Call for Submissions

May 29, 2022 6:37 pm
Many works of fiction began from gameplay. The Dragonlance novels spun from Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman's own campaign while they worked at TSR. The Malazan Books of the Fallen arose from Steven Erikson and Ian Esslemont's long term GURPS campaign. James S.A. Corey's The Expanse novels came from a game, rumoured to originate with Traveller.

The worlds of roleplaying and fiction writing continuously cross over. Who hasn't wondered if their campaign wouldn't make for good fiction? Many have wanted to write the next steps for a character you brought to life in game.

The Games We Play is a publishing project dreamed up by Qralloq and Thielindra, husband and wife writers. Over the past many years, we've attended numerous conferences on writing, participated in professional writing groups, written many stories, and sold several for publishing. We also edit and critique manuscripts written by other published authors in our personal writing groups. Finally, Qralloq self-published his own novel in 2018.

What we propose is to curate and publish a collection of short stories written by Gamers Plane's own community. This is a call for those stories, inspired by tabletop roleplaying games, be those characters, settings, or plots. Bring us your wackiest adventures, fantastic characters, and epic moments from or inspired by your games that will forever be etched in your memories, turned into full, complete stories.

Who Can Submit
This call will only be open to members of GP. Prior publishing credits or experience not required.

Genre Expectations
Any genre is open. Inspiration from a TTRPG is the connective tissue.

Word Limit
Word Count: 2000 to 7500. (Longer pieces will be considered on an individual basis, dependent on length and number of other stories submitted.)

In addition, we may include a limited amount of art within the text.

Submissions Conditions
Accepts Multiple Submissions
Accepts Unpublished Pieces and limited number of reprints.
Accepts Simultaneous Submissions, but please let us know if your story is accepted elsewhere.
Standard formatting preferred, but not required.

Our Process
1. Advertise -- This!
2. Answer questions. Q and A on GP forum.
3. Time Limit -- the submission window will be open for three months, ending on August 31, 2022. While we will acknowledge receipt of stories submitted as we receive them, acceptance will only be communicated after the submission window closes.
4. Read the submissions -- we may need several weeks to get through the slush pile, but we'll intend to complete that in September.
5. Select the pieces best suited -- this is by necessity somewhat arbitrary, and we reserve the right to make our choices and live by them.
6. Work with the selected authors to edit the stories into their best form.
7. Layout, design, cover art, illustrations, and formatting.
8. Publish!
Please send submissions to eastontales@gmail.com with your zodiac sign as the subject of your email. Please include a brief description of your tabletop roleplaying game based source of inspiration.

You may submit more than one story.

We'd prefer to use Google Docs or Microsoft Word, as those tools will make the collaborative editing process easier to share our suggestions back to the author. If you send your story in a different format, we'll likely convert the story to one of those for collaborative editing.

Royalties
We will use Pubshare to distribute equal royalties regardless of length to the creative talents involved. Cover art will receive 5% and story illustrator 10%. Artists to be determined at a later date.
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Jun 1, 2022 6:11 am
This is a wonderful idea! I'll get to work and see if I can come up with something :)
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Jun 1, 2022 8:21 am
Just to clarify, hopefully to others as well, these are story inspired by characters or events in the game we play, not the games we actually played right?

Basically you're not looking to turn games into stories as I initially understood from the other post (before coffee, obviously). There's a lot of great written content just there waiting to be fair, but that could be a different initiative :D
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Jun 1, 2022 8:26 am
Pretty sure either is fine
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Jun 1, 2022 1:10 pm
bowlofspinach says:
Pretty sure either is fine
Correct. New stories inspired by characters or games and settings, but if you have a game campaign that could be a strong story, by all means, we would love to read that as well.
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Jun 1, 2022 2:43 pm
Great idea. I am going to give it a go as it seems like a great opportunity!
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Jun 2, 2022 3:20 am
How will you handle copyrighted material, such as the mention of certain settings like Eberron? I'm not too familiar with what exactly is copyrighted and what isn't in an RPG.

