Pathfinder 1E The good man WotC and the scoundrel Paizo

[TheAuldGrump]

It wasn't a credit card company. For WotC to take our information and immediately resell it inside the month where the first incident happened is increasingly unlikely. We all entertained dozens of hypotheticals like these years ago. I suppose it's easy to believe that everyone who came forward made some sort of mistake or just invented a story. But I have no motive to lie about this and my circumstances were unique to know exactly who had my address and when during the very brief window when this happened.

More likely, WotC gave the information to a market research company, and yes, well inside a month, the market research company then going and doing whatever they wanted with the info - market research companies have done exactly that in the past, and may still be doing it unless the person hiring them takes legal steps to prevent it. Check the boilerplate when dealing with a research company, it helps to prevent ulcers.

I assume misfeasance on the parts of neither Paizo nor WotC, but poor oversight on the part of either the latter or their parent.

The Auld Grump

 

[Jeff Wilder]

Ultimately it's easy to paint faceless people as incompetent. Lots of certainty with little to base it on.

You seem to have decided that it is unfair to judge decisions as "bad" or "incompetent" based upon how those decisions have played out.

That's certainly your right, but it seems very silly to me. (And more than a little apologist.)

And, no, "indifference" can lead to "indifferent" decisions ... decisions that are made, but not based on strong analysis, indicators, experience, or even gut feelings. Just for example, I can decide between playing a cleric and a fighter by flipping a coin. That's a decision, but it's an indifferent one. And if I don't like playing a fighter, it ended up being a bad decision; and I don't get to just blame it on the coin.

 

[S'mon]

I don't have any ill will to either company. WoTC doesn't meet my criteria for being an Evil company - an Evil company is Lorraine Williams T$R misappplying copyright law and trying to ban D&D fansites on the Internet, or Games Workshop misapplying Trade Mark law to try to ban Internet sales of their products - and many other shenanigans, GW is really the poster child for evilness in the hobby games industry. WoTC has done stupid annoying things like withdrawing old pre-3e products from pdf sale, but they are legally entitled to do that. I haven't seen them threaten legal action without a basis for doing so, unlike TSR & GW.

Re Paizo, I think it's a really twisted corporate-centric interpretation to see them parasitising on WotC's IP. Today's Hasbro-owned WotC is not the same people who created the d20 system. And the OGL was not a corporate screw-up by WoTC, I see it as a deliberate decision by a wealthy philanthropist, Peter Adkison, to give something back to the hobby he loved. The OGL was designed from the outset to be irrevocable, to ensure that the game - the core dungeons & dragons IP - belonged to the gaming community forever and would be forever out of corporate control, whoever came to own the actual brand. And the OGL already existed when Hasbro bought WotC and may well have affected the company's value; certainly Hasbro will have taken account of it in future earnings estimates.

 

[JustKim]

So you're suggesting that Paizo gave my information to WotC, who turned the data over to a market research company, who in turn sold the information to Bradford Exchange? This becomes ever more convoluted, and since the chess flyer was a different incident at a different time, there's nothing even linking WotC to the first chain of events. In fact, there's evidence that they were not linked.

What I mentioned before about the timeline not adding up is that according to Paizo, subscriber information was given to WotC before I moved. That means the data they gave to WotC was my old address. So one possibility is that subscriber information was passed to WotC on a regular, perhaps monthly basis, and Paizo was deceptive about when and how often that took place. The other is that WotC was not involved and Paizo shared my information with someone they oughtn't have.

Don't make me construct a flowchart to explain the intricacies of this incident. That's not going to qualify me as a mentally well person.

 

[nedjer]

With the number of folks who say that 4e "is not D&D", perhaps it isn't mechanically as derivative as you imply.

And, if you take your logic a step up, GG and DA didn't invent RPGs, as their work is derivative of David Wesely's "Brauenstein". "Derivative" does not mean "no invention is involved".

Before you defend this point, ask yourself a question - would you, in the presence of the developers of 3e or 4e, say to their faces, person to person, without the anonymity of the internet between you, that they didn't invent anything in those games? If not, then perhaps you shouldn't make this argument.

If you would... well, folks can think of that what they will.

I'll defend my view that setting up D&D v's D&D, or D&D v's other RPGs, is counter-productive as a whole and roughly comparable to a football team that loses a couple of goals/ touchdowny US thingys and chooses to fragment and turn in on itself instead of taking stock, pulling together and trying some new tactics.

