Paragon Layoffs??

Really?
When did they issue MP5's to the mods and start 'disappearing' troublesome posters?

Well there was that guy just down a couple channels that said something he shouldn't have and we haven't heard from him again! Even people that know the person!...

We shouldn't speak of such things. That's how people disappear.

Since they sold comics, novels and the movie rights >.>

Actually legally it is. Bob can turn around and sue for a lot of money because of that simple statement. Blame the government and blame lawyers. It is because of them that businesses have to have no comment policies on employee separation.

As the example that your dismissing shows even glowing comments about departing employees can and often will be turned against a company by other departing employees.

So basically as annoying as the policy is it is a big huge CYA policy.

But that is just it, the lawsuit in this case isn't frivolous and the corporation can lose a lot of money fighting and losing the lawsuit. Blame lawyers and the way the laws are written.

They were written with the intent of 'protecting' people but the side effect is that they enforce such silence policies on a company. Even when the company would love to praise etc someone.

Wait a minute you hadn't heard about the black clad teams of assault troops that Paragon Studio's keeps to send to posters houses? I thought everyone had heard about them.

Just a moment I have to go see who is knocking on the door. .....

Exactly, I'm sorry that Chris and the others are gone. I liked Chris' posting style and enjoyed the work he did on the game that I know of. It definitely made things better. And I wish him and the others long and successful careers that start as soon as they want.

Well, I'm used to such strong-minded stances as this from you, but I had to add in a quick point in addition to what others have said. Having such an opinion about yourself is almost always a sure recipe for disaster, even if it is true. People do not like such attitudes, and it leaves you open for making many mistakes and eventually making them.

I'd hope that I can say something worthwhile about Fiery Aura after all my experience with it, but I'd hardly go on spouting anything like you did. I guess I can see now how you post the the things you do with this attitude, but that's hardly a good thing. Might be a good time for you to reassess.

Lawyers cost money and stress. If a company can avoid a lawsuit by having a good policy in place, they will do it. They're in business to make money, not to wage holy war against frivolous lawsuits. They'll combat a suit that comes their way, but it's far more intelligent to avoid it in the first place.

Frankly, this is all I was looking for. I wanted to know if he was gone or not. If he isn't, a simple "he is here," would be good. Since he's apparently gone, the above does not say anything about him other than he is gone. Sure, I don't know my corporate law, but it seems like you should not get into trouble for this at some point, especially in an industry where you mention who is running what for your development.

I hate it when people at my university move on to other jobs (or just plain don't get a contract to come back), and hardly anything, if at all, is said about them going. Feels rather cold to me, if maybe somewhat expected for an instructor at a university. For someone well known and did considerably more at NC Soft, seems like something should have been said.

Dark_Respite's Farewell Video: "One Last Day"
THE COURSE OF SUPERHERO ROMANCE CONTINUES!
Book I: A Tale of Nerd Flirting! ~*~ Book II: Courtship and Crime Fighting - Chap Nine live!
MA Arcs - 3430: Hell Hath No Fury / 3515: Positron Gets Some / 6600: Dyne of the Times / 351572: For All the Wrong Reasons
378944: Too Clever by Half / 459581: Kill or Cure / 551680: Clerical Errors (NEW!)

For someone who makes a really big deal out of 'ignoring' me you don't do a very good job of it, do you.

Deleted posts are beyond our reach, but not our memory.

that was genuinely hilarious, thanks for the link.

=D

Who said he wasn't? Who said he wanted to? After all the willful twisting of his words that people did, I wasn't surprised to hear he got off the forums and Twitter, and I wasn't particularly surprised (saddened yes) to hear he was leaving.

I'm sure it's painful enough having to face the people in the office as he was leaving. I don't blame him a second if he didn't want to come up with a farewell post and jump through all the hoops needed to make sure what he said was allowed.

Hyperbole for the win!

If you're thinking this is a new policy or are just now becoming aware of just how much what game developers (at this or any game) are hedged in what they say, you're naive.

You didn't really think that would be an option, did you?

Sure ya can, probably not a good idea to do so, but you can.

Threats on a forum are lol. Grow a bit of humility je_saist, it's just a game and just a forum, and you're not all that. None of us are.

Hate to say it but nowadays you cannot even comment if they are eligible for rehire. This is my field of work and trust me not a good thing. Give dates of employment and that is it, nothing more nothing less.

As for BaB, I will miss him as I have missed his posts (and all the devs lately) posting on the forums. Now I know we have an issue or 2 in closed beta with 19 coming out and all their babble about issue 20. But still I miss the days when the devs would post a few times in a day.

Thanks Big Guy, we will miss ya.

Unless, perhaps, the team that was let go had been working on something not DIRECTLY related to CoH... studios often put teams together to investigate other opportunities. If you cancelled those projects abruptly to "focus on the City of Heroes franchise" then you'd have to suddenly find room for these people on the core project-- one thats' already fully staffed. Sometimes you fit them in, sometimes you don't. Heck, sometimes the people don't WANT to go into the positions you DO have available. I can't say with any certainty that any of the above happened here, but BAB did go on forum-silence a while ago, and there had been some cryptic hints dropped in different places about teams within Paragon on different projects. Add to that that BAB himself attributed many of the animations that we saw in GR to the other animators/effects folk, and it does seem a reasonable possibility.

You REALLY have to misread the announcement or imagine all sorts of inflection to turn it into an insult on players or the people let go. I've seen a lot worse-- there's a little marketing-speak... which tries to spin anything negative into a positive for the players, but look at it:

What's not overtly said here is that, for there to NEED a refocus on the CoH franchise, there had to have been work on something outside that franchise, or at least a fringe project. We could speculate all we want, but that gets us nowhere.

You pull the resources from that other work, and (maybe, hopefully) try to find room for them in the CoH franchise, but there's only so much you can do before you're wasting resources. You don't want to specify WHO for privacy purposes and don't want to supply an exact number lest people start a scavenger hunt for the list.

You don't want to say how great these people that are leaving ARE because that feeds the doom-sayers and you couldn't say how terrible they were... because they weren't... but also because that goes against employment privacy law. (A local company's spokesman once gave assurance that a 50-person layoff wouldn't affect profits because they released mostly "dead wood." His statement, however, really DID affect profits after the lawsuit was settled) Heck, just identifying anyone laid off by name would be a violation.

Here we get the "ease the anxiety" speak that just rings too corporate-speak for many, but they are giving assurances that 1) NCSoft is not abandoning the title, 2) they're not shutting down, and 3) they're still focusing on CoH development. Does it seem cold and impersonal? Perhaps, but we don't see if/how the company handled it, what kind of severances were offered... what kind of assistance... how their teammates handled it, etc. That's not something that's visible here and frankly isn't our business.

I think it says a LOT of good things for OCR's and Paragon management that they haven't put a communications blackout on these threads. This is a reactivation weekend and NY ComicCon- that's directing more traffic than normal to these boards to see... layoff news? They have good reason to NOT let us talk about this... but they are.

True that, his post was just copypasta from that site where this info came from. It's none of my business why or how or who or anything like that, so I'll just leave it alone. It's not like knowing all you can know is going to change anything about the situation anyway. It's absolute, and that's all there is to it. BaB's posts were really funny to read sometimes, my fave was that one about the dual pistol doves. someone on here has it as their sig and I lol everytime I see it. He did good work, and the rest now have some big metal gloves to fill.

I wonder if this means the female walk animation for STO won't burn my eyes anymore...

Edit: aww, nevermind, should read more of thread before replying.