Hello folks,

As president of White Wolf, I'll reply to some the rumors flashing
through the newsgroup here. This isn't going to be an official press
release, or politically spun commentary, it's just how it is.

Yes, we had lay-offs last Tuesday. I had to tell about 20% of our staff
that we can no longer afford to keep them on payroll. Clearly, no one is
happy about it. It's a painful, stressful, ugly situation. I know the
time of year is horrible, but faced with certain financial realities
that would allow us to pay people out to a certain date, it's better to
let them know right away and give them severance out to the date than to
wait until after the holiday and then give shorter severance.

Why the lay-offs?

As many of you know, for the last two years, White Wolf has been making
bold strides into non-game publishing. In 1996, we released as many
science fiction and dark fantasy titles as we did storytelling game
titles. Unfortunately, 1996 has been one of the worst years for
publishing - ever. The president of Bantam recently announced that the
past 5 months have been the worst period in Bantam's history as a
publisher. Now imagine being a new entrant to the marketplace.

Part of our "corporate culture" at White Wolf is that we take risks,
that we take great pride in our products (some might say too much
pride), and that we don't give-up easily. We knew going into 1996 that
it would be a tough year, yet signs showed that we could make it through
successfully. Everyone on staff was asked to work at reduced salaries,
with managers taking the bigger reductions. Myself and the owners
Stewart & Mark went without any pay for the first quarter and then less
than 50% pay for the remainder of the year. Everyone did it because they
believed and they were willing to fight it out in some tough markets.

I am proud of the titles we published this year, proud of the stories we
brought to print to share with readers. I am very proud of all of the
people at White Wolf who fought through the year. However, even when
you're doing everything within your power to succeed, the marketplace
can still dictate your success. So it was this year with fiction and
with card games.

Looking ahead at 1997, we were faced with certain financial realities
which made lay-offs necessary. Again, no one is happy about it. If some
of our former employees want to throw out bitter pills onto the net,
then so be it. They fought through a long, hard year, and in the end the
markets defied our best efforts.

I would like to clear up a few things though:

1. There have been accusations that the layoffs were done so the higher
ups at White Wolf could get rich. Well, it pisses me off to hear that.
We have a corporate salary structure that makes Ben & Jerry look like
rail baron exploiters of the working class. I have never heard of a
company the size of White Wolf whose owners or president draw as little
compensation as do Mark, Stewart, and myself, and then to have
ex-employees assert that we're doing this to get rich burns me up. I'm
not saying I or the owners deserve awards for magnanimity, however I
don't think we deserve to be portrayed as corporate money mongers either.

2. We have been accused of being in arrears to our suppliers. Well, I'd
like to be paying our freelancers a bit more promptly than we are
currently, but we are not about to go bankrupt, nor are we going to
default on any payments due to anyone.

3. As to the rumor that Mark Rein•Hagen and Stewart Wieck are splitting
up, anything is possible. The Beatles didn't stay together forever and
Mark and Stewart may end up going different routes. However, White Wolf
is no longer about just Stewart or Mark or any other individual. It's a
company of talented people working with a pool of talented freelance
authors and artists. Regardless of what Stewart or Mark decide to do in
the future, I hope that everyone will continue judging White Wolf on the
quality of its products.

4. As to the rumor that we are seeking outside investment, we are NOT
talking to any hobby market distributors, not Don Reentz at Chessex nor
anyone else, about investing in White Wolf. Chessex is one of our
largest customers and Don recently visited us. I guess some people got
the wrong impression.
        We are talking to investment companies to bring in equity capital, a
perfectly normal type of financial operation companies perform everyday.
Again, no matter who owns White Wolf (even if some of you own it should
it go public), I hope that everyone will continue to judge us on the
quality of our products.

5. Finally, to talk about the products:

Our role-playing game business is doing great. It has been doing great
since it started years ago and it continues to do well. The layoffs did
not affect our games production at all. Our 1997 line-up remains the
same. A lot of people may moan about an ailing games industry but the
only things we see ailing are the general publishing areas and card
games (other than a few). Vampire: the Dark Ages is being well received,
and we've got plenty more fun stuff coming in 1997.

We will not be producing any more card games. This one hurts me since I
really love the card game area and personally had a lot of fun helping
design Rage and Arcadia. I think they're great games, and I hope folks
will continue to play them. 

We are still publishing fiction both under the WOD and Borealis
imprints. We are still publishing Ellison, Moorcock, Leiber, Collins,
and many others. We have scaled back in this area however and will be
releasing fewer titles. On the WOD front, we've got three trilogies
starting in 1997, one for Mage written by Robert Weinburg (author or our
first Vampire trilogy) and also dual trilogies for Vampire:tM and
Vampire: Dark Ages that interweave.

This message was shot form the hip, so if anyone has any other questions
or I missed clarifying anything, let me know. We're not out to hide
anything (except maybe that Gehenna thing). However, I'll be gone for a
week as I find some joy amid a somber holiday season, so don't expect to
hear too much from White Wolf official until the New Year.

In the meantime, I applaud everyone's collective sensibility in taking
rumors with a grain of salt.

Steve Wieck
WW President