So I was preparing for a game with my daughter, who is 12, and I'm digging through all the stuff I have on my shelves, stuff I'd bought in pdf, and random free stuff that I had saved.

And I run across a game I had saved a while back for Fate Accelerated called Princess Drive. Its basically a magical girl mecha style game (something similar to the anime Magic Knight Rayearth). The setting is only about 15 pages, just a vague outline, but what is there is enough there that I like to want  run it (and I can just slightly adjust things I don't).

I like Fate Accelerated anyway, and the changes made are really thematic to magical girls (like the approaches being "virtues" like love, kindness, trust, etc). And it was something I downloaded for free. Plus it seemed like a game that my daughter would like.

Then I noticed who wrote it. Topher. Now, I don't like Topher. He is about everything wrong with the slacktivist social justice warrior movement. After realizing it, I could even tell in the opening (which I had barely skimmed before).

But really, it doesn't hurt the game itself. I didn't even pay for it so it wasn't like I was giving money to someone I hate. What is your thoughts on games made by people you hate? Do you play them anyway if you like them? Does it sour the game for you entirely?

(Another one for me is Mouse Guard. I like it, though its very narrative so some here might not, but Luke Crane is a huge ass).

I'd generally rather not give them or their product the oxygen of conversation. If I dislike them, it's unlikely I'll like their games; the few authors whose work I would refuse to buy nowadays, due to them being cunts, have a tendency to fill their products with sneering, cuntish bullshit... so why would I ever want to play those games?

As long as it doesn't have that insufferably smug looking pic of topher that he uses as an avatar on every page I guess I could handle it.

The new tendency to an inability to separate a work and a person (where before the person was generally little-known, and a work was more likely evaluated on its own merits) is one of the downsides of the digital age.  I still can't believe how many friendships are trashed because one or the other takes extreme offense with memes published on Facebook.  From people they've known for years or decades.

People are flawed, quirky, and opinionated.  That doesn't mean they can't do good things that others would enjoy.

@EOTB, I think mostly similar. It was more just a nasty reaction to realizing it was written by someone who I dislike.

I still plan to run it, and am pretty excited to run it as well. I was really curious though how other people here react, considering the extremely strong opinions people have here on different personalities.

(I mean, I'm not particularly fond of Pundit either, though I respect that he will let people call him out to his face, but I still find Arrows of Indra interesting.)

It may impact on where I spend my money, but if I got the product for free then the beauty of RPGs is that it is what I make of it at my own table. Having a hated writer or creator stop me using a game I wanted seems like I would be giving more power to said creator.

Quote from: EOTB;790601The new tendency to an inability to separate a work and a person (where before the person was generally little-known, and a work was more likely evaluated on its own merits) is one of the downsides of the digital age.  I still can't believe how many friendships are trashed because one or the other takes extreme offense with memes published on Facebook.  From people they've known for years or decades.

People are flawed, quirky, and opinionated.  That doesn't mean they can't do good things that others would enjoy.

No, you've got it backwards. Now that the gap between creators and consumers is much smaller, we've got more information to decide that we just don't want our money to go to certain people or organizations. This is a good thing, because as consumers, we are now more informed, we can decide what we want to fund or not... or we can continue to not give a shit. There's more options available now. Options are good.

Nobody (Here) is saying that some creatives shouldn't be able to keep on producing things, even if they are shitty people... but if they are doing things or holding views that people find abhorrant, they're going to lose sales as a result. And that is not censorship - the person is still welcome to do whatever it is that they do - but if they are producing a product that nobody wants for whatever reason, well, tough shit. Just because you have produced something, doesn't magically make you entitled to people buying it.

And sure, they might occasionally produce something worthwhile even in light of their other issues... but there is plenty of other worthwhile content out there to get through. Like, I have hundreds of RPG's out there to get through before I have to even consider the works of some people. Maybe they'll produce a thing I'll like that's free of all their baggage... but it's not exactly keeping me up at night.

Another thing the digital age has given us is a much more casual reason to declare hatred.

Oh look someone on the internet is being a tool- I HATE them!!!

Do you really though?

Hatred is a strong word to apply to a mere source of disagreement or annoyance. Even if I think someone is full of shit and would tell them so to their face, does that really equal real hatred?

I don't think so. For me personally, hatred isn't so casual. I am very pleased to not be currently hating anyone.

One thing unique to the digital age is thinking things are unique to the digital age.

TBH I don't even read the credit page of any RPG I've owned/ran/played. I have zero interest or concern with who writes the game. If it's good, I'll use it, if not, I'll steal the good ideas and use them in another game.

As an addendum, I really do not understand people who have the need to proclaim, quite loudly, that if you buy a game (or anything else) written by someone whose ideas they don't agree with, then you are a Bad Person. In fact, you may be the Worst Sort of Person. At the very least, you Shouldn't Be Putting Money In Their Pockets. Then they gather a flock of Correct Thinkers around them (metaphorically) and they'll all give each other handjobs (also metaphorically, however if they ever got together in person...).

Fuck you - I'll read what I like.

I had to think about this, and in the end I couldn't come up with any game designer I actually hate.

In fact, with one exception (who I won't name because I don't want to cause drama) I can't even think of a game designer I know well enough to dislike. The vast majority of game designers are simply names on a credit page as far as I'm concerned and I couldn't tell you anything about them - either positive or negative - apart from what they've written.

Having said that, I can use other media as an example. I enjoy H.P. Lovecraft despite his blatant racism, and I still have some Gary Glitter on my playlist despite his paedophilia and some Rolf Harris despite the recent revelations about his past sexual assaults.

These things don't stop me enjoying the media they've produced, but they do always remind me of their authors' moral failings when I hear/read them.

I suppose it might be different if it were a case of buying something new by someone I disliked. Then I'd have to consider whether or not I wanted to give them money - and the only time that's ever cropped up was when I wanted to read a book by a particular Evangelical Fundamentalist and Creationist to see for myself what a liar and fraud he was, but didn't want him to profit from my doing so. In that case I bought his book second-hand, so none of the money I spent went to him.

I had a bad business interaction with FFG and have generally avoided their jobs/products ever since.

I've met Geoff Grabowski and chatted with him in some private hangout and thought he was an insufferable ass/idiot, which cooled my enthusiasm for Exalted (to the point of never having bought any of the games, but then I was never a big WoD fan)

Beyond that... behavior might turn me off to trying a product, but if I find I like something, whatever. Unless you are donating proceeds to Puppy Kickers International.

Quote from: Werekoala;790616TBH I don't even read the credit page of any RPG I've owned/ran/played. I have zero interest or concern with who writes the game. If it's good, I'll use it, if not, I'll steal the good ideas and use them in another game.

Normally I don't either. The only reason I realized that Topher wrote Princess Drive was because I was looking for a summary sheet I remembered being made and found it in a thread he had made.

I gave up on hate a long time ago, after deciding I was better off without it. Personally I think we'd all be better off without it, but hate turns out to be more than a little addictive, so it's not going away anytime soon. Certainly not in the RPG community.

Having said that, there are a few individuals in the gaming industry I personally dislike a great deal. I still buy/use their products on occasion, for various reasons. OTOH, there are others I don't know personally at all, but I find their work or their opinions objectionable enough that I'll refuse to support them and I don't buy/use their products.

So sometimes I play, sometimes I don't. In neither case does "hate" enter into it.