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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DM_Jeff" data-source="post: 122786" data-attributes="member: 3687">I apologize for not responding sooner, there was a small delay in setting up my ID here at the EN World boards. I also apologize for dragging a near-dead topic back to life but there are some things I feel need addressing. The kind folks who suggested I only review stuff that appeals to me is pretty on target: unless something is so mind-numbingly awful that reporting it will help drive it away, I won’t even bother with it. Thank you also those who wrote in defending my right and insight into my review content based on a designer’s point of view as well as a fan, which is exactly how I try to approach this.And of course, I have never deceived anyone. If I ever had published credit in a book, I always reveal that in my reviews (blatantly in the cases of my group rewriting major rules points with Mongoose’s Seas of Blood and Chaos Magic). I was unaffiliated with Troll Lord Games before I wrote the contested reviews, and my admiration and rating for them comes from 1) respect for their boldness, 2) their unique setting and 3) different, imaginative ideas that really spoke to me. Sure, the Treklant trilogy had a few typos and mechanical difficulties, a few. On the other hand I thought the story arc was excellent, like I said it really spoke to me. As for the rating system, I always have the most terrible time working within only five stars here at En World; I find that they don’t work for me when trying to compare items. I just assign one based on my own opinion (which has also grown substantially since I first wrote the Treklant reviews). In fact many staff reviewers here don’t always write their text to match their rating which can also be confusing (but understandable, and forgivable). To me the interest lies in the text, not a convenient number. That’s why on my own reviews page DM’s Haven I don’t use a numerical rating system.As for Mr. Psion’s comment on my needing a lesson on conflict of interest…my interest is in D&D, where’s the conflict!? <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":-)" title="Smile    :-)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":-)" />Seriously the idea that I’d write glowing reviews of a crappy product just because the publisher employs me part time is conceivable but I can tell you is absolutely not the truth. If you think it even has to do with the fact that publishers send me items, I have lost two different publisher’s support because I wrote only a few negative things in reviews of their items and they couldn’t handle it. I am biased only in that I do review stuff I tend to like, but I try my best not to go out of my way to tell you a product is necessary I present information and suggest the types of games (or gamers) the item should appeal to.Anyway, I respect the EN World staff reviewers. If we always agreed then something would be wrong with the cosmic balance and I hope folks read into the reviews to get a feel if an item would be excellent for them and their campaign, not to purchase it just because it has five, three, or one star next to it. Game on!-DM Jeff</blockquote>

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