Couldn't begin to offer a definitive answer on who invented RPGs, but I'd have to agree that there's been plenty of new material/ re-invention involved in the journey from D&D to 4e. However, the core elements in terms of classes, advancement, the role of certain classes . . . remains largely intact.

So IMO the D&D Gesamtkuntswerk 'belongs' to GG and DA; while each creative contribution since, some of them very significant, 'belongs' to those who made. I guess, given the strength of feeling over 4e, some might consider the 're-configuation' to 4e along the lines of a Gesamtkuntswerk. However, for me adjusting the mechanics is not comparable to 'inventing' a compelte system. (Which is not to say that WotC didn't do more than that alone with 4e).

Anonymity wise, I have none. Mudbunny told Trevor guy where I live a long time ago and, as Thistle Games is a registered business, they can come get me as they please. If they have any current awareness of anything I type I suspect they'd see me as a friend of RPGs rather than an enemy of any form of D&D

 

[lrsach01]

wait... are we STILL arguing Edition Wars? Jeez.... just play/write for the game you want and get on with your life. Savage Worlds, Burning Empire, Burning Wheel, Mouse Guard, Fate, Fudge, Iron Tyrants, Pass the Stick, Pathfinder, GURPS, ODD, Osric, ADD, 3.X, Dresden Files, DOgs in the Vinyard, Swords and Wizardry, and yes... even 4e... is just a SHORT list. Play... have fun. Life is to short for grumpiness.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

So you're suggesting that Paizo gave my information to WotC, who turned the data over to a market research company, who in turn sold the information to Bradford Exchange? This becomes ever more convoluted, and since the chess flyer was a different incident at a different time, there's nothing even linking WotC to the first chain of events. In fact, there's evidence that they were not linked.

What I mentioned before about the timeline not adding up is that according to Paizo, subscriber information was given to WotC before I moved. That means the data they gave to WotC was my old address. So one possibility is that subscriber information was passed to WotC on a regular, perhaps monthly basis, and Paizo was deceptive about when and how often that took place. The other is that WotC was not involved and Paizo shared my information with someone they oughtn't have.

Don't make me construct a flowchart to explain the intricacies of this incident. That's not going to qualify me as a mentally well person.

Suggesting? Yes. Convoluted? No, since WotC requested the information expressly to use it for market research. Guess who they would hand the information over too? At a guess, a market research company....

As to how often market research companies have done such things, look it up yourself, you will trust the results more than if I hand them to you. But you may find the results depressing. (A few market research companies released said data even when their contracts forbade doing so. You should be able to find record of several suits in that regard.)

The Auld Grump

 

[Fifth Element]

You seem to have decided that it is unfair to judge decisions as "bad" or "incompetent" based upon how those decisions have played out.

In a sense, it is. Things can play out in unpredictable ways. Someone can make a decision that seems perfectly sound based on the information available at the time the decision was made, and have that decision completely fail. This can either be due to having incomplete information, or due to other factors that arose after the decision was made. Or simply random chance. Just because something turned out badly, it does not necessarily follow that the decision was bad. There's more to it than that, since humans cannot yet predict the future.

Decisions that fail to consider available information available at the time are bad or incompetent. But since we, as outsiders, have no idea what information is used to make a decision about D&D, assuming such decisions to be bad or incompetent is naive. It's an easy out, a facile response. It's armchair quarterbacking with 20/20 hindsight.

 

[BryonD]

No one (outside of the company) really knows. It's a frequent refrain on message boards that Ha sends them orders from down on high without understanding what RPGs are all about, but ultimately we don't know.

Yeah. I think that is just an easy bogeyman.

I suspect that WotC has a $ goal and it is up to them to meet it. Even if they don't make the goal Hasbro is only going to get into the weeds just enough to feel they have chopped the right heads and put new ones in place. (Not that "feeling" means they are right... )

Things like IP protection and such, I'm sure Hasbro is all over. But the details of the game are probably the last thing Hasbro wants to be bothered with.

 

[BryonD]

It's armchair quarterbacking with 20/20 hindsight.

Except that a lot of people are still saying the same things they were saying in 2008.

Though it is nice to hear those comments now referenced as "20/20".