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Tales of a Tech Admin


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Why I Left the C3V

Posted February 26th, 2016 at 12:15 AM by Xotli
Why I Left the C3V

It is with great sadness and a touch of bitterness that I stepped down from my position in the C3V earlier today. I joined the C3V on its Editing team a little over 5 years ago—less than a month after its inception. I wasn’t the first Editor chosen (that honor belongs to Agent Minivann), but I think I could make an argument for being the second; certainly I’m the only current Editor who has been on that team since the beginning.

For much of that time I’ve been very pleased with what we were able to accomplish, and I’m still happy with some aspects of the project, and several of its members. But the parts that I enjoy have been steadily decreasing throughout the years, and lately I’ve come to dread having to post on C3V issues, and that’s not how one should feel about anything that has to do with one’s favorite game. I still want to think of Heroscape as a fun hobby that I share with my children and friends. So I feel like I have to get out now, before it gets worse.

I’m not the first C3V member to step down. I suspect—though I must stress that I do not know for sure—that some (perhaps many) of the others to do so have similar reasons to my own. For various and sundry reasons, no one has shared those reasons publicly. I, however, have decided to do so. If you don’t want to know what goes on behind the curtain, feel free to stop reading now and go on about your business, enjoying the C3V units as you always have. But, for reasons that will become clear as I continue, I felt that the folks who stand to receive the bulk of the benefit provided by the C3V—you, the fans—deserve to know some of the pros and cons of how things get done. It will not be a short story, and it will not be unbiased, despite my honest efforts to make it so: one’s bias colors everything one knows and says, whether we like it or not. But I hope you will find it enlightening nonetheless.

First, we must start with ...


A Little History

Without going into too much detail, the C3V was originally organized by IAmBatman and Griffin, working in concert with Grungebob. Some decisions were made during the early stages that would impact the operation of the C3V in some fundamental ways:
  • First and most importantly, the structure of the C3V: it’s divided into departments. Every C3V member belongs to one of these departments: Design, Art, Editing, and so forth. Overseeing all the other departments is the ERB: the Executive Review Board.
  • New C3V members are elected by a majority of the existing members whenever there is an open position, which essentially only happens when someone steps down (or is voted out, although that’s very rare).
  • Unlike the C3G, which was in some ways a model for the new group, it was decided that the C3V would conduct its business in secret, in a private forum so the public would see only the finished product. People don’t like to see the sausage being made, I suppose.
  • But Grungebob wanted to insure that the fans always had a window into the process. This was the seed planted that would eventually sprout the Public Access Member program (or PAM, as we always liked to call it).
There are a lot of other pieces to the complex machine that is the C3V, but this is enough to illustrate the problems I’m going to discuss. In truth, most of the other parts worked out pretty well, which is precisely why I won’t bore you with explaining them. I freely admit I’m cherry-picking the dubious aspects, so take with as much salt as you need.

Now, if you’ve ever had any experience with small, volunteer groups that are mostly self-organized—homeowners’ associations, church social committees, high school clubs like the chess club or AV club, neighborhood groups like book clubs or knitting circles, small town Red Cross chapters or volunteer fire departments, scouting troops, that sort of thing—you’ll already know what I’m about to tell you. These groups tend to be dominated by those people who want to be in charge. Everyone cares about the project, and everyone wants to accomplish the goals—having a successful bake sale, or writing the neighborhood rules, or organizing a successful summer camp, or whatever—but most of the members have a limited amount of time to devote, and most of them really don’t want to be in charge of anything ... it’s too much responsibility and stress, and they’ve got other things to worry about. There are two quotes that I’m always reminded of at this juncture.

The first is from Douglas Adams:
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of who you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.

To summarize: it is a well-known and much lamented fact that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
The second you’ve never heard before, but you’ll recognize the spirit of it. I had a business partner once who I told that I wanted to run our company without any internal politics. He replied that any time you put three or more people together, you have politics. And he was right, although I didn’t care to admit it at the time.

