[Raya]

THE FUTURE OF VANGUARD SILKY VENOM
by Raya
Exclusive to Vanguard Silky Venom News

It was a beautiful October day in San Diego, and I was looking forward to meeting all the Sigil folks. This was the 2004 Summit meeting organized by Sigil Games Online for the purpose of introducing 21 Vanguard fan site and community representatives to the Sigil offices in Carlsbad, CA and to the game itself: Vanguard: Saga of Heroes (go here for the original news story). I had often talked to Cindy Bowens via phone and IM...had even interviewed her, considering her one of the treasures of the online gaming industry. I was so excited about meeting her in person, not to mention THE Brad McQuaid, the father of EverQuest. It was a foregone conclusion that I was going to do something really embarrassing, like tripping and spilling coffee on him, but I was willing to brave that to just meet the guy who had made my marriage possible (go here for the Love Story).

The Summit dinner/get together was slated for 7 p.m. that night in the cozy U.S. Grant Hotel dining room on the lower concourse. I arrived promptly at 6:59 p.m. and saw a throng of excited, happy people in the room...nearly all of the 21 reps, plus a smattering of the Sigil folks, like Cindy, Brad, Jeff Butler and his lovely wife Michelle, and of course a bundle of energy that zipped from place to place, leaving laughter and a warm feeling wherever he went, the irrepressible Oloh.

That bright bubble of energy didn't diminish over the two-day period of the Vanguard Community Summit…not even after celebrating communityism that night until the wee hours. When I left two days later, there were memories to take home with me that I still cherish…the almost bashful acceptance by Brad of the strong support the 21 members of the press/community gave the entire Sigil team…the fact that Cindy was as warm and loving as she seemed on the internet…the unabated enthusiasm and energy of Oloh, who could probably raise a tractor trailer with that energy, without lifting a finger…oh yeah, and the fact that I didn't spill one thing on Brad, not even after I met him in person.

And now, here I am…with a lovely opportunity spread out before me. I feel like an ant at a pesticide-free picnic. Well, maybe that doesn't give the most accurate image, but it hints at the feast spread before me. It will take all of us at Silky Venom to make this the successful fun project it is meant to be--creating the Vanguard Silky Venom fan site. Someone once asked Rodin how he did such a wonderful job of sculpturing. He answered that, whatever he was sculpting, he just cut away all the bits that weren't that object and ended up with his sculpture. Well, let's just sculpt our fan site the way we see it and it can't help ending up the way we want it to be.