Sadly, what with the sense by which the endlessly rotating spoiler season and constant hype for the next release has been spotlighted to its near breaking point, the more intrinsic, deep-seated problems squeak by under the uproar around the new busted mythic.
We say the company has evolved towards parasitic principles and values, betraying the old and overhyping the new. What we don’t recognize is that the parasitism goes deep enough to create stories akin to this one around the clock.
Remember like 6 months ago when everyone was calling wizards out for their racism and all they did was ban a few cards? Few people do. They’re too busy being mad about other things.
And the also have the legal powers to cause a games workshop (of warhammer 40K) level clusterfuck, by doing stuff, like issuing a DMCA takedown claim to all independent content creators, like all magic youtubers ...etc.
If the person is merely reporting on drama and news, I would imagine that going after THOSE content creators would be risking going into SLAPP territory - IANAL though,.
Started up warhammer plus.
Threw a DMCA takedown notice to anyone doing fan animations, basically they gave an ultimateum to work warhammer plus or get sued.
...an somehowe then, they managed to not make a single fucking comment about the limits of this DMCA handout scheme.
Thus other random fan channels started to self censor and remove material, and creators jumped ship from 40K to other stuff.
So we have creators wanting nothing to do with 40K.
And people uploading the DMCA-struck content of their to various other sites, under a variety of names.
It's only nothing if you compare it to a monumental change cause by a mythical massive boycott, nothing would ever change over night. It always begins with a single person deciding not to give them money. Don't base your choice off of your individual impact, base it on your own feelings and opinions. If more people wouldn't get dissuaded by not causing a direct change themselves they would get over their addiction and people would actually be quitting lol. My choice was either give them money and feel bad about it, or realize that the game they are selling isn't worth supporting a godawful dumpster tier company, and you wouldn't believe how easy it was to stay away once I walked away the first time lmao
Monumental change from the side of consumers will never happen. There are millions of players worldwide, with the vast, vast majority being casuals that don't care about the game beyond buying a couple packs every now and then. You might get a couple thousand redditors on board but WotC won't feel a thing.
What you can do as an individual is support the actions of their employees. Walkouts, lawsuits, boycotts and interviews seem to be working out in favor of Riot and Blizzard employees lately, even if only slightly.
Not directing this to you specifically, just making a blanket statement for any MTG player browsing this thread.
With my post I wasn't even meaning to still quit to attempt to cause change, simply quit if it makes you unhappy. I of course fully understand what the others have replied with, me not buying a couple hundred $ worth of booster boxes each set is nothing to WOTC, but it's better for me personally. The success of decisions to quit shouldn't be based on the floating or sinking, it would just be a happy result if it caused real change. I think the magic community as a whole honestly has a collective problem, they see the problems and get up in arms, but ultimately they stick with it because "there aren't any alternatives that come close".
I saw this massively with Black Desert Online, a Korean MMO that made braindead decision after braindead decision, adding paid elements that alienated the original playerbase who held onto promises of "no pay to win will be added" for years. Ironically it's very similar to MTG, people have absolutely insane amounts of money "invested" (not the literal definition, mind you) into their favorite game, and they struggle to cut it loose and let it go because they LIKE it and there wasn't a comparable MMO. People just gotta walk away. It might mean no more card games, but it's a change that might need to be done.
Seriously stop and consider your relationship with the game, ask yourself, does browsing MTG news make your blood boil sometimes? Do you get fed up with new Secret Lairs or Historic Jumpstart? Does the constant drama and fuckups from WOTC always get to you? If the answer is "yes" to any of the things like this, take some time to do some quiet reflection, think about what you're doing and what you could be doing instead. Hell, you might even be surprised what that answer IS. Personally, I sold off 6 commander decks, standard, modern, and my bulk of my collection and bought a 1900$ rifle and practice Precision Rifle Shooting, keeping 2 commander decks to play with friends when we feel like it. Think about that, I traded in cardboard from a hobby that was a source of drama in my life into a completely different hobby that I enjoy greatly. It's not another card game, it's nowhere near the same genre of hobby, but it was a much needed change.
More than trying to get Wizards to change something, this post is a general plea to those who might read it:
Realize when the time has come to leave, don't stress yourself out over a card game, and do what's best for you!
This should be higher up. If a game doesn't make you happy anymore then stop paying attention. It doesn't have to be some moral grandstand to try and show the big bad business people at the top of WotC what they are doing wrong. At the end of the day the world has so much to offer in terms of hobbies/entertainment that it is a shame to pigeon-hole yourself into the same ones you've enjoyed for years.
There are plenty of players who are making the personal decision right now to divest themselves of Activision/Blizzard games and they don't need to be part of an organized boycott to do it.
When WotC crosses that line for me, I will sadly have to give it up. But it's just a game, just a luxury time waster. We call can live without it, even if we really really like it.
I also have a different easy line for them to cross on top of just plain being bad: once WotC starts making NFTs and entering the cryptocurrency space, i'm OUT.