At this stage in my life, I’ve been involved in school groups and in church groups, I’ve belonged to clubs and associations, I’ve been in management positions and been the employee representative for work groups, I’ve been on a sports team, an academic team, the yearbook staff of my high school, I’ve organized things for my children at public schools, private schools, and for homeschool groups, I’ve served on the board of directors of an organization for professionals and I’ve run my own company with a couple dozen employees. I’ve been very deeply involved in at least two online communities (including this one) and more lightly involved in several others, and I’ve belonged to at least 3 different gaming groups, at various levels of being in charge of activities, including being a DM for several different roleplaying campaigns and helping to organize my share of Heroscape tournaments. And the one thing all those groups had in common was politics. And, in pretty much all those cases, they were run by those people who got a kick out of telling other people what to do. Hell, even in my own company, which I founded, funded, and never owned less than a majority of, I usually ceded control to other people who wanted to be in charge more than I did. Not that that’s saying much, because I never wanted to be in charge of much of anything. All the best leaders are reluctant leaders, I think. But they are not the most common leaders.

Now, most of the groups that you will be familiar with, along the same lines as the ones I outline above, have a few structural similarities that limit the amount of damage any one person can do. Let’s take the example of a homeowner’s association, or a board of directors, or a local governmental committee (such as a planning commission). Nearly all these bodies are composed of individuals who are elected to the position, and nearly all of them hold meetings which are open to the public. If I have to appear before my local planning commission, and I feel like something underhanded is going on in the meeting, if all else fails I can at least decide that I’m going to run for the next open seat on that commission and try to get in there and make a difference personally.

But the C3V is built in a way that makes that sort of thing problematic. First of all, nothing is open to the public, so the public can’t see if there are things going on that they might not approve of. And secondly, not only are there no term limits for C3V members, there are no terms. That means that the “next open seat” might literally never come.

But it’s actually worse than that. Let’s say that I was unhappy with the way the ERB conducted things. Now, I’ve personally been known to claim that the ERB has way too much influence over many aspects of the C3V’s operation, but, to be fair, most of the folks in the ERB have disagreed with that statement. But set that aside for a moment: say I was unhappy with the situation and decided I wanted to change it by trying to convince my fellow C3V members (who are, you may recall, the only people who get to vote) to elect me to the ERB. First I have to wait for someone currently in the ERB to step down, which, as I noted above, might never happen. But let’s say it does: the first thing is, the number of members of any given department is not set by the rules, so the ERB might decide they just won’t replace the outgoing member at all. (In fact, that’s not a hypothetical: it’s already happened once.) Even if they do, there’s no set procedure for how the member will be replaced, so what typically happens is the current ERB members get together, in private (meaning, in private from the already-private forum), decide who they want, and announce the candidate. Then we all get to vote, and theoretically some group of us might vote “no,” but that’s kind of rude—it’s not Candidate Joe’s fault that I personally thought I could do a better job—even amongst those who were aware that I was considering myself for the job, which is probably not enough of the group to make a difference anyway. And I’m not trying to single out the ERB here: this is the way all the departments do it (including mine) ... via what in American politics is commonly referred to as “back-room deals,” with the current members trying to come up with a name that they’re pretty sure the rest of the group won’t object to but won’t rock the boat too much (meaning they basically agree with however the remaining department members want to do things), and maybe some of the other departments will send a few PMs saying “hey, who are you considering?” and “I think you should get this person!” and various other attempts to lobby for their favorite candidate, but in the end the department members just end up choosing someone they like and it’s very unlikely that there will be any pushback on it. And in fact, in the entire history of the C3V, not a single candidate has failed to get elected once their name was put forth.

Now there are two very important things to consider about this situation. The first is that I don’t want you to take it literally: I actually have never tried to get onto the ERB, primarily because of my aforementinoed dislike of being in charge of things. But the important takeaway is that I couldn’t even if I wanted to, and I feel fairly confident in saying that because at least two people that I know of have suggested me for an ERB position at various times and yet I was never even asked if I was interested in serving.

But the more important thing here is that this sort of a process by its very nature produces conformity. It stamps out diversity of opinions with a viciousness that dictators are jealous of. It’s completely democratic, and yet it’s perfect at censoring all disagreement. And the thing about eliminating disagreements in a creative project is that you lose so much that is vital to the project’s success. C3V has always been a fairly big tent: not big enough to hold the superheroes, of course, but aside from that, pretty big. Lots of diverse playstyles and viewpoints were listened to, and respected, and honored. We never produced only units that were competitive on small maps in tourney situations. We produced units that interacted with glyphs, and units that were good in large point-total armies, and units that were terrain-specific, and units that weren’t competitive but just plain fun. We produced units that broke the “rules” because all of us had different concepts of what the “rules” were. Should it be a rule that no unit should ever be more expensive than Jotun? Hello, Bramcephys. Should it be a rule that a unit should never be allowed to make a normal attack and a special attack in the same turn? Not if Mok has anything to say about it. Certainly no unit should ever have 4 powers, except for Sonya, and she doesn’t really count because one of hers is a negative power. And, yet: the Deathwings. On all these units and many many more there were angry voices raised in the halls of the C3V by folks who felt these principles were inviolate. But other voices—diverse voices—spoke up in favor, and there was lively debate, and in the end enough were swayed that the units survived. And of course there were times when the units didn’t survive, and times when they did but they probably shouldn’t have (almost everyone still in the C3V agrees that the “blended turn” mechanic of Omegacron was a bridge too far, despite the fact that he’s awesome fun to play), but the point is, the diversity of the voices is what made all those units possible. If all the opinions start to conform, we lose out on the opportunity for rule-breakers, and our big tent turns into a small teepee. And I personally believe the project as a whole suffers for it.

