Recruitment Exercise - Good for the Black Hand?

johannes wrote:

I get that Jeff is a nice person and helps new player who get zero VPs in you local games and tournaments.

Johannes,

Have you ever considered that fault extends beyond Jeff Kuta? While I certainly support their efforts in making new cards, they've clearly crossed several lines, and acted rashly and counter-productively.

However, your reactions and that of the VKEN have been extremely unprofessional and childish. This situation could have been handled if you had actually addressed Jeff's original complaint (lack of development on the set and then the designer throwing out the work done while absent) in even a slightly appropriate manner. Instead, the VKEN has doubled-down, and you and your buddies have made sneered and howled at any mention of Kuta, PCK, or even the slightest criticism of the VKEN organization.

The above quote is a perfect example of this. When anyone disagrees, you attack not just them, but an entire play group associated with them, just for daring to speak up. As the supposed official mouthpiece of this dead CCG, you should seek to further interest in the game rather than lashing out at the perceived outsiders, and making this game you own little fiefdom. Your glib dismissal of the Shodan is symptomatic of this dysfunctional organization that has refused to engage in any productive discussion of the direction of the game, and instead continues to pander to the old boys club.

I want this game to have a successfully afterlife, but continuing this vendetta is childish. If Jeff Kuta complains about the card design, let him, address him politely, and then ignore him. That's all it takes. If he makes it personal, then warn him of the rules. If he persists, lock or delete the post. That's all it takes.

I would like to see the VKEN take careful steps towards professionalization and legitimization of this organization. The first step is to stop treating it as a clubhouse and treat it like a fucking job. The next step I would like to see is some actual modding and rule for this forum. Delete posts with personal attacks, lock flame wars, and let some actual discussion take place. This is no way for an organization to function. This forum could be an enormously valuable tool, but instead of actual discussion, you've let petty squabbles root out anything of value.

Now, is it my turn to attacked for being young, not winning tournaments, and being outside the boys club?

Count wrote:

This situation could have been handled if you had actually addressed Jeff's original complaint (lack of development on the set and then the designer throwing out the work done while absent) in even a slightly appropriate manner.

What exactly do you call addressing? As far as I, as a player, am concerned, problems were addressed. Had they not been, the PCK set would be called Danse Macabre, and it is precisely to avoid this that measures were taken. If you want to manage a successful project:
1) you don't validate a defective product, even if the guys who made it are really nice guys who put a lot of effort into it. This is not about assigning blame to anyone, this is about focusing on the one thing that matters: the final result.
2) you don't give the boss hat to someone with a previous track record of making poor choices when left on his own.

There are certainly plenty of things that went wrong with the design process, and Jeff was right to raise awareness, however the bottom line remains: PCK made bad cards (I don't recall reading them myself, but I will trust Hugh on the subject, and the 2 released PCK sets are hints enough), and the solution to any problem was certainly NOT to give them free reign to make more bad cards.

Count wrote:

When anyone disagrees, you attack not just them, but an entire play group associated with them, just for daring to speak up. As the supposed official mouthpiece of this dead CCG, you should seek to further interest in the game rather than lashing out at the perceived outsiders, and making this game you own little fiefdom. Your glib dismissal of the Shodan is symptomatic of this dysfunctional organization that has refused to engage in any productive discussion of the direction of the game, and instead continues to pander to the old boys club.

If you read the whole thread, Shodan's post was just factually incorrect. I don't think there was anything else to say about it. Johannes never publically attacked anyone, during or after his chairmanship, even in retaliation. I don't know where someone could get a different idea.

Now, is it my turn to attacked for being young, not winning tournaments, and being outside the boys club?

I don't know where this is coming from. Do you feel like VEKN doesn't accept new players? Is that feeling caused by certain members or by the community as a whole?

johannes wrote:

Just to get the facts straight, the design goal in regards to power level was : do not make wallpaper cards, every card needs to be playable in a tournament environment. I am not sure what "having an impact" is supposed to mean (since I never said it), but the design goal was not to make a set of cards that immediately generate a number of winning decks to please people. I think the set is a job very well done in that regard, naturally quite a number of TWDA decks will surface using the new cards because people are eager to play them.

Johannes,

Those are the facts as you believe them to be true. Unfortunately, I can't comb the several threads on the Design Team forum to see exactly what was said. Nor did I keep an exact transcript of the now infamous phone call I had with Ben Peal. Perhaps this is where Ben said as such to me regarding tournament level cards during our two hour conversation. I don't believe he will ever want to publicly discuss that conversation because of the extremely poor outcome afterward for which he shares a significant portion of the blame. I asked him no less than three times if he and I could come up with some positive takeaway--*any* positive takeaway--of the call to share with the rest of those involved. He was unable to do so. But that's neither here nor there now.

The project drifted from being a free "labor of love" by volunteers to one that some people might profit from. This was not communicated at all to the people doing the actual work. Perhaps it was even kept from those who were putting in the time, perhaps until the work was completed. Anyway, it should be no surprise that the most productive 3 of the 5 Design Team members left as their contributions were marginalized in favor of those who were in the know (or at least that is how things seemed).

So, I stand by my comments about your ulterior motives regarding having high powered cards being good marketing for a potential business model. Noble as those motives may be, and worthy as it is to try and get V:TES restarted, the secrecy and ill communication from Spring 2012 is still very much part of the backstory of what is going on. Specifically, you and Ben were unable or unwilling to keep the Design Team together, and that precipitated any "split" in the player base.

Say what you want on the public forms about the truth and the facts, but I think everyone here knows that there are always at least two sides to every story.

jamesatzephyr wrote:

There wasn't a communication problem. You've communicated, apparently accurately, that you think flopping out 4 Pander bleeding for 2 at +1 stealth on turn one is a positive move for the game. Why the game needs to be dragged back into a world where weenies can make life very, very unpleasant for their initial prey irrespective of whether they get the GW or not when incrementally work has been done to stop weenie decks causing that sort of devestation, I have no idea.

But since you're claiming the PCK think this is a positive move, it demonstrates that your design process is wrong.

That is your opinion. You are entitled to it.

Can anyone think of a two-card combo usable by a certain class of vampire which shuts down infinite bleeds for 2 at 1 stealth by 1-cap vampires?

As I would hope you recognise Jeff, quantity is no measure for quality and productivity measures can include times required to make sub-optimal products into saleable products. From the public comments made, I suspect that the former VEKN Board decided that the productivity of those three (as measured by the amount of quality product produced) was not up to their expectations.


You have still not addressed any of my comments regarding your methods.