Chas
07/30/22 09:07 PM
73.73.53.209
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https://amgreatness.com/2022/07/29/my-pu...atened-my-life/
I am MIGHTILY incensed by this.
In a cowardly attempt to appease a problem child, who is likely not even an actual customer, they've basically dumped a long term, productive author, and managed to alienate yet ANOTHER section of the community who definitely DO (or should I say "DID") spend real money.
Edited by Chas (07/30/22 09:08 PM)
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Karagin
07/31/22 12:34 AM
70.118.172.64
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Well, they are known for doing things that make no sense and have a very long track record of it.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Cray
07/31/22 12:43 PM
71.47.208.18
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About three quarters of the story is missing from BLP's version of events.
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer
Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
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Karagin
07/31/22 01:21 PM
70.118.172.64
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Quote:
About three quarters of the story is missing from BLP's version of events.
Okay, then give us the story Cray; I am tired of hearing that, oh, the story is missing things, YET none of you will give the missing parts.
Right now, CGL and TOPPS are taking this right in the face. They have to know this, and given how we all know there were bad fleeings between a certain FORMER LD and Blaine back in the day and now this crap, it's not hard to see how things are indeed missing since the only one willing to give information is Blaine.
Also, using his initials is insulting.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Karagin
07/31/22 01:30 PM
70.118.172.64
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https://blainepardoe.wordpress.com/2022/07/31/moving-forward/
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Karagin
07/31/22 02:51 PM
70.118.172.64
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Serious question: How will this affect the other writers under contract with CGL? I ask because it seems that, to me, CGL is saying that if you are doing any work for them, you can not have an opinion that goes against ANY current thing or trend.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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ZekeCrane
07/31/22 09:49 PM
97.85.24.48
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I will note that Mr. Pardoe had some INTENSELY hot takes, politically.
But it seems like Catalyst was unwilling to straight up admit that was the reason, so they fashioned something together based on 'Faith McCloskey' and their relentless campaign against Pardoe.
And as we've all seen, just having politically incorrect views is 'literal violence' these days...
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Cray
08/01/22 10:39 AM
136.226.19.182
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Quote:
But it seems like Catalyst was unwilling to straight up admit that was the reason, so they fashioned something together based on 'Faith McCloskey' and their relentless campaign against Pardoe.
Try working with Pardoe first before inventing speculative political reasons.
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer
Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
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Karagin
08/01/22 12:59 PM
70.118.172.64
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Quote:
Quote:
But it seems like Catalyst was unwilling to straight up admit that was the reason, so they fashioned something together based on 'Faith McCloskey' and their relentless campaign against Pardoe.
Try working with Pardoe first before inventing speculative political reasons.
Based on that and the other comments, we can guess you are not a fan of his Cray?
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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ZekeCrane
08/01/22 06:17 PM
97.85.24.48
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Quote:
Quote:
But it seems like Catalyst was unwilling to straight up admit that was the reason, so they fashioned something together based on 'Faith McCloskey' and their relentless campaign against Pardoe.
Try working with Pardoe first before inventing speculative political reasons.
Seeing as how no one is willing to actually state reasons with accompanying evidence, exactly how shall I do that?
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Pht
08/04/22 01:28 AM
173.187.211.196
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Quote:
About three quarters of the story is missing from BLP's version of events.
Man, don't teaser us like this. You know people don't have any other information sources than what's been made public.
Seriously, if you can't or won't tell us, don't post stuff like this.
We know that we don't have all the information, we can only work with what we have.
From the information we have, this looks incredibly dirty and people are (based on what's out there) ticked.
If there is information that will meaningfully change things that CAN be brought to light, it should be, because this is not making CGL, topps, or fanatics look good at all.
Also, woo, what a reason to have a first post here, all reasons aside, because one of the more or most productive authors on the bt fiction line got let go after 30+ years. Regardless the truth of why or how, that sucks.
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Cray
08/04/22 09:17 AM
136.226.19.185
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Quote:
Seriously, if you can't or won't tell us, don't post stuff like this.
