RPG Codex Interview: Chris Avellone on Pillars Cut Content, Game Development Hierarchies and More

[Raziel]

That Stonekeep 2 cover is beautiful. That reminds me why I love rpgs.

The cover he made for BG3 is beautiful as well:

Is that Vance Kovacs' work or Justin Sweet's?

The BG3 cover reminds me a lot of Justin's work on the Snow White and the Huntsman which he worked later on in his career. Then again they both had a similar artstyle.

 

[Mustawd]

CEO doesn't have to explain his actions to others (at least at Obsidian seeing how Chris Avellone was treated), FU can always say that she worked from home or whatever so others wouldn't know what she was doing anyway.

you fucking retard

But look, that's an extremely good argument you're bringing up. Being CFO/CEO of the company makes it very difficult to prove anything

:D
Never change mustard.

There's a difference here that you're not picking up due to having a slavshit brain: Your argument was handwavey and shitty. Average Manatee's was well thought out and expressed rationally.

 

[Average Manatee]

I don't know about the US but having someone fakely hired and on the payroll is 100% illegal here, even if the company is not public and you are the full owner.

You are basicaly stealing money from your company. And you can't do that, even if you own it.

Also you are paying less taxes as a result
i will make you an example:

Your income is 100k and your bracket is 20%. If you split in 50k and 50k of the fakely hired your bracket is suddendly 10%.

Also there are all the unemployment insurance and all the social things you get.

"Fakely hired", as in paying a fake person a 2nd salary that you keep yourself and paying taxes separately as that person, obviously illegal.

"Fakely hired", as in doing no work for your employer but still picking up a paycheck, totally legal. I'm sure his wife is paid and files her taxes (probably jointly with him anyway) just as the IRS likes. Nothing illegal at all. The government doesn't police how much work constitutes a job.

 

[ga♥]

I don't know about the US but having someone fakely hired and on the payroll is 100% illegal here, even if the company is not public and you are the full owner.

You are basicaly stealing money from your company. And you can't do that, even if you own it.

Also you are paying less taxes as a result
i will make you an example:

Your income is 100k and your bracket is 20%. If you split in 50k and 50k of the fakely hired your bracket is suddendly 10%.

Also there are all the unemployment insurance and all the social things you get.

"Fakely hired", as in paying a fake person a 2nd salary and paying taxes separately as that person, obviously illegal.

"Fakely hired", as in doing no work for your employer but still picking up a paycheck, totally legal. I'm sure his wife is paid and files her taxes (probably jointly with him anyway) just as the IRS likes. Nothing illegal at all.

Here it's not. Especially because it is his wife. so they are considered a "household" and he's benefitting from it (if the accusation is true). Anyway idc about convincing you. As I said I am not american, I am talking about my country.
disclaimer: I am talking genericaly not about any specific case.

 

[Average Manatee]

Here it's not. Especially because it is his wife. so they are considered a "household" and he's benefitting from it. Anyway idc about convincing you. As I said I am not american, I am talking about my country.

Of course he's benefitting from it, the point is he can pay himself or her as much as he likes. He's not benefitting illegally from it by defrauding the IRS of any taxes, so how he wants to manage his business is up to him. If he wanted to pay the janitor a $1 million salary it's his business.

What country do you live in?

 

[Mustawd]

Well, you're assuming she's actually hired. What if feargus just wanted more money? Put his wife's info on the payroll. Boom extra paycheck for whatever. Wife is at home playing candy crush and she doesnt even fucking know what's going on.

None of this is proven. My point is that saying it's impossible to get in trouble is not true IMO.

EDIT: Don't forget, he's not the sole owner. He's a CEO/CFO, but that doesn't mean he can buy multiple houses with company funds just cuz he's the CFO.

EDIt2: AGAIN, this is just mental masturbation. Who fucking knows what happened.

 

[Prime Junta]

Where I'm from it could be tax fraud, as splitting the salary between them would put both in a lower tax bracket, i.e. they'd pay less taxes than if he paid it all to himself.

It would be really hard to prove however, so unless the sums were really big I'd expect the tax authorities would let it slide.

 

[Fairfax]

That Stonekeep 2 cover is beautiful. That reminds me why I love rpgs.

The cover he made for BG3 is beautiful as well:

Is that Vance Kovacs' work or Justin Sweet's?

The BG3 cover reminds me a lot of Justin's work on the Snow White and the Huntsman which he worked later on in his career. Then again they both had a similar artstyle.

It's Vance's, but it does resemble Justin's style.

 

[Mustawd]

Where I'm from it could be tax fraud, as splitting the salary between them would put both in a lower tax bracket, i.e. they'd pay less taxes than if he paid it all to himself.

Goddamn. I didn't even think of this. Especially true if you file Married Filing Jointly.

 

[ga♥]

Here it's not. Especially because it is his wife. so they are considered a "household" and he's benefitting from it. Anyway idc about convincing you. As I said I am not american, I am talking about my country.