Edit: I did not see that there was an FAQ about this. Disregard.
Last edited June 2, 2022 3:31 am
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Jun 3, 2022 3:22 pm
saevikas says:
Edit: I did not see that there was an FAQ about this. Disregard.
Could someone point me to the FAQ mentioned here?
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Jun 3, 2022 4:10 pm
Equinox says:
saevikas says:
Edit: I did not see that there was an FAQ about this. Disregard.
Could someone point me to the FAQ mentioned here?
https://gamersplane.com/forums/thread/25586/
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Jun 3, 2022 10:00 pm
Thank you
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Jun 10, 2022 1:50 pm
What a great idea!

I've never had the guts to write, let alone submit, a piece for something like this. But I swear I will this time. It won't matter to me that it'll probably suck and not make the cut. The main thing is to actually finish something and put it out there.
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Jun 10, 2022 2:45 pm
We're certainly cognizant that most GP users aren't professional writers, or necessarily fully fluent in English. These alone will not be barriers and we are willing to help each of you turn your manuscript into something awesome, whether that's tiny tweaks or more complex changes.

We actually like that process, and look forward to the challenge.
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Jun 13, 2022 4:32 pm
Awesome idea! What's the rule for using pen names?
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Jun 13, 2022 4:35 pm
Do you prefer stories from a character perspective or is a recounting of what happened at the table appropriate?
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Jun 13, 2022 4:51 pm
Pen names are perfectly fine. We will only require some sort of identification for payment upon acceptance through Pubshare, but that remains private between us and the author.

Both character perspective (first person POV) or recounting the table adventure (omniscient or third person POV) are accepted. Use whatever you find works best for you and your story.
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Jun 19, 2022 7:03 pm
Qralloq says:
Please send submissions to eastontales@gmail.com with your zodiac sign as the subject of your email.
This seems like evil voodoo πŸ€”
Qralloq says:
Please include a brief description of your tabletop roleplaying game based source of inspiration.
But my question is related to this one... does it have to be an actual, existing game with a name? There were a few ideas thrown around and not (yet!) finished, one of them I think could be interesting for this (if I ever find the time :D)
Last edited June 19, 2022 7:04 pm
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Jun 19, 2022 7:08 pm
Drawing inspiration from a RPG is key, but that sort of inspiration takes many forms. If you discovered an idea while considering a game or character for a game, that certainly fits.
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Jul 10, 2022 10:07 pm
Adam sent a note to Qralloq,bowlofspinach
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Jul 12, 2022 12:55 am
Qralloq sent a note to Qralloq,Adam
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Jul 12, 2022 2:01 pm
Adam sent a note to Qralloq,Adam
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Jul 31, 2022 6:34 pm
One month to go! We have received two stories so far. We know that it is the nature of these things that most submissions will come in the final days. Still, we're excited for the deluge we hope is coming.

If you have any questions or are stuck for how to push your own story forward, we'd love to help.

What are we looking for?
Stories inspired by roleplaying experiences. Maybe these are characters you wish could have seen accomplish their goals, or an plot/event in game that stuck with you for how it affected the characters.

Thielindra once wrote a story, based upon a D&D 3.5 campaign she played in for a couple years. Her characters was a Geomancer, a kind of spellcaster that slowly sprouted new random features. Antlers, spider silk glands, striped skin, it was crazy. Her story didn't take the campaign itself and recite the events, but instead, she took that idea, of someone transformed by magic, and wrote a story about a desperate farm girl who allowed a wizard to perform magical experiments on her in order to help save the family farm. Spoiler alert, these changes weren't all for the better.

Mostly, think carefully about the main point-of-view character, and how they're affected by the events. A great story puts the reader in the character's space, and shows them the emotions and drama that the character experiences.
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Jul 31, 2022 9:53 pm
I want to read that farmgirl story now
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Jul 31, 2022 10:18 pm
bowlofspinach says:
I want to read that farmgirl story now
It’ll be in the anthology. πŸ™‚
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Jul 31, 2022 10:25 pm
Yay
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Aug 10, 2022 10:12 pm
Just submitted a story. I will try to get one or two more in before the end of the month.
Last edited August 10, 2022 10:13 pm
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Aug 10, 2022 11:51 pm
@Julius_Seizure received and thank you!
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Aug 24, 2022 10:00 pm
Story submitted a week before the deadline!
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Aug 25, 2022 4:01 pm
@Windyridge thanks! Another for the pile. Less than a week to go for the rest of you! Even if you don't get it just right, send it in before the deadline. We'll suggest changes for the final version so you'll have a bit more time for that, but we can't edit anything we don't know about.
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Aug 29, 2022 1:37 pm
Just a few days left.
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Aug 31, 2022 1:03 pm
We have recieved eight submissions so far, plus Thielindra and I will contribute one or two each.