It's worth reminding folks that there are two sides of the story, so go looking for the other side. Especially when the most public version of events is custom-crafted to punch political triggers. Maybe make friends with other CGL writers and reviewers on Facebook and check their feeds for something that violates their NDA. Or go looking for archival versions of Blaine's deleted posts.
Edited by Cray (08/04/22 09:34 AM)
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Karagin
08/04/22 10:07 AM
70.118.172.64
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Cray, why don't you just tell us? You are baiting, and you know it.
I do know that Beas and Blaine got into it, and Beas blames Blaine for his getting fried. Now I could suggest that some of this is being fed by Beas since Beas still hates Blaine. But that is a guess. However, it's apparent that you know more, so why not just tell us since the bait is there?
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Karagin
08/04/22 10:14 AM
70.118.172.64
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Cray made you have missed things, but this move by CGL has split the community. The same way actions taken or lack of them to rein friends of LDs in the 00s split the community of the Jihad crap.
So here you are telling us that you know more about the situation, but you can't say it because of your NDA, but then you suggest that other writers might indeed tell us that it is not like you to suggest others would violate things.
So again, how does this bode for you and others who are contractors for CGL?
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Pht
08/04/22 03:07 PM
173.188.194.161
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On the basis of that post I wouldn't say Cray was baiting us, Karagin. That's why I said teaser, instead of tease. It does feel that way, though, even if it's not justifiable to divine his intent from that post. This is a rotten situation.
Quote:
Orignally Posted by Cray
It's worth reminding folks that there are two sides of the story, so go looking for the other side. Especially when the most public version of events is custom-crafted to punch political triggers. Maybe make friends with other CGL writers and reviewers on Facebook and check their feeds for something that violates their NDA. Or go looking for archival versions of Blaine's deleted posts.
Yes, but than ... that was the second thing I did, after I had begun to try and nail down what was publicly said.
I am not on any modern social media (my choice), so I went looking for what could be publicly found, and the one that was a collection of screencaps of some of his social media posts (looked like all twitter stuff) was ...
Boring. Pedestrian. I did a triple-take and read it all carefully because it looked like it might have been a snark-joke to post it as "dirt." "blp cancelled himself" on the pic, when you find it.
As for archives ... github.com/dessant/web-archives ... have had that installed for a long time now. Streamlines the process a lot.
But than, a lot of drama hides behind "you have to have this social media site's login."
If something underhanded or dirty is going on that changes things, and CGL knows it, they need make it known, because this is hurting them.
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Karagin
08/04/22 03:21 PM
70.118.172.64
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This is my point Pht and Cray's little game of I know something, but I can't say, but I am going to tease things because I can doesn't help. It's out of character for him, or maybe it's not.
Then again, I have seen firsthand HOW the PTB and their buddies, along with their cliques of friends, treat and act towards fans who don't follow the party line and kowtow to things said PTB wants to happen just because they said so.
All of this hurt CGL. It's also hurting the brand. Loren's little post, with all the grand typos and such, didn't help either. None of this is good for the community as a whole. It has already split things and as folks in camps. Either you side with CGL, or you are scum if you side with Blaine.
Maybe if folks acted like adults and dealt with all of this like adults, we would not be discussing this topic. IF is an overused word, though.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Pht
08/04/22 03:45 PM
173.188.194.161
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Whatever cray knows is probably under NDA, so if any of it really is meaningful, he cant' share it.
That drives a person nuts. I can tell you firsthand what that particular boogeyman is like, and the stuff I was nda'd for was minor and pedestrian by comparison.
I'm pretty sure cray grokked that I was telling him to not try and share the misery of "I know something that I want to tell but can't" - and don't you dare PM me cray, I'll delete it without reading it, you don't need to get squashed for telling :P - with us.
Also, as he said, reminding people that there could be other things going on.
-------------
As it stands based on what I could find, things are at "cgl you screwed up big time and look dirty."
Again, I'm going to poke CGL and say, if this ISN'T true, find the people with authority to let you break NDA, and put the *verifiable* truth out.
