Deborah Leighton Plom becomes LOTW's first GM of the Year

And now, shortly in advance of the AJJE Site-level Awards, it is my very great privilege to present LOTW's first GM of the Year Award.

This has actually been one of the most deeply discussed awards we've handed out at club level, and for good reason. Our previous club-level awards have all been recognising achievements over a relatively short period of time, albeit wide-ranging and great achievements each time. But with the GM of the Year Award, not only was the scope that much wider - twelve times as wide, of course - in terms of time, but also that much more tightly defined in terms of criteria and in weighty significance to the club...

What I'm saying is firstly that this club couldn't exist without its members. Every member of LOTW is hugely valued, and I hope you all feel that way. But our players would have nothing to do if it weren't for the cohort of GMs that give of their time and energy to provide us with sims in which to play, environments to explore, and plots through which to develop our characters. The role of the GM is hard to define, and at the risk of being glib I will sum it up by saying there is no one way to be a GM. But even so, the Committee members bought considerable experience of both GMing and being GMd to the discussions, and we had well-developed perceptions of what makes good and excellent GMs.

In LOTW, we are currently blessed with a high quality cadre of GMs, and it is important for the Awards Committee to stress that every one of you who is reading this and is a GM: you are appreciated. Your efforts are appreciated. Your contribution is appreciated.

As one Committee Member put it, and I hope he won't mind my quoting him, "GMing isn't a thankless task, fortunately - we have a lot of considerate players who are extremely mindful, loyal and supportive of their refs and that's one of the many reasons why being involved in this game is so great. Neverthless, I do think it's important to show how high the bar is and how much all GMs are appreciated, even if they're not *the* GM of the Year."

So with that firmly in mind, we move on to focus on the award itself...

It was early this month that the Committee came to the decision to bestow a GM of the Year Award, which would be worth more than the 12 Player of the Month awards and would in fact be worth the same as the site-level Player of the Year award, in order to appropriately recognise the magnitude of this particular honour.

Nominations were immediately forthcoming, with three very worthy individuals soon making it to shortlist. To call them by name:

Deborah Leighton Plom, for GMing Akers Bluff and for her oversight role facilitating the GMing of the club in general under the purview of GM Support Director,

James Mcguire, for GMing the Prinz Eugen - a consistent flag-ship RPE not only by LOTW's high standards, but actually regularly at the top of AJJE's entire network of sims,

and

Kevin Diamond, for exceptional GMing of the Cocidius and also of St Michael, and all that that entails.

It also seems right to me to say that these three outstanding individuals made it to shortlist not because of anything the other GMs are doing or have done wrong, but because of a clear and powerful sense among the Committee that Deborah, James, and Kevin each embody much of what we felt was especially praiseworthy in the field of GMing. Other GMs certainly display outstanding strengths and have had noteworthy moments over the course of the year, but it was these three who rose to the fore over the course of our careful and thorough deliberations.

After being nominated, Kevin opted to remove himself from the discussions, temporarily delegating his voting rights on the Committee to a proxy, Robert Longtin. Robert proved a great asset to the Committee through the considerable diligence with which he fulfilled his responsibility.

Our discussions included coverage of such topics as 'what makes a good GM?', 'what is GMing, anyway?', and hard though it is to do justice to such theoretical and subjective questions, we moved forwards communicably and in a happy spirit of unity, with the club in mind.

Our candidates were praised with such adjectives as 'epic', 'excellent', 'encouraging', 'dedicated', 'proactive', 'responsive', 'helpful', and 'superb', with attention given to Sim Strength Rankings, player-focus, and so much more. One candidate was even described as being "as constant as the Northern Star" (and again, I hope this Committee member won't mind me quoting him either).

It was consistently understood that GMs are the glue which hold a sim together and that perhaps what makes for a great GM is their relationship with the players. For all of this we give them thanks and praise.

To conclude... the decision was a close run thing. Kevin came in a respectable third, which is no small thing in light of the competition just to get shortlisted. So please everyone join me in congratulating Kevin!

Now, one final quote, this time to describe the sim GMd by our runner-up:

"For the Prinz Eugen: the best and perhaps only way to describe it is such, if you've ever watched a show/movie with only the best actors all together (like Firefly/Serenity, hehe) where the characters they portray all bear that 'lovable' quality that makes you feel like deep down you can relate to that character, and the story, producer, and director are among the best in film history, if you could combine ALL of those things, it would be the Prinz Eugen. I'm rarely one to take such an extreme stance, but after reading 2 weeks worth (what felt like 2 months worth of reading in comparison to several other ships/planets), it had that 'perfect movie' quality where everything just rings true."

I couldn't have hoped to word it better myself. James, congratulations on this outstanding achievement. The Prinz is such an excellent sim.

And finally, to announce Leaf on the Wind's first ever GM of the Year...

*drum roll*

She's responsive, player-driven and supportive as a GM on Akers. She serves as GM Support Director, co-ordinating the club's GMing. Known by many players and, I think, all GMs through her many projects, it is my distinct and personal pleasure to present to you our GM of the Year 2009!

Deborah Leighton Plom!

Congratulations to you, Deborah!

Ash