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Nuns with Guns posted:As far as inclusivity, just having a baseline group of cishet white guys and sitting with them in a room for multiple hours playing make-believe can be a bit of a deterrent, unfortunately. I have seen actual play groups cropping up that are all-women/all queer/all PoC. Hopefully they're able to stick around, because I think that does add a valuable set of perspectives to approaching a cooperative narrative together. Roll20 published numbers a while back that were something along the lines of there being pretty much equal men and women using the service, its just that women for the most part played in women-only groups. I wouldn't be surprised if the stats were similar along queer/PoC lines as well. It's not hard to make your game attractive to people outside your main group, but it does require doing stuff. It only takes a little effort, but doing any effort at all puts you in the top 5%.
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Oct 5, 2019 16:18
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LongDarkNight posted:When Zak got his credit removed Pundit was in the twitter replies losing his poo poo about how he wouldn't be silenced. I keep hoping he releases his secret emails or whatever it was he was claiming to hold hostage to keep Mearls in line.
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Oct 5, 2019 16:18
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Mearls took a lot of 4e criticism personally, and he's a thinskin nerd who desperately needed the approval of people who were dragging him. So he bought what he assumed were pillars of the community, after his crappy Essentials appeasement failed.
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Oct 5, 2019 16:35
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I think the belief that Mearls brought Zak S in for any kind of marketing reason is naive. He brought him in because he was a fan, and because he's a poo poo head. Pundit, sure, I can see that being for vague weird marketing reasons - remember how almost all the "advertisement" Mearls did beforehand was talking about how he was playing AD&D and poo poo like that? And he didn't really defend Swami Nisarg when poo poo came up, especially not in the same way. But Zak? Mearls absolutely saw him as a friend, and to be frank probably still does and is probably still real loving bitter he's had to try to walk that friendship back.
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Oct 5, 2019 16:41
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moths posted:Mearls took a lot of 4e criticism personally, and he's a thinskin nerd who desperately needed the approval of people who were dragging him. i dunno if mearls took 4e criticism personally so much as he agreed with the criticisms in the first place the people dragging him the most in those days were 4e fans who didn't like the direction of essentials, where fighter encounter powers were replaced with 'hit harder once per battle' and every loving book had a new wizard or cleric subclass + new powers
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Oct 5, 2019 16:49
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Zereth posted:i belive mearls was confirmed to be part of one of the google plus groups that zaks used to organize harassing people. or maybe it was one of the other guys. also stated he was a fan of their blog where they did slightly more deniable but still pretty obvious poo poo. I don't remember anyone being confirmed to be in Zak's weird G+ dogpile group except Skarka (who outed it when he got sick of Zak). I think Zak was keeping big-name devs who followed him out of the group so he could namedrop them when he pretended it wasn't real. IIRC he was a fan of at least one of their blogs, but FWIW I know at least one person who used to read Zak's blog until they found out about him from someone else because they just skipped everything that wasn't game related. Don't know if I'd be that generous to Mearls though 
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Oct 5, 2019 16:58
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EthanSteele posted:Roll20 published numbers a while back that were something along the lines of there being pretty much equal men and women using the service, its just that women for the most part played in women-only groups. I wouldn't be surprised if the stats were similar along queer/PoC lines as well. A streaming group (tried to) made a big to-do over getting passed over by Roll20 because they were a group of six white guys and oppression oppression etc. I think they tried to start their own competing brand (serious airquotes needed) but I don't think it went anywhere because it wouldn't.
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Oct 5, 2019 17:24
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Passed over by Roll20 how? Like, for sponsorship?
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Oct 5, 2019 18:26
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Dawgstar posted:A streaming group (tried to) made a big to-do over getting passed over by Roll20 because they were a group of six white guys and oppression oppression etc. I think they tried to start their own competing brand (serious airquotes needed) but I don't think it went anywhere because it wouldn't. Weren't they they same ones who tried to do that "competitive D&D" league that ended up hiring chuds and fizzling after one episode?
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Oct 5, 2019 18:33
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Desiden posted:Weren't they they same ones who tried to do that "competitive D&D" league that ended up hiring chuds and fizzling after one episode? The ones that tried to create a DnD branded company without getting permission from WotC? I don't know but it sounds like something a group of white dudes would do
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Oct 5, 2019 18:38
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Kai Tave posted:Yeah this is something I brought up earlier elsewhere, but Critical Role being as big and influential as they are does oblige them with more responsibility than some random obscure podcast that only a thousand people listen to. When you've got a big platform, people are gonna want to take advantage of that poo poo, and if you let them do it, well, that's pretty fuckin bad. Yeah, and not to mention, they're all professional voice actors who from what I've seen/heard behind the scenes have mostly built up their company with people they know through LA media development stuff. I don't think any of them are dumb or anything, but I don't get the impression they've got a brand manager or other person with professional experience in licensing and sponsorship helping them avoid pitfalls like this. Hopefully getting bapped on the nose with this one helps serve as a wakeup call about why they need that, because Wendy's awfulness is pretty blatant, but the next one might not be.
