Draft Proposal: WAGDIE Brand Book

General
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ABSTRACT
Create a WAGDIE brand book outlining the projects mission, vision, style guides, and visual identify.

MOTIVATION
As the project continues to branch out with new internal and community development understanding the WAGDIE brand becomes increasingly important.

RATIONALE
Having a reference to refer to when building WAGDIE projects will streamline development and ensure consistency. Color palettes, fonts, logos, and reference character designs are some examples of elements that are useful to any builder. A brand book is also a necessary piece when pitching and explaining WAGDIE to outside groups.

SPECIFICATIONS
The following will be required to execute this proposal:

  • Team will provide brand copy
  • Team will provide art assets
  • Graphic design work by @Atriox
  • Charts and technical documentation by @Dontfeedthewolf
  • Once complete, brand book will be hosted on Conclave for community use

IMPLEMENTATION
These are the steps to accomplish this proposal:

  • Write out WAGDIE mission, vision, goals and other text.
  • Lore & character descriptions
  • Compile visual elements to include: characters, map, assets, charts etc.
  • Layout all items into cohesive brand book

TIMELINE
We would like to have this complete by Oct. 31st.

OVERALL COST
Initial estimate is 5000 USDC.

Funds will be paid directly to @Atriox and @Dontfeedthewolf based on hours worked.
(Wallets to be added if this moves to final proposal)

SUMMARY
WAGDIE has a strong brand identity but we need a way to communicate it effectively inside and outside of our community. Creating a brand book is a great way to do that.

Example:

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Within the coming weeks should have better draft of things, but in case anyone in conclave hasnโ€™t seen it:

This is the players manual I am working on. Consider it to be a rough sketch. Itโ€™s not even tip of the iceberg, but it does give some examples of resources I can provide and the ways in which I will be of aid to the designer.

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Fully support, love this idea.

Iโ€™d want it to go to the next level and be available hard copy once done, but that can be a further step.

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Fantastic idea. I really want a hard copy version as well

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Yes a hard copy is something we would like as well.

I would like a hard copy to be a bit more art focused and probably longer than the initial brand book but this would give us a very strong foundation to work from.

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If possible I would like to get this up for discussion on Mondays meeting then put to a vote. If anyone has comments or opposition please share them.

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This could be really cool.
Only advice is to write it in fashion that keeps it relevant for as long as possible.
WAGDIE evolves so fast, Iโ€™d hate to see it out-of-date before it hits print.

Yes, I want it printed and on my coffee table.

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I love the idea!

Could someone link here references to the artistโ€™s work?

I think it would be good to compare costs of other artists and maybe reduce the cost of implementation a bit (I donโ€™t know much about the cost of this kind of thing either)

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Itโ€™s an interesting idea, but two thoughts;

  • could we lower costs by integrating much of the content thatโ€™s been developed in these other channels? (cc @KingOffling since youโ€™ve been really active in documenting the lore, characters, assets, โ€ฆ . Iโ€™m interested if you have comments on what could be reused vs what might need to be created anew)
  • The proposal is unclear about this being a physical book โ€“ Iโ€™m more in favor of investments in online materials since those are more easily distributed to new people & updated as the story progresses.

Wiki

https://wagdie.wiki/

Lore Summary

https://www.wagdie.org/

Recap Podcast

Spotify

Wagdie Weekly Podcast

Spotify

Wagdie Weekly Twitter

https://twitter.com/wagdieweekly

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This is amazing!! First time seeing it :see_no_evil:

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Thank you, itโ€™s only the beginning and Iโ€™m building this guide out regardless. It and me as a resource should reduce cost and allow the artist to focus on design instead of having to learn everything from scratch.

The proposal is not for a physical book, just many commenting saying they want one.

The initial proposal is for it to be online and updatable

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@Icculus I agree showing them any samples of the designers work would be great to add to the proposal before finalizing.

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(cc @KingOffling since youโ€™ve been really active in documenting the lore, characters, assets, โ€ฆ . Iโ€™m interested if you have comments on what could be reused vs what might need to be created anew)

For reference, each of my recap theatre podcasts gets a script about 1000 words for $100.
Thatโ€™s on the average side of the typical scale for freelance writers at $0.10 per word.

Therefore, we could expect something in the ballpark of 20-25k words for this rate.

A smiliar book to the example has about 200 words every other page.
Graphics and layout make up the rest of the contents.

Given these figures we could expect an twice-as detailed 125+ page book.
Whether thatโ€™s necessary comes down to the breakdown of sections and expanse.

Timeline is probably the biggest enemy, but 1k words per day for a month is feasible.
Although, thatโ€™s nearly a full-time output for a reasonably experienced author.
Weโ€™re leaving very little room for editing, reformatting, and implementation to layout.

In terms of layout expense, professional catalog or magazine design runs $20-30 per page.

By that regard, weโ€™re looking at 80-100 pages on the low-end.
That includes full InDesign makeup, image generation, cropping and design.

This task is also very time intensive and would demand an output of 4 pages per day.
Iโ€™m not familiar with how long it takes to make a single page, but thatโ€™s only 2hrs each.
Assuming thorough pre-plan of imagery, and fully sourced assets, it might be possible.
Though, again, this would be a full-time job to produce it within the month.

You might scoff at the idea of a 100+ page book for WAGDIE, but I think youโ€™d be surprised.
The wiki itself has 500 pages, and a substantially higher word density than a brand book.

Thereโ€™s absolutely enough lore content, technical details, and other explainers to fill it.

My chief concerns are timeline, edit, and oversight.
I feel this deadline is super important for progress.

What is the review process for this project going to be?
How much of the writing / graphics will The Team be providing?
Are there already a section breakdowns, layout concepts, and asset bundles?

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This proposal is not for a physical book even though it could be a step towards one.

Design is our largest cost with an expected rate of around $80 an hour this proposal would only cover 62 hours of work if 100% went towards design and we didnโ€™t leverage some good will in our community.

I agree and tagged the designer in this post. Iโ€™ll reach out to them directly and get some samples to post.

This book will not be 125 pages. The work is mostly around developing and presenting brand guidelines and highlighting key concepts. I would love to see a more lore focused 100+ page book developed in the future. We could easily fill it with already released content!

The review process will include posting the book here as its developed for feedback. The team will be providing almost all of the copy as stated in my original post. Remember this is more of a business presentation for brand outreach and not a retelling of the story in the style of the wiki.

There is not already a section on breakdowns or assets but work has started on that.

To be a bit more revealing about our plans than usual. The project is already in talks with outside groups about developing the WAGDIE property in more traditional print, video, entertainment media. With this happening alongside all of the direct development our time and resources are limited.

If the community doesnโ€™t see value in this proposal we will still push forward on the brand book but the budget will come out of somewhere else.

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I for one think that it is a good investment of the treasury funds and good value at ~$5k.

:star_struck:

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I think there is an inherent and open need for a brand book. Explaining the WHY behind WAGDIE is very important. Taking all the complexity and dumbing it down into a format thatโ€™s digestible for people to understand (not talking story wise). The deflationary mechanics of wagdie is appealing

I would love to see the ip of wagdie be expanded and showed to others that also view this from a business standpoint.

I know youโ€™re just getting the general structure together @Dontfeedthewolf and donโ€™t want to be overly critical of everything but if you need help assembling or putting together this or have any thoughts, Iโ€™d be happy to help

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Praying for this other lore book!

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@Icculus This sounds great, can we see some examples of the graphic design work slated for this?

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@Atriox @Icculus Pinging again, any possibility of getting some examples?