I can verify that what's been said is true. Our success at
JG may have simply been we were first. Not to minimize what talents we brought to project but God provided the timing and all the circumstances and talent development besides. Our unique supply created demand that even TSR didn't recognize (sort of in line with Say's Law).
And despite our initial success, I did not quit my job right away. Bob was already unemployed and needed it to be very real success asap. And wargaming graphics standard was very basic back then so we needn't invest in anything more than a handmade light table... $200 total was the investment needed to start this business. But one could not reasonably expect that then and now multiply by a fact of 10 or 100.
Re all the talent you'd need to hire. The only way that I can personally see that this can work is if 2 people get together to donate their labor (a form of partnership investment which could be tracked to determine ownership share) and complement each really well: an author who happens to be draftsmen and a graphic layout person who is very comfortable with the business side. That's Bob & me respectively.
Marc Summerlott (Marcham the Elf warrior & author of Thieves of Badabaskor) wanted to be part of the partnership but had personal issues that held him back. The dynamic would have been completely different but might have worked because we already had high trust relationships built. He could have provided more authorship (never my strong suit except for mechanical play aids like Judges Shield as opposed to scenario/world creation) and he had a background in printing/layout. Sort of expandingt the output of both Bob & I. I cannot vouch for the dynamic of 3 people vs. 2 though... after
JG I was in the travel business with 2 family members and it was not very good.
But if you are not plowing new ground, not first to market, then at best this may be a sideline to whatever you already do--i.e. a hobby. And with plowing new ground you may find that you hit a big boulder and it fails. It's a sobering fact that most new businesses DO fail.
I've kept up on printing technology over the years so I could publish my own little projects (my D-Day campaign maps on
www.cafepress.com/judgesguild outsell the JG stuff... but then they are unique) and to give input to Bob for his small scale publishing of JG materials.
Finally, even if one has real-world publishing experience, skills and access to technology with self-publishing & 30 years you can end up with a miserably small Booty List of personal wargaming products where I did every part of the product (except 1 piece of cover art on 2):
1. Treasury of Archaic Names 1979
2. Series of 10 D-Day campaign maps each from 12x18" to 23x35" in 3 hex scales & subset of same 3 maps covering just the beaches in a 4th hex scale 2004
3. Judges Guild's Bob & Bill, A Cautionary Tale 2008
4. Great Battles of the Civil War projected 2009 exactly 30 years late
5. Expanded Judges Guild's Bob & Bill, A Cautionary Tale projected 2009*
(plus non-gamer books & booklets)
6. Travel Catalogs #1-36 1991-2006 16-64 page 2 or 4 color travel brochures
7. Miscellaneous dozen(s?) other booklets and a charity calendar printed at Stevens who did most of our JG stuff
8. Owen Tuttle 2005 my family picture book
http://www.cafepress.com/billowen
9. From Tot to Trooper 2006 a WWII Vet memoir
http://www.rupertbook.com/
And this does not count several projects where I helped Bob & others to do artwork for their game components as boringly detailed at
http://www.g-design.us/jg
So the bulk of my publishing after JG has been for my travel agency work and building on what I learned while at JG.
For the relatively small income from these adhoc products and the too-solitary pursuit that self-publishing can be, it's not been worth it. Really just Vanity Publishing. However, for me only perhaps, the modest reward has been in my publishing skill development and more lately & more greatly rewarding being exposed to nice gamers around the world that I would not have otherwise known.
PS I suggest 2 things you could practically do: buy everything that James Mishler has (to encourage him to continue) and submit your product to him for analysis.
*A favor to ask, if you bought unique or ancient stuff from me on eBay, would you consider scanning (or photoing if large) it and sending to me at
[email protected]? I will be putting a "coffee table" book of about 80 pages asap. The resolution needs to be 240 dots or greater. Thanks!