Of course he's benefitting from it, the point is he can pay himself or her as much as he likes. He's not benefitting illegally from it by defrauding the IRS of any taxes, so how he wants to manage his business is up to him. If he wanted to pay the janitor a $1 million salary it's his business.

What country do you live in?

The janitor? The janitor would be a stranger.
We are talking about the same household. You don't seem to get the point (like the tax bracket thing I already pointed out) and to me it seems you care more about winning the argument since you keep repeating your point like it's some sort of god's commandment.
As I said it's a boring topic and I hope it gets dropped.

 

[Mustawd]

This is great for my bingo sheet tbh.

 

[Taxnomore]

Guys, I do not know how the IRS works in the USA. But here is it how it works in France :

During our investigations we sometimes come accross some shady shit. Possible smuggling, drug dealing, illegal activites, embezzling, ghost employees, etc. Now, as tax people, when confronted to a situation like this, we do two things :

-Tax the stuff. Illegal income is still income. Illegal spending is still spending. For company taxes, every expense has to be done in the best interest of the company. We do not judge on opportunity of spending (you should have bought a cheaper car, etc), but we have our word to say on useless, unrelated spending that is not done in any way benefits the company. Not sure how it works in the US, but in France, it's the benefits that are taxed, meaning that some companies to do some bullshit spending to artificially reduce benefits. Ghost employees fall under that stuff. So what we do is substract the employee salary to the amount of spending they choose to deduce to their taxes, effectively ending in additional taxation. Again, let's take the case of how it works here : Suppose someone was paid a 100 k€ yearly salary and the company fails to prove that said person is actually doing stuff, we conclude she's a ghost employee and that she shouldn't be on their payroll. Company had record of benefit of 150k€ which "normally" (it's more complicated than that") is taxed 50k€. Well, without that ghost employee, the taxation should be out of 250k€, meaning they should pay (250/3) 88.3k€ instead of 50k€.
This leads to 33k€ of additional tax for each year we see this bullshit. We're allowed to go back three years, which means in this case the ghost employee will cost an additional 100 k€ to the company. And should we see any attempt at trying to dissimulate this or lie to us, we can fine an extra 40%, 80% or 100% (depending on how severe the fraud or opposition).

This kind of amount can effectively kill a company that is not doing that great.

-Depending on how severe and certain the stuff we see, there is usually a talk among the inspector and his heirarchy over the opportunity to denounce the fraud to legal authorities who can also fine severely said company, putting the final nail in the coffin, and forbidding the guy running the companies to ever have responsabilities again.

Again, that's just here, but I wouldn't be shocked if it's not that much different over here.

 

[Mustawd]

Fuck so many hours of tax classes shooting back into my brain from Taxalot's post. Yes we have similar stuff in the US. The details are hazy, but for closely held companies, a ghost employee's salary could be considered a dividend if they are related to the owner or owners. And if not reported as such constitutes tax fraud for some magical tax reason I cannot remember.

 

[Alienman]

That's a lot of taxes, taxalot

 

[Average Manatee]

The janitor? The janitor would be a stranger.
We are talking about the same household. You don't seem to get the point (like the tax bracket thing I already pointed out) and to me it seems you care more about winning the argument since you keep repeating your point like it's some sort of god's commandment.
As I said it's a boring topic and I hope it gets dropped.

What tax bracket thing? If his wife pays taxes on her income, what matters to the IRS?

In case you didn't know, if you are married and file together (combined incomes) your tax bracket is 2x as high as if you are married and file separately. So it doesn't matter if he pays her $100k and pays himself $100k and they file together at $200k or separately at $100k apiece. It's all the same as if he paid himself $200k.

The only way something like this becomes illegal would be if he paid someone other than his wife $100k, they paid a lower tax bracket, and then they gave him some/all of the money under the table as an illegal tax-free kickback. But that would probably be pretty damn easy to spot.

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

I think what I find exasperating is that these people front like informal, relaxed, progressive, super with-it gaming nerds who appreciate the fans and even let the fans get in on the action a little bit, but then instantly transmogrify into conservative Japanese businessmen with their loaf loppers clenched tighter than an over-torqued lug nut whenever shit gets real or a dime is on the line.

Really underlines the fact that that superficial shit is just a set of lifestyle accessories.

TBH, it's on us for consistently buying into the image they're projecting rather than admitting to ourselves that it's all business. I think most of the Obsidian guys really are gaming nerds who like to interact with their audience, but they're still doing it mainly for marketing purposes. Just like how a prostitute can enjoy having sex with her clients, but that will never be the point of the exercise for her.

And also like the noble prostitute, the moment someone fucks with their revenue stream or their rep, the time for a relaxed, friendly interaction is over and they get real serious, real fast. Nothing wrong with that: business is business. Nobody at Obsidian makes games as a hobby. They're working. We fool ourselves when we pretend otherwise, the same way some men convince themselves that a hooker really, truly likes them (she may even enjoy their company, but she's got a job to do and that takes precedence).

ha, ha, you are fooling yourself. That bitch you paid in vegas hated every second of it, especially the few minutes you spent talking and especially the sloppy kiss. She thought you had a small wiener too. Real talk.

