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[Aberzanzorax]

How much of the non-EnWorld/Die Hard Internet fanbase follows third party news, let alone would be greatly impacted if Third Parties left the game?

About a 1 to 1 correlation with those who want 3rd party production. I.E. everyone who cares about the GSL and everyone who would expand or develop interest in 4e if there were third party production.

A good way to answer this is "what have the 4e sales for Goodman and KenzerCo been like"? That gives us a very rough idea of the numbers of people that this could affect. Another question might be "what kind of sales numbers did the companies I mention who are not converting have". That gives us an idea of the "investment potential" (term I made up, not sure if it might be an economic term or not) available in this opportunity.

I've constantly seen third party importance derided. It may be unimportant to WotC. It is clearly not unimportant to all the people who bought third party products, and who wish to continue to do so.

I can only speak for myself here. I have all but about 10 or so WotC books from third edition. I have a greater number of books from third party publishers (but none individually greater than WotC). I haven't bought a single 4th edition product. If I were convinced to (through having adventures beyond the "generic", "vanilla" ones from WotC), I'd likely drop a couple of thousand dollars on WotC products. As it is, I see no reason to collect WotC products at the present time. I suspect I am not alone in this regard.