Ronin Roundtable: Small Shows

I don’t write up a lot of blogs here for Green Ronin. Mostly, everyone sees my pushes for GMs for Gen Con and an occasional posting for other folks. I’m taking on the duties this week for the Ronin Round Table and I’m super stoked to talk about fan-run conventions and smaller events.

We receive a few emails here and there from fan-run conventions looking for support. This could mean a variety of things, ranging from free books, GMs to run games, or Green Ronin Staff & Developers to be Special Guests or Guests of Honor at various cons. Some events are looking for sponsorship or product for their game libraries. I’ll talk about each one and how we can (or sadly, cannot) support your event.

GMs – We have a pretty small group of super fans who run games for us at Gen Con aka the Green Ronin Freebooters. Many of them run games in their local game stores and conventions. They do this for the love of the hobby and supporting local game communities. We have a bunch of free content & “Quick Start” adventures which can easily be converted to “con games”, over at freeronin.com. Many of our GMs run their homebrews, tailored to their FLGS/con.

How we’re supporting the GMs – We’ve been working on more Quick Start adventures, which will make it easier for not only our Freebooters, but for any GM to run at a game store and con. These will be great introductory adventures, to highlight our game systems and our worlds. We’re talking of an asset kit, too, so any GM, FLGS, or Con can use these assets to promote their games and events on their social media.

Free Products – This one is tough. We’re still a small team, even though GR has been around many years. We simply cannot afford to send every convention free product. We still have to pay for the game, as it were, to “buy” it for said con. And then spend the shipping to send it out. We get many requests for books to add to a con’s library or “play & win” program.

But really, to be honest? Not a lot of folks actually pick up an RPG book to learn how to play over the course of the con. There are always exceptions, of course, for super motivated RPG players. And sadly, many of us in the industry have been burned by con organizers keeping the products themselves or selling them on eBay/their FLGS.

Green Ronin as Guests – This is an upside for everyone! You get to invite our staff to a show, we get to talk about our products, run some games, talk about the industry, and all kinds of cool things that benefit the con and our staff. Many of us have been invited to a variety of events, all over the world. We’re also more likely to bring a small amount of product with us to sell and donate, as we’ll be able to meet the organizers and the community.

Small conventions are great. It’s really wonderful to be able to easily chat with our community. It’s a great way for us to network with other publishers, and meet future freelancers. It’s a good way for us to bring content to your show, especially when we’re doing writer’s seminars, giving advice about publishing, or talking about diversity in our games and in our industry.

If you’re interested in our Freebooter program, you can check it out here. If you’d like to invite a member of the Green Ronin Team to your event, you can email me directly and let me know who you’re interested in bringing on board. You can find me at donna@greenronin.com and I’ll reach out to my team. We can focus panels, workshops, and games for your event.