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Message: <blockquote data-quote="SteveC" data-source="post: 8924510" data-attributes="member: 9053">One thing that this is bringing to mind, and I hope it's not thought of as a derail, but a number of people have said "company X isn't my friend either!" My reaction to that is ... that's kind of sad.I am not in the industry, but I have friends who are, and the thing they universally talk about is how small it is. How everyone knows everyone else. It is easy to get to know people who make the games you play. I still have the signed note from Mike Mearls saying that a particular change to a power in 4E should be considered official errata. I got that sharing a beverage with him a long time ago, and it let me use a particular ability (Duelist's Prowess for you 4E people) in the way that makes it useful.I go to a gaming convention each year (Gamehole Con) where I have been able to meet and game with a ton of game designers and have really enjoyed myself. They aren't my friends exactly, but when I see a project they're working on, you bet I'm going to look at it. When 13th Age launches the Kickstarter I will be a first day backer because of my history with gaming with the creators. From the perspective of game designers versus "corporate" types, it's my estimation that WotC is pretty much the only company that has people involved with their brand that aren't gamers. When you see something from other companies or decisions they make, you can be assured that the people who are making those decisions are gamers. They also have skin in the game because the company is so small. That's fundamentally different from WotC senior management because of Hasbro.Here's my point: third party companies are fundamentally different from corporate WotC. The gaming part of WotC is fundamentally different from the corporate part. Should I "forgive" WotC? I don't know that I have anything to forgive the gaming part of the company for. As for the corporate? I never thought of them as my friends. That's a different world from smaller companies where if you want to engage with them, you really can, if you care and want to.</blockquote>

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