Quote from: CRKrueger;625373Yeah, instead of doing a fulltime job and then coming home to the honey-do list, you just come up with the honey-do list yourself.  You'd save time and live a decade longer.

Exactly! Plus I always wanted to be self-employed and can't afford to own a business yet.

Quote from: Settembrini;625420I agree.
But you'd have TONS of things to do and be most likely exhausted. And you would feel bad if you spent the time rather on the net blogging and pretending to be an auteur of gygaxian proportions!
All stay-at-home-wifes or husbands whom I know have LESS time for self-fulfillment and small businesses on the side!

ADD: And you would most likely NOT endanger the single income via creating debts and obligations in the 50k range, would you?

No RESPONSIBILITY towards dependants has many faces. Pursueing your hobby in that time is not responsible! It is a slap in the face of all hard working stay-at-home people, be they man, women or anything in between. Especially if it financially creates obligations.

ADD2: And not communicating with his dream-job-partners is also super irresponsible.

I don't think we need to conflate the problems with dwimmermount with other stay at home parents. Plenty of people can stay at home with their children, have a small business on the side and participate in a hobby. The problem here is Jame's hadn't given what he was paid to create. People gave him money, expecting that to fund a product. All this other stuff you are going on about just isn't relevant.

Quote from: amacris;624887Tavis created a budget for James detailing the costs for art, layout, design, and printing. It was highly detailed. Tavis writes grant proposals for a living, so he is very meticulous. He could quote you the cost per unit of the maps, the shipping & handling fees on the softcover art books, etc. There is/was a plan for every dollar.

Thanks for all the clarifications, Alex. One thing I can add here is that one cost factored in was James' work as the writer, which we estimated at about the cents-per-word that he and I have sometimes made as freelancers for WotC. Those are the best rates in the business as far as I know, but on the minus side more work is involved than writing a similar number of words for Wizards since with them you generally get to turn over all further editing and development to someone else once you meet your word count. Having a budget for the project's writer/developer based on their cents-per-word is what I meant when I said that the Kickstarter supported James' time. That's a term of art in the kind of grant writing I do in my day job, and so familiar to me that I forget it isn't plain English.

This is getting into Redbrick territory - ie, designers personal lives being discussed in lieu of actual points.

Wmarshall, welcome to the scumpits!

Instead of wasting your money in a lawsuit against Grogtardia, spend the cash on a completed OSR goodie that catches your interest. That would be a win-win.

If you haven't checked out Carcosa, The Dungeon Alphabet or Vornheim, I highly recommend all three over anything promised by the Grogtard.

Quote from: Killfuck Soulshitter;625395Ironic thing is that most folks in the RPG community are so generous, that if only he'd posted a couple of plausible updates, he could still be stringing things along now with much less loss of good will.

So freaking true. Important lesson for all publishers.

Quote from: J Arcane;625397**Awesome Comic**

That was genius! Thank you.

Quote from: Endless Flight;625439Exactly! Plus I always wanted to be self-employed and can't afford to own a business yet.

I suggest reading this article:
http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2013/01/10-reasons-why-you-have-to-quit-your-job-this-year/

Quote from: JRT;625438The problem is, this is a creative endeavor, and it's not the same as a regular good like a car that has a standards expectation.  Creative works would be much harder to deal with.  Many of the people were wanting James M.'s work, and having somebody else finish it might go against what they expected from the Kickstarter.

I didn't back this Kickstarter, but if I was offered a choice on somebody else completing the work, or either getting my money back, or waiting several months or even a year or two, I'd choose the latter.  I follow creators and having somebody else finish it would feel wrong to me.



I think the key thing is Autarch, in the backer updates, has apparently polled the audience and the majority feel okay in waiting, based on this public post:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/autarch/dwimmermount/posts/392668

I think if more and more time goes by without any communication from James, a new survey would reflect dissatisfaction, but it seems they are proceeding in the best way that will satisfy the majority of the backers, so I think before an individual backer wants to do things "on behalf of the group". the majority should rule.

Don't get me wrong--James lack of even communicating with Autarch is rather troubling, and I suspect if he doesn't correct this soon he's going to have a lot of lost respect--more than what's been lost already.  I'm still not willing to state though that it's a case of him "taking the money and running".

My intention isn't to necessarily do things completely on my own, but to my mind it is coming time to consider taking some kind of action. A conversation amongst the backers might be warranted soon.

As far as any respect James has left to lose I don't think he has any, at least no longer in my eyes. I enjoyed his blog, and I don't care if anyone thinks me a loser for that. However, I wouldn't call his behavior "rather troubling". For how he's left Autarch to twist in the wind for almost 3 months so far I'd call his behavior disgusting.

Quote from: Spinachcat;625717Wmarshall, welcome to the scumpits!

Instead of wasting your money in a lawsuit against Grogtardia, spend the cash on a completed OSR goodie that catches your interest. That would be a win-win.

If you haven't checked out Carcosa, The Dungeon Alphabet or Vornheim, I highly recommend all three over anything promised by the Grogtard.

I already have all three of your recommendations (All very good in my opinion). For myself, even if I didn't already have your recommendations I wouldn't consider following your advice a win-win. To me it'd be more like buying some liquor to drown my sorrows. How would it be a win-win? If one of the "wins" is my spending additional money to get some cool product, what is the other "win"? Would that be James getting to keep the KS money while failing to meet his commitments and putting Autarch's reputation at risk? Doesn't seem to be a "win" to me, unless your James possibly.