 

[Ohmsquare]

Feargus is the employer. Can't defraud yourself.

Doubt it. It's very likely that the employer would be Obsidian, not one of the owners. And that is a substantial difference in legal situations like this.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

I think what I find exasperating is that these people front like informal, relaxed, progressive, super with-it gaming nerds who appreciate the fans and even let the fans get in on the action a little bit, but then instantly transmogrify into conservative Japanese businessmen with their loaf loppers clenched tighter than an over-torqued lug nut whenever shit gets real or a dime is on the line.

Really underlines the fact that that superficial shit is just a set of lifestyle accessories.

TBH, it's on us for consistently buying into the image they're projecting rather than admitting to ourselves that it's all business. I think most of the Obsidian guys really are gaming nerds who like to interact with their audience, but they're still doing it mainly for marketing purposes. Just like how a prostitute can enjoy having sex with her clients, but that will never be the point of the exercise for her.

And also like the noble prostitute, the moment someone fucks with their revenue stream or their rep, the time for a relaxed, friendly interaction is over and they get real serious, real fast. Nothing wrong with that: business is business. Nobody at Obsidian makes games as a hobby. They're working. We fool ourselves when we pretend otherwise, the same way some men convince themselves that a hooker really, truly likes them (she may even enjoy their company, but she's got a job to do and that takes precedence).

ha, ha, you are fooling yourself. That bitch you paid in vegas hated every second of it, especially the few minutes you spent talking and especially the sloppy kiss. She thought you had a small wiener too. Real talk.

Did you read my post? The whole point is that most devs pretend to enjoy interacting with fans the same way most prostitutes pretend to enjoy having sex with their clients. I added the caveats because I'm sure there's some prostitute somewhere who genuinely likes her job, but obviously that's an exceptional situation.

Also, my god, who kisses a hooker?

 

[Average Manatee]

Feargus is the employer. Can't defraud yourself.

Doubt it. It's very likely that the employer would be Obsidian, not one of the owners. And that is a substantial difference in legal situations like this.

Fraud requires an injured party to bring suit. I guess Feargus could direct Obsidian's lawyers to sue Feargus for misuse of company funds, but I'm not sure how that would benefit him. Only reason for the government to get involved is if he defrauded the government.

Also, my god, who kisses a hooker?

A real tremendous faggot I'd say.

 

[Bohr]

Ah, I see we've advanced to the 'bring in the authorities' stage

I don't think it is so black and white situation. I understand why Chris feels the way he does, but at the same from a business point of view it makes perfect sense. Sure, for some of the owners it might have been pure greed doing the talking, but at the same time at least the CEO has to guarantee that the company doesn't suffer from the buyout and that it doesn't lead to layoffs later on when money starts running low.

After struggling for years, they finally get a product that leaves them with some cash and then one of them decides to cash out. That will lead to bitterness on the other side of the table as well.

Although if I didn't want someone to leave at an inconvenient moment, I'd probably hold off on the whole "deownering" thing which was always going to trigger their departure

 

[J_C]

This is going to the IRS today:

You are an idiot Bester. You are in involving MCA in an IRS fraud investigation, and make accusations based on nothing except a fucking Codex post. This is not a game, and should stop right there. I don't think MCA would want this, otherwise he would have done it himself. Do you think you are some kind of champion of the Codex who needs to do things like this? Also, everybody hates snitches.

 

[frajaq]

Alternatively: this is really funny and you should keep going at it Bester and report back

 

[Taxnomore]

I actually disapprove of what Bester is doing incidentally, believe it or not.
Not that anyone cares of course.

edit : I only said that this could warrant an IRS audit because, yes, that's the case, and to emphasize how absolutely serious the accusations made by MCA are. We're way past "random venting about my bosses" stage here. Still, putting him in more hot water that he wants to get into is not a nice move to someone you would consider a buddy.

There's the "right thing to do" and there's just being human, in some cases, I guess.

edit 2 : and that shit about Bester needing to report back ? If he files it in, he will NEVER hear anything back, even if his thing is investigated on. It's between the IRS and Obsidian, Bester has a right to denounce, but taxes are still a secret between the tax administration and the company involved.

 

[Infinitron]

I can't endorse what Bester is doing, but if you want to try to blow things up and get the whole truth - which is what I've tried to do by posting provocative threads on the Obsidian forums - then that's one way to achieve it.

 

[Janslin]

Alternatively: this is really funny and you should keep going at it Bester and report back

Reporting someone to the IRS is not a fun and games thing. Not even a little.

MCA eluded to mismanagement of money, he never said fraudulent use of money. Nor were any claims of tax evasion ever made.

Anyone contacting the IRS based on what's been posted in this thread is indeed a moron, and truly a despicable person. As J_C says, if MCA wanted this or thought it or thought it was justified, he would have done it himself.