In late October, I tabled at CRITcon 2, in Portland OR. That’s me (on the left), in front of Tyler Welch’s (on the right) sign. Don’t worry, I sat in front of it all weekend and confused everyone.

Overview

Cascadia Regional Indepent Tabletop Convention is primarily a Warhammer 40k Kill Team tournament, but it also hosts vendors (focusing on independent creators local to the PNW). My friend Tyler Welch put a ton of work into expanding the games on offer to include RPG stuff, to mixed success (more on that later).

Tyler graciously offered me his guest room, so I was off the hook for accommodations. We collaborated on the Liminal Horror adventure Ex Inferis, which was the primary product he’d have for sale at the event, so we decided to split the table.

Expenses

I hadn’t tabled at an event since Emerald City Comic Con in march, so I had more expenses than normal. I had to pick up a new wire grid display, brochure holders, re-up on business cards, and order prints of my new stuff.

These are the costs of everything that I bought specifically to be able to vend at the event, but I’m not together enough to track things like meal costs or gas, although I suppose that I should start (I desperately need to become the kind of person who does things like claim expenses on my taxes).

Of course, it wouldn’t be appropriate to attribute the entire cost of table displays to just one event, or the printing costs of books that I take home, but I don’t have the kind of bank account that likes to accommodate the amortization of costs. I was in a pretty big hole, and without any guarantee that the event would generate foot traffic, or that Warhammer players would be interested in my silly little books, I was pretty nervous.

Sales

Total sales: $882

These numbers include some wholesales that I made to an awesome game store next door to the event venue, Dice Pool. I made another small wholesale at the excellent Dark Future Dungeon, and left a few copies on commission at MindTaker Miniatures, who are in the process of expanding their selection to include TTRPGS, with an emphasis on indie games.

The relative numbers of books that I sold matched my expectations:

• Beneath the Muckfort is my latest book, has a very strong cover, and I pitched it to everyone who came by the table.
• Foxtrot Uniform is my only Mothership RPG adventure (so far!), and people love mothership! It was also only $5, so a lot of people grabbed it as an add on. Great! that’s exactly why I have it at the table.
• Ex Inferis has a striking cover, and since Liminal Horror is written by a couple of Portland guys, people know about the system. Quite a few people told me they already had it.
• The Line is my next best cover, but Vaults of Vaarn is relatively unknown. I’d also say it’s not the strongest product, since it leans heavily on vibes as opposed to tight adventure design.
• Diet of Worms is a good adventure, but it doesn’t have a very interesting cover. It’s the reason that all my books have a color cover and are illustrated.
• Halls of the Beetle Queen I don’t even want to talk about this one, it’s the first adventure I ever wrote, and I only brought it out because I had a few copies lying around. It’s probably fine, but it has a weak cover, and not enough illustrations inside.

I didn’t sell as many prints as I’d hoped. They were all black and white, and small (8x10 or 5x7). My experience at Emerald City Comic Con had shown me that small, cheap prints do great at larger events, but these didn’t perform well. My unit cost on them was less than fifty cents (I got 280 prints for $50), so I gave away a bunch to people who bought more than one thing. I got a lot of people asking about large color prints of some of my covers, so that’s something to look into for my next show.

I didn’t sell a single copy of The Fiend Sworn… because my prints didn’t get delivered on time. They were stuck in customs, then a warehouse in the midwest for two weeks, and arrived the wednesday after the event. They look great, little A6 booklets in full color, my #14 ranked submission to the Appx. N Jam. Given how Foxtrot Uniform did, I expect I would have sold quite a few. Bummer!

The future of the event

As I mentioned at the start, Tyler Welch did a ton of legwork in the months leading up to the event to organize independent wargames and ttrpgs for the event. The wargames went great, but ttrpgs had a few GMs drop out immediately before the event. The organizers were excited about it anyway, they really want CRITcon to feel like more of a Con than a big 40k tournament.

I’ll definitely be back next year, and selfishly offered to donate some graphic design time to next year’s event. I’m hoping that the marketing materials can highlight the vendors and open play games more prominently, and offering to do it for free is the most straightforward way to make that happen I could think of.

Conclusion

Takeaway #1

At large events like Comic Con, people know that there are going to be more things that they want to buy than they have money.

At a smaller event like this one, people are looking to see if there is something that they want to buy.

Having some exciting products that are more expensive is something I need to figure out. John Kero of Smacked Down fame was at the table next to me, and he sold out of his $100+ Smacked Down box sets on the first day.

• Larger color prints that have a bit of a price tag
• Deluxe prints / sets of my adventures, which leads me to…

Takeaway #2

Tyler, Matt Gomez of GomezWritesGames, and I spent the entire weekend chatting about making and publishing games, easily the highlight of the weekend. We did a bit of number crunching on hardcovers, and realized that, despite the higher unit cost, you make more money on every sale. Who knew that selling a book for $30 or $35 would make more money than selling one for $20?

I don’t have anything currently in development that I could just port over into a hardcover, but it’s something that I’m going to be looking at moving forward.

• I could expand one of my books into a larger volume (I was planning to do that with Diet of Worms, but #2 got put on the backlog),
• or maybe collect my cairn adventures into an anthology once I’ve got enough.

Takeaway #3

My table still sucks.

• I don’t like the wire cubes, they’re too noisy. I need to either switch the kind of cubes that are solid (instead of wire grid), or switch to using some little book displays. I’m leaning towards book displays, and doing a bit of DIY to give them Gravy cat ears.
• I need a backdrop. I spent the whole weekend sitting in front of a popup banner with Tyler’s face on it, which confused people. I’m thinking about getting a pipe-and-drape kit, and just hanging a black backdrop behind the table.
• I need a table runner or a custom tablecloth. I have a vinyl banner that I bought to hang in front of my table, but it’s like an inch too big in every dimension, so it looks bad. I think I’d be better off with a table runner that features the Maneki Gravy logo.

Takeaway #4

I need at least one product that is a standalone game, and one product that I can sell to complete normies. There are layers of explanation standing between me and a sale with anyone who isn’t already pretty invested in TTRPGS. I was hoping that my prints would do that job, but I’m learning the same lesson I learned with my book covers: it’s got to be in color.

• I need a game that I can pitch as a complete game. I’m leaning towards a solo mapmaking game that I’ve been outlining in my spare time. I have another adventure project slated for next year that will include a bespoke rule system. Ok, it’s just another Cairn hack.
• I need something for someone who just likes the art. An art zine, sticker sheets/packs, larger and more colorful prints.
• I’m going to pick up some mystery dice bags from my friend Kenku Court, the presence of dice at the table communicates “I’m selling ttrpg stuff” more effectively than any big banner that says “GAMES” ever could.