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Author Topic: glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace  (Read 10505 times)

Omega

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #60 on: February 07, 2015, 12:38:37 PM »
Quote from: Will;814530
On the topic of gaming companies ... doing freelance is a big ball of suck, too.


Was that Chaosium or White Wolf?

Guardians of Order pulled simmilar stunts near the end.
I knew two artists with a particular hate on for Steve Jackson after they got ripped off on payments for art.
I've got a huge file of stories from former Palladium writers.
and more. Unfortunately.

TSR was surprisingly the one that heard the least about for trouble.

jeff37923

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #61 on: February 07, 2015, 01:03:19 PM »
Quote from: Will;814527
Oh my fucking god take the fucking hint


the -rpg- site


Pot. Kettle. Black.
"Meh."

Bradford C. Walker

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #62 on: February 07, 2015, 01:11:56 PM »
Quote from: Omega;814538
Was that Chaosium or White Wolf?

Guardians of Order pulled simmilar stunts near the end.
I knew two artists with a particular hate on for Steve Jackson after they got ripped off on payments for art.
I've got a huge file of stories from former Palladium writers.
and more. Unfortunately.

TSR was surprisingly the one that heard the least about for trouble.

I just dipped my toe into this 10 year or so ago, and that experience was enough to turn me off anything else (and that was a mostly-neutral one, now that I have others to compare against). Any future TRPG work I do, I do for myself.

Lynn

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #63 on: February 07, 2015, 03:05:12 PM »
Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;814547
I just dipped my toe into this 10 year or so ago, and that experience was enough to turn me off anything else (and that was a mostly-neutral one, now that I have others to compare against). Any future TRPG work I do, I do for myself.


A lot of very small companies will take the hit to their reputation and get by as a kind of zombie company, and do whatever they can to get healthy. The reason is simple - its owner run (and / or family run) - they won't just bail out like corporate employees do when the ship is sinking. But they will do anything to keep from being driven into bankruptcy (except when they are ready).

Now that less product goes through complicated channels -> small resellers (and the financing and payment foot dragging involved with that), if people aren't getting paid sooner, than say, 10 years ago.
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Omega

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #64 on: February 07, 2015, 06:16:56 PM »
Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;814547
I just dipped my toe into this 10 year or so ago, and that experience was enough to turn me off anything else (and that was a mostly-neutral one, now that I have others to compare against). Any future TRPG work I do, I do for myself.


Atlas games by chance? Then wasnt just you.

Thats another one on the list of screw-overs.

Omega

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #65 on: February 07, 2015, 06:29:34 PM »
Quote from: Lynn;814553
Now that less product goes through complicated channels -> small resellers (and the financing and payment foot dragging involved with that), if people aren't getting paid sooner, than say, 10 years ago.


We recently had a publisher scam a designer by claiming that they did not have to pay him for any of the sales of the game via their kickstarter campaign because it was not sold through the store and thus not part of his contract.

Another mid level one purchased a designers game for a nice royalty fee. Then locked the game up as they just didnt want the game competing with one of their own. Apparently thats happened a few times.

I am ever surprised at the amount of fuck-overs that happen in the mid level publishers.

Gronan of Simmerya

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #66 on: February 07, 2015, 06:38:17 PM »
Le plus ca change, le plus c'est la meme chose.

I was lucky; working for Dave Arneson was wonderful, not horrible, because Adventure Games was a small company of eight or ten people.

Unfortunately, history has now shown that Dave started up AG just as the D&D bubble burst and took most of the money in gaming with it.

And yeah, freelance game writing sucks Jabba the Hutt's dick; the reason I haven't written any game shit isn't that I can't, but I have much better things to do with my time, like build railroad models.

You can get a penny to a penny and a half a word from Textbroker for writing web ads for diet supplements and boner pills.
You should go to GaryCon.  Period.

The rules can't cure stupid, and the rules can't cure asshole.

Lynn

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #67 on: February 07, 2015, 09:33:58 PM »
Quote from: Omega;814563
We recently had a publisher scam a designer by claiming that they did not have to pay him for any of the sales of the game via their kickstarter campaign because it was not sold through the store and thus not part of his contract.


I wouldn't venture an opinion without seeing the contract.

If that was a part of his contract, then it isn't a scam as he agreed to it.

If something doesn't look right in a contract, and you have to ask "What does that mean?", then you listen to the answer and then get THAT added to the contract.

If you are a freelancer, you wear all the hats: creator, accountant, negotiator. You can't be bad at any of them.