There is room for more, but today is the last day.
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Aug 31, 2022 7:20 pm
Did you receive mine? :D There was no confirmation, so I belatedly realized that maybe I should check. Just in case!
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Aug 31, 2022 7:21 pm
You did submit something after all? Yay
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Aug 31, 2022 7:34 pm
I did, like a true procrastinator - at the last possible day. :'D
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Aug 31, 2022 7:37 pm
That's awesome!

And no better time for it 😁
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Aug 31, 2022 7:51 pm
We did receive yours, @FlyingSucculent, and also one from @Phil_Ozzy_Fer in case he's wondering.
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Sep 1, 2022 1:06 am
I got my submission in earlier today and received the confirmation. Thank you, Qrallog, for doing this. Whatever happens, it was a great experience. I found your writing tips very helpful when did my last-minute edits.
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Sep 1, 2022 1:38 am
I love how you had to clarify that they weren't very helpful
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Sep 1, 2022 2:22 am
Submitted! And I didn't even need to calculate when it'd be midnight at the International Date Line....

Thanks for hosting!
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Sep 1, 2022 2:35 am
rpgventurer says:
I got my submission in earlier today and received the confirmation. Thank you, Qrallog, for doing this. Whatever happens, it was a great experience. I found your writing tips very helpful when did my last-minute edits.
Qrallog? Ten points from Hufflepuff.

πŸ˜†
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Sep 1, 2022 2:04 pm
Thanks for all the submissions everyone. We really appreciate the enthusiasm and participation we’ve seen with this project.

Over the next few weeks, Q and I will go over all the stories, and let you know if your work will be part of the anthology. At that point, we will send back a contract, editing, and maybe some developmental suggestions.

Thanks again for being part of this.

Thielindra
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Sep 15, 2022 12:24 am
Responses have been sent out. If you submitted a story but have not heard from us about it, please contact either of us and we'll look into it right away.
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Sep 22, 2022 12:52 am
Anthology Update

We've responded to everyone who submitted, and asked for confirmation that your story is still available. If you haven't responded, please check your email (and possibly spam folder) and let us know.
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Oct 10, 2022 11:21 pm
Anthology Update

We're slowly receiving the contracts back, and sending out suggested line edits to those stories. For the few of you who have not yet returned the contract, please let us know if you have any questions, and check your spam folder if you haven't seen it yet.

We're hoping to have the bulk of the edits done by the end of October, which gives us November to build the anthology and finalize the copy. Aiming for an early December publication date.
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Oct 11, 2022 1:35 am
Woot! Looking forward to it.
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Oct 28, 2022 2:35 am
Update
Contracts have been signed by all the authors. Line edits of the stories have been sent to all the contributors (with grammar and other suggestions). We're hoping to receive the last of those stories back in the next couple weeks. Meanwhile, we're busy finalizing the stories that have already come back with those final edits, and preparing the book itself. We've even chosen an order for the table of contents! We've designed the cover, and am working with our artist to realize that vision.

The pieces are slowly arranging themselves into a reasonable facsimile of an actual book! We're still hoping to have it published for early December, in time for the gift-giving holiday season.
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Jan 19, 2023 9:44 pm
It's alive!!

What's alive? The anthology of course. After working with the authors, receiving their stories, getting signed contracts, editing those stories, and discussing their stories with them, then obtaining biographies and inspirations, we managed to get the book into working shape in December. We set up a royalty sharing site for the contributors, and that took us into January to get all in place.

This week, we prepared the ebook versions, and have those published on: Apple Books, Kindle, Kobo, Nook, and Pubshare.

It took a little bit longer, but we also have the paperbook available, on Amazon storefronts around the world. Here's a link to the US store and the Canadian store.

If you buy our labour of love, we'd love for you to review it on your retailer choice. Reviews tell Amazon in particular to push their internal marketing efforts into overdrive, and so each review is more precious than you would otherwise believe.

We hope you enjoy, and thank you to all the wonderful authors who participated. A special thank you to my lovely wife @Thielindra who did the heavily lifting on the editing of these stories.

https://i.imgur.com/2Krgr4w.png

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