"Do you loath rules with poor grammar?" Topic

Bashing grammar Nazism targeting casually-written prose such as blogs is what it is, but if someone is taking money for something they wrote, that is quite another beast.

I've just purchased the second edition of an otherwise-excellent rule set whose first was criticised around the traps for sloppy grammar and spelling errors, and I am saddened to see that the new version is no better. Worse, it's not really new – it's several years old and still uncorrected.

There is another popular author I cannot bring myself to buy rules from because the website promoting the rules consistently uses bad habits any writer would be aware of.

So, do you loath rules with poor grammar?

a) YES! Show some professional pride.
b) It makes me wince but I move on.
c) Meh.
d) No, because life's too short to worry.
e) No, and you should stop picking on people who can't get it together to learn things small children can do properly, and can't find a friend to proofread.
f) No, and you want the verb "loathe", not the adjective "loath".

A, a thousand times A!

A

g) If rule writers with a set of good ideas employed professional ghost writers and proof readers to do the literary bit, the complaint would be "How much?"

It has lees to do with pride than accuracy.

d)

x42

More annoyed by rules with poor organization. But poor grammar/spelling often go hand in hand with that.

Is Barker-ese (of WRG) poor grammar, or a foreign language?

I'm with KP on this one.

there/their/they're

They really are not interchangeable :)

"A!"

Though as I writer, I am an imperfect mortal, myself.

TVAG

B

And I learned English spelling (3 major changes in 6 grades) and grammar (well, sort of grammar, ) in East Los Angeles in the 1950s so while I understand I do expect better than some products apparently aspire to achieve.

A pay for product should not look like an internet post from LAF (God help the UK if some of those are representative of the state of the King's English.)

b/f

When you are straining gnats at trying to figure out what a response to a charge declaration is, the last thing you want is poor grammar.

Look. Grammar is NOT a set of frivolous rules that some anal doofus wishes to impose. They are guidelines to clarity.

A

there/their/they're

They really are not interchangeable :)

Nor are to/too/two.

A

I agree with most of the comments above, but the issue which really annoys me is the lack of an index. Black Powder and its various offshoots, FoG(N) etc are all decent rule sets, with good production values, but are very frustrating to use.

AAA

A – but only if I notice…

A

Poor organisation. Yes.

There is another set of rules I own that had a muddled first edition, followed by a properly-ordered second edition, now followed by a muddled advanced edition with the signature rule of the system broken into pieces and scattered throughout the book. The ink-saving version removes the page numbers!

Winston, your statement is the height of pithiness.

A. I've thrown away rules for less.

Loathe

One sees far to much of this sort of thing these days. What amazes me is that many have so little pride in they're product they don't take that small extra step to make sure their are less errors in what they publish. Off with there heads, says me!

A

What Daryl Haselton says.

I found bad use of English in DBMM v1.0 and pointed it out to a local gamer who had "proof read" the rules during the production process. He was so close to them in the first place, he couldn't see the mistakes that had been in them from the beginning. And as that error made its way past loads of "proof readers" they were obviously all too close to it.

When I worked in the printing industry, apprentice and tradesman (30+ years ago), professional readers who were detached from the product did the proof reading and it worked. Today it is all about saving cost.

A! I've been a wargamer for 45 years and a professional editor for over 30 years. Have some of these people never heard of spell check???

A! Anything you pay for is a professional work. It should be professionally written. It's not just courtesy and pride, it's also a matter of clarity.

A.

+1 Tango India Mike

I hope all the spelling mistakes in many of these posts are purposeful, otherwise my irony meter is going to explode! 8)=

A and B, depending upon the severity, and circumstances.

Frequently, poor punctuation has an even bigger impact, since depending upon how the words are strung together, they can have totally different meanings, with and/or without that, at a critical juncture.

I hope all the spelling mistakes in many of these posts are purposeful, otherwise my irony meter is going to explode! 8)=

As the official TMP Grammer, and, Speling, and, punctuaion Fashist Emeritus, when one pontificates, one inserts some erors drlibrately lest one offend the gods with hubris.
Less.

