Pathfinder 1E Pathfinder outselling D&D

Hmmm…. Let’s see if I can help get this back on track (my apologies in advance if this is a little long-winded) I’m extremely happy that Paizo and Pathfinder are doing so well. Not just because I’m a Pathfinder player but also because their business model fits my gaming needs so well. I cut my teeth on the Red Box and Keep on the Borderlands. While the rulebook was fun to read it was KotB that really ignited my imagination and all I wanted to do was find some kids to run through that thing. And I did. And it was a blast. We graduated to the Expert Box (if my memory is correct) and the Isle of Dread . From then on as a DM I was hooked on the modules. Into the Unknown, Caverns of Tsojinth, the Giants series, the Drow series… as we got older Night Below and other campaign arcs. It was the modules that really kept me coming back.

But 2nd Edition and its issues coupled with really liking game systems like Shadowrun, GURPS, Rolemaster, Old School Marvel, moved me away from D&D. When 3rd edition came around I was excited. When I realized that the D20 and Open Game movement meant a plethora of 3rd party support in the form of adventures, I was hooked. I was excited again like I was when I opened up the Basic Box for the first time. And for me and my group, it worked. I was able to cobble together campaigns from all these different adventure modules and Dungeon magazine.

The rules system was our sweet spot so when Paizo announced Pathfinder, needless to say we were excited. I loved what Paizo had done with Dungeon, had played through Shackled City and Savage Tide and seeing that the Adventure Paths were going to be their bread and butter, it was what I was looking for – a campaign world supported by published adventures. Many have said an RPG company can’t be sustained by adventures modules. Probably not totally but obviously folks like me who liked a lot of what 3E/3.5 offered, enjoy the work that Paizo is doing and Lisa’s announcement makes me feel confident (or maybe it’s just hopeful?) that Paizo’s business model is sustainable and we’ll have world’s to explore and evil machinations to topple for years to come.

Imaro said:

So we have no numbers, no statements by WotC reps as to the profits or losses... yet we can declare it a success. This makes no sense. We have no indication (except for wild guesses and opinions) that DDI is a success financially compared to the amount invested in it... Unless you have real numbers or a statement it's just as erroneous to claim it is a success as it is to claim it's a failure... how do you not see this?

Click to expand...

Okay, I think I'm seeing where the difficulty is, here.

I'm not using the word "successful". I'm using the word "working". I cannot say how well DDI is doing for WotC. I don't have hard numbers, as you say. But I am forced to conclude that it is working, purely by virtue of the fact that they are continuing to pursue the same path after three full years and show no signs of moving away from it.

If DDI were not working for WotC, they would have made significant changes to the model, and would undoubtedly be putting a much stronger emphasis on book sales. Instead, we see the opposite.

Does this make sense, now?

Yeah, only they do still produce books and thus a comparison can be made. Whether you feel the comparison is valid or not is pure opinion.

Click to expand...

It's all opinion, but my (and Morrus') opinion is backed up by what we know: WotC is receiving tremendous amounts of revenue from DDI (this can't really be disputed; we do know that 56,000+ DDI subscribers have accounts set up on WotC's community site, so the real number of subscribers must be at least that number). It seems silly to point to book sales vs. book sales and say "Paizo is clearly better off as a company than WotC!" when a huge chunk of WotC's business is now no longer represented by book sales.

Again, does this make sense to you?

An observation about this thread: Several people have indicated as part of their overall posts that they believed that 4e was a failure, or was somehow not as successful as 3.x for WotC. Though their published strictly-RPG ventures (i.e. excluding board games and other avenues of recent focus) may have slowed recently, and perhaps slowed significantly, I do believe (or rather guess) that 4e has been just as successful as 3.x over its (continuing) lifetime, and in fact, including the introduction of the subscription model, is likely their most successful edition of Dungeon & Dragons ever (both in sales and in player base). Anecdotally, I've never seen so many people play and talk about any edition of any TTRPG ever (from my own local stores to mentions in the news to promotion through Penny Arcade to the number of websites and blogs discussing, dissecting, and experimenting with 4e).

Though we may disagree about whether 4e is cutting edge or a step backwards (I think it is great, obv), I find it hard to imagine that WotC is dissapointed with 4e overall (excluding the rise of Pathfinder). And I say that as a happy shareholder of HAS (though note that Hasbro's proxies, conference calls, and outside analysis of the company almost never mention WotC, except as a short blip when listing the company's holdings. And as far as HAS is concerned, WotC is M:tg, and then, everything else. Also, Hasbro has been doing phenomenally well, primarily through the Transformers movies).

