Over the past few days, I’ve had enough time — and an amazing amount of feedback — to fully think (and rethink) through my decision to stop writing Treasure Tables. My thanks to everyone who took the time to comment and let me know what TT meant to them.
As much as I would like to try one of the many excellent options that readers suggested — such as doing away with my daily posting schedule and turning TT into a group blog — I’ve concluded that what I really need is a hiatus. I had a great break in November (albeit one in which I did rather a lot of writing!), but that break needs to be upgraded to full-blown hiatus status.
• The Treasure Tables Forums will be staying open, thanks to the efforts of our four community moderators, Rick_TWA, Scott M, Telas and VV_GM. The TT forums were created in the same spirit of friendly, practical GMing discussion as the blog. If you’d like a place to discuss GMing while the blog slumbers (perhaps indefinitely), I highly recommend the forums.
• TT’s archives aren’t going anywhere. I have credit with my web host for at least several more months, and as rerun month showed lots of TT readers haven’t seen everything that’s in the archives — there’s a huge amount of GMing material on this site! I’ll probably reconfigure the front page to emphasize the best posts from the archives (and to direct folks to the forums).
• One reason I’m not closing the site is that, as many of you pointed out, I might want to start writing about GMing again — and if the site is down, where would I go to do that? If do start posting again, it won’t be on a daily schedule. As crucial as that was to building the TT community, it burned me the hell out.
If you’re already subscribed to TT’s RSS feed, please don’t delete your subscription — if I start blogging again, or my batteries recharge and I invite TT members to join me in a group GMing blog, you’ll be the first to know about it. And if you’re not already a subscriber, sign up! It’s hassle-free, and you’ll get instant notification if the blog comes back.
Thank you for making this blog’s run — from July 11, 2005 through today — a great one. I’m glad to have been able to help fellow GMs run better games, and to have had this site become the hub of an awesome GMing community. Thank you for everything, and I’ll see you in the forums.
Take a WELL DESERVED break and enjoy it. Breaks where you start up some other project that you work harder on aren’t really that refreshing :).
I definitely think it would be cool if you set the blog to show old posts during your hiatus. While I didn’t check them as often as when there were new posts, I definitely appreciated reading them.
That is the thing about the GMing advice from this site, it is always relevant to whatever I’m running or planning, and that is why I think TT got to be as great as it is.
Martin,
I’m a newcomer to TT but I understand were you’re coming from. For the past few years I’ve been deeply involved with a gaming convention and I’ve pretty much reached the burnout point as well. Between work and school (trying to finish my degree) I just don’t have the time nor the interest in spending half my year working on the convention. I still plan to attend as a GM and purse some other interests, such as designing a board game for the game design contest they host each year.
Enjoy your time off, enjoy the holidays, and don’t think you need to rush back. I’ve found so much material on this site it would take me months to devour it all. I do hope you intend to keep the site up eventually and come back to post. As myself and others have commented, you could simply post less often, such as bi-weekly.
Cheers and thanks!
We’ll be here waiting for you, sir. Glad you decided to keep things a bit more open ended in case you decide to make your return.
Enjoy your break away from blogging, and if possible enjoy a few weeks off where you do as little writing as possible. =)
w00t!
That is GREAT news! I think you’ve made the best decision for all of us who soak up the wisdom on this site but rarely say much.
And of course you, by keeping otions open you can rest well and get past the burn, re discover why you made this site in the first place and generate some ideas for absolutely positively awesome blogs.
(I’ll stop now)
As Omnius said, we’ll be waiting for you and in the meantime practicing our GM-fu
I’d like to say thank you for all of the great posts that you’ve given us over the last two years, as well as thank you for keeping the site open while you rest/pursue other things.
I’ve really loved your posts over the couple of years I’ve been watching, TT has been about the only blog that I check on a daily (or near daily) basis.
I do hope that you come back at some point and post some more, but I ‘ve experienced burnout & mental real estate myself, so no pressure. Just leaving the rest of the site running is fantastic.
Thanks Again.
Enjoy the time off.
Never hesitate to take it.
And my I also vote for a group gming blog, when and if you decide to come back.
Do what you must, and pray for the best. And always remember the words of Buckaroo Bonzi, “no matter where you go, there you are.”
As great as this news is I must ask: when do we get to read the novel?!?
Here’s to you Martin! You rock!
Thank you, everyone. I’m still not happy about shuttering the blog, but I know it’s the right decision.
VV: My novel is currently marinating for a few weeks so that I can approach it with fresh eyes when I start revisions. No one but me has read it yet. 😉