Embezzlement in Catalyst

[Panzerfaust 150]

http://catalystgamelabs.com/2010/04/21/ ... bs-update/

And the shuffling of the deck chairs continues.

I don't buy it for a minute. Hi, I'm new. I mostly plan to lurk, but I thought I'd at least contribute some to the discussion.

[Juton]

Welcome aboard Panzerfaust, thanks for the link.

I'm curious what Catalyst's current strategy is. I think it's a good idea for them to placate their freelancers, because if they want to work with them in the future they kind of need to. But why not hit the magic button and start a new company or allude to bigger changes to come? Basically do they think that this company is going to weather the storm or do they want to postpone declaring the inevitable for some reason?

[Jacob_Orlove]

http://catalystgamelabs.com/2010/04/21/ ... bs-update/

And the shuffling of the deck chairs continues.

I don't buy it for a minute. Hi, I'm new. I mostly plan to lurk, but I thought I'd at least contribute some to the discussion.

That last paragraph is quite something:

Finally, as some of you may have noticed, we’ve just changed the legal text and logos on all our appropriate sites that reference Shadowrun and BattleTech from WizKids to The Topps Company, Inc., per their direction. We’ve been in contact with Topps for weeks regarding these situations. We are currently in negotiations to re-secure the Shadowrun and BattleTech licenses.

[mean_liar]

Is this different from a previous iteration?

http://www.shadowrun4.com/legal.shtml

I didn't notice the Topps logo before in the lower left-hand corner of the main page:
http://www.shadowrun4.com
...but I don't know if that's because I just didn't notice it, or because it's a change.

[Username17]

It was simple enough for me to understand at least conceptually.
Don't make him start with the complicated medical sciency stuff again, i usually can't follow with that <.<;,

Too late!

A neuron isn't exactly digital or analog in th way w normally think of the subject, because it doesn't store a value of 0 or 1. All it does is send a value of 1 or not send a value at all. A neuron is at any moment either firing or not firing, but information is created by the arrangement of neurons (which is way beyond analog) and the rate at which the neurons fire, which has everything to do with their physical and chemical environment and is really complex.

But here's the thing: a neuron still only fires or doesn't fire. And they don't fire by having to pass direct current from one end to the other. They fire by flipping voltage gated ion channels due to the depolarization of any part of the neuron, which in turn causes the ions outside the cell to flood in to the next segment (depolarizing it), which opens the next set of voltage gated ion channels and so on all the way down to the end. Triggering a neuron to the "on" state while it is off is a simple matter of causing a 20 millivolt depolarization at any point along the entire length of the neuron. Preventing a neuron from successfully firing entails merely a similarly sized hyperpolarization at any point along the same neuron.

There's been some ranting about Ohm's Law, but that honestly doesn't really hit very hard, since we're talking about using X-Rays, Radio-Waves and other "lesser known rays" to transmit signal from the projector to the target, the total resistance encountered is actually very low - and not amazingly distance dependent. We're talking about inducing very tiny electrical changes in very small areas. The actual energy involved is much less than the fluctuations in a human's own magnetic fields. If this shit worked at all, Technomancers would be totally reasonable.

Of course, this is fantasy science. It wouldn't actually work like that. Yes, you can externally signal the auditory nerve and the optic nerve to represent any sight or sound, and put people into a Lawnmower Man or Tron-like universe. But there's no reason to do that. The number of neurons involved in sensation is very much more than would be required to send someone into seizure. Realistically speaking, incapacitating or killing someone is much much easier than getting any usable information out of their head or projecting any sensory information at all.

However, game mechanically, we put all kinds of limits on Black Hammer, because that stuff is story ending. In reality this shit wouldn't work like Lawnmower Man, Tron, The Matrix, or any Gibson story. It would work like that episode of Fringe where the neurologist chick had a light show that made humans go blank for an hour. But we choose to make things more exciting, with virtual fencing like in Snowcrash. You know, because it's a game, that makes stories.

-Username17

[Username17]

Is this different from a previous iteration?

http://www.shadowrun4.com/legal.shtml

I didn't notice the Topps logo before in the lower left-hand corner of the main page:
http://www.shadowrun4.com
...but I don't know if that's because I just didn't notice it, or because it's a change.