In short, just because Paizo has been successful (and good for them), does not mean that 4e has not also been widely successful. And when I see others state that "many" were unhappy with 4e and left it, I interpret this to mean "a not insignificant number," but not approaching anywhere close to half, or even a quarter, and certainly not "most".

Dannager said:

Okay, I think I'm seeing where the difficulty is, here.

I'm not using the word "successful". I'm using the word "working". I cannot say how well DDI is doing for WotC. I don't have hard numbers, as you say. But I am forced to conclude that it is working, purely by virtue of the fact that they are continuing to pursue the same path after three full years and show no signs of moving away from it.

If DDI were not working for WotC, they would have made significant changes to the model, and would undoubtedly be putting a much stronger emphasis on book sales. Instead, we see the opposite.

Does this make sense, now?

It's all opinion, but my (and Morrus') opinion is backed up by what we know: WotC is receiving tremendous amounts of revenue from DDI (this can't really be disputed; we do know that 56,000+ DDI subscribers have accounts set up on WotC's community site, so the real number of subscribers must be at least that number). It seems silly to point to book sales vs. book sales and say "Paizo is clearly better off as a company than WotC!" when a huge chunk of WotC's business is now no longer represented by book sales.

Again, does this make sense to you?

Click to expand...

I am not certain where WotC removing the slightly flawed offline character and monster generators in order to replace them with less functional but entirely online generators falls. I can see it as consolidation, but it was handled in a manner that damaged their abilities. But for the most part, I agree - WotC's DDi, flawed as it may be, is a working model, but I also think that it needs better in store support than they are currently allocating for that model.

A recurring question, with unknown answer, is how much does it cost to keep that online model running and how much was the cost of creationg and expanding it? Related is 'how much debt load remains from the horrible Gleemax catastrophe?'

Another question, currently unanswerable, is 'how many of that 56,000 is current? Are they counting total subscriptions, then removing subscriptions from that number as they are withdrawn? If Bob signs up, unsubscribes, then signs back up because he likes Gamma World, does that count as two subscriptions?

The other problem is that an offline presence is part of what spurs the online presence, if folks do not like what they see in the stores then they do not become part of that online community.

That said, had DDi been better implemented for 3.5 then I would likely have been a subscriber, though dropping it when 4e appeared. This part of their model likely is working. It is either turning a profit or will do so in the future.

While I would like more knowledge of the actual numbers I do not deny that it works - and a few days ago I met a user for the first time. A teenager, he waxed enthusiastic about the online character generator, then bought Pathfinder.

Not counting him as a convert, just enjoying the irony - the book store is running a Pathfinder event, he wants to be part of it, so he bought the core book. He will also be dragging his friends to it. But I suspect that he and they shall remain 4e players. I actually know very few 4e players, but this has more to do with the gamers that I know than with success or failure of the 4e brand.

For myself, I don't think that it matters that much if the subscription model is print or electronic - and both WotC and Paizo rely on their subscription models, different though their form may be. Neither subscriptions add to their in store presence, but both benefit from the incomes thereof.

Paizo does have some of the functionality of the online model in regards to the various SRD sites, which by their nature are not limited to only Paizo's official content, but can draw on 3PP as well.

Not at all sure how well the char gen, monster gen, and VTT pieces of software are represented for Pathfinder - I use PCGen, which by its nature is slow to incorporate massive rules changes like those in the APG. And I have never used any online tabletop. But at least PCGen supports 3PP, and it is possible to input data by hand, features lacking from WotC's online generator.

The Auld Grump

TheAuldGrump said:

Not at all sure how well the char gen, monster gen, and VTT pieces of software are represented for Pathfinder - I use PCGen, which by its nature is slow to incorporate massive rules changes like those in the APG. And I have never used any online tabletop. But at least PCGen supports 3PP, and it is possible to input data by hand, features lacking from WotC's online generator.

Click to expand...

There are a couple of great character gen options for Pathfinder. PCGen which you've already mentioned, there are a few other that float around on the Paizo boards which are fairly popular. And then there is Hero Lab, the officially licensed character gen tool. Hero Lab is very good. Makes NPC and character creation a breeze.

There is also combat manager which I have only recently started playing with - but it looks like a pretty powerful tool as well for combat management, advancing monsters and such as well.

As for VTTs there are several with good Pathfinder support. d20 Pro is one option, TTopRPG is good and MapTool with one of the Pathfinder frameworks is excellent. Combine PC Gen or Hero Lab with MapTool and token creation for critters, characters and NPCs is a breeze.

Who can say if WotC is disappointed in 4e?

WotC.