Of course, there’s one thing that conformity is really awesome at. Which bring us to ...


The Need for Speed

In every project that you need to accomplish in life, be it a work project, a school project, a home gardening project, or anything else, you will face a fundamental dichotomy: do it fast, or get it right. Some people have a natural instinct for getting things right. Others have a natural instinct for doing things fast. Neither of those is right ... or to be more precise, both are right, and both are wrong. You need a balance. If you do it fast and care nothing for getting it right, you will produce sloppy work that will not stand the test of time. If you get it right and completely ignore the issue of speed, you will spend forever trying to achieve perfection and never produce anything at all. In a good project, there will be people who crack the whip ceaselessly and demand you get to the finish line. And there will also be people who fight tooth and nail to get it right, and slow down the process to achieve quality. Ideally there’s a perfect balance between the two groups. But if that balance shifts, the project suffers.

I happen to be a “get it right” person. I consider it my job (whether at work, in family matters, or in the C3V) to say, “whoa, let’s slow down and actually think about this before we go off half-cocked.” I know that I slow things down. I consider it a desireable quality. On the other hand, I also know that I should never be in charge of things, because then nothing will ever get finished. I need someone who wants things to go faster faster faster, to balance me out.

Unfortunately, I feel like those people in the C3V who were helping to balance me out are now too much in power. I’m not the first “get it right” person to leave the project—just the latest one. And there are a few left, to be sure, but even some of those are grumbling that the constant battles are not worth the effort. The “do it fast” people have taken over. And I believe this has been a deliberate effort on their part. I’m sure that some of them even felt like this was doing the right thing for the project: after all, we have been criticized (and have criticized ourselves) for taking years to produce some figures. And “get it right” folks such as myself will argue that those C3V units that took the longest to produce are our best work, while those that flew through the process are weaker, but no one (not even me) can really argue with the fact that asking C3V fans to wait a year or more between the time a figure is announced and the time the card is released is a terrible process. It’s just that, given various factors, it’s the best we’ve been able to come up with. (It’s reminiscent of that infamous Churchill quote that democracy is the worst form of goverment, except for all the others that have been tried.) If there were a way to reduce that amount of time without significantly impacting quality, I would be all about it. But I don’t believe there is.

And the problem with the “do it fast” approach, when not appropriately balanced, is that it lives (and dies) by the old aphorism “the perfect is the enemy of the good enough.” Which is certainly true. Unfortunately, it’s also true that the good enough is the enemy of doing things that you can be proud of, producing things that will last ... the “good enough” is the enemy of the high quality that I believe C3V fans have come to expect, and to respect. Of course, I could be wrong. Maybe the fanbase out there would be perfectly happy with crappier units that they got hold of faster. In fact, I’m sure at least some folks would be—it’s not like the C3V leadership is composed of the only “do it fast” folks in existence, after all. But that’s not the output that I personally want the C3V to be associated with.

And perhaps the most frustrating thing to me about this whole situation is that all these efforts—deliberately reshaping the group membership, instituting policies that restrict the ability of the group to comment on problems, gradual exclusion of all public participation in the project that involves having an actual vote in the process—none of them have actually worked. I mean, it’s like the old joke about whatever horrible dictator you’re discussing: “but at least he made the trains run on time.” If all these things which I’m presenting as so terrible at least resulted in the process actually speeding up significantly, that would be a powerful rebuttal to my concerns. But, in truth, nothing has gotten faster. (In fact, I could make a decent argument that some things have gotten slower. But I don’t want to get sidetracked.) I can’t see any evidence that units are going through the system any faster than they were before, and I don’t believe anyone else can provide such evidence either.

