Do you want to Ask the Angry GM a question? It’s easy to do. Just e-mail your BRIEF question to TheAngryGameMaster@gmail.com and put ASK ANGRY in the subject. And include your name so I can use your proper appellation when making fun of your question, your inability to proofread, your poor understanding of brevity, your name, your personal habits, or your failings as a game master, be they real, imagined, or invented for the express purpose of having something to make fun of. And yes, you should consider that a warning. If you want politeness, go ask the Hippie-Dippie-Sunshine-and-Rainbows-and-Bunny-Farts-GM. If you want the best damned advice about gaming anywhere on the Internet for free, well, you’d better be able to take a few punches. Oh, and remember, this column is written at least two weeks in advance and can only address a fraction of the questions it receives. So, if you have an emergency and you’re under a time constraint, go on Twitter and ask Perkins or Crawford to s$&% something out for you. If you ain’t paying for it, you can have either quality or speed, but you can’t have both. And I only offer quality.

Now, on with this week’s question(s).

Literally EVERYONE has been asking for, like, FOUR GODDAMNED YEARS:

Hey, Angry, why don’t you compile a bunch of your articles into a book? I’d love to have a book of your stuff? That would be great. I could carry it around with me, read it while pooping without the risk of dropping my laptop in the toilet, give copies of it to friends, kiss your handsome picture on the cover and pretend I’m making out with you, rub it on my plantar wart to get rid of it, and swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth on the one book I really, truly believe is doing the work of the gods in this world. Seriously, I want this book so much that I have printed out all of your articles and put them in a big binder. But it isn’t the same. Please, please, please give me a book. You don’t even have to do any work. Just print your articles and staple them together. I’d pay for that. I’m terrible with money. That’s why I play Dungeons & Dragons. So, please, give me a book. As hilarious internet meme says, SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY.

Okay.

I mean, okay. But also no. Yes, I will write a book. And thank God you sent that e-mail. It was the one that put me over the edge. I’ve been getting those e-mails and messages and comments for yours. But it was YOURS that finally convinced me. YOU are the reason I’m writing this book. YOU PERSONALLY. And everyone else who wants the book should thank you.

In point of fact, you convinced me so hard, that I retroactively decided to publish this book roughly four months ago. All that s$&% about getting my workflow in order, organizing myself as a real, honest-to-Satan corporation, reorganizing my website, and proving that I can actually be consistent the way I used to? All that was part of my master plan to prove to my fans that, if I say I’m going to give them a book, I’m going to give them a book.

So, I’m publishing a book! Vague promise powers: ACTIVATE!

Wait, no. No vague promises. I’m publishing a book THIS YEAR.

No, too vague. Okay, I’m publishing a book THIS SUMMER.

No, still too vague. Okay, in mid-June: a wild Kickstarter will appear. And your support will be SUPER EFFECTIVE. So, mark it on your calendar. Put a big circle around the middle of June and write “Angry, I choose you!”

This isn’t some vague, someday thing. This is a real plan. It has a publisher, a budget, an editor, one of those people who decides where text and pictures and things should go on pages, and even estimates from several different printers. One is even in China, so you KNOW I’m not f$&%ing around. And some of the book is even already written! I mean, it’s outliney, drafty s$&%, but it actually exists.

And by the time it goes onto Kickstarter, it’ll mostly or completely exist, barring the bits that will be dangled in front of my hapless she… my zealous, cult-like supp… my customers as stretch goals and s$&%. And that’s because I don’t want to have a Kickstarter and then spend the next two years explaining why the book didn’t show up. I want to have a Kickstarter, and then, in like two months, put out an update that says, “if you’re looking for your book, check your mailbox, I put it there myself… last night… I’m hiding in your bushes right now. Come out and play.”

So, that’s the plan. On a date in mid-June to be determined in the near future, you will be able to back the first print run of The Angry GM: The Website: The Book – I’m sure my publisher can do better on that title – on Kickstarter.

Except, it isn’t going to be The Angry GM: The Website: The Book. It’ll be more awesome than that. Because I’m not f$&%ing Order of the Stick. I ain’t a f$&%ing webcomic. So, I’m not just going to staple together printouts of my work. The book will be all original content. Well, except for the fact, that it will cover a lot of what I’ve already covered on the website. Except, it’ll be cleaned up, reordered, and compressed. And it’ll have a lot of new insights because a lot has changed since I started writing this s$&% and there’s stuff I wish I could have gone back in time and included in my earliest articles.

The book will focus on teaching new and inexperienced GMs how to run their first game and then, after their first game sucks, how to run games that get better and better. It’ll be divided into three color-coded sections, so you can easily find the s$&% you need. If you’re someone’s kid brother or niece and someone gave you the book, the first section will teach you how to kidnap three of your friends, pick a game, and learn enough to run it. That’s right, it’ll be doing what WotC and Paizo can’t figure out how to do: teach someone who knows nothing about their game how to the game. The second section will tell you how to actually run your first game. It’ll cover the basicest of basic GMing skills. The third section will talk about more advanced GMing concepts like pacing and social interaction and all that crap that you need after you’ve run a few games and it’s time to up your game. Basically, it won’t just be a master course in GMing, it’ll be three courses: 101, 201, and 301. Taught by a really sweary professor. Like, maybe if Yosemite Sam got a job teaching adult education courses at the local college.

And that’s why you’ll want to buy two copies. One to keep and one to give to that kid brother or niece or whoever that keeps pestering you to teach them how to game, but you don’t have the time, and you’re concerned about their friends’ parents assuming you’re a pedophile when you invite a group of three or four of the little brats to your basement for snacks and fun, secret games.

Do you want to know more? Well, you will. There’s still some details being ironed out. But, don’t worry, I will keep you in the loop. I’ll let you know every exciting development. You won’t forget for one moment that I want to sell you a book in June. You’ll wish you’d never heard of me or my book by then. And then, maybe, you’ll wish you hadn’t pestered me to write the damned thing.

On the other hand, if this book thing goes well and enough of you harass me, you’ll probably be able to bully me into writing that RPG I haven’t been writing for a year.