Yee-haw! I was looking forward to your expansions/fact-checks on this.
> Leroy dislikes a lot of people. Evidence suggests that he is no longer
> relevant.
I, on the other hand, am disliked by a lot of people, and am also no
longer relevant. Leroy and I have a lot in common, it's a shame we didn't
get along. :-)
> The "Great Magic Shakeout" happened in games distro about the same time GDW
> was shutting down, and the two may be more related than is normally given
> credit. The drive into general bookstore distro that bit both GDW and TSR
> was likely catalyzed by the utter failure of the games distributors in the
> mid-90s to *be distributors*. "X is a great game; it's a shame nothing has
> been released for it recently" was a common refrain heard by active,
producing companies who could get no traction with the Magic: the Gathering
> addicted distributors. The WWW coming along *right then* probably saved a
> lot of companies.
Yes, I'm glad you pointed that out, as that was the actual mechanism by
which MTG killed us. GDW's financial model was this: For any new product,
the initial shipment paid for its production costs (printing, binding,
die-cutting, box, etc.). After that, follow-on sales of it as "backlist"
were what paid our salaries, rent, utility bills. So, no backlist sales,
no GDW. And starting in 1994 the distributors en masse stopped buying ANY
of our backlist. Why? Our backlist wasn't as lucrative for them as simply
taking their pass-through cut off the top of shrink-wrapped skids of MTG
cards they didn't even have to take off the loading dock. If they bought,
say, 12 copies of Regency SB, they'd have to cut open the box, carry them
back and put them on shelves, and then re-ship them out one or two at a
time to the comic/game shops. That's labor, overhead, cost of inventory.
Instead, WotC semi-trailer backs up to their warehouse, shoves out umpteen
shrink-wrapped skids of MTG cases. They just push one shrink-wrapped skid
into a truck heading to store A, another into the truck for store B, and
so on, never even break the shrink-wrap, go home for the week. Hardly any
labor, no overhead, no cost of inventory. What you describe above, "shame
nothing's been released lately" is exactly what happened to us. Hardly
anyone ever saw RSB, one of the best-received TNE products we'd done, we
couldn't sell them. Or anything else for that matter, and this went on for
MONTHS until GDW couldn't write paychecks any more and I had to find
another job.
Actually the "screw" I had in mind that directly affected the players was
the TNE Deluxe Boxed Set. We priced it so that if you bought the boxed set
it would be LESS than if you bought the TNE and FF&S books separately,
plus you got the goodies inside. We sold out of those instantly, but TNE
and FF&S separately didn't sell as fast. We found out that some of the
distributors were opening up the boxed sets and selling TNE and FF&S a la
carte to the retailers, pocketing the savings themselves, and then using
the goodies as promotional items or selling them as well. That happened at
the store level as well, so the savings we tried to give to the players
was stolen by the distributors and retailers (the latter at the explicit
advice of the distributors). So to prevent this from happening again, we
had to raise the price of the boxed set to be greater than the contents so
that the distributors and retailers no longer had an incentive to cheat.
And those boxes are expensive to produce.
> I'm beginning to think that DGP's balancing act, between showing us the
> "Imperium that was" with their Four Troublemakers and myriad supporting
articles, and the "Death By Rebellion" of the
> following decade, may have been pumping up more anti-Rebellion sentiment
than they realized.
I'm inclined to believe that. There was way more going on before I got
there so it wasn't as simple as, "Dave came along, shot Marc, stole his
crown, and threw Traveller Nation into Civil War." I think there were
tensions all over the place that boiled over with TNE. And DGP wanted to
have it both ways further balkanizing the Traveller base. I always noticed
that "it's always sunny in DGP land" with their supplements of stable,
steady, serene societies, but they invented the Rebellion, so why not act
like they meant it? Their classic adventure was those guys on the
well-mannered sight-seeing tour of the Imperium, which continued running
through the Rebellion. What movie are we watching here, "Rushmore," or
"Sands of Iwo Jima?" I like them both, but they make a dissonant
double-feature. When I sent a tour through the Imperium, I sent an AHL
cruiser for Pete's sake.
But DGP was creative, talented, smart, well-meaning people doing the best
that they could, as was I. Life ain't easy.
Nonetheless, I agree that stuff was brewing in MT and TNE wasn't all
cause, it was a lot of effect too.
> [Aside: I'm on record in several venues as disliking you for "taking the
> future of Traveller with you". That is no longer the case, as you and I
cleared up at Celesticon 2012. Old archives
> might still turn up that vinegar, though.]