Of course, maybe it’s all been me the whole time. Perhaps I am the one holding everything up, and, now that I’m gone, things will start moving lightning fast. Maybe.

But don’t hold your breath.

And then there are the ...


Smoke-Filled Back Rooms

You know, the cliché of smoke-filled back rooms is a cliché for a reason. Democracy is messy, and it can be excruciatingly painful to get a decent-sized group of people to agree on something. People who want to get things done (especially those “do it fast” folks I talked about before, and please remember that I am saying that those folks are absolutely vital to accomplishing anything) can be forgiven for organizing smaller, more nimble groups to actually accomplish things, then present those results to the group at large as a fait accompli. Ideally this is done with the full knowledge of the larger group, such as a committee formed by a board of directors, or by a parliamentary body. But sometimes it happens behind the scenes, and, in the non-virtual world, I’m sure it often does happen in back rooms, many of which may very well be filled with smoke.

For example, I said above that there have been deliberate attempts to change the composition of the group. How I can make a statement like that with such confidence? Well, simple: there are three reasons.
  • I know of several people who left the group who reported being encouraged to do so by the “do it fast” faction: some subtly, some overtly, but all directly.
  • I know of at least one person who was rebuffed by the “do it fast” faction in their attempt to join the group, in a department where we desperately needed people. You would think that we wouldn’t turn away volunteers in that situation, but not only did this faction do so, they did so without informing the rest of the group.
  • But most importantly, I know these sort of “back room deals” are going on because, once upon a time, I used to participate in them.
Back at the beginning of my tenure, I was part of the “in” group, and I happily took part in trying to get things accomplished, in the name of expediency, and always with the goal of making the group better. I recognized the exact things I said in the first paragraph of this section: a smaller group can be more nimble, can get things done faster, can make tough decisions with less in-fighting and no endless debate. But, as time went on, I became more and more uncomfortable with this methodology. I felt a little dirty. It would probably make me look quite virtuous if I could tell you that I quit such back room dealings, but the truth is I didn’t. I thought I could accomplish more by working inside the system, although eventually I became such an obstacle that the rest of the back-room folks just stopped including me. And for a while I even tried to start a counter-group which would also work behind the scenes, but my heart was never in it, and I lacked the motivation to make it work. So some people will undoubtedly say that I was part of the problem, and I won’t deny it, or try to offer excuses. I’m just being honest here.

There are other examples of secrecy being used in ways I disagreed with. For instance, we originally had a period for every unit called “Inner Sanctum Review,” or ISR. Once the intial design was fleshed out, before it went on to the other stages in the process, the unit would be reviewed by every C3V member (and, later, the SoV Judges as well). This was always a long and—as you can imagine—contentious part of the process, as suddenly everyone had the right to voice their opinion, so they generally did. But the ISR is no more. Ostensibly, it was removed in the name of speed. But what it really did was remove the opportunity that many C3V members had to dissent and criticize.

Of course, people could still see what was going on, even if they technically weren’t allowed to comment (until things got to their department, of course). That wasn’t secret enough, apparently, and so it was decided that every group of units would get its own forum, which would be hidden even from the other C3V members, so business related to that unit could be conducted truly in secret. At the time, I threw out my favorite quote from Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis:

Quote:
Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.
Conducting business in secret is just antithetical to the proper functioning of a group such as the C3V. We need more transparency, not less. (I must insert here that, very recently, this particular policy was reversed. Although I think those privater-than-private fora still exist. But I might be wrong.)

Of course, you may wonder how such policies get instituted. Don’t we have to vote them in? Well, first of all, it’s not actually that hard to push through the policies that you want, if you know what you’re doing. Here: I’ll give you a blueprint for pushing through a potentially unpopular policy with a minimum of resistance. First you need to use PMs and private email to gather a core group of followers. Cautiously feel out potential allies, but make sure not to reveal too much, because you want the announcement to be a complete surprise to everyone except those who you already know to be on your side. Talk over the proposed policy with your back-room coterie for several days, if not weeks: by the time you announce it, it should be completely sensible and even obvious to the folks in the know. Also, use this time to practice your arguments in support of the policy. Then start a thread for discussion where you announce the policy. Actually, have one of your back-room group do it—if at all possible, the one member of the group who is the most unlikely ally. Then each of you join in quickly with cries of admiration and approbation. If anyone speaks up in objection, the group should promptly gang up on that person, making them seem silly, or anti-progress, or immature, or melodramatic, or just incalcitrant. This won’t be hard: remember, your objector is speaking off the cuff, having been taken completely by surprise by this policy, while you and your group have cogent, well-reasoned (and well-rehearsed) counter-arguments ready on the spot. When it comes time to vote, your back-room group will all vote “yes,” the few objectors will vote “no,” a few other members of the group will be swayed by your superior arguments, and the remainder just won’t want to rock the boat: they’ll either vote “yes” or simply abstain, which is just as good as a “yes” as far as you’re concerned. And voilà: your policy passes.

