping to be at 10 employees by the end of this year if all goes well. We are hoping by some time next year that we will break the half million dollar mark in services revenue (cross your fingers)!.

We hope to eventually to have enough revenue from the LLC and other sources to help fund an RPG Foundation as a separate non-profit to help cover the costs of the for-profit services for those that might struggle with the therapeutic and other services from the LLC (and keep paying employees and their benefits), and to help those wanting to undertake similar non-profit programs around the world.

The liability insurance for these programs is very expensive btw, because we work with so many “high risk” groups from ages 2 through senior adults, incarcerated an other groups.

For the Research archives and RPG Museum we are once again making weekly progress on the indexing, cataloging, and scanning of the Paul Cardwell collection, and other collections filling up multiple rooms in the queue. We have a dedicated room setup in my house for this processing, and the archivist volunteers are steadily chiseling away at the 1,000+ pounds in 25 boxes. As they are processed we are moving them from the cardboard boxes to sturdier fully enclosed plastic boxes.
https://www.rpgresearch.com/web/image/19163/rpg_museume_cardwell_legacy_scanning_archivist_amber_20220129_102645-a.jpg

There are probably a number of things I’ve forgotten, with all this going on, but that should help bring you somewhat into the loop on how things are rolling on our end. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks for all you are doing on your end as well!

We will let you everyone when we finalize the lease agreement so we can start getting the word out and really try to ratchet up awareness and donations as quickly as possible for the RPG Research, RPG Community Center, RPG Museum endeavors.

Regards,

Hawke Robinson
President & Founder, RPG Research
http://www.rpgresearch.com
“International non-profit accessible & inclusive music & role-playing game research & community programs.” Washington State Department of Health Registered Recreation Therapist.
http://www.rpgtherapy.com/about/our-staff/hawke-robinson
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm5620159/

Toll-free Phone: (833) RPG-INFO (774-4636) x710 Text/Direct Mobile:
(509) 608-7630 Alternate Mobile: (509) 481-5437
1312 N. Monroe Suite #114
Spokane, WA, 99218
USA

Social network and other contact information:
http://rpgresearch.com/contact/

RPG Research is a 501(c)3 non-profit charitable multi-disciplinary research organization studying the effects of all role-playing game formats. Providing an open international online research repository as well as research-supported community programs enabling participants to achieve their educational, recreational & therapeutic goals.
http://www.rpgresearch.com

NEW MATERIAL

FROM DAVID MILLIANS

Ball, Meghan (2022 Feb 14) Pick a Path to Romance: The Forgotten 1980s D&D Romance Novels. https://www.tor.com/2022/02/14/pick-a-path-to-romance-the-forgotten-1980s-dd-romance-novels. HeartQuest books as marketing tactic and history.

Carter, Chase (2022 Feb 7) Digital indie TRPG platform Itch.io calls NFTs a scam. https://www.dicebreaker.com/topics/itchio/news/itch-calls-nfts-scam. Creators, crowd funders, producers, and distributors continue to debate the place non-fungible tokens and other blockchain techniques.

Carter, Chase (2022 Feb 8) DriveThruRPG is the latest in a growing number of digital storefronts to denounce NFTs. https://www.dicebreaker.com/companies/drivethrurpg/news/drivethrurpg-nft-statement. No use…ever.

Carter, Chase (2022 Feb 16) Chaosium scraps future NFT drops for Call of Cthulhu after fan backlash. https://www.dicebreaker.com/games/call-of-cthulhu-rpg/news/chaosium-call-of-cthulhu-ends-nft-support. Changing plans in a changing society and economy.

Carter, Chase (2022 Feb 17) Kickstarter won’t allow NFTs on its blockchain protocol but asks creators and backers to help build it. https://www.dicebreaker.com/companies/kickstarter/news/kickstarter-blockchain-update-no-nfts. Complications on the road to future business arrangements.

Davis, Adam (2021 Dec 30) Clarifying “Social Skills”. https://gametogrow.org/2021/12/30/clarifying-social-skills. Supporting individual’s growth into their most flourishing selves.

Davis, Adam (2022 Feb 11) Bringing the life-enriching magic of games to hospitalized youth. https://gametogrow.org/2022/02/11/bringing-the-life-enriching-magic-of-games-to-hospitalized-youth. Working with children at Methodist Children’s Hospital in San Antonio, Texas.

