So new year coming up...

[darb]

So, how about a no bullshit assessment of what the future of the game is. It is your company Tim, so you can do as you please of course, but it would be nice to have real honesty. I understand that things can be challenging and that rpg design is probably not in the top 20 things for you at this time in life, but if that is the case, how about coming up with a plan to deal with the situation instead of just saying you hope that you might consider doing something again.... I know that is very harsh (Merry Christmas!) but Tim I think you are a very very talented game designer but seem to have some difficulty with follow-through. And think of it like this, the only thing worse than customers complaining that you are not making enough stuff for them to buy is when no one cares if you are making product.....

[AresLunthar]

So, obviously you are annoyed.  I'll try and look past the ugly tone of your comment.  What I like is that you do care.  YOu see something here that is worth being emotionally invested in.  So, I for one, am grateful for that.

I really don't feel like anyone should answer on Tim's behalf.  But, I will say that aside from maybe D&D every successful game is kept alive and afloat by it's fans.  So, the challenge is simple.  If you are a fan of the game be part of the solution.  It's a one-way street right now in terms of contributions, but, that doesn't mean that the development of Novus has to stop.

Maybe we can start an internal dialogue: how can we as fans keep this going?  If we have enough interest I'd be happy to coordinate efforts and help in anyway I can.  I've been a part of Novus since before it was Novus.  If you're in; I'm in.

[darb]

Sorry about the tone, I know at times I can be a bit.... abrupt. And honestly I am not even sure why I care, I don't really have a dog in the fight as they say (someone says, somewhere). I guess I am just hoping that a bit of direct communication might actually elicit a meaningful response. Ares, you are the only one that has turned out anything for Novus in several years, or even posted anything substantive, and Tim can't even be bothered to respond to your posts. For a couple years it has been basically nothing. I get that he might be busy, but how hard is it to get on your own company's forum and post something once a month. I find it very disrespectful.

A couple months ago I posted about basically what you are saying, lets find a way to involve the community more to take up some of the slack. Let Tim find a role that works for him. I would be willing to help out. But he didn't respond. I got interested because I had been working on an adventure arc for HARP. I had never run Novus, but it looked good, and when I saw that 2E was coming out, I thought I would wait and take advantage of the opportunity... It is a path to madness to care more than the principle of a company.

I think Tim is a very talented designer, and again, I am pushing because I want the system to succeed. I am not saying that he has to push out product every month. But I would like. to know if there is real hope of some life. And yeah, it is a for profit company and I think it is reasonable to hope for more responsible communication.

Well, we shall see if this shakes anything loose. If not, I will go back to HARP, it is a great system in the main.

And Ares I will try to be nicer in the future if this conversation leads to anything!

[AresLunthar]

Hey Darb.  No worries and happy holidays.  As I said, I like that you cared enough to be upset.  To me that is what is important. 

I feel confident enough in my relationship (based on my past with Tim) to know a few things:
1. If Tim had no intention of resurfacing he would have pulled the site down.
2. Anything that we do will be greatly appreciated and not met with any author-biased authoritarian you can't do that bull-crap.
3. Tim is very talented, but also is a great collaborator.  He relies on this community to help him hone his craft and inspire innovation.
4. If Tim were somehow unable to resurface he would reach out to someone in his inner circle and we'd know.

Based on this I'm 100% confident that what our best course of action, as a community, is to pump out some material under the Fan Licensed Product format (you can find it under the Licensing Novus link on your left).  I'm in the process of developing some (obviously) for Novus.  The material has to hit external sources (drivethru rpg etc) to create an influx on new interest.  (I am ignoring the fact there is a Novus 2 in the works because I know it is at least a year away from being a viable product after Tim returns.)  My general idea is to release something externally, then have people find this site, and all of the other material I have posted to the forums.  If Novus is free to try (although I always reference the paid version) and there is a 1 book start-up scenario (2 downloads: rules and adventure) we might be able to attract a new player or two a month.
 
So my observation is this: if you're working on a HARP adventure you'd probably be comfortable publishing it for Novus too?  Well, here is your chance to have complete control of it!

Do you have a world created?  Are you willing to collaborate on a project?  I am looking for help.  So, if you (or anyone else) are interested PM me and we can start sooner rather than later.

Kind Regards
Ares

[imported_Rasyr]

Yeah, things have been tough for me the past couple of years, and I am finally in a place where I can start working on things again.

I have a psionics system in the works for Novus, and I fully encourage folks to create setitngs (in fact that is another item on my TODO list, a free license for creating settings/adventures for Novus, one with a reciprocal license for any new creatures/spells/talents/etc/ so that they can be shared among any who wants to use them (basically, such items would require a "common" or shared name (unlike the d20 license which made stats shared but you could not use description/name/background for things (was an error to not require such items be fully sharable).

And yes, 2E is in the works, and I may try to get a version out for playtesting, once I determine what should be part of the core (the playtest version currently has 247 pages and is not yet complete (still have a bunch of monsters to add), as it contains all sorts of expansion items that I wanted to be sure fit in and worked well with the core rules).

Being a one man operation does have its pitfalls, especially if real life kicks me in the shins like it did a couple of years ago.