Jammin' and Publishin'

Hey there, Yawning Chasm That Is The Intarwebz. How y'all been? It's been a hot minute since I just talked to you, so I thought I'd do something like that now.

I basically gave this blog over to my current campaign setting Fellport over the past 2.5 years, posting nothing but NPCs, locations, items, groups, and related snippets to use in your game if you want. I shifted focus from my thoughts to stuff I made, thinking nobody would care about this aging white guy's opinions. Maybe that's true. Maybe the void will eat my thoughts and never give anything back. But does that negate the effort or the accomplishment of having strung together words in hopes of clarifying my thoughts and working through what I might think? I don't think so. I'm writing here mainly for me, but if these words reach anyone with similar beliefs and biases, great! So let's get to it.

Just to let you know, things have shifted for me since April, and things have shifted more in the past 6-7 weeks. Lemme 'splain.

(WARNING: Brain Dump Below The Cut! Double-check your safety gear now!)

Day Job, and the Lack Thereof

On Monday, April 7th, 2025, I clocked in to work as usual. I got a cryptic meeting invite for 9:30AM call with my boss. I joined, and only then checked the invite list: me, my boss, and someone from HR. Uh oh. Congratulations, I was placed on furlough for 6 months in hopes of finding the budget to pay my salary again. I still technically had my job, but I couldn't legally do any work, and I wouldn't be paid unless things changed. It's usually the newest hire or the most senior person on the team to get the axe. The new guy had an infant at home, so the axe fell on my seniormost neck. No huge surprise. Just thank that guy remodeling the Oval Office for axing research overhead money back in February. Apparently, as the only developer on a small IT team that supports every research group on campus, I'm overhead.

It took me a few days to get over the shock. I got my resume polished and started looking for contract work. I applied for unemployment assistance. I didn't worry too much about the situation, as someone with 30 years of database, project management, and programming skills should get hired pretty quickly, right?

Suffice to say it's been 19 weeks, 3 recruiters, 70 applications, and zero interest. Finding contract work feels like a fever dream from twenty years ago, so I'm looking for anything I can get. Half of my applications just fly off into the ether with no response at all, never mind a boilerplate email saying "Thanks, but we're looking at other applicants, and we'll keep you on file." It's a little disheartening.

On top of that, I haven't seen any money from unemployment. All queries on my claim have been answered back in April, but there's no decision so I can't even appeal anything. I've called several times but can't get past the general phone pool. Their stock answer is "We can't do anything until an adjuster reviews your claim." I've been placed on the Expedited List three times. No change. I've reached out to my state representative who said they'd reach out to see what's happening. No change. I'm surviving on loans and the generosity of my family right now. It sucks.

Making Something Happen

I finally pushed myself to finish Bolthaven Folios #1 back in July. Since I'm a new publisher at DriveThru, it took a while to get everything squared away. My little zine about making magic items that might not do exactly what the creator thinks has been live for about a month now. I priced it at $4, which means I have a few hits but zero sales. If you want to take a look and maybe pick up a copy, it's live now on DriveThru RPG and over on itch.io.

As I worked out the final listing issues, I tripped across the Appendix N Jam and signed up. I received my assigned title and brainstormed, wrote, edited, and embellished in a narrative voice that matched the mid-century Fantasy/SciFi pulp genre. I copied the basic layout from Bolthaven Folios and went to town, finally publishing Echoes at the Edge of the World on July 27th.

I never even looked at the voting criteria, just pushing to get something done and out the door. I had zero art and no room to fit any, so my little 4-page folio ended up as a wall of text. People who rated it liked the content, and I thrilled at getting comments during the voting window. It ended up #184/227, though getting mostly 4s on the theme and writing placed me almost dead center of the submissions, which felt great. I'm taking the win for getting something out on time with an assigned title.

I started looking at other jams, and I signed up for the One-Page RPG Jam, an annual event to make more light TTRPGs. I cranked out a game and character sheets in a few weeks, and now Historia Obscura exists for your downloading, perusing, and playing pleasure. It's a GMless game for 3-5 Sage players interested in building and fighting about the "true" history behind an event. It's free-form in the stories that emerge from play, and Sages can have their reputations changed during and after a session. Go grab a copy and kick in a few bucks if you like it.

So that's 3 titles I've published over the past 7 weeks. That's not too shabby. Cranking out a thing a month isn't a bad goal, but I've got higher priorities if the stars align in the near future.

What's Next?

I'm looking at a few more Jams in the next month or two, and I've already signed up for the Indie Adventure Jam ending in a month (September 17th). The idea here is simple: Pick an indie TTRPG that you think deserves more love, then make something for it. It could be an adventure, a supplement, a play aid, or whatever, but the goal involves making more content for cool games that might not get that otherwise.

Is cranking out games and zines going to replace my developer's salary? Maybe, but that's years down the road, if ever. So I'll keep finding interesting opportunities and applying in hopes of getting some financial stability back. The job hunt goes on. Hopefully something will turn up and I'll actually get an interview like a real potential employee.

I'm going to make more things. Hopefully I'll blog more like this, even if only to write shorter posts. This one's a monster. I recently read Grognardia's post on the shrinking OSR blogging scene, and that inspired me to write this, among other things. And yes, writing something and then writing more to respond to other people's writing is something I've missed in the past decade or so. Be the change, and all that. Time to get started.

Thanks for enduring the stream-of-consciousness fire hose above. Sometimes I just need to put words together to take some of the load off my brain and spirit, y'know?

Hope you're doing well, in whatever form that takes for you. You're welcome to comment, and I'll probably even respond. I've got more to write, so stay tuned.

Until next!
- Wombat

PS: Yay for itch widgets!