That was totally brand new, yeah. Also, when they first put it up, the Topps logo was still a link to WizKids!

As for the "65 payments" thing, that counts each payment for each book separately. So we aren't talking about paying off 65 creditors, we are talking about putting out all of the payments to creative staff on five books (one in production and four that were already printed and sold for 30 days or more). It's not exactly a moment of triumph here - they finally managed to do something they were contractually obligated to do months ago, they are still deeply in debt, and they are still habitually failing to pay their debts.

Let's take the case of WildFire, which I'm fairly impartial about because I honestly don't give a rat's ass about CthulhuTech. We go back in time to the beginning of the year, when they were supposed to get their royalty checks for the books Catalyst printed and sold on their behalf. That money did not come. Keep in mind that this wasn't some flat fee or something, this was money from the books that Catalyst printed and sold, which means that all they had to do was hand over part of the money that was handed to them by the distributors to WildFire. And instead, the money just... didn't show up.

WildFire asks for it in increasingly insistent tones, and of course rumors of the embezzlement are ringing loudly in their ears. When the check doesn't get written and then doesn't get written again (or perhaps gets written and bounces, I'm not sure which category WildFire was falling into at that point), they put their foot down. They put their foot down in February, so Catalyst has already been sitting on their money for months.

And what do they do to put the foot down? They deny Catalyst the right to print additional books and get them to agree to sell off remaining stock to pay off the debt. And yes, Catalyst continues to sell CthulhuTech books. And yet... none of that money goes to WildFire. Catalyst pockets every cent. March comes around, the embezzlement numbers go viral, and WildFire turns up the heat even more.

What do they do to turn up the heat even more? They deny Catalyst the rights to sell any of the books and offer to take Cthulhutech books in lieu of owed money. Catalyst agrees to send them the materials and WildFire sits back down and waits for payment. And yet... when the remaining books arrive, it's not enough to cover the debt. Catalyst had in fact sold more or printed less than they claimed, which means that WildFire had been lied to again and shortchanged again by Catalyst. By mid-April they had no more leverage left on Catalyst and were still owed tens of thousands of dollars.

So they went to court. Posthuman Studios and Topps Inc. are both also owed Royalties, but both companies have been keeping it closer to their chest what lines of bullshit they have been fed by the Colemans over the last year (and in Topps' case, three years). Right now, WildFire is in line to get money court ordered into their pockets and Topps is not. But Topps does not make over two hundred million dollars a year because it allows people to fuck with it.

Remember, they agreed in principle to pay for the books that got holds placed on them when I first broke the story in March. Meaning that I strongly suspect that they are paying it now because they finally suckered someone else into giving them a loan. Paying for the new book is just bizarre. I think it's some sort of weird guilt trip to try to convince Topps that they would have less money coming in if they killed the golden goose by cutting them off in May.

-Username17

[Starmaker]

Also, when they first put it up, the Topps logo was still a link to WizKids!

The Topps logo image is still named bottom_wizkids.png.

[Wesley Street]

The Topps logo image is still named bottom_wizkids.png.

That's a common lazy website designer tactic; scale a new image down to the size of the one to be replaced and give the file an identical name. It's a bad coding practice but not unusual.

[Fuchs]

I guess copy/paste is too much work?

[souran]

However, game mechanically, we put all kinds of limits on Black Hammer, because that stuff is story ending. In reality this shit wouldn't work like Lawnmower Man, Tron, The Matrix, or any Gibson story. It would work like that episode of Fringe where the neurologist chick had a light show that made humans go blank for an hour. But we choose to make things more exciting, with virtual fencing like in Snowcrash. You know, because it's a game, that makes stories.

-Username17

This. Also, since when did rpg books become peer reviewed journals. Anybody arguing about "teh sciceence" should be forced to play starwars instead of shadowrun, because in starwars people track speed using only units of distance an no units of time.

[Clutch9800]

http://catalystgamelabs.com/2010/04/21/ ... bs-update/

And the shuffling of the deck chairs continues.

I don't buy it for a minute. Hi, I'm new. I mostly plan to lurk, but I thought I'd at least contribute some to the discussion.

You shouldn't be here J. W.