I have a little bit of money to burn, and if I spent it on a lawsuit I have a very, very low bar to meet to where I would not consider it a waste.
• If it by some miracle causes him to get motivated to meet his commitments = success.
• If it causes James to give the money back to Autarch and allows them to use the IP to publish Dwimmermount = success.
• If it results in a lien against his assets or bankruptcy (or some kind of financial consequence) for James so that he does not profit from the KS while failing to meet his commitments = success.
• If it causes James distressed bowel movements for a decent amount of time because he's having to deal with a lawsuit = success.

Like I said, I have a low bar for what I would consider a success, but I get to set that bar where I like.

What's a waste and failure to me is allowing James to walk away from his commitments with the KS money in hand, and the backers taking it on the chin like some kind of sad sap. It would be some bizarre case of Gamer Stockholm Syndrome.

I'm kind of surprised that Autarch isn't at least considering legal action themselves. Their contract with James is not being met. Their reputation is being put at risk, which in turn could hinder their future Kickstarters. Maybe they are, but aren't disclosing this info. They've described themselves as "Lawful Good", and I'm willing to take them at their word, but I'd think that at some point they'd need to realize their responsibility to the backers over any sense of collegiality they may have for James. James certainly hasn't been collegial to Autarch.

I'm not a lawyer, and maybe there is truly nothing to be done, but I think I'll at least start to investigate the options. If the backers put up 10% of what they pledged maybe that would be enough to get the ball rolling, and I'm willing to put up more than my original pledge. Yes, I can be that ornery.

A Dwimmermount Lawsuit kickstarter...  How meta would that be!

Quote from: wmarshal;625748To me it'd be more like buying some liquor to drown my sorrows. How would it be a win-win?

If you buy some fine artisan liquor, you win by enjoying their excellent liquor and the artisan distillery wins because you patronized them instead of a megacorp. It becomes money well spent instead good money pissed away after bad money.

Quote from: wmarshal;625748I'm kind of surprised that Autarch isn't at least considering legal action themselves.

Legal action is the bane of small business. It's an effective intimidation tool for big business, but lawsuits are a major time suck and money suck for small business.

Also, threat of legal action + effective negotiation is far more effective at creating settlements. Lawsuits are only a stick, but negotiation can use both carrots and sticks.

Quote from: wmarshal;625748and I'm willing to put up more than my original pledge. Yes, I can be that ornery.

I respect revenge, but I hope you don't confuse it with justice.

There are plenty of gamer attorneys. I would not be surprised there is one among the Dwimmermount backers and maybe you can get them to take the case on a percentage. Maybe even pro boner.

Yeah I know its pro bono, but I get wood when I think of lawyers working for free. And then I trade that wood for sheep. Yeah baby yeah.

I've been paying attention to this thread off and on; I know you guys are pretty much all talk, but remember James M is a human being. He's posted on G+ about his father, and during a time like this it doesn't seem like fair play to be talking about suing the poor guy. I know this is the internet, and compassion doesn't exist on the internet, but think for a second about how you would feel in his place if you came across this thread.

He should have been more communicative with Autarch and his backers, but that's not a good enough reason to kick him while he's down.

I don't mean to be a jerk, but losing parents is part of life. It happens to pretty much everyone (well, not orphans, obviously). It sucks. A lot. But it doesn't mean you get a free pass to drop all your problems and responsibilities.

I would be much more sympathetic if it was one of his kids that was ill.

But on the flip side, isn't he in Canada? I don't see how a lawsuit would even be plausible, since I think Autarch is in North Carolina. Yeah, looking at the contract they posted, they are.

Actually, looking at that again make me wonder if there isn't another contract. Section 5 is about Publication. It says that publication isn't part of this agreement, but then on the very next line, it says that if funded, Autarch will publish and distribute the initial release. A little confusing.

Quote from: JeremyR;625763I don't mean to be a jerk, but losing parents is part of life. It happens to pretty much everyone (well, not orphans, obviously). It sucks. A lot. But it doesn't mean you get a free pass to drop all your problems and responsibilities.

Sure, it doesn't give him a free pass, but it does mean that when people talk about suing him while he goes through that situation, they are behaving in a very inconsiderate and mean-spirited fashion and should take a long, hard look at themselves.

Quote from: noisms;625764Sure, it doesn't give him a free pass, but it does mean that when people talk about suing him while he goes through that situation, they are behaving in a very inconsiderate and mean-spirited fashion and should take a long, hard look at themselves.

It's been 3 months. Time enough to get your act together.

Quote from: zarathustra;625769It's been 3 months. Time enough to get your act together.

3 months since what?

I'm not excusing his behaviour; I'm saying maybe it's a best idea to save the criticism and the talking out of arses about legal action until a more appropriate time and set of circumstances?

Quote from: noisms;6257703 months since what?

I'm not excusing his behaviour; I'm saying maybe it's a best idea to save the criticism and the talking out of arses about legal action until a more appropriate time and set of circumstances?

3 months since he began ignoring and cut contact with with Autarch and his family crisis occurred/escalated.