Free RPG Day (2022) Prepare for the next Free RPG Day. https://www.freerpgday.com. June 25 in the USA, July 23 Worldwide.

Jarvis, Matt (2022 Feb 28) “Now, more than ever, we need to be strong”: Ukraine board game publishers, creators, and stores rally in wake of Russian invasion. https://www.dicebreaker.com/topics/ukraine/news/ukraine-board-game-publishers-rally-russian-invasion. Solidarity and aid.

Low, Michael (2022) Beyond D&D: Teaching Toddlers With RPGs. https://www.luckoflegends.com/post/beyonddnd-teachingtoddlerswithrpgs. Storytelling, setting, system, and theme.

Meehan, Alex (2022 Feb 14) A Dungeons & Dragons inspired musical is coming to New York. https://www.dicebreaker.com/series/dungeons-and-dragons/news/dnd-inspired-musical-announced. Here There Be Dragons, a musical of friendship and possibilities.

Meehan, Alex (2022 Feb 14) Tabletop RPGs are perfect for safely exploring romance and intimacy. https://www.dicebreaker.com/categories/roleplaying-game/opinion/trpgs-romance-intimacy. Opinion piece on the potentials in games.

Meehan, Alex (2022 Feb 23) Roll20’s userbase has double since 2020, more than 10 million people join online RPG platform. https://www.dicebreaker.com/companies/roll20/news/roll20-userbase-doubles. Covid leads to explosive growth.

Morressey, Russ (2022 Feb 12) TTRGS, Blockchains, and NFTs. https://www.enworld.org/threads/ttrgs-blockchains-and-nfts.686028. New frontier of business or inherently flawed, NFT debate in the hobby.

Morressey, Russ (2022 Feb 22) Tabletop Grows 13% on Kickstarter. https://www.enworld.org/threads/tabletop-grows-13-on-kickstarter.686218. 3500 projects raised around $272 million in 2021.

Peregrine, Andrew (2022 Feb 15) Defining Religion in Your Campaign. https://www.enworld.org/threads/defining-religions-in-your-campaign.685510. Developing multi-dimensional religious traditions.

Polverine (2022 Feb 10) Game Theory Storytelling: The Stag Hunt. https://thepolverine.com/2022/02/10/theory-thursday-game-theory-for-ttrpgs-the-stag-hunt. Using models from game theory to create drama in scenarios.

Walters, Clint & Jared Reck (2022 Feb 16) Middle School D&D Club. https://dnd4thekids.blogspot.com/2022/02/middle-school-d-club.html. Growing gamers, school schedules, and the power of imagination.

Whelan, Michael (2022 Feb 24) What’s worse than D&D being everywhere? Shutting people down for enjoying it. https://www.dicebreaker.com/games/dungeons-and-dragons-5e/opinion/dnd-popularity-complaining-indie-rpgs. Play what’s fun for you and don’t be a jerk.

Yow, Jenna (2022 Feb 8) The Problem with Critical Role’s Latest Campaign. https://kotaku.com/critical-role-marquet-third-campaign-asian-cultures-col-1848500055. Aesthetics, history, and questionable choices.

FROM MIKE TRESCA

Tresca, Michael (2022 Feb 14) The Half-Edition Shuffle. https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-half-edition-shuffle.685901. As D&D 6.0 draws closer, other publishers navigate the transition.

Tresca, Michael (2022 Feb 28) The Child Becomes the Parent. https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-child-becomes-the-parent.686254. Wizards of the Coast and its profits loom large within Hasbro and plans to expand beyond it.

© Copyright 2022 by the Committee for the Advancement of Role-Playing Games (CAR-PGa), ISSN 1071 7129. The CAR-PGa Newsletter is a monthly publication. For more information contact David Millians, Editor, Paideia School, 1509 Ponce de Leon Avenue, Atlanta, Georgia 30307 USA, phone (404) 808-1070, fax (404) 377-3491, e-mail millians.david@paideiaschool.org. Back issues are available. Contributions of material from the membership are urged, and the byline is responsible for content. Deadline is the last weekday of the month, email preferred. Permission is granted to copy anything in the Newsletter, provided we get a credit line in the publication copying it, and it doesn’t have someone else’s copyright on it. Information, including details on joining CAR-PGa, can be obtained on the Internet at car-pga.org.