I don't think this is your kind of place.

Clutch

[Clutch9800]

Mr. Trollman,

Can I ask you a personal question?

Word 'round the campfire has it that you are a medical student in Prague.

What is your nationality? The reason I ask is because your American English is flawless. Right down to the slang.

Clutch

[Roy]

Mr. Trollman,

Can I ask you a personal question?

Word 'round the campfire has it that you are a medical student in Prague.

What is your nationality? The reason I ask is because your American English is flawless. Right down to the slang.

Clutch

I think he's from the US and just moved there. But I'm not sure.

[mean_liar]

...Topps does not make over two hundred million dollars a year because it allows people to fuck with it.

I wouldn't be so sure about this.

As an organization I think Topps could drop a hammer on someone, but they're not a hivemind. The Shadowrun line falls into someone's portfolio and that person is managing it according to their personal skill and responsibilities, and it's entirely possible that they have not been watching their SR-associated revenue closely or effectively because it's outside their ordinary revenue stream.

So for that hammer to fall, it has to escape the orbit of whoever was charged with watching it in the first place, then to that guy's supervisor, and through that stage to one or two more internal processes, and THEN it would go to legal. So if Topps hasn't really gotten wind of this until now, then the "Topps takes a shit on CGL" event could still conceivably be at least six months away.

[Akula]

Except they have to renew the license to print the damn books in May. So while real legal action may be some time coming, they'll be shitting on CGL much sooner than six months.

I guess if they lose the license CGL could just continue as normal, until a new company got rolling. It would only be one more illegal and slimy thing on their record.

[Username17]

Mr. Trollman,

Can I ask you a personal question?

Word 'round the campfire has it that you are a medical student in Prague.

What is your nationality? The reason I ask is because your American English is flawless. Right down to the slang.

Clutch

I am originally from California. I am a medical student in Prague, I have a Canadian girlfriend; but I'll be returning to North America in July to visit family for a few months.

But yes, I do speak English as a fucking native. Complete with the ability to add swear-word empathics into sentences in the grammatically appropriate places. Mluvím &#269;eské nedob&#345;e. Byl jsem v praze p&#345;ed t&#345;i roky, a u&#269;il se jsem jayzk jen trošku. Lek je první.

-Username17

[Panzerfaust 150]

http://catalystgamelabs.com/2010/04/21/ ... bs-update/

And the shuffling of the deck chairs continues.

I don't buy it for a minute. Hi, I'm new. I mostly plan to lurk, but I thought I'd at least contribute some to the discussion.

You shouldn't be here J. W.

I don't think this is your kind of place.

Clutch

Just a private person now, and as I said, I mostly plan to play nice and lurk. Aren't you doing the same?

[Clutch9800]

http://catalystgamelabs.com/2010/04/21/ ... bs-update/

And the shuffling of the deck chairs continues.

I don't buy it for a minute. Hi, I'm new. I mostly plan to lurk, but I thought I'd at least contribute some to the discussion.

You shouldn't be here J. W.

I don't think this is your kind of place.

Clutch

Just a private person now, and as I said, I mostly plan to play nice and lurk. Aren't you doing the same?

Just funnin ya.

[Doom]

Should better introductions be in order here?

[Clutch9800]

Nah,

Panzer and I are just a couple of guys trying to make it in the White Mans world.

Clutch

[Kaelik]

Pretty clearly they used to be involved in Shadowrun and CGL in some sense or another.

[Crissa]

I speak Czech ill. I was in Prague three years ago, and I learned a little jayzk. The drug is the first.

-Crissa

[duo31]

So what books are being held up / may not see print?

I'm still upset about corp war not being released.

[Juton]

Pretty clearly they used to be involved in Shadowrun and CGL in some sense or another.

There used to be a Clutch that ran Fanpro's convention demo teams, at least for Battletech. For those not in the know Fanpro used to run Catalyst's properties before their was a Catalyst.

[koz]

I speak Czech ill. I was in Prague three years ago, and I learned a little jayzk. The drug is the first.

-Crissa

I'm guessing 'jayzk' means 'language', or, in this particular case, 'of the language'. Not sure what the fuck the whole 'drug is the first' thing is all about, though.