My first post here on Treasure Tables went up on July 11th, 2005, and in many jobs (at least here in the U.S.) your first 90 days is a “probationary period.” As of today, TT is officially out of its probationary period.

I think that’s pretty neat, so I want to reflect briefly on the highlights of the past three months — and ask you a question: how can I make Treasure Tables better for you? If you’re new to TT, this post is a great way to catch up on some of the most popular posts, among other things!

First, some numbers — stats, actually:

  • July 2005: (21 days) 1,432 unique visitors, 7,869 page views
  • August 2005: 2,341 unique visitors, 21,398 page views
  • September 2005: 2,536 unique visitors, 31,167 page views
  • October 2005: (first 9 days) 960 unique visitors, 9,494 page views

“Unique visitors” means pretty much what you’d expect: different people who’ve visited TT. “Page views” tracks how many times all of the site’s pages, combined, were viewed (also known as “hits”). There’s one other stat worth noting, but it’s a bit fuzzier: TT currently averages 150-200 unique visitors per day, and when compared to the number of unique visitors per month you can see that TT gets a lot of repeat visits (which is great!).

I’m not posting these numbers to brag — compared to larger, better-established sites, this is a drop in the bucket! (In my own mind, I’ll know TT has “made it” when the site is getting 1,000+ unique visitors per day.) That’s not to say that I’m not thrilled, because I am: these stats show that TT is enjoyed by quite a few people, and that its readership is growing.

Over the past 3 months, I’ve written 43 posts (counting this one), and over 400 comments have been made about those posts. Since one of the things I’m trying to do here is create a community of smart, insightful readers, that number — 400+ — means a lot to me. In fact, your comments are the singlest biggest reason that this blog is so much fun to write!

In terms of the interest they’ve generated in the comments, these were the 7 most popular posts in the past 90 days:

• How Did You Learn to GM?
• Fudging Die Rolls
• Rolling Dice in the Open
• Booze at the Table
• Speeding Up Item Management
• Professional GMing
• Why You Should Think About Game Design

After those 7, the most popular posts in terms of how many people read them (rather than how many commented on them) were these 4:

• More Fun, Less Work
• Applying Stross’s Law
• Robert’s Rules of GMing
• Handwaving PC Advancement

There have also been a couple of noteworthy events during the past 3 months:

• I collaborated with my friend Darren Hardy to launch TT’s line of gaming T-shirts through the Treasure Tables store
• This month, I kicked off the Blogging for GMs project (which is currently on day 11).

Most importantly, though, I’ve had some excellent conversations with TT readers, and learned a lot of great tips about GMing in the process — and I’m having a blast writing this blog. By reading this right now, and by commenting on it if you’re so inclined, you — yes, you — make running Treasure Tables worthwhile. Thank you!

…and because I’ve learned to always end my posts with a question or two, here’s a doozy: what can I do to make Treasure Tables better for you, personally? I’m not fishing for compliments, I’m genuinely curious what would make you visit more often and have more fun while you’re here. I can’t promise to do everything you ask, but I will read — and respond to — every comment that you leave on this topic.

Because you come here to read about GMing (and not, say, my site stats), I try to keep these metaposts to a minimum. Thanks for bearing with me, and hopefully you found this one interesting even though it’s not about GMing!