Fare thee well Ravens Bluff. your majestic towers are in flames and your walls crumble all around.

I just attended a local convention and even though I was attending the convention, I was turned away from the Role Playing events because I was not a member of Organized Play. I was told that it would be yet another membership and another large wad of money to participate. As a convention going gamer, and volunteer, I urge everyone to stop this practice. Say "No" to Organized Play.

The early RPGA spent years tweaking its system and finally realized that asking for dues from everyone subverted the gaming environment, often beyond repair. That is why there is a free level of RPGA membership. Requiring even more payment above the convention fees turned people off and away from the very games and conventions that they were trying to promote. Now Organized Play is on the scene and they need to be shown the same thing, only faster. I can attest that they are quickly driving a wedge into my local gaming community, and there's no telling where it will stop.

As gamers, we are discriminated against by a wide segment of society. Do we dare let an organization like Organized Play require that we discriminate against ourselves?

Say "No" to:

• yet more required memberships to play the same games that we've been playing all along, in the world that we helped develop.
  
• sending people away from the gaming table because they have not paid extra gaming fees beyond those imposed by the convention organizers.
  
• requiring all players to have online access in order to participate in local convention games.

Have we glutted the game market so much that the only way to make money is to leech off the players of games that are already established? What will keep other companies (or the RPGA for that matter) from licensing further member developed campaigns? Will there be a separate fee for each setting?

Stop this stupidity now, and let the budget gamer play. We've paid for the rule books, we've paid for the convention, must we pay even more out of our own pockets to use those books at the convention? As people who have been excluded and ridiculed because of our hobby, we need to include and support each other. We need to set an example. We need to send the message that enough is enough.

What can you do?

1. Don't join Organized Play or any other organization that requires that you pay dues of some sort in order to play in "their" games.
   
2. Boycott Conventions that exclusively have Organized Play rounds.
   
3. Let your convention organizers know in advance that you wish to only play games for which there is not a second fee, or required PAID membership to any other organization.
   
4. Do not volunteer to help perpetuate this practice. Decline to help them make money off of your fellow gamers. Remember that the money that you may save on OP membership by helping out is not only less than your time is worth, but it is taken directly from the pockets of other gamers and friends. (If you feel the urge to do volunteer work, there are many charitable organizations that will welcome your aid.)
   
5. Tell all of your gamer friends and have them tell all of their gamer friends that you have had it with everyone sticking their hand out for a piece of a pie to which they have no credible claim.

One gamer can make only a little difference, but as a whole, we have a voice.

Sincerely,

Jeremy Fowler-Lindemulder