Thanks for taking a risk by posting this Backgammon, it's the most coherent explanation I have heard to date.
For what it's worth I'll respond inline.
I hope I can get the quote tags working properly.
Since I happen to be in this thread and feeling slightly calm right now, I'll take a stab here. I'm warning you now though, you will in no way feel better after this. But you asked for it:
>How come their rules supplements are stuffed with more fluff than you can shake a stick at.?
It is YOUR OPINION that there is too much fluff. That is not a fact. Your opinion is not universally shared. You need to accept this fact.
No doubt, it's my opinion.
Not a universal one, but a common one.
I feel (and this could be wrong) if they spent less time authoring, editing and putting in fluff they could spend more time to get the rules right.
If you have a finite, constricted resource (editor time) then spend it where it matters most, getting the rules right.
This seems like basic logic when writing a RULE SYSTEM.
Perhaps its not so obvious from the other side of the table.
I'd like to see Catalyst change their mind about this.
Get the rules right, then add in fluff with whatever left over resources they have.
>What is the rational for that vs. putting it all in a coherent campaign sourcebook?
>For example CFD would have been far better served as it's own campaign sourcebook rather than strewing it's fluff across multiple rulebooks.
That is YOUR OPINION and is not a fact. Further than that, it is an editorial dictum that we writers do it that way. Jason believed this was the best way to push this metaplot and so instructed us to write that way. That was the mechanical process. I repeat that it is YOUR OPINION that you disliked this. It does not make it a fact.
True, my opinion no doubt.
However if a book's focus is, for example, Extractions (see Stolen Souls) then why spend so much of the book talking about something entirely different (CFD)?
See Hard Targets et al.
It seems to make no sense, their not CFD books.
But, in the end, it's my opinion, no doubt.
>Why can't they get their rules to work together without constant contradictions between books?
Different freelancers work on different things. So you know that story how Star Trek has this "bible" and everyone who works on anything gets fact checked so the unniverse is always ensured to be coherent? Yeah, we don't have that. We have a few fallible human beings that, with very little tools, try to make it all work. It pinches us all when we make a mistake like that. We hate it. We also do our best to make sure it doesn't happen. But it does. It doesn't happen super often though. I do not believe there are any means whatsoever that will see a reduction of that error rate, as the options are not affordable to CGL.
Why not employ a few freelancers to work as a "round table" that ensure rulebooks are coherently edited and work together rather than against each other?
Take the hours from the fluff, it's overwhelming (my opinion).
It would help the rules greatly.
>Why can't they focus on editing the rules in the rulebooks such that they are accurate and make sense (see Rigger 5.0's incomplete rules, contradictions on rules between the written description and tables)?
Different sections of each book are written by different authors, who do their best. Editors review the work, but only to a certain extent. Basically, there isn't the type of super in-depth cross-checking necessary to ensure super smooth books. Back in the old days, one author would write one book. It was easier for them to ensure super smooth consistency. But books aren't written like that anymore and that isn't going to change. So, you get more books faster with more diversity, but the downside is it's harder to be flawless in conherence.
Right.
So my response would be to focus my limited resources on getting stuff right, rather than making the problem worse.
See my recommendation above for pruning the hours spent on fluff and dedicating those hours to turning out accurate, well authored rules.
Produce fluff with left over man hours.
That approach could produce well written and edited rulebooks that have still have plenty of fluff.
See Battletech.
> Why don't they have errata out by now for the older books?
Quite frankly, that is a mystery. All I know is that it is not in the freelancer's hands. I know nothing more.
Fair nuff.
I have to respect you just for taking a risk and posting this.
But again, see battletech's well managed errata updates.
Clearly they know how to get this right, so why can't they spend some time to replicate this for shadowrun rather than paying for more fluff?
>Why does their customer service suck so terribly? (see posts in the forum here and elsewhere).
Don't know. Speculation extrapolated from what I know: because they do not have the qualitifed staff to properly service customers. That is unlikely to change due to the very profit-poor nature of the industry.
This is understandable to some extent (no one expects a person to answer a phone) but it does not explain why a customer service email address cannot answer and resolve missing items very quickly and easily.
>These are the basics of creating and managing a PnP RPG and Catalyst seems to be able to do ok with Battletech and yet they fail so miserably with Shadowrun.
IN YOUR UNQUALIFIED OPINION THAT HAS NEXT TO NO VISIBILITY IN THE PROCESSES AND IN THE NATURE OF RUNNING SUCH A BUSINESS. Just pointing that out again. Opinion, not fact.
Sure, it's my opinion.
However it is fact that they have focussed on fluff over accurate rules, customer service, errata, updated PDFs etc.
Personally I'd like to see them cut back fluff and spend the man hours where it counts, on getting rules right.
The fact that they are not makes me draw the conclusion (could be wrong) that fluff is very cheap to author and edit compared to making sure rules work, that books do not contradict each other and that rules are authored properly.
>Answering those questions would go a long way towards shedding some light on why their products are so poor for Srun.
Well, hope this helped.
Sure, it's great to see you engaged and providing some insight.
It would be nice if Catalyst themselves could do so.
>It might even help them internally to make themselves into a better company by asking the hard questions and getting the right people in the right positions instead of continuing to pump out more sub-standard work riddled with rules errors and horrific editing.
This is a good closing point. IRL, while I wear many hats, one of the things you could say I am is a business analyst. Optimizing businesses and their business processes is something I do, and do exceedingly well. So big disclaimer: I have NEVER discussed the intricacies of CGL business operation with anyone at CGL. This is PURE observation, from a very narrow window. That being said. what I observe is pretty simple: CGL, as a business, does not have the resources to change and improve. The people that are in place are mostly capped in their abilities, due to both raw knowledge and time available. To change, CGL needs to hire more people in more places. These people cost money. Money CGL does not have. And the return on investment WOULD NOT BE THERE. That is the most important point. CGL would likely go out of business if they attempted to significantly improve their processes.
So, improvements do happen. As I said in my previous post, some feedback is taken in. Some feedback HAS been taken in. But overall, you need to understand the business of publishing RPG books is a piss-poor business that operates with pennies. There isn't much room to make big changes we can all see are needed. There just isn't the money to do so.
Yeah I understand we play a game that is tiny compared to the revenue generated by video games.
But if battletech can get it mostly right how come Shadowrun can't?
How come they focus so much on fluff and not on getting things right?
Those are questions worth answering.