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Oct 5, 2019 18:42
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Lord_Hambrose posted:Do any of the bigger podcasts actually pay the players for their work, or does that money all mostly go to equipment/hosting/ect? The one group I have knowledge of the players do get paid. The DM geta travel, lodging, meals comp'd, along with trips to conventions. Also lots of free merch, to the point where he's running out of storage space in his home.
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Oct 5, 2019 19:02
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Silence, Brand is a 20-page improvisational RPG about a group of anti-corporate activists who give everything they have to fighting the machine.
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Oct 5, 2019 21:11
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Admiral Joeslop posted:The ones that tried to create a DnD branded company without getting permission from WotC? That sounds right. And let us never forget, nor forget to laugh at, that their internet superstar ringer was Boogie.
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Oct 5, 2019 21:15
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CitizenKeen posted:Passed over by Roll20 how? Like, for sponsorship? One of the people involved was a tabletop channel called Taking 20. Who in one of his videos expressed his displeasure with Roll20 during some unrelated drama (where one of the site's co-owners was banning people from the subreddit for talking about poor customer service). This was the video in question. There was also Jim Davis of Web DM posting about it on Twitter, who was also one of the people turned down by Roll20. He was more cordial than Taking 20, although wasn't as talkative about the issue. This is of course their sides of the story , so take them with a grain of salt. I do not know the identity of the other 3 people discussed, and while I watched it a while ago forgive me if I am not sitting through a 30 minute long YT video about drama. Desiden posted:Weren't they they same ones who tried to do that "competitive D&D" league that ended up hiring chuds and fizzling after one episode? You're thinking of D&D Sports/RPG Sports. You're right in that it is dead, although I am not as well-versed in their hiring practices, nor do I know the owners of said franchise, so I cannot comment on that front. Libertad! fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Oct 5, 2019 |
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Oct 5, 2019 22:58
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LongDarkNight posted:The one group I have knowledge of the players do get paid. The DM geta travel, lodging, meals comp'd, along with trips to conventions. Also lots of free merch, to the point where he's running out of storage space in his home. I know also HyperRPG (started by Zac Eubank from Critical Role/G&S early days) pays all players including guests etc and has been vocal about it being a living wage rather than token minimum or whatever.
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Oct 6, 2019 04:11
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Warthur posted:My pet theory is that they were the equivalents of canaries in the coalmine - if Zak and Urbanski were shown a draft of the game and started writing rants about how the latest playtest edition was an affront to Liberty and the American Way and the Law of Thelema and whatnot, that'd be a sign that that draft would get a substantial kickback from the nostalgic grognard audience section, if a different subsection of the consultants were shown a playtest draft and kicked off against it that'd be a sign that a different audience segment would be unhappy and so on. The goal was to arrive at an edition which didn't seriously offend anybody (except for 4E purists, hence the lack of a major advocate for 4E among the consultants). My theory is that keeping them as consultants kept their trolling and poo poo-stirring away from 5th edition, because people with unlimited time to spend online obsess over perceived slights can be pretty damaging, especially as both had their followers to their bidding, yours sounds more plausible though. My hunch is too that they did not write anything in the books though.
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Oct 6, 2019 21:44
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i dunno why there has to be more complicated theories than 'mearls brought them on as consultants because he likes them and agrees with them' mearls wasn't intimidated into regressing d&d by the unruly masses of grognards, he was one of those grognards to begin with
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Oct 6, 2019 22:03
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like, there are plenty of people on earth will enough social grace that you can have disagreements about your hobbies and still be perfectly fine friends the rpg pundit? absolutely not one of those people. he's always been a huge blowhard about the right way to elfgame that i can't picture anyone willingly associating with him without already agreeing with most of his grog poo poo
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Oct 6, 2019 22:07
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Brother Entropy posted:i dunno why there has to be more complicated theories than 'mearls brought them on as consultants because he likes them and agrees with them' Yeah, you are propably right. That is simple playsible explanation and most likely the right one. I personally just have weird want, perhaps wishful thinking to there being more than just folks like Mearls being uncaring.
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Oct 6, 2019 22:27
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Brother Entropy posted:i dunno why there has to be more complicated theories than 'mearls brought them on as consultants because he likes them and agrees with them' yea I'm sure there were elements of 'wow some people really hated 4e' but I don't think it has to be any deeper than 'Mearls knew them, agrees with them, and liked their input'.
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Oct 7, 2019 00:03
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I don't know how people can think Mearls was coerced into being a grog when Essentials exists.
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Oct 7, 2019 00:05
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Brother Entropy posted:i dunno why there has to be more complicated theories than 'mearls brought them on as consultants because he likes them and agrees with them' I mean, "Mearls brought them on to give his game cachet among lovely nerds" isn't at all incompatible with him personally liking them, that's one of the reasons why he brought them on in the first place. Why wouldn't you try to get the visible stamp of approval from someone you agree with and admire?
