It's related. Early on, White Wolf had a history of aiming for ambitious artistic statements and, um, not always having the intellectual capital to back them up. Wraith, a game about playing ghosts, actually had a stat called Angst, and another called Pathos. A few years later, an influx of new creators led to the building of much-needed foundations.
Rich Dansky actually is a scholar and a gentleman. :) He's also Jewish, and one of his sisters works at the Holocaust Museum. From the moment he took over as line developer on Wraith, he'd wanted to do a book about the modern-day legacy of the Holocaust for the realm of ghosts, and a few years in, did. The announcement drew a lot of flak from people bent on tarring him and the project with everything imaginable and some not. Someone reported him to the Anti-Defamation League, who gave him a puzzled call, interviewed him, and ended up supporting the project.
At first I found a bunch of the criticisms quite plausible. It wasn't long before that White Wolf had done some just atrocious handling of other real-world issues. But the quality of Rich's response persuaded me to give it a real chance, and out of it came a lasting friendship as well as a well-earned sale. He made a bunch of other converts during that flamefest, too.
But it really is the exception to a sound principle.
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Date: 2009-08-24 02:49 am (UTC)Rich Dansky actually is a scholar and a gentleman. :) He's also Jewish, and one of his sisters works at the Holocaust Museum. From the moment he took over as line developer on Wraith, he'd wanted to do a book about the modern-day legacy of the Holocaust for the realm of ghosts, and a few years in, did. The announcement drew a lot of flak from people bent on tarring him and the project with everything imaginable and some not. Someone reported him to the Anti-Defamation League, who gave him a puzzled call, interviewed him, and ended up supporting the project.
At first I found a bunch of the criticisms quite plausible. It wasn't long before that White Wolf had done some just atrocious handling of other real-world issues. But the quality of Rich's response persuaded me to give it a real chance, and out of it came a lasting friendship as well as a well-earned sale. He made a bunch of other converts during that flamefest, too.
But it really is the exception to a sound principle.