#creative live

August 17, 2020

Welcome to the newest installment of Hrothgar's Hoard's newsletter. In many ways this is the first newsletter. I've never used my email particularly well or regularly over the years, but new times have forced certain changes. What I hope to accomplish with this newsletter is to keep you up to date on what is going on with the Hoard, including any news on Kickstarter Projects, show schedules, promotions, or just things I find interesting in the industry. I hope that you will find this helpful, and will strive to send out two newsletters a month. You may unscubscribe at any time by clicking on the link at the bottom of the page.

Kickstarter News

Our latest Kickstarter project ended with over $12,000 being raised for these great new spell and ability tracking cards. We had a lot of great input from backers on designs for different classes and the offerings expanded greatly from the original 11 class cards. We are now in the production and fullfillment stage. I'm getting about 30-50 cards processed a day and this should be completely fulfilled by October. If you missed this, or think a friend might be interested in it, you can still get in through pre-orders by going here:

LINK

Convention Schedule

Normally at this time, I would have recently returned from Gen Con, exhausted and cranky, easily my biggest show of the year. But 2020 has thrown a wrench into the machinery. All my shows this year have been cancelled, with the possible exception of a local Christmas crafting bazaar I usually go to just because I can support the community. This hiatus has made me do some severe soul searching on how I will approach conventions in the future. I'll talk more about that in other newsletters, but one of the big questions I have is how many people would be willing to exchange some time working in a booth at conventions for compensation in some form. At many conventions, I'm all by myself and could use help. I've put together a very brief survey that asks some basic questions and I'd appreciate some feedback. If you would have any interest in being a boothling for the Hoard, please take this quick survey: LINK Upcoming shows: Well, none really. I'm crossing my fingers for OhayoCon in Columbus in January, but haven't heard anything one way or the other yet.

Personal News

I'm not going to bore everyone with a lot of news from my personal life, but since you signed up to get this, I figure you might be at least mildly interested in what goes on behind the scenes at the Hoard. So here are a few things that are going on in the world of Hrothgar:

I got to spend this summer with my eldest daughter as an official employee. I've never made my kids work for my business (outside of assisting at GenCon), but she was home from college and couldn't find a job in the market this year. I hired her on and taught her a little cabinetry, how to use the major tools and how to finish products. She has a great eye for detail and quickly became better than me at the finishing process.

My youngest daughter, who is only 17, achieved one of her big goals this year. She wants to be an author and had as a goal to be published in a real literary journal before she was 18. She accomplished this with her short story titled "Kerman". If interested, you can read it starting on page 76 here: LINK

This year has offered me the opportunity to take stock of a lot of things. We are all pretty much resigned to staying at home as much as possible, so I've had some extra time on my hands. One of the things that I've done is signed up for a year's membership for Creative Live. If you aren't familiar with it, it is basically a library of self improvement classes focused on creators, artists and small business people. Whenever I have downtime, I've had a class going. I did one on product photography, a couple on general marketing, and even one on boudoir photography, because why not? So this newsletter is actually the first step in re-positioning my business to take better advantage of a market that is moving more and more online. Marketing has never come easily to me. I'm hoping that by taking these courses, I can find a marketing method which is beneficial to both me and you.

Promotions Currently, I'm not running any sales or doing any promotions. I'm focusing on the Kickstarter and getting that out as soon as possible. If you want to get in on that, click the button below to get into the Pre-order store. Just be advised that shipping on this will likely be in September/October. If you are looking for a non-character card item, please visit my online store at Etsy.

I am working on an event that I hope to hold in the fall, so keep an eye out for information on that.

I am currently using Etsy as my storefront. Take a look around there by clicking here:

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COME CHECK OUT THESE FREE ONLINE CLASSES !

{Fiery sunset over Paseo, Guam. Taken with a Canon 7DII}

For all you creatives, out there if you haven’t heard of Creative Live, you may be missing out. I always browse their site for anything to do with photography (including the legal and business aspects as well as the heavier side of image editing) and sign up for whatever I find interesting. I’ve…

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A reflection of a Thai Pagoda shot in infrared. Modified Canon 400D + EF-S 24mm STM.

For all you creatives, out there if you haven’t heard of Creative Live, you may be missing out. I always browse their site for anything to do with photography (including the legal and business aspects as well as the heavier side of image editing) and sign up for…