We probably didn't spend a lot of time on that, because I don't really
remember it, except maybe vaguely, like maybe you were wary around me at
first, and then after a while you weren't. One thing is that so many
Traveller people are hidden behind aliases that I never knew who they
were, and even with a real name that I've never met face-to-face, can't
remember who they are anyway. So anyone who used to not like me but has
changed their mind has an opportunity to start fresh, because I probably
don't realize it. But thanks for the warning, in case I stumble over old
UXO.
Also, I eventually got where you were coming from, but at first I could
not tell the difference between the people who hated me for being involved
with TNE to begin with (Frank gets more of a pass, I'm easier meat) or the
people that loved TNE and hated me for "leaving." The former group will
probably always think they hate me, the latter, I think we're probably all
right.
The thing that is so weird is that I lost my job, had to find another one
in a really unrelated field that kept me from remaining in touch, no one
ever called me to say, "we're getting the band back together," (and I
think there's a reason for that, they didn't want the TNE tar baby in
their band, and that's their perfect right), and I sure couldn't call
anyone up to get the band back together because it wasn't my band, the new
band refused to play those songs anymore, etc. (If I try to imagine myself
planting the TNE flag in the middle of a field, shouting, "rally to me,
TNE faithful, we're going to take the Iridium Throne..." ...write your own
punchline.) What I heard in the late '90s was, "TNE is repudiated," then
fast forward to MJD's in charge of TNE now. I never had any levers to
pull. That was my life, and while I find it ironic or unfair that
unbeknownst to me I was the guy who took TNE away, I can understand that
people who got that impression would feel bugged (mad at me--BECAUSE they
loved TNE so much. That's really awful). It is a measure of how
disconnected I was from everything that it was only about two years ago
that I remembered the "white lie" that I went along with and realized,
"holy crap, people who believe that have a good reason for hating me."
Since I knew it wasn't true I never thought about it.
Where there is a grain of truth in "he took the game away," it is this:
had anyone come to me in that period and said, "tell me everything you
know about TNE so I can go and make it without you," I would not have. I
would have wanted to be involved in doing it, but as I said, no one gave
me that option, and for most of that time there was never going to be any
more TNE anyway.
But we're good. You're one of my favorite old-line Traveller guys (HIWG is
the definition of "old-line").
> Of course, the reality was different.
>
> As any writer can tell you, getting attached to your work is near
inevitable. "I did all this work and you/GDW/DGP are just going to write
> over it?" was a constant danger. Most of us realized that, but there
were
> exceptions. As GDW transitioned from MT to TNE, some of the membership
lapsed and made a point of taking their earlier contributions with them.
So I would not be too far off if I said I got a feeling discontent, or
frustration from HIWG guys? Almost a sense of, "so, are you the next guy
who's gonna screw me?"
I'm glad you said "getting attached to your work." I didn't want to use
that phrase for fear it would sound pejorative or belittling, and it's
not, it's just a fact. I tried to get at it a different way in my
original. You put a lot of work into something with the promise it will be
useful, you fill it up with a lot complex ideas and principles, and
someone comes along and wants to truncate and hack it all up and break
stuff he doesn't even know he's breaking because he doesn't understand all
the threads woven through it, that's the definition of no fun. And knowing
the truth of that, I didn't want to put myself in a position where I was
going to be doing that to a HIWG guy. But of course I did to Harold, and
the reason is if someone wants to do something really badly, at some point
you feel bad for fending him off and it seems less mean to say, "okay,"
even though you might be setting him up to get punched even worse later.
Mea culpa.
I still think all of that is one of those sad dynamics where you try to do
things for the right reasons, but they still don't work out that often.
> I find the Long Night increasingly fascinating as a period to game in.
Unlike the Golden Age of the Imperium, every sector is different. Some had
> sporadic sparks, a few had persistent flames, and many were, to
outsiders
> at least, filled with tales of surviving in the dark.
Sounds neat, less homogeneous, more "neighborhoods." I know nothing in
particular about it. How long does it take you to get over that sense of
dissonance that you're playing in the past with a fixed conclusion and
that "freedom of action" is not what you're used to?
I would imagine not long, all game settings are fictional constructs
constrained by their non-reality, not by whether they're in the pretend
past or the pretend future. So the illusion of freedom in fictional 1201
is really not that different from the illusion of "less freedom" in Mileu
0. However, there must be some kind of rules preventing you from blowing
up worlds that become Capital, Hub, etc., killing Cleon, destroying all
the Cymbeline chips... :-)
But if you like Long Night, don't forget that I am the bastard who would
have argued against TNE taking you there! I will rise from the grave to
kill Traveller in all times and all climes, blah, blah, blah.