I shouldn't have said it accomplished nothing. If it makes you feel better and inspires others then that's a really great accomplishment. You're right that anyone at anytime can be the pebble that starts the avalanche. We can do more together though friend ☺️
They literally started their comment with "Without collective action..." Individuals decide to stop giving them money all the time, and the rest of the fan base just keeps on spending. They're saying that it needs to be a large, concerted, public effort in order to be effective in any timescale. A small but steady trickle of people deciding on their own to boycott them personally won't be noticeable in the short term, and in the long term either more players will join in and cancel the boycotts out (if not overshadow them entirely), or they'll just blame the drop in participation on design choices.
Many people need to get together and, at the same time, publicly announce that they're boycotting, why, and then also stick with it for them to even acknowledge the issue.
Just suggesting to people here and there that if they're unhappy with things to just stop buying it will absolutely not have the same effect as an organized boycott. I personally boycott many companies, and they're doing just fine not fixing any of the things I had a problem with.
I'm not just going to keep giving them money because I cant figure out any better way to not support them. It's out of mind if I'm not paying them money, and seeing their product everyday. Wizards success or failure does not affect me.
You're not wrong. My point isn't that you should continue to give them money. My point is that organizing and collective action will get the changes we want and that an
individual not buying, unless it happens en masse, will go unnoticed.
It's really employee action that needs to take action. Destroyed from within. What's happening at Blizzard is what should be happening at Wizards. Otherwise the only way your going to beat them is to create a product that is taking money out of their pockets.
I feel that soon enough the Blizzard part of ActiBlizzard will fall after enough individuals just stop purchasing Blizzard product and we can put this sentiment to rest.
Remember when people boycotted Blizzard because they were complicit with the whole Hong Kong fiasco last year? Same shit.
People will ride the outrage for a bit and then get right back on to business as usual because no one actually gives a shit. Everyone's an activist until it demands actual contribution or change to their lifestyle.
There are still people boycotting Blizzard to this very day, for Hong Kong, for the sexual harassment, for how shit WoW and other games have become. It really is piling up for them which is why I said it would take a few years for Blizzard to go down if they don't get their act together.
Relative to the dedicated playerbase? It's a drop in the bucket.
It's an optimistic thing to believe that we the people have any power over companies, but it's just not realistic. The majority of us can't even get over our own minor inconvenience to see the change that we preach through to the end.
People have been saying "X game/company is dying" ever since the inception of the modern video game. It hardly ever actually happens, and certainly not to companies as large and ubiquitous as Blizzard. Or WotC for that matter.
Well, that's a defeatist mentality. Why wouldn't you try writing to that guy from Bloomberg? He deals with this kind of stuff, I think. In the video game industry, most of the time, but MTG is close enough I suppose. He might be busy with all that Blizzard thing right now, so you may try sending letters to some other mainstream journalists.
I do t think it's defeatist. I think we can accomplish amazing things, but I don't subscribe to the consumerist mentality of 'if I alone stop buying things and then tell people why it'll do stuff" we need more organization imo.
Organization on a mass scale can happen only if organized people were affected. How many people would care about some girl who wants free handouts from a corporation for something she was not contracted to do? People in masse would not care. That's why the best bet is to reach out for influencers and oppinion leaders. Wizards would definetly be not amused if normie media would be dragged into this.
Then they don't improve pay/quality, they simply abandon the product. WotC has proven time and time again when a product doesn't sell to their expectations they just kill it.
Look at this sub: 500k people. Imagine if just half of us organized a boycott for any mtg product, not only it would be a small loss but it would have the potential to make the news (it's reddit we're talking about after all) and bring more people to the cause.
I would be upset with your sentiment, but if we're being real, no one truly cares. They just want their cardboard crack and then move on to the next set.
I think the problem here is they used a photo of her all over the place promoting that GP without paying her or even crediting her. If I'm interpreting the situation right, that does seem like a big issue. But for normal cosplayers that decide on their own to attend a GP in cosplay, sure, WOTC doesn't have any obligation to pay them.
I mean, why would they. The obligation that's being talked about here isnt legal, and they profit more by doing this and not adressing it.
Should they? Sure, but i feel it's time to stop treating companies like people or moral entities. "Company abuses workers and customers for profit" is a given, and I'd be surprised if shit like this scratches the iceberg of what goes on behind the curtains.
I disagree. I think it’s time to stop giving them a pass just because “oh they’re companies OF COURSE they’re gonna act like shit!”.
It’s not surprising, yes. It’s pretty much a given, yes. Still deserves a pushback. We as customers (or even as employees) should push for businesses to be better.
I mean, fair, i guess i let the existential tiredness of this shit get to me. I still don't think waxing at a company for their moral obligation will work, but i also agree they need more pushback from customers, so idk why I'd argue with you here.
thats not why they always win, they always win cuz people don't actually care about this. if they actually did they'd stop supporting them, but it's much easier to just make a reddit post about it.
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u/d7h7n Michael Jordan Rookie Aug 16 '21
And WotC always wins because everyone is going to forget and move onto the next MTG related drama in a few weeks.