Some people will say I’m unfairly characterizing this process, and I am. But remember: I just took a bunch of true things and made them sound bad. I didn’t actually make any of them up.

Of course, a process like this is not foolproof. Every once in a while even this level of preparedness fails you, and you realize during the general discussion that it’s never going to pass. Never fear: you still have a chance to get your policy anyway. Just never actually call the vote ... and then start doing the policy anyway.

Case in point: the PAM program. It was a condition of Grungebob’s lending his support to the project, back in its infancy, that the C3V have a way to let one member of the public into the group for a limited time to see how things worked. (I have to stress that this is my second-hand understanding of what Gb said; I wasn’t there.) Thus was born the concept of the Public Access Member, or PAM. Once upon a time we inducted a new PAM every month. Then it went to every month and a half. In less than two months, it will be a year since we inducted anyone at all. There was a discussion about dropping the PAM program several months ago, but many of the members (including myself) spoke against the proposal, so it was eventually dropped. And yet, no more PAMs since then. So it’s tough to claim that the proposal was defeated.

Honestly, I’m not entirely clear why some C3V members were against the PAM program. Possibly it’s the speed thing again: the process of bringing in a complete outsider and getting them up to speed certainly takes up time. Or maybe it’s just more secrecy: the more PAMs we let in, the more of our fans know (or can figure out, if they’re inclined to read through a bunch of long-ass threads) exactly what’s going on behind the scenes. But, see, I personally think our fans should know that ... and presumably Grungebob did as well, which is why he suggested the program in the first place (although of course I can’t speak for him). I find the quiet discontinuation of the PAM program, without even any official policy being passed, fairly disconcerting.

All of which leads me to:


A Difficult Decision

I’ve resisted this decision for a long time. A lot of that is because I’m a stubborn bastard, and I know that, if I quit, I’m giving the folks who want me gone exactly what they want, which annoys me. But a bigger part of it is that I feel like I see the group going in directions that disturb me. I perceive a loss of quality, a refusal to compromise, and a narrowing of vision that could well lead to the quashing of the diversity of voices that has thus far made the C3V great. All that combined with the steady lessening of my enjoyment of the work means that I just can’t continue any longer.

I had always hoped that my feeling that a loss of quality was inevitable as the scales tipped from balanced over to favor the “do it fast” side was just an overreaction on my part. As a self-avowed “get it right” person, of course I would think that, but that doesn’t mean it’s true. However, while working on my VC-inclusive partial scoring sheet, I had to pull all the info on the last few C3V waves from the Books of threads and the official card uploads in the Gallery. By the time I got to the final wave, the number of silly errors (e.g. typos, missing planets on the basic sides, entire basic side missing, etc) was just depressing. We used to take our time and any oversights like those would get caught. Now things get rushed through and no one notices. Perhaps no one cares, other than me. But I find it depressing anyway.

I also find it depressing that fewer and fewer C3V members seem to care about anything other than tournament play. Tournament play is an important aspect of unit design, of course. But it’s not the only one. And tourney play is a very constrained slice of Heroscape: it’s small to medium point values (hardly ever more than 600 pts), on small (e.g. BoV) maps, and it’s nearly always kill ’em all. But that’s not the entirety of how people play Heroscape. In fact, the amazing diversity of gameplay is one of the main things I’ve always loved about this game. I can build a giant, multi-level map, and we can play 3-way battles with 1,000-pt armies. I can play with glyphs, or without them, or with only certain ones. I can play kill ’em all, or hold the line, or capture the flag, or kill the king. I can play a treasure hunt game where you have collect things, or a world tour game where you have to visit certain spots on the map. I can play a small defensive force hunkered down behind my castle walls while my opponent brings an overwhelming force to storm the castle. I can set up dungeon-crawl campaigns, or zombie horde survival campaigns, or heroes’ quests where you can “level up” by trading one hero for another of higher point value if you achieve certain goals. My army can be anything, my map can be anything, and my goals can be anything: that is the beauty of Heroscape. Why would I want that to go away and end up with a group that only seems to care about tourneys? And yet I keep end up having discussions about powers where I point out that such and such a unit may be too powerful against the fortress door, and the response is, I never see the fortress door in tournaments, so who cares?

