Did WotC underestimate the Paizo effect on 4E?

[AllisterH]

re: WOTC happy with D&D sales.

Someone earlier mentioned that WOTC would need to realize that D&D may never become as successful as M:TG and or Duelmasters. Personally, I think WOTC itself knows this and is ok with it.

While D&D may not be as successful as M:TG, I have a hunch it _IS_ more successful than either Axis & Allies or Heroscape

 

[Maggan]

Someone earlier mentioned that WOTC would need to realize that D&D may never become as successful as M:TG and or Duelmasters. Personally, I think WOTC itself knows this and is ok with it.

Yeah, given that WotC has the financial information on the performance of D&D at least back 10 years, I'm pretty certain they know exactly what to expect in regards to sales.

Whether they are getting the sales they expect is another question. I believe they do, but that's mostly because I want to believe so, not because I have any numbers to back it up.

/M

 

[Reynard]

Since most SoD effects have been removed from Pathfinder it seems like rather a moot point anyway. A rallying cry, and a bit of a straw man.

Emphasis mine. Most, but not all, plus the inherent backward compatibility of PF allows me to re-include 3.5 SoD without much trouble.

Diseases and poisons... I like the way Pathfinder handles them, but don't know enough about how they are handled in 4e to really compare.

4E disease differ from PF ones in that 4E disease have a progression chart -- every time period (usually a day) a save is rolled and if successful the condition gets better and if failed it gets worse. This is as opposed to PF's kind of flat disease system, where every time period a save is made or an effect happens, which is the same from time period to time period. The 4E way is just more flavorful IMO, and represents one of the handful of areas where I think 4E really nailed it.

 

[El Mahdi]

...4E disease differ from PF ones in that 4E disease have a progression chart ...

I've heard that some are visually transmitted also...

 

[Neonchameleon]

FWIW, I really like the 4E disease system, too., and have incorporated it into my PF game -- including using it for magical curses and insanity. But it doesn't *replace* save or die or energy drain.

Here's an important thing, IMO: it is damn near impossible to produce actual fear in a player at the game table, and equally difficult to get a player to make his character act as if terrified of some monster. However, give that monster a save or die or level draining touch/gaze/breath/whatever, and suddenly in game you have terrified PCs run by terrified players. Even Conan got "scared" when faced with the truly weird monstrosities of the ages buried beneath the earth. Whether it was the original design intent of save or die and level drain, the effect was just this.

That's why it is worthwhile and why I think you'd find that in general DMs are more positive about it and players are more negative (those there's exceptions both directions, of course). More to the point, they shouldn't be removed. Alternatives should be offered and advice should be given, but not taking them out of the game.

In my experience, what you need to terrorise players isn't necessarily level drain. It's long term consequences. Level drain is merely one example of a long term problem and save or die a second. And both of them are clunky and fundamentally disempowering.

Level drain nerfs characters long term, which is why people fear it. The condition track is in many ways worse for two reasons: the conditions can get worse and they can get permanent. Save or Die is just like playing Russian Roulette.

 

[Kralin Thornberry]

And so, when the save or die monster becomes apparent, you (and your character) will behave in such a way as to avoid having to make that saving throw in the first place -- which is exactly what i am talking about. it isn't quite "terror" but it looks enough like it to call it a duck.

But I would counter with: does my character know the creature, and if not, why would I be afraid of a save or die effect I do not know about? Player vs. Character knowledge...

OR

Surprise round, and I get hit with a save or die effect, and die.

OR

I've fought the creature before, and my character wasn't effected by the save or die mechanic, so why would he/she be afraid of it?

If the player decides that a character should be afraid of a creature, that's fine, but don't give me a power that kills my character with no other option. My characters are not walking encylopedias of monster knowledge. Even if I has the player know what the monster can do, I will play my character accordingly.

Also, I would rather have a series of chances of failing at something (like the 4E death saves system), which would give my party members a chance to help than have 1 shot, and if I fail, I die.

I also never liked the level draining mechanic either. I understand the concept of it, that the creatures are draining your life force from you, but when you are losing levels, they take experience points from the character, thereby making it effectively that the creatures are draining experience and not life from a character, unlike losing healing surges in 4E.

Don't think I'm saying "3.x sux, and 4E roolz". I'm not. I would rather play 4E, I like the system more than the 3.x system, but I don't think that the 4E system is perfect. I just like the fact that they did away with the Save vs. Die mechanic.

 

[Kralin Thornberry]

There's even a series of choices that occurs before a save or die single roll as well. I suppose with multiple rolls, depending on what's going on, there may be ways to arrest the slide. But how many rolls is that? How many does it take to ameliorate the frustration of a single save or die roll? Or is a player, doomed by a single die or multiple dice, really going to feel different having to sit and make up a new character or wait to be raise?

I have had characters surprised by creatures (a beholder is one that comes to mind), that hit the character with an attack that required a save vs. die roll that I failed before I ever got a chance to do anything.

 

[The Little Raven]

I've seen that graph posted quite a few months ago, certainly before July 2010, so I believe that July 2009 might be an accurate date for the sales figures. I don't thing that that pie chart takes into account Pathfinder Sales this year at all, one way or the other.

...

Pathfinder was released in August 2009. How could a chart which tracks 11 months of sales for the book end a month before the book was released?

 

[Banshee16]

I didn't know what "Paizo" was before Pathfinder, so perhaps I'm guilty of underestimating them too. However, I think what WotC really underestimated was the game and the fans. 3.5 is a really good game, and people really liked it, and by releasing a wildly different game that doesn't share many of its strengths with a marketing effort that really trashed 3.5 and prior editions, they alienated a significant part of their own fanbase. All of this occurred before PF; so as I see it, Paizo simply jumped on an opportunity. If they hadn't someone else would have. It's just smart business.

Well, hindsight is 20/20. Paizo's gamble looks like sheer brilliance now. But at the time that they made their decision to create Pathfinder, it was a huge risk. There was no guarantee that sufficient numbers of customers would stay away from 4E to support Pathfinder.

There was no guarantee that, out of the number of customers who didn't move to 4E, enough would be interested in the Pathfinder changes to the rules.

And there was what....a year long delay from the release of 4E to the release of Pathfinder? It was a risk that those customer who stayed away from 4E *wouldn't* end up giving in, and starting to play in the new edition.

I'm glad they made those decisions.....but I agree with those who state that Paizo's success may have surprised even Paizo. I'm sure they hoped for it......but that's a far cry from expecting it.

Banshee

 

[Banshee16]

But a bit more on topic... Given the nature of the OGL, I think that someone would have come along to sell new material to 3.5 fans if Paizo wasn't around. It's basic supply and demand. The market demanded more OGL 3.5 material and the company that decided to supply the products was Paizo--it could have been someone else if Paizo wasn't around, but for my part, I'm glad that it's Paizo. My flavor of D&D is in good hands.

Did the market demand more 3E? Wasn't that the point of the d20 glut? There was more product than demand? Hence the need to get 4E out the door?

Banshee