Do your own trolling, like a man's man.

Quote from: DKChannelBoredom;789025Remember when Pundit laughed at the people who went through his (10+ year) old blogposts to find something to (mis)quote him over, trying to win arguments during consultantgate? Kettle black, much?

I think you missed the much funnier point how a many who's defining games he does not like as Swine fights with a man who's defining games he does not like as Non - OSR. It's literally a post that should someone else write it, it'd go straight into "This is why we hate you." Not that that 1 minute hate idea took off.

Quote from: stuffis;789033I hope he's doing alright now, and getting work done. The death of a parent is a hard thing, self-inflicted public humiliation doesn't make it any easier, and the outpouring of entitled cuntistry from the peanut gallery that followed his disappearance won't soften the blow much.

What does a death in the family have to do with outright theft?

Hell, I'll bite: who the hell is James Maliszewski, and why should I care one way or another about what he's said?

Quote from: Ladybird;789031I'm also not fond of this internet concept that, once someone has expressed an opinion on a subject, they can never ever change their minds, or rethink something, without being accused of being a hypocrite, sellout, or whatever the commenter's current insult of choice is. This isn't a game show; we don't have to only accept one answer.

Sure it does.  In our worldscape of tribalist fiefdoms, someone who disagrees with your POV is an Enemy, to be treated as such.  Someone who changed his mind to agree with you was already a traitor to his side, and may prove to be a traitor to yours: you certainly can't trust the two-faced bastard, right?

The [SARCASM] flag being turned off, +1.  What the hell, right?  So this guy may have changed his mind over the years.  Isn't that the frigging point of Internet debates in the first place, to convince the other guys that your way of looking at things is the right way?  Are people that astonished when it actually works?

[SARCASM]  Oh, wait.  No, that's stupid of me.  The point isn't to convince anyone of anything, because that's never going to happen.  The point is to do a tribal wardance in front of the Enemy, so that onlookers can watch you count coup if you're more eloquent than the other guys, or if you merely have better snark. [/SARCASM]

Crom's hairy nutsack, Pundy, you're making yourself look ridiculous.

"James M didn't like older games, thought about it, and changed his mind.  Then he got full of his own shit and thought he could write some stuff for money.  It ended badly.  The end."

No ten-year conspiracy needed.  I mean, really.  Painting him as some mastermind who planned to rip people off years in advance sounds like something from a James Bond villain.  Somebody who shot off his mouth and then fucked up royally seems a lot more believable.

DISCLAIMER:  I have never met James M nor do I play him on TV.  I just don't believe in multi-year conspiracies.

Yup can't beat Old Geezer's summary. Pretty much sums it up accurately.

Quote from: Guy Fullerton;789003To show that this is in good faith, I will start with the "best" thing I have found, which may not be much:

In 1999 Maliszewski was critical of (dissed?) Gamma World and 80's games in a general sense:
https://web.archive.org/web/20000124101747/http://rpg.net/news+reviews/columns/sffeb99.html

In 2009 Maliszewski showed a positive view toward Gamma World:
http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2009/04/retrospective-gamma-world.html

Those just show a man changing his mind after a decade. A decade that included the 9/11 and its fallout taking a big dump on the optimism James M. predicts at the end of the first link. Providing shiny new villains to keep viewers at home scared and paranoid.
Jeez... I'd find much more disconcerting if the guy had held the same opinions all those years... never wavering.

I never had much interest in Dwimmermount but I enjoyed his blog and was sad to see it end. I doubt he's had a pleasant time during any of this crapfest and see no need to continue his punishment.

I'm sympathetic with people changing their mind. In terms of Maliszewski's viewpoint, that seems like the most likely explanation (given what I've read), as opposed to a conspiracy. Hell—my mind has changed significantly on many things over far less time than 9 years.

But I'm willing to give Pundit the benefit of the doubt, for purposes of discussion, if he or anybody else wants to continue that angle.

Pundit, on G+ you said: "James as in Grognardia? As in the guy who wrote articles all through the 90s about how fucking lame D&D and especially old-school is, and then when he saw a chance faked a road-to-damascus conversion?"
https://plus.google.com/u/0/116753362008267799901/posts/TfrBqeAsVs1

Most of this is already covered by the question I already asked, but I'm curious about the underlined part.

Pundit, what's the story on Maliszewski faking his new viewpoint on stuff?