Don't be idiots and try to spin it with PR. That makes things look WORSE. You cannot avoid the ride, you are LOCKED into it, because it started. Do what's right and true for the long term. You can't make the pain right now go away. If fanatics or topps are pressuring you regarding this, TELL US, so we can lean on them.
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Karagin
08/04/22 04:26 PM
70.118.172.64
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I guess will either see them come out with some corporate, or we will see them come out with something that shines the light of day on this and clears things up.
Given how things have been handled so far...my money's on it's going to be the corporate way and we have a split community.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Pht
08/04/22 05:00 PM
173.188.194.161
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Quote:
Karagin
I guess will either see them come out with some corporate, or we will see them come out with something that shines the light of day on this and clears things up.
Given how things have been handled so far...my money's on it's going to be the corporate way and we have a split community.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
That seems most likely to me too.
People seem to steadfastly refuse to have the truth come out in a way that's verifiable, warts and all, regardless what good that could do.
When you hide like that, people will treat you as if you are hiding because you did wrong and don't want people to know. It doesn't matter if you did or not, and when people do PR to try and make it go away ... that makes things go from bad to worse.
So here us fans of the setting are, stuck with a crap sandwich, and expecting that all we're going to get is some utterly unverifiable partial PR releases that will look exactly like they're tailored to cover people's butts. Because that's what usually happens in corporate america.
Fanatics and topps, if you really did tell people to make this go away, congrats, it got made worse. You're now locked onto the bear trap.
You can chew your foot off to get out of it and bleed out and take an assured loss, or you can put out the truth to the fans in a way that we can verify and be adults and make whatever happened right, and salvage things, while earning long term respect from your customers and fans.
You can't have both.
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Karagin
08/04/22 06:20 PM
70.118.172.64
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They want what is best for the bottom line, though the dollars in the accounts. They don't care about the fans or anything else. Battletech is a minor fish for TOPPS/FANATICS. We all know that. So they will play the game of throwing CGL to the wolves and the ones who are left digging out the mess are fans.
We will see what happns when they actually worry about it since clearly GenCon and new KickStarter is far more important to them for other prodoucts than the one thing they are well know for. However, what do us fans of one of the longest running sci-fi miniatues games know...
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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ghostrider
08/04/22 06:46 PM
45.51.181.83
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This is not defending either side, as I don't know much about any of it.
There is a problem if the situation is a result of political differences. Lawsuits tend to come up. This could lead to even more suits, as others that were terminated could try to jump on this wagon.
But that swings both ways as well.
If it is politics causing the issue, what happens if the fan base decides to revolt because of one side or the other is against their views?
What every is actually happening, there is obviously some dirt on both sides.
If you would, keep those of us that are out of the loop informed.
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Akalabeth
08/06/22 02:59 PM
99.199.56.239
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Interesting situation but with scant evidence either way. The only real evidence pardon presented is that catalyst was unprofessional with him when one guy called his novels drivel, which they subsequently apologized for.
Pardoe has said a bunch of stuff on twitter but honestly nothing that many conservatives in the states haven’t already said.
The claims against faith haven’t really been substantiated. Faith, who I believe is faithbomb on the forums clearly does not like pardoe and has made some questionable claims of her own, comparing the reborn smoke jaguars to the southern confederacy for one.
Personally I don’t think any of the three parties in this story is blameless based on what I’ve seen. But I suspect catalyst dropped pardoe because they simply don’t want to deal with it. Pardoe’s near-future novels may have been a factor as well, perhaps seen as too extreme in their content to be associated with battletech since they are basically fear mongering based on current politics.
Did it split the community? I don’t see battletech products getting review bombed anywhere, on Amazon or BGG. I don’t see negative comments on leviathans kickstarter. So where's the backlash? The only thing I’ve seen is a bunch of youtubers capitalizing on the story to get clicks. There might be tons of backlash behind the scenes but the topic is forbidden on the forums from what I can see.