Again, I’m not saying that every C3V member has this attitude. Just that those who don’t are in an ever-shrinking minority, and I personally feel that it’s happening on purpose.

I feel like I’ve tried everything I can think of to work through these issues. No doubt others think I didn’t do enough, and that’s fine. That’s their right. But I’m just tired of dealing with it all. And, thus, here we are.

Now for some:


Prescient Rebuttals

Now, after this exhaustive (and terribly long) discussion of my tenure with the C3V, I’m done with this topic. I’m perfectly happy to let my detractors (and I think I’m safe in assuming I’ll have a few of those) say what they like without feeling the need to jump back in and have protracted debates on the finer points of what-have-you. So I’m giving everyone the chance to say that I’m full of bovine fertilizer material and not even have to justify their statements with actual facts.

However, I do anticipate a few natural responses, both from those who don’t care for me much, and those who may just be curious about this convoluted situation. And I can go ahead and address those right off the top, before they even appear.

First of all, some will say I’m just bitter. Well, of course I’m bitter: I said that right at the very beginning. This project has been over 5 years of my life, and it’s produced some amazing units (and a few duds here and there, but far more winners than losers). Most of the people involved have done amazing work. The thought that a few individuals can come in and reshape the group to suit their own vision, say “screw everyone else,” and start to go down a path that in my opinion will lead to an inevitable decline of the project ... hell, yeah, that makes me bitter. Am I bitter that I haven’t “gotten my way” on some issue or other? Well, quite honestly, I mostly have gotten my way in the various contentious debates that have popped up throughout the years. And, in those cases where I haven’t ... well, so what? I can hardly make an argument that this community project should never be a slave to only one person’s vision and then whine about it not being a slave to my vision. So, I’m bitter, but probably not for the reasons that some people will say.

But perhaps folks will wonder if I want to get my way in the future. That is, perhaps I’m hoping that my statement here will lead to a change in leadership over in the C3V and then I’ll want to come back. Well, I honestly do hope my post leads to a change in leadership—I don’t expect that it will, but one can always hope. But, whether it does or not, I won’t be returning. For the past year or more, every time I look at my Heroscape collection, the first thought is one of dread, because it reminds me of all the C3V crap I need to wade through for whatever issues are currently being viciously argued over—and, for the past year or more, there’s always been at least one of those, and usually several at a time. Outside of our local NHSD tourney, I haven’t actually played Heroscape in probably close to two years ... not even a casual game with my kids. Not all of that can be laid at the feet of C3V, of course ... my oldest child is a teenager now, and has his own friends to play games with that don’t require good ol’ dad, and my middle child is just getting deep into video games, so when he wants me to play with him it’s LittleBigPlanet or PixelJunk Monsters or to help him with Zelda or 3-D Dot Heroes, and my youngest is just approaching her fourth birthday and hasn’t quite reached the level of wanting to play games yet. So there are other reasons they don’t approach me. But when it comes to reasons I don’t approach them, C3V is pretty much all of it. I’m spending all of my allotted Heroscape time arguing about the game instead of enjoying it. And that’s just silly. So, as much as it kills me to leave the project (partially because I’m advertently making some people happy I don’t want to, as I already admitted, but mostly because I love the project with all my heart and soul), I’ve got to make smart choices. And this is the smart choice for me.

Perhaps the biggest criticism that I anticipate is that I’m “airing dirty laundry” and I should keep these C3V issues private. This is also the one I regret the most, because I expect it’ll come from some folks who might otherwise be more or less on my side. So I’m probably going to alienate some people who I deeply respect, and I really hate that. I apologize to those folks in advance. But I’m doing it anyway. The truth is, I have come to believe that this fiction of how the C3V process needs to be kept private “for the fans” is utter crap. I believe it’s being kept private so that the exact sort of shenanigans that are currently going on can flourish without being disinfected by the sunlight of transparency. There’s been too much kept hidden from the fans—hell, even from other C3V members—for too long. I will be bummed that some people will think I’m a terrible person for wanting to talk about what has gone on behind closed doors. But I stand by my decision that the fans of this game deserve to know what is happening.

Finally, a few brief words about my


Future Plans

As I said, I’m done with the C3V. If it gets better, I’ll be pleased. If it doesn’t get better, but none of the dire predicitions I’ve made come to pass, I’ll still be pleased. But, no matter what, I don’t intend to try to return. (And I’m sure there will be plenty of folks who are pleased to hear it.)

