Mongoose Publishing's Rep...?

[Allandaros]

After poking around this forum a bit, I seem to have found a not-too-positive outlook for Mongoose Publishing. Can people tell me:
a) why they feel this way?
b) Whether quality for Mongoose's various lines (e.g. the Bab5 RPG and PARANOIA, for starters) is different than Mongoose quality in general?

See, I'm a member of Paranoia-Live, a forum which was pretty heavily involved in developing the latest Paranoia edition. And I KNOW that Paranoia XP is high quality, so I was wondering about Mongoose's poor reputation in this respect.
...perhaps the fact that Allen Varney, rather than a Mongoose staffer, was the main force behind Paranoia XP?

 

[loki44]

Are you talking about me behind my back!?

No really, I love Mongoose Publishing for one simple reason.....Conan. Yes, despite the editing snafus that are so widely disseminated I think this MGP product, and all its accompanying products, are top-notch.

 

[Mark]

After poking around this forum a bit, I seem to have found a not-too-positive outlook for Mongoose Publishing.

Really? They seem to sell a lot of books and do very well. Do you have links (anyone)?

 

[Crothian]

He is right. Early Mongoose books and then last years Conan editing problems has left Mongoose with a bad rap. There is really no denying this.

1) People feel this way becasue Mongoose had a bad track record. I say had because I feel the books of the last year have been a huge improvement. THe Babylon 5 books are great, the Paroia stuff as you know is fantastic, and I've enjoyed many of their Book of ones as well.

2) THe Qualty of mongoose's books as I have said has improved over the last year. Moingoosematt, the owner of the comany, has really done everything he sdaid he was going to do in terms of fixing the problems they had with editing. That is not to say their books are perfect, no one's is.

 

[loki44]

He is right. Early Mongoose books and then last years Conan editing problems has left Mongoose with a bad rap.

I'm a Mongoose apologist here and obviously I have no problem weathering through a few, or quite a few as the case may be, editing mistakes. Having said that, I must take umbrage with your assertion that these mistakes are a thing of the past. The boxed "City of Shahdizar" was released this year and contained a plagiarized map. It doesn't get much worse than that. However, IMO the content of MGP's products far out-shine their quality, editorialy speaking, therefore I will continue to buy their products (Conan at least).

So in the end I guess I agree and disagree with you, Crothian, on some level or another.

 

[Crothian]

I'm a Mongoose apologist here and obviously I have no problem weathering through a few, or quite a few as the case may be, editing mistakes. Having said that, I must take umbrage with your assertion that these mistakes are a thing of the past. The boxed "City of Shahdizar" was released this year and contained a plagiarized map. It doesn't get much worse than that. However, IMO the content of MGP's products far out-shine their quality, editorialy speaking, therefore I will continue to buy their products (Conan at least).

So in the end I guess I agree and disagree with you, Crothian, on some level or another.

The Map situation is hard to place blame. I can understand how a company can get fooled by a freelancer. But in the products of there's I've seen I have not noticed much in the way of editing problems. I have not seen everything though, so it is very possible I've just gotten lucky.

 

[TroyXavier]

Their OGL stuff tends to be really good, their D20 stuff is all over the place.

 

[loki44]

But in the products of there's I've seen I have not noticed much in the way of editing problems.

I did not mean to be contentious on that point. The map very well may have been an exception, and the editing mistakes that others have been so quick to point out have not really detracted from my enjoyment of MGP's products (albeit Conan only). I guess my point was that, while I do not personally have a problem with the quality of MGP's products, there may still be an impression that quality is lacking (i.e. plagiarized maps). It's all about first impressions, no? I will adamantly defend the quality of MGP's content, but must hush up when it comes to evaluating the "slickness" of their products.

 

[KaosDevice]

Mr problem with Mongoose, and I wrote this for a review of thier Babylon 5 line at RevSF, is the production value is top notch, why isn't the editing? The Bab 5 line if abso-frelling-lutely awesome, except the layout and placement of material is a logic nightmare. It reminds me of Palladium, "Here isn't this cool!" with out rhyme or reason. They are fixing it in later volumes and I applaud their efforts on that front.

But hells bells, get me at hello. The big saving grace of the early Bab 5 game was that it couldn't SUCK WORSE then the earlier Chameleon Ecclectic game and they won it...barely.

It was the episode books that really owned the deal. Who ever they have reviewing B5 Episodes really gets it and it translates to the material. Spell checker aside. I loove Mongoose, they are doing fun things an American company couldn't and are obviously having fun in their sand box. I don't reckon they are going to leave any time soon.

 

[mattcolville]

My experience has been;

"Hey, this D&D supplement is a piece of crap."

"Hey, this stand alone game is pretty good."

YMMV.