Time will tell maybe
Edited by Akalabeth (08/06/22 05:03 PM)
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Reiter
08/06/22 04:53 PM
148.72.164.214
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Side note, I dislike him now more because of his conversative views from those 2 links just for the brief messages and wasn't a huge fan of his novels; just BT in general. Considering the political **** show that is America right now, I can only wish him successful future endeavors to save you all from me having a Ted Talk rant about republicans.
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Akalabeth
08/06/22 05:40 PM
99.199.56.239
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Quote:
Side note, I dislike him now more because of his conversative views from those 2 links just for the brief messages and wasn't a huge fan of his novels; just BT in general. Considering the political **** show that is America right now, I can only wish him successful future endeavors to save you all from me having a Ted Talk rant about republicans.
I take it you're also not aware of his new novel(s) which feature the left violently overthrowing the government and putting conservatives into concentration camps?
The tagline: "Ripped from today’s headlines, bestselling and award-winning author Blaine Pardoe presents an eerily realistic view of an alternate history political thriller where conservatism is a crime and patriotism is treason"
Edited by Akalabeth (08/06/22 06:13 PM)
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Karagin
08/06/22 06:47 PM
70.118.172.64
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Okay, his novels that are not Battletech have NOTHING to do with his work for CGL. Blaine's other works never crossed over into Battletech, so that is a dead track going down Akalabeth unless you have proof that he brought his personal politics into the novels he has written for BT.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Akalabeth
08/06/22 08:33 PM
99.199.56.239
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Quote:
Okay, his novels that are not Battletech have NOTHING to do with his work for CGL. Blaine's other works never crossed over into Battletech, so that is a dead track going down Akalabeth unless you have proof that he brought his personal politics into the novels he has written for BT.
One of the battletech staff explicitly said “ugh we don’t want battletech associated with this drivel” in reference to his novel. That isn’t proof that it’s a contributing factor but it’s naive to discount the possibility.
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Karagin
08/06/22 09:17 PM
70.118.172.64
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That person who said that was the Fantanics person, so not Battletech.
And again, show us the proof that Blaine put his personal politics into any Battletech novel; it's a simple request. Either you can prove that, or you can not.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Akalabeth
08/06/22 09:48 PM
99.199.56.239
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Quote:
And again, show us the proof that Blaine put his personal politics into any Battletech novel; it's a simple request. Either you can prove that, or you can not.
I've never made the claim. But here's your proof:
https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Bull_Run
Now go and jump through hoops and tell me why it doesn't count. Tell me why it makes sense for a scottish Highlander regiment to name their dropship after a southern confederate victory.
And after you've jumped through hoops. Go stow your strawman argument and start addressing things that I've actually written.
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Karagin
08/06/22 09:56 PM
70.118.172.64
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A dropship named after a famous battle is your proof? HAHAHA! Wow... wow...
You realize that military vessels are named after famous battles, warriors, and such correct? So it would be impossible for them to pick a name for a ship that a member of the mercenary unit had a distant relation who fought there? Or maybe they captured the vessel and never changed the name?
Strawman's argument is what you are doing by trying to use a ship's name as your reasoning and not understanding how ships are named. You have made it clear you don't like Blaine, and you have made it very clear that you have chosen to take the side of their firing him.
You have claimed that his outside writings being right-wing in nature was the reason, and now you are trying to use the idea that a battlefield near where he lives is proof that he was bringing his politics into the game. If that's the case, we might as well have CGL remove all references to the American War of Independence or World War 2 while we are at it.
Karagin
Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
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Pht
08/07/22 12:34 AM
174.131.73.145
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Akalabeth
One of the battletech staff explicitly said “ugh we don’t want battletech associated with this drivel” in reference to his novel. That isn’t proof that it’s a contributing factor but it’s naive to discount the possibility.
You mean the one where the person who said that said it before the book was even released AND he hadn't read it yet?
Because I can't do links yet, here:
blainepardoe.files.wordpress. /2022/07/img_1651-1.png
Add the .com
Email was sent on the 14th. Book didn't release until the 28th. Person who sent it was John Helfers, exec editor of CGL. This is what got the apology.
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