I will most likely continue to play with C3V units, even those released in the future. I won’t consider this at all hypocritical. If you do, I’m sorry that you feel that way.

While I won’t participate in any further VC activities directly, I’m happy to provide any help wording powers for anyone who wants it: anyone who wants to polish up wording for an SoV submission, say, or if any of the other groups such as HoSS or C3G wanted my opinion on a particularly thorny problem, I would be happy to receive a PM. And, if you think my opinion on such things is not worth spit, that’s okay too.

I have no plans to change any of my non-VC-related activities here at Heroscapers whatsoever.

I will not respond to (nor even read) the comments on this blog post. Go crazy, if you like. Feel free to point out what a terrible person I am, how unfair I’m being, or anything else you like, without fear that I’ll call you out. I will not respond to public messages about this post in other threads. I will make judicious use of the excellent “ignore list” feature of our esteemed website to avoid having to read as many of those as possible. (And, by the way: I highly recommend the ignore list. It’s probably the best feature on Heroscapers, and I think it’s criminally under-utilized.) I will not respond to reputation comments, so feel free to leave me as much negrep as you like. (However, don’t forget that, as an admin, I can see who you are from your reputation comment even if you don’t “sign” it.) I will probably not even respond to PMs about this post ... but then again, I might. No promises either way on that one. But the main thing is, this is a very long post, and it really is the final word, at least from me. I’ve got nothing else to say on this topic. I’m ready to move on.

Mainly I hope to return to enjoying the game again. I think there are a lot of amazing people on this site, and there are a lot of amazing things about this game which attracted all those amazing people. I’m going to leave the C3V politics to those who seem to enjoy that sort of thing. What I want to enjoy is putting together an insane army of mummies and ogres and cybermonkeys and birdmen and, yes: even a superhero or two, and fielding that insane army against my 10-year-old son who has his own insane army of dragons and elementals and snakes and Mohicans, on an insanely large map where it takes us 3 turns to even be in range of each other, and talking strategy and insane ideas for customs with my 17-year-old son and his friends, who are now coming to our tournaments every year, and picking up my 4-year-old daughter and “telling her about my guys,” and smiling, and having fun.

And I highly recommend this plan to everyone reading this as well.
Total Comments 18

Comments

Old
IAmBatman's Avatar
Good read. Definitely some things here and there I could comment on or provide detail on (e.g. GBob didn't suggest the PAM program, he just said to be inclusive, and that's what we came up with) but I'll stick to this (even though you're not going to read it): I'm glad your focus is where it should be, on having fun with your kids. Life is too short to prioritize anything over that.
Oh, and Omegacron is one of my favorites.
Posted February 26th, 2016 at 12:48 AM by IAmBatman IAmBatman is online now
Old
Evar-Scarcarver's Avatar
My Dad works in a leadership position at a Not-for-profit, and I still remember when he realized he needed to actually specifically try and hire people who disagreed with him, thought differently than him, and tackled issues in a different way then him, if he wanted the organization to grow in a healthy way.
Politics will be there no matter what. Better to have a diverse pool of views giving their perspectives on the issues then to have a deadly echo chamber, in my opinion.

I'm just happy to be on a site where things like this happen and they don't immediately dissolve into flame wars where tens of people end up getting banned. This is definitely one of my favorite communities on the internet I have ever had the pleasure to be a part of.
Posted February 26th, 2016 at 11:34 AM by Evar-Scarcarver Evar-Scarcarver is offline
Old
caps's Avatar
The private design forums were not being used, so yes, they were discontinued.

The PAM program was not discontinued: it was expanded to allow PAMs to stay for the duration of a design's lifetime through the process. We also have greatly opened up our public playtesting as well.

Xotli is an excellent editor, those of you who make customs should definitely take him up on his offer for editing help.
Posted March 2nd, 2016 at 12:56 AM by caps caps is offline
Old
Porkins's Avatar
Interesting read Xotli. As an outsider, I am forced to take it with some salt since it is just one side of the story, but I do see firsthand some of the effects of what you are talking about.

- I see people quietly peeling off the project. There is no announcement or congratulations or anything...the names are simply removed from the list of members. Normally a retirement comes with some sort of thanks or celebration.
- I see that the releases have slowed down (May 2015 was the latest, I think)
- I noticed that the PAM program had essentially ended, since nobody has been invited for a very long time. Capsocrates contradicts this observation above, and yet, nobody has been invited in a very long time...as far as I can tell, April 2015 was the last PAM vote. I note that the Welcome to C3V thread still says something like "every 45 days".

