Pathfinder 1E Paizo Bites- A Rant

[FraserRonald]

Actually, each of those indicate that you have no problem with an editor/developer changing your material, which was loud and clear considering the number of times you posted it . None of them, however, directly answered the question asked, being how you felt about your name being associated with said editor's/developer's material, which may or may not be well received by the consumers (with the risk being that it may not be well received as is the case with the Noonan/Paizo Dark Sun conversion).

You did get around to it, though...

Eventually.

In all honesty I thought that was implicit in my statement that if one signs the contract, one accepts the consequences. I really didn't think it was necessary to map out all the possible permutations--which would be quite a lengthy post.

True. Although there is sometimes a sliding scale; one company is definately rated by author more than anything else, although one of those authors has his own scale (adventures poor, rules/accessories high). Overall, though, you are right; while no company has my 100% assurance, there are a few that I'll call 95-Percenters, being 95% sure that I'll like the product so long as the subject matter appeals to me. (And it kinda makes me laugh that WotC isn't amongst them...)

Other than the core books, I haven't bought anything from WotC. The last supplement I bought from them was "the Fighter's Handbook" way, way back. I kid you not.

Lost many a book that way myself... You'd be amazed how many folks simply refuse to return The Black Company or The Forever War. I'll dig up a copy, though, seeing as both you and S'mon have suggested it.

I jealousy guard my decaying copy of BC. I've lost about three of Joe Haldeman's novels through loans, but never The Forever War. I can't figure that out.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

In all honesty I thought that was implicit in my statement that if one signs the contract, one accepts the consequences. I really didn't think it was necessary to map out all the possible permutations--which would be quite a lengthy post.

True, but I was only asking about the one. Water under the bridge at this point, though.

Other than the core books, I haven't bought anything from WotC. The last supplement I bought from them was "the Fighter's Handbook" way, way back. I kid you not.

No, you kid indeed... CFHB was TSR.

I jealousy guard my decaying copy of BC.

Don't blame you.

I've lost about three of Joe Haldeman's novels through loans, but never The Forever War. I can't figure that out.

That is odd, although it's my favorite by him, so I'm biased.

 

[FraserRonald]

True, but I was only asking about the one. Water under the bridge at this point, though.

Too true.

No, you kid indeed... CFHB was TSR.

Yeah, wow, that's right. Change that to I've never purchased a supplement from WotC.

That is odd, although it's my favorite by him, so I'm biased.

Got intro'd to J. Haldeman through the Forever War in university. Strange thing was, it was in a course on fantasy literature rather than science fiction (the Uni had both and so--of course--I took both!).

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Got intro'd to J. Haldeman through the Forever War in university. Strange thing was, it was in a course on fantasy literature rather than science fiction (the Uni had both and so--of course--I took both!).

Odd... Did the Sci-Fi class have a distinction between Sci-Fi such as The Net (science-based Fiction) and Science-Fantasy like Star Wars and The Core? Or did it seem the two overlapped.

 

[Mighty Halfling]

I would LOVE to see a writer come on this discussion board and publicly point out all the boners, gaffes, nonsensical sentences, and other mistakes that his editors have fixed. Until a writer does that, I don't have much patience for people who have to deflect any criticisms of their work on to an editor's head.

Not only did James Jacobs (Dungeon associate editor, I believe) completely convert my adventure "Racing the Snake" (Dungeon 105) from 3e to 3.5e, he actually added a lot of flavor text to it to make it Ket-appropriate for Greyhawk. In other words, he made it better. He fixed it.
He also polished the finale to make it a real finale. My early draft had the adventurers arriving in port, and that was all. Yep. No big fight. Just an arrival at port. You see, I figured the main villain would have been dispatched by then. In all, it was a dumb way to do it, but I couldn't figure out what should happen. The published version was much better. In other words, he made it better. He fixed it.


In Dungeon 110 -- you know, the one everybody's so angry about -- the non-Dark Sun adventure, "Buzz in the Bridge" was mine. I detected some changes and cuts, but nothing bad. The best I could figure is that they trimmed it for space to keep MORE Dark Sun text.
It was the editors' idea, by the way, to make the big bridge map at "miniatures scale." I figure that will help the playability of the adventure immensely. What a great idea.

To sum up: Thank you, Dungeon editors, for your excellence.

John Simcoe

 

[tmaaas]

Not only did James Jacobs (Dungeon associate editor, I believe) completely convert my adventure "Racing the Snake" (Dungeon 105) ...

Really liked that adventure. Kudos to you & James.

 

[FraserRonald]

Odd... Did the Sci-Fi class have a distinction between Sci-Fi such as The Net (science-based Fiction) and Science-Fantasy like Star Wars and The Core? Or did it seem the two overlapped.

It was pure literature, so no movies. The books we studied (that I remember) included War of the Worlds, the Left Hand of Darkness, A Walk in Woman's Country, Neuromancer and Childhood's End. There were a couple of other feminist SF titles that we studied that left 0 impression on me so I don't really recall their titles. They weren't bad because they were feminist, but--IIRC--they allowed their agenda to overwhelm their narrative and they completely lost me.

It would have been a more interesting course if the Prof hadn't been an obstinate prick. "No, that's not what it means, it means . . ." is NOT the way to teach literary interpretation.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

It was pure literature, so no movies.

Wouldn't have thought so... Just examples off the top of my head (mostly because I'd seen them recently).

The books we studied (that I remember) included War of the Worlds, the Left Hand of Darkness, A Walk in Woman's Country, Neuromancer and Childhood's End.

No Dune?

There were a couple of other feminist SF titles that we studied that left 0 impression on me so I don't really recall their titles. They weren't bad because they were feminist, but--IIRC--they allowed their agenda to overwhelm their narrative and they completely lost me.

Hate when that happens. It's not exactly limited to feminist themes either... The over-emphasis on environmental issues in Dances with Wolves really made that movie difficult to sit through, and I'm an environmentalist.

It would have been a more interesting course if the Prof hadn't been an obstinate prick. "No, that's not what it means, it means . . ." is NOT the way to teach literary interpretation.

Sheesh... There's a difference between "making interpretations" and "learning my interpretations". Now I'm half-glad Dune wasn't in the above list (especially since I feel like I'm getting a new interpretation of several themes every time I read it).

 

[FraserRonald]

Wouldn't have thought so... Just examples off the top of my head (mostly because I'd seen them recently).

Sorry, thought there might be some confusion as all the examples were of movies, ergo my assumption that you believed the course might involve movies rather than books.

Things seemed to be getting way off topic, so I continued The rest of the discussion here.

Hope to see you there.

 

[woodelf]

That's exactly how editing works for journals. Yes, we can change language and grammar, but numbers....heck no!

We can suggest that authors make those changes, but it is their puppy. If we do not like it, then we do not publish it.

And they have the option to pull their paper as well.

That is just good business.

There'sa huge difference here: the numbers in a scientific article have an objective standard of correctness. There is no such thing for RPGs. Even in this case, given your years of experience with playtesting the rules, that doesn't mean that someone else couln't prefer them differently, and get better results with those different rules. But i do agree it is very poor form not to at least tell you, and give you the option of removing your byline.