Ain't that a Kick in the Head

 

Wow. At the website where I sell my PDFs I am now a double-barrel "Copper Best Seller." I am very proud of this not because of the sales but because of the products that have that badge attached to them. One is my New Khazan title which is my sphere fantasy for the Tunnels &Trolls rules system. Now that doesn't surprise me. T&T is a brand name which sells solid and only gathers more readers as people start looking for stuff to read as well as play. 9KW (my own abbreviation for New Khazan) was easy for me to write. I was adapting my passion for space opera with my love of the Flying Buffalo Incorporated-owned (FBI) rules system written by Ken St Andre. So when it sold well and quickly, I bought pizza and beer with the profits and kept on writing-- A behavior which continues to this day, just not as often with said item's moneys. 

The second is my TAG Spacers product. Lordheads know, I did not know any one besides old friends from space RPG chatroom days had ever heard of it let alone read this one. It was written before 9KW, actually being typed on an old fashioned typewriter that my Grampa had given me to be photocopied, folded in half, and mailed to people back in the 90s. I dressed it up a bit when Pery Publishing first started and we released the "new and improved" version. After a few sales over the opening month, nobody ever seemed to talk about it. Running it at conventions had enthusiastic players that'd buy a copy a few weeks later, then I'd never hear from them again. I felt I had produced a flop, but I knew the system worked just fine. So I concentrated on writing T&T stuff.

There have been signs though that people have been buying it. Besides the itemized sale reports, where it was always hidden beneath all the new and shinier pieces buying my rewards that week, folks would say things. Indeed the author of a bootleg version 9KW for a certain Outlaw Press, done without my permission of course but in the T&T crowd a bit of piracy is forgiven if the person doing it apologizes and is nice when foiled, told me, "The copy I had of your New Khazan notes was mostly your Spacers (the TAG ones) classes and the spells were from the equipment lists."

Okay what's the big deal? People get higher rankings by selling their untested brands at "Chose Your Price" rates and just giving it away for free all the time. You see, I don't do that. I sell. I don't plan on home improvements with the money, but I insist on some recompense for the artwork (which people need to start investing in again because the big companies are getting sucky with their choices) and formatting, as well as just the time spent. Still it is nice to go perusing a random review of a newer product and find out that your flop of a product from a decade ago has made into to medallion level sales of game sales at a preferred site.