Guardians of the Faith, a PDF VTES Set by PCK

ICL wrote:

Laibon need far more holes filled.

Which mean we should first get Sabbat finished, then Anarch finished, then Laibon finished. I prefer two sect well done than four with three unfinished

blackday wrote:

I agree with Erol and Daidalos. If you've been asked to leave the VEKN design team, then that leaves any work for "official cards" in their hands and not somebody else's.

Not true. VEKN does not own the rights to VTES, so anything they do is not "official". They have the advantage of player support, which validates what they do: their authority is de facto, not de jure. PCK found out that there was no formal way for them as volunteers to address differences with VEKN.

Should VTES be player-run with some kind of due process until a new publisher emerges or shoud VTES be run by a small group with the right politics? PCK thought it should be the former, while most players thought it should be the latter. I admired Jeff Kuta's call for a more transparent, inclusive system of governance of the game, but he just didn't have the votes, so-to-speak.

VEKN has a lot of history and brand loyalty from players. Many, like Blackday, see VEKN as being "official", when it isn't truly official. I think players like having an authority in place, and most don't want to think too strongly past that. Since most players support VEKN it is essentially official.

There is no reason why an alternative organized group could not try to do things differently than VEKN, but practically it would be difficult and would require the right group of people to get it off the ground with any chance of success. I don't think PCK considered forming a splinter group, which is probably the only way their designs would ever have any influence.

Frankly, I have seen some awesome player-designed sets of cards on this board with great finished artwork, like this one that dealt with the Inconnu (www.vekn.net/index.php/forum/30-expansion-sets-a-card-ideas/8865-the-inconnu. Glaswanderer has disappeared from the board, which is a shame). But no one I know has been playing with any homebrewed PDF cards. It's really a shame, but we do prefer our cards to be official, don't we?

On a positive note, the whole affair seems to have made VEKN more responsive to the community and more active.

If the discussion is absurd, feel free to abstain.

Here is an absurd statement: PCK is trying to "destroy what the VEKN...[is] trying to do...". Johannes has already said that the cards in the new set differ significantly from those in the PCK set. From what I understand, VEKN did not want to go with the creative direction of PCK, so Ben Peal designed different cards for the new set.

As I noted, there have many people who have submitted small sets of cards on this board. You attitude is negative towards them. For instance, instead of commenting on the quality of the cards at the link I mentioned, you made an unrelated comment.

I don't know what the permission status is for that art. It's certainly nice to look at. I don't think anyone is talking about making money from them.

Instead of encouraging fan creativity, you are obsessed with authenticity. Those who control the license for this game are not producing cards. Any cards not created by the license-holders are inauthentic by definition, including those produced by VEKN.

You say that you "don't go around making a fool of myself", meaning that you don't go around submitting your own fan-created cards for public consumption. I'm not saying that I endorse the PCK set, but I do endorse their right to create fan-based cards for public review and private consumption.

Certainly there are hard feelings between PCK and VEKN, but VEKN does not have any monopoly on fan-created cards. They have a monopoly on cards that they will accept for use at VEKN-sanctioned tournaments. It's not the same thing.

VEKN holds a monopoly on tournament play, so non-VEKN sets created by non-VEKN players cannot "destroy" the creation of new cards by VEKN for tournament play.

Ashur wrote:

This discussion is absurd. I too would like more transparency in the VEKN (and the _official_ card design), but I don´t go around making a fool of myself, trying to destroy what the VEKN and 115 playtesters are trying to do just because I can´t have what I can´t have. It´s like children. Kids in the playground.

I hear the same tone deployed a lot when protesters close down a street for a march: "Look at them. Bunch of entitled brats. Get back to work." Well, if they have a real reason to protest, let them. In this case, I'd say that if Jeff and the others have something interesting to offer the community, then let them. I don't think that their set is somehow going to cause the community to implode. A little discourse, especially about creativity and government, can be productive.

DeathInABottle wrote:

In this case, I'd say that if Jeff and the others have something interesting to offer the community, then let them.

I don't see removing pieces from a collaborative work and release them first to claim them as your own, rushing the development process in the way, as "offering" anything to anyone.

For the next set they plan, if it ever goes through, it will be a different story.

A little discourse, especially about creativity and government, can be productive.

Jeff's comments were made a long time ago and I agreed with a lot of them. But in the light of recent developments, the biggest mistake the VEKN made was not anything he pointed: it was to trust people and not make them sign a copyright cession agreement before starting to work. At least the VEKN has learnt something. Maybe you can count that as PCK's contribution to the community