There is no existing fallacy among gaming professionals, from independent operators like James Mishler to brand managers and major corporations like Scott Rouse, that "if it were good it will sell as well as D&D." Anyone with an even basic understanding of the RPG industry knows that _no_ pen and paper RPG will sell as well as D&D. It would take a CATASTROPHIC failure of game design, distribution, and probably the economy overall for the D&D business to falter to the point at which another company can even contemplate selling in the sort of numbers that Wizards sells.
Actually I didn't think there was amongst the publishing side - so my amends if that came across that way - but it does keep coming up around the various online communities amongst posters, and I've definitely seen it thrown as an argument against C&C, True20, etc., so I was just pointing it out as something that irks me....
Most gaming stores, if they carry RPGs at all, carry only Dungeons & Dragons. No, I'm not talking about good stores, but ALL stores that carry RPGs, which vastly outnumber the good stores. When Paizo was publishing 3.5 products with production values and quality equal to or exceeding that of Wizards of the Coast, we continually ran into retailers who refused to carry our line (or the products of any other publisher), because it "wasn't D&D". This is even though we published 100% official D&D in the form of Dragon and Dungeon magazines for FIVE YEARS. Many of the same stores that ordered a few copies of Dragon a month didn't bother to check out our stuff, and still haven't.
Well, you'll be happy to hear that locally Gnome Games in Green Bay has Pathfinder stuff in their "prime" rpg shelves, along with D&D on the top shelf and C&C (which makes me happy) in between the two.
Companies that are basically one dude with some desktop publishing software working out of his basement, or who only do PDFs, or who can't get the interest and attention of honest-to-god hobby distributors like Alliance or ACD are completely screwed out of participation in the "industry," and frankly aren't really a part of it.
Ah but here I have to disagree, if for nothing else than this:
The tradition of D&D back to the early days you mentioned.... was Gary and his kids and a few others sitting with a typewriter in his kitchen, putting product together by hand.
And while that's not a good "business" model for long term, it represents a tradition of creativity and passion that really wants for and needs the lone guy (or gal!) sitting at the computer making a pdf.... and whether you call it a part of the "industry" or not, it is a part of the hobby and, IMHOP, a part of the heart of it too...
I do thank you for your response here.
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