Quote from: Omega;814563
Another mid level one purchased a designers game for a nice royalty fee. Then locked the game up as they just didnt want the game competing with one of their own. Apparently thats happened a few times.


Ive seen that in the tech industry a lot. Once you really sell your baby, you have no control over it.
Lynn Fredricks
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GameDaddy
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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #68 on: February 07, 2015, 09:47:11 PM »
Quote from: Old Geezer;814565

And yeah, freelance game writing sucks Jabba the Hutt's dick; the reason I haven't written any game shit isn't that I can't, but I have much better things to do with my time, like build railroad models.


^^^^ This right here. 4c a word means a 10,000 word short story is $400

No point at all in writing RPG stuff when i can get a minimum of $350 a day plus expenses and even more doing fun tech stuff instead. If I'm writing my own mobile apps I get to keep the lions share of the net sales revenue, so I can end up making several thousand dollars on 10,000 words in an app. Which would you rather work for?

I do like to write new RPG adventures, and campaign stuff, and extra material for my games, that's just for self-satisfaction though these days.
Blackmoor grew from a single Castle to include, first, several adjacent Castles (with the forces of Evil lying just off the edge of the world to an entire Northern Province of the Castle and Crusade Society's Great Kingdom.

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Bradford C. Walker

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #69 on: February 07, 2015, 10:23:51 PM »
Quote from: Omega;814561
Atlas games by chance? Then wasnt just you.

That's another one on the list of screw-overs.

I contributed to Uncommon Character from Atlas and Relics & Rituals II from Sword & Sorcery Studios. (Also had an unattributed contribution to The Shop, from AEG.)

Ratman_tf

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #70 on: February 07, 2015, 11:12:48 PM »
Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;814436
I wonder if Apple or Google is better. Anyone else know anything about those?


I'm currently working a temp contract at Google. It's a sad revolving door situation where they bring in batches of temps, work them for two years, and then chuck them out. It's not hideous, but it is that kind of yukky atmosphere where I know I'm likely to leave in a few months, so why bother caring past that...
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Ratman_tf

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #71 on: February 07, 2015, 11:22:09 PM »
Quote from: TristramEvans;814508
ust goes back to my opinion that the roleplaying hobby doesn't need the roleplaying industry. Even if I didnt create my own games at this point, I could easily game for the rest of my life just on the material produced by independent other gamers, most of which they're perfectly happy to put online for free jut out of love for the hobby. D&D is a gateway drug, sure, but it doesn't match up with actual gamers introducing other people to gaming. The hobby could do just fine without it.

I agree. We get a few big fish like WOTC or GW on the wargaming side, but the only thing stopping me from playing 2nd edition, or Dungeon Crawl Classics is my ability to persuade my group. :D
I think there's an event horizon coming where a tipping point of people re-discover that they don't need to play Dungeons & Dragons(tm) to role-play. The OSR seems to be the tip of that iceberg.

If big companies want to stay relevant in the hobby, they're probably going to have to pay attention to the online presense, find out what people are sharing, copy it and put some polish on the product.
The notion of an exclusionary and hostile RPG community is a fever dream of zealots who view all social dynamics through a narrow keyhole of structural oppression.
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Shipyard Locked

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #72 on: February 08, 2015, 12:58:12 AM »
Quote from: Ratman_tf;814579

I think there's an event horizon coming where a tipping point of people re-discover that they don't need to play Dungeons & Dragons(tm) to role-play. The OSR seems to be the tip of that iceberg.


Have we explored this idea in its own thread? Because that could be an interesting thread. I feel we've talked about things similar to this idea, but not this idea directly.

EOTB

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #73 on: February 08, 2015, 01:46:13 AM »
Quote from: Ratman_tf;814579
I think there's an event horizon coming where a tipping point of people re-discover that they don't need to play Dungeons & Dragons(tm) to role-play. The OSR seems to be the tip of that iceberg

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;814591
Have we explored this idea in its own thread? Because that could be an interesting thread. I feel we've talked about things similar to this idea, but not this idea directly.

So wait, now the OSR is about why we don't need to play D&D?  Man, things really have come full circle!  

It's like the beer of the month club morphing into a 12-step program.
« Last Edit: February 08, 2015, 01:48:24 AM by EOTB »
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mAcular Chaotic

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glassdoor: WotC is a shitty workplace
« Reply #74 on: February 08, 2015, 02:54:36 AM »
Here's a good article about how Wizards went down the toilet: http://www.salon.com/2001/03/23/wizards/
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