Would Paizo Make a Better Steward for Our Hobby?

[GMforPowergamers]

AHHHH!!! I hate when people bring up this idea.

I think WotC made a lot of mistakes, and I call them on it when they do. I have still upgraded with every edition since I started.

Piazo almost always strikes me as a good company, but man I can't stand there games. They are not able to be forward thinking enough because they are hideing in the past. I will never again play pathfinder I would rather go back to 3.5 if it came to it. I have played now in 4 campaigns and 2 one shots of Pathfinder and it is a lousy excuse to sell books.

Way back when they were selling there beta test (Yes all you fans of money grabs they sold a beta test book at gen con) I remember being at gen con in line at the Mcdonalds across the street in a hotel, and having a group of jerks tell my friend reading a 4e book all the reasons why WotC sucks, chief umong them the fact that you always need new books... but they all had there Piazo books... like paying for one company is WAY better then paying for another.

I do admit piazo was smart cashing in on bitter edition wars, but I don't like that they faned the flames for money. They made a system just the same enough to appel to people who don't want change, but just different enough to have to sell more books.

Every problem I have with any edition can be fixed with house rules... but somehow pathfinder fixed almost none of 3.5s. It did make it so my fixes to 3.5 no longer worked though.


No I don't want Piazo running D&D, I want forward thinking people who are not afreaid to shake things up and try newthings. Like WotC

 

[DMZ2112]

To answer the question in the thread title: NO. To be honest I don't get the difference between the two companies at all. If a WotC employee or ad says something bad about 3.5 (Grapple rules) then it is taken as a huge slap in the face. When Piazo does the same (Fighters have spells) everyone cheers. Someone once wrote if WotC put $100 in every PHB there would be people on the internet complaining the next day it was folded the wrong way.

The phenomenon you're describing is just the human fondness for the underdog. Paizo can mock Hasbro because they're David and Hasbro is Goliath. Hasbro is a billion-dollar juggernaut and cannot get away with firing back because it looks like bullying. You're right; it's all nonsense; they're both corporations, not kids in a schoolyard. Loyalty to a corporation is crazy. People should be loyal to a product they like, and when they stop liking it, they should find another product.

The only reason why I think Paizo would make a better steward at this precise instant in time is that they are still small and focused enough that their management actively cares about the quality of their product, while Hasbro's management only cares whether the line on the Net Profit graph labeled "Dungeons & Dragons" is trending upward. Because at the end of the day it doesn't matter how much Mearls and his team care about D&D if the people paying their salaries don't.

In fact, the more the D&D team cares about their product the less likely it is to survive, in some ways, because they will be unwilling to cut the corners that could save them money and improve their bottom line. D&D could go away /tomorrow/ because someone doesn't like the look of a chart at a board meeting, and only come back when Hasbro thinks there's nostalgia profit to be made.

I want to be clear that I am not making a moral judgment -- I have strong opinions about this stuff, but what I'm saying here is just the facts. If you want someone to steward the hobby, you don't want them comparing its margins to GI Joe or My Little Pony. That is not a fight D&D can win.

Way back when they were selling there beta test (Yes all you fans of money grabs they sold a beta test book at gen con)

Whoa there, Zorro, just to put a gentle yoke on that righteous fury, the book cost money because books cost money. The PDF was free. WotC did the exact same thing at GenCon 2013.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Piazo almost always strikes me as a good company, but man I can't stand there games. They are not able to be forward thinking enough because they are hideing in the past. I will never again play pathfinder I would rather go back to 3.5 if it came to it. I have played now in 4 campaigns and 2 one shots of Pathfinder and it is a lousy excuse to sell books.

Way back when they were selling there beta test (Yes all you fans of money grabs they sold a beta test book at gen con) I remember being at gen con in line at the Mcdonalds across the street in a hotel, and having a group of jerks tell my friend reading a 4e book all the reasons why WotC sucks, chief umong them the fact that you always need new books... but they all had there Piazo books... like paying for one company is WAY better then paying for another.

I do admit piazo was smart cashing in on bitter edition wars, but I don't like that they faned the flames for money. They made a system just the same enough to appel to people who don't want change, but just different enough to have to sell more books.

It's "Paizo". You can bash them, but please at least respect them enough to get their name correct. Otherwise I'll be tempted to loan you my hat of d02; it looks like it might fit.

No I don't want Piazo [sic] running D&D, I want forward thinking people who are not afreaid [sic] to shake things up and try newthings [sic]. Like WotC

I think that's a fair criticism, but based on sales information that has been hinted at you may be in the minority. Paizo certainly played it more cautiously than WotC did given the time frame and appears to have come off better for it. WotC certainly seems to be taking a step away from pushing the envelope with 5E. Whether that will be a net positive or negative as far as D&D's future remains to be seen.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

First, let me say I don't think Paizo would be better, just different.

If a WotC employee or ad says something bad about 3.5 (Grapple rules) then it is taken as a huge slap in the face. When Piazo does the same (Fighters have spells) everyone cheers.

When WotC says something bad about 3.5Ed, that is a company bad mouthing its own product. This is bad marketing.

When Paizo does so, it is a competitor differentiating its product and creating brand identity.

Also, lets all avoid sweeping generalizations. I don't cheer Paizo because they're an underdog, I don't worship at the altar of Pathfinder- to me, its just another 3.5Ed variant, no better or worse than Arcana Unearthed, Fantasy Craft, and several others...including 3.5Ed itself. And I don't like it when they do things that I didn't like when WotC did them.

 

[GreyLord]

I don't worship at the altar of Pathfinder-.

And Woe be unto thee, for thou has committed the unpardonable...fall to thy knees and plead forgiveness...for thou hast forsaken that which is good, and accepted stones for bread.

Thus saith this clergy of PF...and that's PF...not Pfft.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Pfft!

 

[Sunseeker]

This is getting off-topic, but by the time a company can be forced to go public by the government -- at least in the US -- it already has 500 shareholders. At which point there is already a problem, initial public offering or no initial public offering.

This depends on the company, but 500 shareholders isn't spectacular especially if employees are given share options.

 

[DMZ2112]

Also, lets all avoid sweeping generalizations.

If you insist on being reasonable, I'm going to have to ask you to shelve the pastel firebreak.

and accepted stones for bread

From now on whenever anyone doesn't like something I think is good I'm going to tell them, "Thou hast accepted stones for bread. Go, and poop no more."

This depends on the company, but 500 shareholders isn't spectacular especially if employees are given share options.

If I follow you down this road, we will leave this thread far, far behind.

 

[billd91]

No I don't want Piazo running D&D, I want forward thinking people who are not afreaid to shake things up and try newthings. Like WotC

Well, there was Paizo out there selling their electronic versions of the core rules (and all major rulebooks) for a much smaller amount (9.99) than their print books while WotC turtled up their PDF sales. I consider that a pretty strong play on being forward thinking.

 

[Sunseeker]

Well, there was Paizo out there selling their electronic versions of the core rules (and all major rulebooks) for a much smaller amount (9.99) than their print books while WotC turtled up their PDF sales. I consider that a pretty strong play on being forward thinking.

Selling text documents with some art as PDFs was forward thinking in 1995. Paizo's got to do a little better than that now.

I'd love to see Paizo develop a character builder, integrate at least the base rules, perhaps add some additional component to their PDFs to integrate them into it as well.

Paizo doesn't strike me as an innovator. They're not interested in trying something new, just sticking with what works until the hobby dies.