Iron Rev 8: Revenge of the Rev
First things first:
The winner of IRON REV 8: REVENGE OF THE REV is Kris Overstreet's
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Prince",
with an overall rating of 4.50.
Now, on to the explanation.
If Pyramid* can do it, gosh darn it, we can too.
It's been three years (almost three and a half, actually) since the
first Iron Rev competition; we haven't had one in a while, and since in
about three weeks a lot of the INML is going back to school, now's as
good a time to run one as any. On the other hand, it's been long enough
that a refresher's in order; therefore, this page is long enough to
require a table of contents.
1. WHAT IS IRON REV?
2. WHO COULD PARTICIPATE?
3. WHAT DID PARTICIPANTS HAVE TO DO?
4. WHAT WERE THE INGREDIENTS? (If you don't understand why this is here,
read #3.)
5. WERE THERE PRIZES?
6. WHAT WERE THE ENTRIES?
7. HOW DID VOTING WORK?
8. WHEN DID VOTING STOP?
9. I HAVE QUESTIONS (ABOUT IRON REV) THAT AREN'T ANSWERED HERE.
Iron Rev was originally inspired, through the medium of Jo Hart (long
enough ago that she still was Jo Hart), by the Pyramid "Iron Ref"
contest. This involved pitting three game designers against each other,
each using a different genre but the same ingredients to create a
playable adventure. They had 2500 words and 24 hours. Iron Ref is
itself based loosely on the Iron Chef television program, a Japanese
show which pits a single challenger-chef against one of the house
chefs to create a full four- or five-course meal (including dessert),
each dish incorporating a single ingredient not known to either
contestant before the start of the show.**
Since we can't transmit food over the Internet, Jo wasn't mean enough
to only give people 24 hours (especially when she didn't know if people
would even agree to participate), and 2500 words is above the INML's
10k-per-day limit (it actually comes out to 1646 words, assuming an
average word length of five letters) - the original contest ran for a
little over three days, had a length limit of 1000 words, and required
that each entry at least touch on three "ingredients". In addition, the
writers had to come up with adventures that could be run using only the
core rules.
Each Iron Rev has modified the rules slightly. Some have changed the
"core rules" requirement to "canon"; some have changed the word limit
or the time limit; some have changed the nature of the ingredients.
(See *** at the bottom for a list of the ingredients that each Iron Rev
has used.) This version takes some of the same liberties; don't be
confused if the original rules aren't what you get here.
Anybody could. Well, not anybody, really; anybody subscribed to the In
Nomine Mailing List (in-nomine-list [at] sjgames [dot] com).
There were eight rules for Iron Rev 8 participants. In their original form:
- Only one response will be accepted from a single participant. If you
want to replace a submission you've sent in with another, see #3.
- Responses should be sent to the list; if you send a response to me, I
will direct you to send it to the list.
- Responses should have subject lines in the following format:
"[IRON REV] <title>". Thus, if your entry was entitled "Electric Boogaloo",
your subject line would be "[IRON REV] Electric Boogaloo". If you are
replacing an earlier submission, use the subject line
"[IRON REV] <title> [replaces <old title>]".
- Responses must come in the form of playable adventures or fleshed-out
adventure seeds. No character writeups (unless you have room in the
wordcount of your adventure), no fiction, no art: these must be adventures
or adventure seeds. If fiction or character writeups accompany the text,
the adventure or adventure seed must be the primary focus of the response.
- Responses must not be longer than 1500 words or 10k in size, WHICHEVER
IS SMALLER.
- Responses must be able to be run using only the core In Nomine rules
and the Player's Guides (Angelic, Corporeal, Ethereal, Infernal).
- Responses must at least tangentially include the three ingredients.
- Responses must be returned by 11:59 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Sunday,
August 15, 2004.
On Monday, August 16, EDG posted a list of the titles of the eligible
responses, along with links to the entries themselves in the INML
archive. Voting began immediately after I post the list, and
will continue until 11:59 PM EDT, Sunday, August 22, 2004. EDG tallied
the votes and posted the results on Tuesday, August 24, 2004.
In no particular order:
- A locally-owned hardware store.
- Two dogs, of any breed and age.
- An unpleasant cure.
Not really. The "prize" here was esteem in the eyes of the INML
community; the better the adventure (in terms of both excitement and
structure; a really cool but unplayable adventure was just as likely to
receive low votes as a well-structured but dull adventure), the more
ikely posters were to get good votes. There was also the reward of doing the
best you can, whose mere inclusion makes me sound like your dad. Sorry.
In alphabetical order:
All votes were sent to EDG's private email address. Voters were
requested to not send their votes to the INML; EDG ignored
votes not sent directly to him.
Entrants could - and were encouraged to - vote, even for their own
entries. Voters did not have to vote for every entry, although, again,
this was encouraged. Votes were to rate each entry on a scale of 1-5,
1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest. Votes were requested in
integers (i.e., no votes of 4.5). They could - but were not required to
- include one "pi" vote, which might or might not have been counted in
the rating average...
It was strictly a coincidence that the number of entries was equal to
the number of available values for voting. Voters did not need to use a
different rating for each entry, but did need to list the title of the
entry, or at least the name of the author, with their rating.
Voting continued until 11:59 PM EDT on Sunday, August 22, 2004. Final
tallies were posted Tuesday, August 24.
Email EDG.
Footnotes
* http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/
- for those poor benighted souls who've never heard of it.
** Iron Chef still, as far as I know, airs on the Food Network in the
United States, if that description made you interested.
*** In case you're interested, here's a list of the historical ingredients:
IRON REV (5/01): A pyramid; an unlikely insect; a rumor of an easy redemption.
IRON REV 2 (6/01): Computers; conspiracy; footwear.
IRON REV 3 (7/01): Minor Word Friction; high society; yoghurt.
IRON REV 4 (9/01): [Iron Rev 4 was unique in that it used song lyrics as its ingredients.]
"This is the noise that keeps me awake/ my head explodes and my body aches" -- Garbage, _Push It_;
"Too bad dark languages rarely survive." -- Poe, _Hey Pretty_;
"Now get in the pit and try to love someone!" -- Kid Rock, _Bawitdaba_
IRON REV 5 (2/02): [Iron Rev 5 was unique in that it used a
drawing as its ingredient.]
IRON REV 6 (3/03): The Archangel Jordi; lawn gnomes; flan.
IRON REV 7 (2/04): Menunim; skydiving; Infernal Word of Hardcore.
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