Links to RPGNow/DTRPG, etc. (including links to your own websites)

[HinterWelt]

Originally Posted by Morrus

I think he's referring to RPGNow's CoC.

Correct. Sorry if that was confusing.

Bill

[philreed]

Bump for clarification on this policy. Is it required or requested?

[Morrus]

Very much a requirement.

[philreed]

Originally Posted by Morrus

Very much a requirement.

Thanks. That helps.

[Darrin Drader]

Originally Posted by Morrus

OK, folks, you've all heard the news. RPGNow and DTRPG are now one company, and EN World has an affiliate site which is a mirror of that merged store. All products at one of those sites will appear at both of them (and, thus, at the EN World affiliate store), and your commission, etc. is to be the same at each.

Goodman Games Dungeon Crawl Classics #35 at RPGNow: $39.99 http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_in...ducts_id=7814&

Goodman Games Dungeon Crawl Classics #35 at Drivethru RPG: $69.99 http://enworld.rpgnow.com/catalog/pr...ducts_id=16180

This is the reason I'm not particularly excited about this merge. Drivethru's prices have always seemed a little inflated. The $70 price tag is actually about twice the price as the lowest price I've seen on the printed version of this product, and its the same price as I would have paid if I would have bought it direct from Goodman Games hot off the presses. If I'm buying a PDF, there's about a 75% chance that I'm going to have it printed. Printing costs on something of this size (not even including maps) will run $15 minimum.

Now in this particular case, I was interested in this product since well before it came out. When it did come out, I asked around and found that the printed product was very hard to read because of the dark background image. I know from experience that dark background images tend to strain my eyes and lead to books not getting read, so I decided to hold off. I then waited until I got word on the PDF quality to see if they had remedied the situation, and it turned out that they had by offering a version of the product without the background image, so I recently bought that from RPGNow.

I don't know if RPGNow offered larger commissions to the publishers, or if it was simply a difference in the companies selling through either place, but I definitely would describe myself as an RPGNow customer, and would not describe myself as a DrivethruRPG customer, mainly because of the pricing, not because of the watermarking or DRM issues..

I apologize for the thread derailment, but I'm having a hard time seeing this merger as a positive thing. In all likelyhood, it will lead to me buying fewer PDFs. It does look like Lulu.com is stepping up as a friend to the small presses, and I know they sell PDFs as well as print on demand, so I might end up watching what happens with them.