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That was during the Brian Thomsen era of the department, which ran from late 1992 to the WotC buyout, with his impact really hitting the department processes and schedule partway through 1993 and into 1994. See also Laurell Hamilton's troubles with the program and all the stuff covered by Ben...

I didn't mean for the TSR examples to sidetrack the more important and current discussion of the thread. Those references are handy to show how much the business/creator conflict has been a common problem in the TTRPG market for a long time. The Peter Adkison/TSR references, though, are where...

Absolutely. Because barrier of entry is lower for TTRPGs than other media operations, it's more common for the leadership mismatch, but failure to understand how to work with creative talent is a very common business problem wherever the arts intersect with commerce. The esoteric nature of print...

They aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, either. You can do both, but doing both well means you understand that they are different skill sets. And while the creator-who-didn't-understand-business-and-lost/destroyed-their-company has been a major theme in TTRPG publishing history, the reverse...

Agree here 100%. And the people involved are tightly constrained over what they can now say. This kind of staff exodus or turnover has also been endemic across the tabletop game market, particularly with RPG-focused companies, over the past two to three years, and the trend has been been...

I was asking for a clarification for what was already stated, which, in itself, implied confidential information. (This was also the company owner making the post implying information about ex-staff, not an employee who can be fired.) I asked for clarification of meaning, not supporting...

You seem really invested in changing the topic of the thread here. Tedious trolling is tedious. You've had your answers on the speculation trolling. Move along.

No, I asked a very open initial question that could have had all kinds of answers that would have taken the discussion in a different direction. I also answered your demand for speculation. If you want to play those games, you can speculate on what answer you are fishing for here that would...

No, there is a large difference. You accused me of being unethical for doing something I did not do. Beyond that, you are asking for speculation. Could there have been posts that would have made the exchange run differently? Of course. But there's no need to play hypothetical games here. The...

Employers have no intrinsic right or expectation of confidentiality from employees in regards employment status or for the general reasons they quit. In other words, posting "I no longer work at Company X because I do not agree with the company's policies" is not a breach of confidentiality...

I faulted him for his answer (and the original post implying employee stances using what amounts to confidential communications), not for answering. There is a very large difference.

TSR was around for 24 years. What eventually became known as the Book Department played a significant role in keeping the lights on for 15 of those 24. Before the novels it was the Endless Quest books, championed by Rose Estes. From 1982 to 1987, with the department run by Jean Blashfield Black...

Lorraine Williams did some very good things for TSR and certainly for individual people. She also did some destructive things and oversaw a VP and middle management level at the company that, by the 1990s, was notoriously vindictive both within the company and outside the company. As much as she...

But you choose to go other places with your comments before getting to this. The implications about positions on ethics and the one-sided, selective references to employee documents are not fine. I'm not going to belabor the point, but you should not be surprised to get pushback on those.

You are posting one side of the story here--yours. Moreover, you are citing their confidential letters and implying things about their positions they can't address specifically without airing "dirty laundry," which could have serious legal implications for them. That's neither fair nor transparent.

If you are citing the reasons people quit, is it fair for them to post the specific reasons they quit? You're citing what I assume are confidential employee communications. Can they post the resignation letters if they choose, without legal repercussions?

This implies the people quit because of the AI and Blockchain policies. Is this what you are trying to say? Jim Lowder

Hi: I've been doing a Games to Gift segment every year since 2010 for local Public Radio. The top pick this year was an RPG and, like previous years, I tend to cover RPGs as a general topic, too. There are two versions of the segment at the link below: the one that aired and the longer one...

People in house tried to tell upper management, including Lorraine, where at least some of the problems were cropping up. They were ignored or contradicted, especially by some of the VPs. I had a couple firsthand experiences raising red flags with upper management. The outcomes were depressingly...

Great point. Most of the fiction manuscripts we got at TSR were paper copies up until the early 90s, at which point we required both printed manuscripts and discs, from those who could provide them. Editing notes were indeed sent back to writers as handwritten notes on the 400-page physical...