> Leroy dislikes a lot of people. Evidence suggests that he is no longer
> relevant.
I, on the other hand, am disliked by a lot of people, and am also no
longer relevant. Leroy and I have a lot in common, it's a shame we didn't
get along. :-)
> The "Great Magic Shakeout" happened in games distro about the same time GDW
> was shutting down, and the two may be more related than is normally given
> credit. The drive into general bookstore distro that bit both GDW and TSR
> was likely catalyzed by the utter failure of the games distributors in the
> mid-90s to *be distributors*. "X is a great game; it's a shame nothing has
> been released for it recently" was a common refrain heard by active,
producing companies who could get no traction with the Magic: the Gathering
> addicted distributors. The WWW coming along *right then* probably saved a
> lot of companies.
Yes, I'm glad you pointed that out, as that was the actual mechanism by
which MTG killed us. GDW's financial model was this: For any new product,
the initial shipment paid for its production costs (printing, binding,
die-cutting, box, etc.). After that, follow-on sales of it as "backlist"
were what paid our salaries, rent, utility bills. So, no backlist sales,
no GDW. And starting in 1994 the distributors en masse stopped buying ANY
of our backlist. Why? Our backlist wasn't as lucrative for them as simply
taking their pass-through cut off the top of shrink-wrapped skids of MTG
cards they didn't even have to take off the loading dock. If they bought,
say, 12 copies of Regency SB, they'd have to cut open the box, carry them
back and put them on shelves, and then re-ship them out one or two at a
time to the comic/game shops. That's labor, overhead, cost of inventory.
Instead, WotC semi-trailer backs up to their warehouse, shoves out umpteen
shrink-wrapped skids of MTG cases. They just push one shrink-wrapped skid
into a truck heading to store A, another into the truck for store B, and
so on, never even break the shrink-wrap, go home for the week. Hardly any
labor, no overhead, no cost of inventory. What you describe above, "shame
nothing's been released lately" is exactly what happened to us. Hardly
anyone ever saw RSB, one of the best-received TNE products we'd done, we
couldn't sell them. Or anything else for that matter, and this went on for
MONTHS until GDW couldn't write paychecks any more and I had to find
another job.
Actually the "screw" I had in mind that directly affected the players was
the TNE Deluxe Boxed Set. We priced it so that if you bought the boxed set
it would be LESS than if you bought the TNE and FF&S books separately,
plus you got the goodies inside. We sold out of those instantly, but TNE
and FF&S separately didn't sell as fast. We found out that some of the
distributors were opening up the boxed sets and selling TNE and FF&S a la
carte to the retailers, pocketing the savings themselves, and then using
the goodies as promotional items or selling them as well. That happened at
the store level as well, so the savings we tried to give to the players
was stolen by the distributors and retailers (the latter at the explicit
advice of the distributors). So to prevent this from happening again, we
had to raise the price of the boxed set to be greater than the contents so
that the distributors and retailers no longer had an incentive to cheat.
And those boxes are expensive to produce.
> I'm beginning to think that DGP's balancing act, between showing us the
> "Imperium that was" with their Four Troublemakers and myriad supporting
articles, and the "Death By Rebellion" of the
> following decade, may have been pumping up more anti-Rebellion sentiment
than they realized.
I'm inclined to believe that. There was way more going on before I got
there so it wasn't as simple as, "Dave came along, shot Marc, stole his
crown, and threw Traveller Nation into Civil War." I think there were
tensions all over the place that boiled over with TNE. And DGP wanted to
have it both ways further balkanizing the Traveller base. I always noticed
that "it's always sunny in DGP land" with their supplements of stable,
steady, serene societies, but they invented the Rebellion, so why not act
like they meant it? Their classic adventure was those guys on the
well-mannered sight-seeing tour of the Imperium, which continued running
through the Rebellion. What movie are we watching here, "Rushmore," or
"Sands of Iwo Jima?" I like them both, but they make a dissonant
double-feature. When I sent a tour through the Imperium, I sent an AHL
cruiser for Pete's sake.
But DGP was creative, talented, smart, well-meaning people doing the best
that they could, as was I. Life ain't easy.
Nonetheless, I agree that stuff was brewing in MT and TNE wasn't all
cause, it was a lot of effect too.
> [Aside: I'm on record in several venues as disliking you for "taking the
> future of Traveller with you". That is no longer the case, as you and I
cleared up at Celesticon 2012. Old archives
> might still turn up that vinegar, though.]
