So after some observation of other designers and talking to some folks (thanks Shreyas) I had this idea for a design contest:

Thesis-
Speaking generally, the last thing in most RPG books is a character sheet. Character sheets are the thing that players most use to interface between the design of the game and actual play. Character sheets have ranged from beautiful and elegant to ugly and neigh-useless. The design of these play-tools should be pushed further, not just asthetically but also their relationship to the games they belong to.

The challenge- Design a character sheet. NOT A GAME. Just a character sheet. You have 2 weeks to do this. Everyone may submit a design, but they may only submit 1.

At the end of the two week entrance period the sheets will be randomly distributed to the designers (you will not get your own). Using only the character sheet as a guide, the designers will have an additional 2 weeks to design a game that uses that character sheet.

The designers will then reveiw the games and vote on a winner using set criteria (all designs will be posted on the web for public veiwing).
Some sort of cool prize awaits, and certainly the accolades of your peers.
Character sheets may be sent to my email: kevin_allen_jr AT hotmail DOT com. Please send PDFs if able, other formats are fine, they are just more work for me.

start of contest Aug 14. Character sheets accepted untill midnight Aug 28. Design assignments will be given out on the 29-30 (don't worry, they will all be released at the same time, i just want to give myself a window to get the work done). Completed designs must be submitted by Sept 13.

To work, you monsters.

Whose midnight? :P

This sounds interesting and awesome. Unfortunately, I often wait until my game is done, and then give some very sketchy notes to a graphic designer, who then designs a character sheet for me. I feel I could have some awesome contributions and designs when it comes to working with an extant character sheet, while I don't feel like I could design a character sheet at all - to the point that I kind of feel bad for whomever might end up with whatever sheet I create.

(And perhaps there are some graphic designers who would love to design sheets, but might not be all that interested in the game design part, I don't know.)

Might I suggest separating this out into two contests, where entrants in the first might not necessarily be entrants in the second, and vice versa? Perhaps the Game Contest could even only use a subset of the entries to the Sheet Contest (the top three winners?). Imagine the possible Game Anthology that could result: "30 games, 3 character sheets". I'd be way interested.

But in short: Please, consider those of us who might be very interested (and able) in one half of the contest, and not in the other.

I'd be interested in the design-a-sheet part, not so much in the design-a-game part.

I'm just sayin'.

Like Remi, I'd like to design a sheet, but not a game right now...

Can I design Remi's game? Is that legal? We're a power team.

"If I lose I fix the copier. If I win I fix the copier and my wife dies."

I will take a try at this as well.

I add my voice to those who have spoken before, please clarify what elements must not be included on the contest sheet. (And if applicable, what elements must be included.)

Those who just want to design could consider stealing a character sheet from some public-domain source.

[Those who just want to design a game, that is]

wow, i'm glad this got such a good responce. Some clarifications.

If you only want to design one half of the contest:
i'm gonna say yeah, go ahead, it looks like a pretty even split between folks who want to design just sheets and just games. If you ONLY want to make a game, just send me an email saying so, that way you get a sheet when they are all submitted.

if this ends up being grossly unbalanced (i get 10 sheets and 3 people who want to design games) people who designed sheets and games will get preferential treatment. I don't know what to do if the scales tip the other way. Suggestions?

i'm going to whip up a sheet, but not submit it, and i won't plan on making a game. I'll only participate if it evens out the teams.

sorry durham 2, teams are random.

as to including a game name on the cha sheet, yeah thats a little lame, but i don't think illustration or symbology is. Do with that what you will.

i'm very interested to see how chaotic and abstract these sheets get, and then how the games wrangle them together.

Posted By: RemiI didn't want to work with 'Cockpuncher' Morningstar, anyway. When do I have to get you the sheet, Kevin (date-wise)?

August 28th's the deadline, I think?

Catchup time: Companion thread over at the Forge.

In case I haven't been effusive enough, this is gonna RAWK.

My character sheet has been submitted.

I hear you Mike! While I was working on my sheet, I had to try really hard not to think about "what game would this work for?"

It wasn't easy focusing on the job of designing a sheet without allowing some game design to trickle in. But I think a little GD is important, otherwise you could end up with a big circle with "GO" written in the middle...

That raises an interesting point -- what sort of headings/text showed up in your designs? I ended up with none other than Title stuff. However, I think I conveyed a lot of intent/meaning through use of graphics.

I just submitted a character sheet. Poor impulse control.

I can write you the game for that right now Joshua. But I'm not allowed to post it until the second half of the competition.

