Jamison Stone & Satine Phoenix's Apotheosis Studio To Wind Down [UPDATED]

After being accused of abusive behaviour towards freelancers and co-workers, the game company run by D&D influencer Satine Phoenix and her husband Jamison Stone, is to enter a 'reduced capacity' mode.

After the accusations were made, Jamison Stone resigned as CEO; after a couple of weeks he was added back to the company's staff page, saying that he was never actually removed but merely taking personal time while Apotheosis Studio conducted an investigation.

In a draft of a recent statement obtained by Dicebreaker, Stone indicated that the results of this investigations were that the 'vast majority' of the accusations made were 'factually inaccurate'. He went on to discuss the ramifications of 'cancel culture', although the statement was updated to rephrase that as 'extreme changes'. Other than the initial apology to tattooist Chad Rowe, Stone has indicated that no further apologies will be forthcoming.

“The rest of the team now has completed those investigations and found that while some individuals had legitimate complaints, the vast majority of the allegations to date levelled against Jameson and others on our team have been proven to be factually inaccurate. We believe that people should be shown compassion, given the opportunity to write their wrongs and grow as individuals.”

As for the company itself, it will finish fulfilling existing Kickstarter projects. It will not be accepting requests to cancel and refund pledges for existing funded Kickstarters, and noted that most of the freelancers and contributors have been paid. When asked about the company's future, Stone said "As it stands - and I don’t know what the future will hold - it’s just a company that is there. It just exists and sells books. Some of my books, some books by other people. It will sell The Red Opera and eventually sirens. All of the people who are there are just contracted at this point."

A statement is expected to come soon from Apotheosis.

UPDATE -- Apotheosis Studio's statement has arrived:

Thank you for your patience. We have had a lot of questions about the future of Apotheosis Studios, its team, and our projects. While Jamison Stone did step down as CEO to take personal time while Apotheosis Studios did an internal investigation on the allegations brought forth by numerous individuals, we in no way claimed that we were removing Jamison from the company. Having completed our internal investigation, we have found that while some individuals had legitimate complaints, the vast majority of the allegations to date levied against Jamison and others on our team have been proven to be inaccurate. Jamison will directly address major allegations and misinformation within the month.

We at Apotheosis Studios do not support abuse in any form. We believe in accountability and the ability for everyone to reflect, learn from their mistakes, grow, and be given the opportunity to show what they’ve learned by actively being better through action. We encourage everyone to stand up for themselves in compassionate ways with the hope to make things better so no one has to live in fear. It is in this honesty that we can learn from one another and each be better for ourselves, our families, and our communities while not furthering abuse, bullying, harassment, and other dehumanizing behaviors.

Sirens: Battle of the Bards will be delayed while those who are still working on the project deal with the ramifications of the extreme changes that we have had to make due to this situation. We will be sending out merchandise that we already have in hand for US backers first. Sirens: Battle of the Bards is 90% finished and its contractors have been paid, therefore refunds will not be issued. We will provide additional updates on fulfillment as we know more.

Because there seems to have been some confusion regarding the nature of our operations, we wish to state again that payments to writers started in March 2022 and as new invoices were received, we processed them promptly. All artists and contractors who have completed their work and were authorized for billing have been paid. The only remaining work is rewrites, editing, and layout. This, as stated above, will take longer than originally planned.

For reference: we had the following number of contractors working on this project:

• Writers - 22 writers. Paid 10 cents per word
• Artists - 4. Paid monthly or per image
• Graphic Designer - 1. Paid monthly
• Layout artist - Paid monthly, even when not working on a project
• Musicians - 2. Paid promptly per song
• Sculptor - 1. Paid promptly per sculpt

The Sirens writing Deadline was Oct 31. Approval passes started in November. Unfortunately, the approval passes took longer than expected which pushed out approval for the contractors to bill by 3-4 months. Billing authorization was issued in March of 2022 and we promptly paid all invoices properly submitted to our accountant.

For this project, we provided templates for Adventure Chapters with an 8,450 words max budget. 9 of 22 chapters were over word count

• 4 over by 1000 words
• 1 over by 3700 words
• 2 over by 4750 words
• 1 over by 7000 words

Despite the fact that many chapters were over the word counts outlined the writers were paid for the overages after appropriate approval. Writers whose writing was not used were still authorized to bill us and were paid 10 cents per word.

