Tony, this thread is pure win.

I'd like to thank Charlotte for keeping me excited about design, and Jamey for spotting me when there was just too much static in my brain. My guinea pig crew of Alex, Nick, Dan, and Quee is the most diverse array of gamers one could ask for, all shockingly enthusiastic about revising mechanics in media res, tweaking and polishing, all the while developing compelling characters with heartbreaking tragedies. I've taken a design from frustratingly incomplete to playable and sassy in the span of an evening because of the powerful motivation and confidence these guys pour into me.

I'd also like to thank the good sir Hammack for inspiring all the madness I'm working on right now, the Ryans, Stoughton and Macklin, for each reminding me what it is to humbly design for fun, Matt for calling when I needed very much for someone to call, and Mr. Morningstar for bridging that gap between human being I respect and cool guy I know.

And, as always, I'd like to thank my hetero life partner George for listening to me bitch about my game designs and bitching right back.

I stopped looking for/reciprocating mutualism online once I started getting a ton of it locally off of the Intermets. My shout-out goes to Eric, Lisa, Matthew, Mark, Shane, Amy (Aimee?), Remi, Jason, Clinton, and others in just the raleigh/durham area who have helped me out immensely with feedback for my private and public projects; and also for whom I've tried to go out of my way to assist in reciprocating playtesting. Outside of that local circle, I've gotten help in person from Keith S, Luke Crane and Dro Radek (who have been a fucking geyser of Helping Other People), Fred. And folks that have helped me with game stuff from more personal connections (livejournal, emails, etc) like Chad Underkoffler and John Harper, which I reciprocated in kind (Stranger Things, Dead Inside, and SOTC playtesting)
Back in the day, when I was puttering around with nascent design ideas, Ron Edwards and Mike Holmes were big help, but unfortunately I have not helped back so much.

-Andy

I would love to take credit for this excellent interview, but this was actually Clyde's work.

Heya,

Now I want to have a mutualism shout out. Let's shout out to the people who've been kind enough to take our projects and interests and make them their own. This is good.

I have to give a shout out to Clinton Nixon. He helped me get my first website up and running. To Jason Morningstar, for being an encouragement and a conscience. To Remi Truer for being a great guy and an understanding colleague. To Ron Edwards, for making all this possible in the first place. To John Wick for his design articles back on Gaming Outpost. To Chris Chinn, for his blog that is so damn brilliant I can't even post replies I agree with him so much. To Graham Walmsley and Arturo G., for being two of the best outside playtesters I ever worked with. I really appreciate what you did guys. And to Mike Holmes and Ralph Maza for all the things they wrote in the Indie Game Design/First Thoughts forums over the years.

Peace,

-Troy

Awesome thread.

I'm not going to talk about all the great big names out there (you know, Vincent, Ron, Clinton, etc), because we all know about them. But there are a few people who have been particularly welcoming and helpful and I'd like to thank them.

In Canada:

Ryan Stoughton, for inviting me to play IaWA (even though no one else showed up) and various interesting conversations.

Jonathan Benn, for hashing out the story-telling game thing with me before I found any of this online community business.

In Scotland:

Malcolm Craig, Per Fischer, Gregor Hutton, and Joe Murphy for great ideas, good times, and good Guinness. I've got to find another excuse to go back to Edinburgh!

In New York:

John (jenskot), Eppy, Jim, and Jason of the Imagination Sweatshop. Those guys know how to have a good time! You four have such a great vibe, and help a lot of people in NYC find their grooves too.

Finally, everyone on this forum. Best I've seen, especially for threads like this one.

Posted By: johnzogrievous Seattle omissions

And I am a big dummy for not mentioning the GPNW crowd -- Tony, Harper, Phil, Brandon, you guys are the shit.

Plus, the Emerald City Game Fest people deserve kudos for the great job they do bringing the indie goodness to the traditional con scene -- they were the force behind the excellent indie lounge at ConQuest NW.

edit: even if the extremely narrow mutualism of game design critique is suffering, it is totally alive and well in the widespread alpha-nerd impulse to selflessly bust one's ass so that other nerds can have a good time at a convention. It happens all over geekdom -- in the SCA and in fandom and in comics and in gaming and at all those nutty Civil War things and at Burning Man. I wish I had a battery of Flak 88s so I could salute all of 'em properly.

Mike Holmes, Paul Tarusov, Lance Allen, Jarrod, Ryan Macklin have all been a huge help in looking at my designs, especially in tolerating my scattershot always-seeming-to-be-designing-something-slightly-different-each-week-even-though-its-the-same-damn-project behaviour.

*** I almost forgot E Tage Larsen who did up awesome logos for me for play now and TGCHNN.

I owe everybody who has joined Play Now - I'm glad these games are happening even if I can't find three hours to string together for gaming right now.

I also feel tremendous debt to everybody who contributed to the great hundred project, which I've had to take a break from but which really is cool and will only get cooler over time.

I owe Erik Weissengruber, Kate Bullock, Sandy Mackay and Rob 'Valvorik' Harper for showing me there really is a local gaming scene here in Toronto.

Of course I owe Vincent Baker for writing In A Wicked Age. That game is ridiculously good, and it does so many things I've been dying to make RPGs do for ages. Also, Eric Provost solved so many of my design problems just by producing Red Box Hack, it's totally brilliant.

But my biggest debt is to Justin D. Jacobson and Andy Kitkowski. When Luke and Vincent talked about how years ago they found a community that embraced their ideas and really wanted to see them flourish, I thought "That's me, last year." I never really gave Story Games a second glance, but one day Rob 'Valvorik' Harper pointed me there and I saw this thread. Instead of having to argue for the design, I suddenly had this tremendous feeling of... I'm home.

I'm not even going to try to thank all the people whose games I've read and played and from which I've stolen countless fantastic ideas, or all the people who run forums or post inspiring blog entries. I do want to thank specific people who have given me personal time.

Thank you to Jon Eisenstein, just a normal guy (not one of those designer weirdos) who is Verge's biggest fan. He never misses an opportunity to ask me about the game, to jump into a playtest, to spend extra time with me talking about what works and what doesn't.

Thank you to Tony Lower-Basch and Sean deArment, who were willing to playtest Verge with me when it was a very young game, and who weren't afraid to break the hell out of it and tell me why it broke. And suggest really cool fixes. Thank you to Ben Lehman and Joshua A.C. Newman for a late-night playtest that helped me see a lot of problems and solutions. Thank you to Fred Hicks who has a keen eye for fun, and whose playtest comments not only pointed me in the right design directions but also gave me the push I needed to get stuff done.

Thank you to all the other people who have taken time to playtest this game, with me or without me. I have a list somewhere!

Thank you to Ron Edwards who saw something interesting in one of my posts and decided to arrange a phone call with me to talk to me about the design one evening. His advice is always laser-accurate.

Thank you to Nathan Bolt and Lee Cerolis, two upcoming artists who took a chance on me and helped me with interior art. I won't let you down. Thank you to Jake Richmond for a beautiful cover and for putting up with my crazy ideas.