I have a fun little idea from a game concept that fizzled. I'll see if I can bang it together this weekend.

I didn't put any words on at all. I considered just putting in large Greek letters like Psi, Phi, Chi and Theta, but it was hard to do so I thought, why limit the (other) designer?

I have a long list of alchemical and astrological symbols that I was considering using. Hm.

Posted By: Kevin Allen Jrso now you can chart your progress over onkevinallenjr.com

The list is complete as of 6:00pm (eastern standard) thursday.

Those submissions are wild. I can't wait for the second half.

You guys are looking to break my brain. This is awesome! If I think I can handle this challenge after school starts next week, I'll be dropping Kevin a line and saying "Hey, I want one of those sheets!" I am very excited!

Darcy's very close to what I had in mind. Now I have to see if I can come up with something different :)

Man, the urge to submit a 1st Edition AD&D sheet is almost unbearable! Just to see what the designer who gets it makes instead...

Fred, that's interesting - mine specified, I think, less than any of the others and yet it's the one that you have the most specific starting ideas for. Fruitful Void?

I plead synchronicity to the other labrynthine designs.

It got away from me toward the end but a little random happening never hurt art. Badly.

Mine's in. It even has a space for a character portrait -- assuming that's what the designer puts in that big rectangle.

Mike RM, I want to fold your sheet into a BOX. It is clearly a folding diagram of some sort!

Meanwhile, I want to make, like, 3 different sheets. I did one that's all circle-y and (I think) has evocative labels. I want to do a crunchy-looking one like Mike Wormley's with extra pips. And I want to do a really weird abstract one possibly using a chaotic attractor as the base!

But, uh, I'm totally not up to designing 3 different games. What do I doooo?

-Selene

I'm holding off on looking at all your entries until I get mine in.

So....if mine is derivative....well, at least it's originally derivative!

I just fired off an entry too. It's a neat challenge.

I tried to make my sheet include stuff that (hopefully) will give the designer ideas without constraining them in what they do. I don't know if I succeeded, but it was fun to try.

You can seriously constrain function through the application of form. I promise you that. Actually, I really hope I get to design around one of the hardcore stats/advantages/flak ratio/body point character sheets, just to see where it will take me.

I'm glad we are limited to one-entry. After I submitted mine, I started to get this idea about one laid out in panels like a comic book page but can't quite get it completely worked out. If we could submit more than one I would be forced to obsess over the concept.....

Got mine done this morning, and then my internet crashed as I was sending it. I'll be sending it again later, but my apologies if it ends up being two emails.

- Mendel

Posted By: Jason MorningstarYou can seriously constrain function through the application of form. I promise you that. Actually, I really hope I get to design around one of the hardcore stats/advantages/flak ratio/body point character sheets, just to see where it will take me.

Exactly. At first glance, I was like, "Man, that's not gonna be too interesting", then I immediately retracted: It's the task of the DESIGNER to make it interesting. And hell, even if you go for the full "stats, skills, powers" stuff, doing those in a new way would be a fun and exciting challenge, I think, even more than the hippie froo-froo character sheets.

I'll make mine this weekend. I have Mon and Tues off too.

-Andy

Posted By: DarcyWith that in mind, I feel that I need to ask:How are we ever going to review this many games in anything resembling a timely manner?I'm thinking that we need a page limit or somesuch.

We've only got two weeks, right? My page count isn't getting above 10 in that time.

Seems like less of a challenge if I get to cherry pick. I'd be going with the ideas I've already had instead of being inventive.

I like random. I also like John Cage so you know I like to suffer because of random.

You bastiges!

I wasn't suggesting that we pick the sheet we want. What I meant was "vote on coolest sheet award". I was merely suggesting a criteria for the vote!

Suahuab!

I think voting for that kind of stuff can happen after they have been distributed, during the design period. Have categories: most intimidating, prettiest, most abstract, most awesome, etc. That would be keen.

Posted By: Graham WThere's pretty much two types of sheets: the ones that almost define the game by themselves (by naming all the attributes) and the ones where it's left wide open.

I named things -- sort of. But I didn't name them in terms of "these are things that go together on a character sheet." I named them more in terms of "ha ha, relate these elements, designer!"

Also, the IRS sheet totally reminds me of the character sheet for Vesperteen.

Posted By: JonathanWaltonthen we are some seriously John Cage motherf***ers.

Heh. How about a character sheet that is 9 perfectly blank sheets. But all 9 sheets must be used, and the rules explain how and why.

You are whatever you can fold from this blank piece of paper.