For those of you who have reached out with constructive feedback, we greatly appreciate your support and patience. We will have further updates as more information becomes available.

Sarah Urfer

 

[Morrus]

But to the issue at hand, if these people were such Dickensians to work with, the problem should swiftly sort itself out, shouldn't it? Freelancers will turn to other employers, who will treat them with the kindness, love, and emotional support they want and desire. Seems like a self-adjusting issue.

This is exactly what you're watching happening. Only it's not 1970, it's 2022 and there's an internet now, so it's a lot more visible.

 

[Jd Smith1]

I'm a departmental manager at my job. If I treated workers like your example or Stone/Phoenix, I'd get fired.
The point of spreading the message is that the only accountability the owners can face is educating other freelancers who don't want to be treated that way won't work for them - and customers who don't want to support them won't buy future products.
Just because something worked like that "back in your day" doesn't mean that it should continue that way forever.

Yeah, some places are boring.

'Back in my day' was last Thursday; I stopped by after court to check in, and overheard a similar dialogue through an open office door.

 

[Jd Smith1]

The social media backlash you're seeing is what the problem "sorting itself out" looks like in practice.

Well, then all is right with the world.

 

[Michael Linke]

This says everything was paid, even the overages. Is there anyone still saying they haven’t been paid? I haven’t been a big student of this, but there were a few complaining, but not all. If they paid everything “properly submitted” in March, they just paid late. Not great but not weird. Yet there’s a lot of dog piling for being crap to creators when it just seems they were late to all and d-bags to some. Were the some those trying to get paid on the huge overages? not trying to defend bad people with a history of shafting creators but…unless they’re lying and no one got paid before the s-storm, this issue maybe is overblown?

It says that freelancers who invoiced correctly were paid. The problem with some of the complaints was that pay was late, and they were not allowed to invoice until well after their work was delivered. It also qualifies that only the freelancers who invoiced correctly were paid, so anyone still complaining is to blame for not invoicing correctly.

 

[Morrus]

It says that freelancers who invoiced correctly were paid. The problem with some of the complaints was that pay was late, and they were not allowed to invoice until well after their work was delivered. It also qualifies that only the freelancers who invoiced correctly were paid, so anyone still complaining is to blame for not invoicing correctly.

Yeah, unless the contract states otherwise specifically, an invoice is an invoice is an invoice. You pay it.

Also, payment on acceptance, and that shouldn't take longer than a month (allowing for monthly pay cycles and unfortunate timing). It doesn't take long to look at a manuscript and determine whether it's acceptable or not.

 

[dragoner]

As a consultant, BCA, eng.; all my invoices are payable on receipt, and I still have lost out, such as not getting paid $6,000 after I had paid other subs. It is a common saying that getting paid is the hardest part of the job. S&S are lowlifes, but that's capitalism, this is what other countries get bombed out of existence for.

 

[Dioltach]

Not sure we need to make this about global politics.

 

[bedir than]

It also qualifies that only the freelancers who invoiced correctly were paid, so anyone still complaining is to blame

I was once told my invoice was incorrect. It was the same format as the most common freelance sports invoice in use, and they'd already paid me for dozens of other pieces using the same invoice.

The new manager just didn't want to pay mez inventing a reason.

I suspect Jamison and Satine are doing the same thing. Their invented red tape is an excuse to not pay.

 

[Wicht]

I have not done any RPG freelance work where I had to submit an invoice. That just seems... weird. We're not talking major corporations here; we're talking Mom and Pop size operations. You get the gig, sign a contract, do the work, submit the work and then, hopefully, the money gets sent your way according to the dictates of the contract. I've done a few gigs where the pay never materialized, but then you just don't do work for those same again. But none of them ever asked for an invoice.

 

[Morrus]

I have not done any RPG freelance work where I had to submit an invoice. That just seems... weird. We're not talking major corporations here; we're talking Mom and Pop size operations. You get the gig, sign a contract, do the work, submit the work and then, hopefully, the money gets sent your way according to the dictates of the contract. I've done a few gigs where the pay never materialized, but then you just don't do work for those same again. But none of them ever asked for an invoice.

The tax man likes to see the invoices. Doesn't matter most of the time, but the time it does matter it really matters.