And they won't, regardless of if they are or not, because the culture of most businesses is such that even if a flop is recognized, it's never bandied about (in the hopes that people will quickly forget it), and most often it's not even recognized as a flop. It's "market forces" or "unpredictable fans" or "changing media landscape" or "OH NOES PIRATES ON TEH INTARWEBS!", it's never "We screwed up, we're looking at how, and we'll try to do better."

So THEY aren't exactly a trustworthy source.

Which makes EVERYTHING wishful thinking and speculation. Low book sales don't necessarily mean poor 4e income, since DDI is a pretty big pillar of that. Big group membership in the DDI doesn't necessarily mean the D&D RPG folks are having money fights and buying hookers and blow ale and whores, either, given the high initial costs of set-up, and how frequently they've re-invented that particular wheel.

So YOU don't know how 4e is doing financially (I guess unless you happen to be a WotC accountant?).

Not that that has ever really mattered for individual games anyway.

TheAuldGrump said:

Related is 'how much debt load remains from the horrible Gleemax catastrophe?'

Click to expand...

There's a fair chance that this was simply written off by Hasbro. WotC itself isn't necessarily carrying that debt, and it's a fair bet that if the DDI model is showing good numbers they'll let it continue to run its course regardless of what came before. Being owned by a much larger corporation is not without its perks.

Another question, currently unanswerable, is 'how many of that 56,000 is current? Are they counting total subscriptions, then removing subscriptions from that number as they are withdrawn? If Bob signs up, unsubscribes, then signs back up because he likes Gamma World, does that count as two subscriptions?

Click to expand...

You're right, it is unanswerable (or, at least, hasn't been answered), but I'm willing to bet that this number is outweighed by the number of people who have DDI accounts but have not set up community accounts (and thus were never included in this group). 56,000 strikes me as a conservative figure, given what little information we have.

The other problem is that an offline presence is part of what spurs the online presence, if folks do not like what they see in the stores then they do not become part of that online community.

Click to expand...

That's true up to a point, but the biggest driving force behind the spread of the hobby has been word of mouth. The internet offers new, easy, effective opportunities to push that same word of mouth (see: Penny Arcade) without having to worry about supporting an in-store presence to do so.

That said, had DDi been better implemented for 3.5 then I would likely have been a subscriber, though dropping it when 4e appeared. This part of their model likely is working. It is either turning a profit or will do so in the future.

While I would like more knowledge of the actual numbers I do not deny that it works - and a few days ago I met a user for the first time. A teenager, he waxed enthusiastic about the online character generator, then bought Pathfinder.

Not counting him as a convert, just enjoying the irony - the book store is running a Pathfinder event, he wants to be part of it, so he bought the core book. He will also be dragging his friends to it. But I suspect that he and they shall remain 4e players. I actually know very few 4e players, but this has more to do with the gamers that I know than with success or failure of the 4e brand.

Click to expand...

Good for him! He's branching out and he'll have a better idea of what sort of game he's looking for. Would that we all gave that a shot every once in a while.

Kamikaze Midget said:

And they won't, regardless of if they are or not, because the culture of most businesses is such that even if a flop is recognized, it's never bandied about (in the hopes that people will quickly forget it), and most often it's not even recognized as a flop. It's "market forces" or "unpredictable fans" or "changing media landscape" or "OH NOES PIRATES ON TEH INTARWEBS!", it's never "We screwed up, we're looking at how, and we'll try to do better."

Click to expand...

Actually, I've seen WotC reps say, "We screwed up, we're looking at how, and we'll try to do better," almost verbatim a few times.

So, no.

Dannager said:

Actually, I've seen WotC reps say, "We screwed up, we're looking at how, and we'll try to do better," almost verbatim a few times.

So, no.

Click to expand...

Not, perhaps, as often as they should, but that is human nature. It does seem to happen less than it used to, though that is likely because I pay less attention to WotC these days.

Paizo has also been willing to eat some crow now and again, Green Ronin likewise. Acknowledging a mistake, fixing it, and moving on.

GW... not so much. (Any time that I wonder about WotC's sanity I look at GW. Things could be a lot worse than WotC....)

The Auld Grump, crow! It's what's for dinner!

TheAuldGrump said:

Another question, currently unanswerable, is 'how many of that 56,000 is current? Are they counting total subscriptions, then removing subscriptions from that number as they are withdrawn? If Bob signs up, unsubscribes, then signs back up because he likes Gamma World, does that count as two subscriptions?
The Auld Grump

Click to expand...

I don't know if the 56,000 counts cancelled subscriptions, but I'm fairly sure our hypothetical Bob doesn't count as two. I've subscribed and unsubscribed a few times as funds permit, and it keeps your account info. I never made a new account, just reactivated the old.