Even if he was faking his enthusiasm (which I've seen no evidence of), I don't get why that matters.
His blog was of use to me, that's enough. I'm not looking for saints and prophets... and I'm not fucking the guy.

Quote from: RPGPundit;788999pretend to just lovey love love old-school in order to become a blogging celebrity to a group of people he considered retarded (so as to eventually embezzle them).

I'm pretty sure that is an overly harsh (if not libellous) analysis.

He was a typical 1990s railroad/metaplot type guy who then got interested in the newly fashionable old-school D&D, went way into that, started a campaign dungeon, thought he could write up his campaign dungeon for Kickstarter money, took the money and mostly failed to write up the dungeon. The whole 'money first-product later' Kickstarter phenomena inevitably creates situations like this.

I'm pretty sure he didn't read Swords & Wizardry and think "Aha! A great opportunity to embezzle foolish fans of old D&D!"

JM's bitching about post-holocaust games seems to imply that he should absolutely loathe D&D-type games. If it's damning that global thermonuclear war has not really happened, or that science-fantasy mutants are silly, then what of sword-n-sorcery magic and monsters?

Quote from: Phillip;789050JM's bitching about post-holocaust games seems to imply that he should absolutely loathe D&D-type games. If it's damning that global thermonuclear war has not really happened, or that science-fantasy mutants are silly, then what of sword-n-sorcery magic and monsters?

If this is the same guy as posted on the Gamma World group way way back then yeah he was a dick. As one of the admin I considered booting him. But did not as we reserve that for trolling the group which Ive only had to block one guy because he kept dragging historical revisionism into conversations when not trying to drag things down religious gutters.

Now-a-days I'd be a bit more harsh with someone joining just to bash Post Apoc settings.

Now I'll have to dig through archives and see who that person was for sure.

But yeah. Opinions change. Sometimes for the worse. Sometimes for the better. Foes can become friends. And vis-a-vis. Unfortunately. Sometimes they really are lying through their teeth about their change of heart.

How the hell do you tell them apart?

So Grogtard changed his mind? Big whoopee do.

One-wayism of any flavor is lame.

Quote from: One Horse Town;789000You should hang out here more Pundit, it's quite a nice forum. :pundit:

He's right Pundy. It's your bar, you pay the rent, so drink here more often.

Quote from: Omega;789058How the hell do you tell them apart?

You shall know them by their fruits.

Making a half assed dungeon for a game you don't like just to rip people off would be more effort than making a good thing for a game you do like.  Thus it is HIGHLY unlikely that JM pulled some sort of multiyear conspiracy to become a "fake OSR guru" just so he could fuck up Dwimmermount to get people's money.

Quote from: CRKrueger;789007So what's the narrative?

1. JMal plays D&D like everyone else as a kid.
2. At some point starts writing for gaming companies.
3. Gets involved with WW in the 90s and works on a lot of WW stuff.  Along the way he becomes a snooty elitist (or always was one).
4. During his stint at WW does 3e stuff via S&S imprint.
5. Doesn't like 3.5 and 4.
6. Starts Blog to figure out why D&D isn't D&D anymore
7. Becomes Pope of the OSR
8. Implodes spectacularly in a Perfect Storm of hype, internet hysteria, and Kickstarter malfeasance.

You have to be a political blogger's level of asshole to blog daily for 4 years and not mean a word of it, so in all likelihood, he meant a decent portion of what he wrote.  He might have been pompous and overblown, with an insufferable sense of his own geek-fanboi bolstered celebrity, but his blog could be interesting and useful at times.

Even if the worst possible interpretation of all that were true, that he was a total "swine" who "came to Gygax" only as a marketing opportunity, so what?

His bubble has burst, let the poor bastard be.

Heh heh heh, next 4 years here will be very funny.

Quote from: Old Geezer;789081You shall know them by their fruits.

Making a half assed dungeon for a game you don't like just to rip people off would be more effort than making a good thing for a game you do like.  Thus it is HIGHLY unlikely that JM pulled some sort of multiyear conspiracy to become a "fake OSR guru" just so he could fuck up Dwimmermount to get people's money.

I bet Maliszewski is just another Serbian war criminal who was trying to hide it out as a guru.

Quote from: Brad;789035What does a death in the family have to do with outright theft?

i continue to assume that the guy meant well, freaked out, fucked up, and left others holding the bag. i haven't heard who knows what's up accuse james of trying to steal the money -- only of handling a bad scene very (very) badly.

i'm not sure what i'd gain by assuming otherwise.