So salt or no, the whole situation provides some very interesting food for thought, and over at HoSS we are paying attention and discussing it...especially Xotli's offer to help out with editing.


EDIT: I also just noticed something that I find strange. According to the list of C3V Inner Sanctum members, two of the ERB members are also the two Design Team members...so they are reviewing and approving their own work?? In industry, that is a pretty huge no - no as it is a conflict of interest.
Posted March 3rd, 2016 at 09:16 AM by Porkins Porkins is offline
Old
NecroBlade's Avatar
Fellow former C3V member here. Thanks for the read. I can't say that I had such a negative view as Xotli, but I probably didn't see or pay attention to as much as he was. He also stuck it out longer than I did, but I will say his reasons for leaving sound familiar. Certain opinions began to overpower others, and whether or not the "do it fast" crowd/mentality is winning or working, the effort "get it right" felt lost in the mire. Rather, there was a lot more time spent debating (often at length and often pointlessly) instead of "make it simple, make it fun, make it Heroscape". It was not an easy decision for me to leave either, but I felt like I was no longer able to continue to contribute to the project meaningfully enough, both through my own fault and the project's. I truly hope Xotli is able to get back to enjoying this great game, and I also hold hope for more great C3V units yet to come. One last thing: thanks for being part of the C3V, Xotli.
Posted March 6th, 2016 at 08:40 AM by NecroBlade NecroBlade is offline
Old
Porkins's Avatar
Hmm...yet another person who retired from C3V without even a "thank you."

Well, thank you Necro!
Posted March 7th, 2016 at 04:19 PM by Porkins Porkins is offline
Old
Sherman Davies's Avatar
@Porkins - What makes you think Necro and Xotli were not thanked for their contributions when they left?
Posted March 9th, 2016 at 10:27 AM by Sherman Davies Sherman Davies is offline
Old
Porkins's Avatar
Hopefully I am wrong, but I never saw an announcement in the public thread or anywhere indicating they had retired and thanks for all of their work, etc. Arch-vile is another...
Posted March 9th, 2016 at 10:45 AM by Porkins Porkins is offline
Old
Sherman Davies's Avatar
We thanked them, but not publicly. Honest question - is that something you think the community is itching to see happen? I'm not even sure most people know or care who makes up the C3V, as long as they like the end product.
Posted March 9th, 2016 at 11:10 AM by Sherman Davies Sherman Davies is offline
Old
Porkins's Avatar
I think it would be a nice gesture. I can't speak for the community.

I have a pretty good idea who makes up C3V and C3G; I follow both groups loosely, so it's nice to know when somebody leaves and to be able to offer my thanks for their participation. I had not realized that Necro left until his post here.
Posted March 9th, 2016 at 04:02 PM by Porkins Porkins is offline
Old
IAmBatman's Avatar
Do you guys announce publicly when someone leaves HOSS? I don't remember you announcing it for me way, way, way back in the day.
Posted March 9th, 2016 at 04:36 PM by IAmBatman IAmBatman is online now
Old
Porkins's Avatar
Heh heh, too long ago. That was pre-HoSS, back when mac and I were learning custom design at the feet of Greyowl and IAmBatman.


Although, at the risk of sounding hypocritical, I will admit that we did not have a "thank you" announcement when heroscaper2010 was retired. But in our defense, that was a weird one. He disappeared from the site for several months, so it didn't make sense to thank someone in absentia. But then he reappeared, sort of, right after we retired him from HoSS. He only makes brief appearances now.
I think we made an announcement when Karat retired from HoSS to focus on C3G...at least I think we did...I can't remember for certain
Posted March 10th, 2016 at 01:54 PM by Porkins Porkins is offline
Old
IAmBatman's Avatar
I'd like to take this opportunity to publicly thank Necroblade for his contributions as a founding member of C3G.

He has since left the project, however ....
Posted March 11th, 2016 at 09:25 AM by IAmBatman IAmBatman is online now
Old
The B.I.V.'s Avatar
Interesting stuff, Xotli. Thanks for your frankness.
Posted June 2nd, 2016 at 12:39 PM by The B.I.V. The B.I.V. is offline
Old
Arkham's Avatar
Great read!
Posted March 8th, 2018 at 06:37 AM by Arkham Arkham is offline
 
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