Another "loathe."

Poor grammar = ambiguity = arguments = no fun.

Rick

I'm a B type. It does annoy me, but I move on.
Grelber

A & F.

I do strive for B, but as Kenneth Portner points out, all too often poor grammar goes hand in hand with poor organization.

And poor math.

A, if you cannot take the time and pride to do your best then why should I shell out my hard earned money to purchase your rag?

a) YES! Show some professional pride.

A) If I can have a real, honest-to-gawd copy editor on my rules, so can you!

Seriously: why should the reader put in more effort to understand you than you put in to be understood?

A, always A. Otherwise rule interpretation debates slow the game down until agreements are made. Too much wasted time.

G.
I do not loathe rules with bad grammar,
I school them with both tong and hammer,
I make them chime with tools and joules,
I loathe bad rules in wig and rhyme.

English is a language with poor grammar. Beyond that, poor grammar contributes to the inability to smoothly understand and execute the rules. I don't loathe such rules, but I like them less as an effect.

Coming back for a second time.

I've been thinking about this. I've come to a stark and contradictory conclusion to most.

Rule sets are not best selling novels. No one is going to build a swimming pool on the profits from writing a set of rules for us. I doubt that the profit margins, after printing, would keep most of us in socks. Consequently, for most, professional editors and proof readers are well out of budget.

I don't meet that many authors. I go to a literary festival once a year and I might meet one or two. They are generally friendly but, you generally get the idea that you are there to meet them rather than it being a level playing field. I get the feeling that if most of the respondents to this thread were authors they would be climbing ladders away from the throng of the hoi polloi who they wish to acclaim them.

I meet about the same number of rule authors every year and the feeling is much different. These guys share my hobby. They don't put themselves on pedestals to be admired – they are just ordinary blokes [women] who think they have a contribution to make to our hobby. Some have never been academic achievers, indeed some are quite the reverse but it does not preclude their knowledge or insight. It does not make their contribution to rule mechanisms and solutions any the less valid.

Rule writers write rules because they think they have a clever solution to difficult problems. They tend not to think about their literary prowess, only about their 'solution'.

I get the 'if I'm paying' aspect of this thread, but I ask you, given the very small profit margins rule writers might make, would you rather everyone without an education that meets your approval keep their mouth shut?

I ask you, are you really that up yourself that you will not take the contribution of someone less academically qualified than you in a subject they might know much more about?

It's just a thought, as I come from a bad school and a poorly educated background.

Regards,

Chav Outraged

I guess I don't notice it, which probably means my games make a lot of you very upset :-)

A.

Don't be outraged, Olicana, as I mean no snobbish elitism; my primary and secondary education was at below-average state schools too. Such taught us both to write. It also instilled that anything worth doing is worth doing properly, and that goes double for a labour of love, and treble for something you take money for.

If an author can find play testers they can find proof readers. If they're typing on a computer they can use a spell checker.

Terrement, I get your argument, except that how do you know who is qualified.

I, for my sins, have written several sets of published rules (hell, I have an ISBN) but only one was properly, and professionally, proof read. That set, though it is my best written, is not my best published set of rules.

It is all down to partnerships. Therein, lies the rub. You need the right people in place to cover all bases. some, including me, are not able to do so every time.

Muerto,

I think this kind of thing is more difficult than you think. Believe me, play testers are one thing, professional editors and proof readers are another.

Send me your copy, I'll proof read it. What the hell, outside a 'their' is 'there' what will that tell you?

People here think that proof reading and editorship is the skill of any higher grade education. Sorry guys, it is not!

That is why the higher educated of you are paid for one thing, and the other are paid more for doing the other.

Going to college makes (or should do) you literate. It does not qualify you as an editor.

I speak from experience.

The pdf rules that have got my ire up cost 20 bucks and misspelt "and" on the very first page.

Hope it wasn't mine.

'Twas not you.