We probably didn't spend a lot of time on that, because I don't really
remember it, except maybe vaguely, like maybe you were wary around me at
first, and then after a while you weren't. One thing is that so many
Traveller people are hidden behind aliases that I never knew who they
were, and even with a real name that I've never met face-to-face, can't
remember who they are anyway. So anyone who used to not like me but has
changed their mind has an opportunity to start fresh, because I probably
don't realize it. But thanks for the warning, in case I stumble over old
UXO.
Also, I eventually got where you were coming from, but at first I could
not tell the difference between the people who hated me for being involved
with TNE to begin with (Frank gets more of a pass, I'm easier meat) or the
people that loved TNE and hated me for "leaving." The former group will
probably always think they hate me, the latter, I think we're probably all
right.
The thing that is so weird is that I lost my job, had to find another one
in a really unrelated field that kept me from remaining in touch, no one
ever called me to say, "we're getting the band back together," (and I
think there's a reason for that, they didn't want the TNE tar baby in
their band, and that's their perfect right), and I sure couldn't call
anyone up to get the band back together because it wasn't my band, the new
band refused to play those songs anymore, etc. (If I try to imagine myself
planting the TNE flag in the middle of a field, shouting, "rally to me,
TNE faithful, we're going to take the Iridium Throne..." ...write your own
punchline.) What I heard in the late '90s was, "TNE is repudiated," then
fast forward to MJD's in charge of TNE now. I never had any levers to
pull. That was my life, and while I find it ironic or unfair that
unbeknownst to me I was the guy who took TNE away, I can understand that
people who got that impression would feel bugged (mad at me--BECAUSE they
loved TNE so much. That's really awful). It is a measure of how
disconnected I was from everything that it was only about two years ago
that I remembered the "white lie" that I went along with and realized,
"holy crap, people who believe that have a good reason for hating me."
Since I knew it wasn't true I never thought about it.
Where there is a grain of truth in "he took the game away," it is this:
had anyone come to me in that period and said, "tell me everything you
know about TNE so I can go and make it without you," I would not have. I
would have wanted to be involved in doing it, but as I said, no one gave
me that option, and for most of that time there was never going to be any
more TNE anyway.
But we're good. You're one of my favorite old-line Traveller guys (HIWG is
the definition of "old-line").
> Of course, the reality was different.
>
> As any writer can tell you, getting attached to your work is near
inevitable. "I did all this work and you/GDW/DGP are just going to write
> over it?" was a constant danger. Most of us realized that, but there
were
> exceptions. As GDW transitioned from MT to TNE, some of the membership
lapsed and made a point of taking their earlier contributions with them.
So I would not be too far off if I said I got a feeling discontent, or
frustration from HIWG guys? Almost a sense of, "so, are you the next guy
who's gonna screw me?"
I'm glad you said "getting attached to your work." I didn't want to use
that phrase for fear it would sound pejorative or belittling, and it's
not, it's just a fact. I tried to get at it a different way in my
original. You put a lot of work into something with the promise it will be
useful, you fill it up with a lot complex ideas and principles, and
someone comes along and wants to truncate and hack it all up and break
stuff he doesn't even know he's breaking because he doesn't understand all
the threads woven through it, that's the definition of no fun. And knowing
the truth of that, I didn't want to put myself in a position where I was
going to be doing that to a HIWG guy. But of course I did to Harold, and
the reason is if someone wants to do something really badly, at some point
you feel bad for fending him off and it seems less mean to say, "okay,"
even though you might be setting him up to get punched even worse later.
Mea culpa.
I still think all of that is one of those sad dynamics where you try to do
things for the right reasons, but they still don't work out that often.
> I find the Long Night increasingly fascinating as a period to game in.
Unlike the Golden Age of the Imperium, every sector is different. Some had
> sporadic sparks, a few had persistent flames, and many were, to
outsiders
> at least, filled with tales of surviving in the dark.
Sounds neat, less homogeneous, more "neighborhoods." I know nothing in
particular about it. How long does it take you to get over that sense of
dissonance that you're playing in the past with a fixed conclusion and
that "freedom of action" is not what you're used to?
I would imagine not long, all game settings are fictional constructs
constrained by their non-reality, not by whether they're in the pretend
past or the pretend future. So the illusion of freedom in fictional 1201
is really not that different from the illusion of "less freedom" in Mileu
0. However, there must be some kind of rules preventing you from blowing
up worlds that become Capital, Hub, etc., killing Cleon, destroying all
the Cymbeline chips... :-)
But if you like Long Night, don't forget that I am the bastard who would
have argued against TNE taking you there! I will rise from the grave to
kill Traveller in all times and all climes, blah, blah, blah.