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Oct 7, 2019 00:11
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Did Swami Tarnowski really have much stroke at one time? I mean, he probably thinks he does but talk about a biased source.
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Oct 7, 2019 00:18
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Dawgstar posted:Did Swami Tarnowski really have much stroke at one time? I mean, he probably thinks he does but talk about a biased source. I mean, he's more famous than Kevin Kulp who got mentioned as a consultant so I don't think the bar was that high. Now keep in mind Kevin is actually a good designer though.
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Oct 7, 2019 00:37
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neaden posted:I mean, he's more famous than Kevin Kulp who got mentioned as a consultant so I don't think the bar was that high. Now keep in mind Kevin is actually a good designer though. As is S John Ross.
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Oct 7, 2019 00:47
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neaden posted:I mean, he's more famous than Kevin Kulp who got mentioned as a consultant so I don't think the bar was that high. Now keep in mind Kevin is actually a good designer though. Wasn't Kevin Kulp a prominent ENWorld poster (maybe even a mod) for a long time? Not to suggest Kulp wasn't a worthwhile consultant for his design skills, but getting a prominent voice from ENWorld apparently onside seems like something Mearls would have wanted.
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Oct 7, 2019 01:02
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moths posted:Mearls took a lot of 4e criticism personally, and he's a thinskin nerd who desperately needed the approval of people who were dragging him.
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Oct 7, 2019 01:36
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The issue with Mearls is that he was perfectly capable of understanding 4e, and communicating it to players in a simple, welcoming manner. In the run-up to 4e he wrote a bunch of mini-books that were basically "CHANGE IS SCARY PLEASE EXPLAIN THE FRIGHTENING NEW EDITION TO ME MR. WOTC!" But once he was put in charge, and no one was forcing him to actually create a game where martials were balanced against casters and Hit Points were literally anything but literal actual flesh. He went right back to 3.5 grognardism. He wanted 4e to succeed long enough that he could "Correct" it back to what it was supposed to be.
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Oct 7, 2019 01:48
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Kurieg posted:The issue with Mearls is that he was perfectly capable of understanding 4e, and communicating it to players in a simple, welcoming manner. In the run-up to 4e he wrote a bunch of mini-books that were basically "CHANGE IS SCARY PLEASE EXPLAIN THE FRIGHTENING NEW EDITION TO ME MR. WOTC!" It's still very weird to me. He wrote a 3.5 book dedicated to the idea that martial fighters should be able to handle the same challenges as arcanists. He got the problem.
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Oct 7, 2019 01:59
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Thanlis posted:It's still very weird to me. He wrote a 3.5 book dedicated to the idea that martial fighters should be able to handle the same challenges as arcanists. He got the problem. he even took the stance idea from Tome of Battle and adapted it to PHB 2 in the form of Rage abilities in Barbarians (and later Stances for the Essentials Fighter) he knew exactly what he was doing
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Oct 7, 2019 02:04
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I always thought Legend of the Flame Princess was grim, bleak, and over the top but this new version goes further than I could have anticipated.
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Oct 7, 2019 14:58
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piL posted:I always thought Legend of the Flame Princess was grim, bleak, and over the top but this new version goes further than I could have anticipated. What did he do? A lot of OSR/DREAM people I talk to have switched away from LotFP and are converting things to GLOG or whatever. Definitely seeing less interest in the game.
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Oct 7, 2019 15:37
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Has anyone here tried Index Card RPG? I bought the book a while back, and though I haven't played it, i like a lot of the mechanics. Instead of being class based, it's loot based, with tons of big random loot charts. Instead of XP you just pick a path similar to a class and that's just a discrete list of role specific loot you are guaranteed to get in any order you like as you reach milestones. you pay for magic or damage bonuses during character creation, along with AC, every die has one unique function. It looks neat, and that random loot mechaanic really scratches a certain itch for me.
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Oct 7, 2019 15:56
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Arivia posted:What did he do? I was trying to imply that Wendy's the RPG was an even more cynical and cruel version of LotFP, but failed to provide enough context to land the joke.
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Oct 7, 2019 18:01
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Brother Entropy posted:i dunno why there has to be more complicated theories than 'mearls brought them on as consultants because he likes them and agrees with them'
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Oct 7, 2019 18:16
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Warthur posted:Well the context of the conversation was speculating as to how much these "consultants" actually contributed to the final text of 5E and I was explaining that my hunch is the answer is "sweet gently caress all".
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Oct 7, 2019 19:02
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Warthur posted:Well the context of the conversation was speculating as to how much these "consultants" actually contributed to the final text of 5E and I was explaining that my hunch is the answer is "sweet gently caress all". oh yeah that part i agree with, '3.5 warmed over' doesn't seem like what'd happen if either of those two had much direct contribution to 5e
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Oct 7, 2019 19:28
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Warthur posted:Well the context of the conversation was speculating as to how much these "consultants" actually contributed to the final text of 5E and I was explaining that my hunch is the answer is "sweet gently caress all".
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Oct 7, 2019 19:35
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what were their recommendations?
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Oct 7, 2019 20:18
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