Pathfinder 2E Release Day Second Edition Amazon Sales Rank

[BryonD]

yea, maybe.

And, FWIW, Amazon is a much different company now.
I think comparing even really good Amazon data head to head between 2010 and 2020 would be difficult to interpret.
A lot of brick and mortar game stores went under since 2010.

 

[darjr]

looks like keepa has lots of good info especially historical sales rank on several products, maybe even back to the release of the 3.5 books. But at $20 a month..... maybe someone who wan'ts to pursue sales rank in more detail including 3.5 comparisions to PF1 and 4e and PF2 and 5e, which is almost me. but not quite.

 

[darjr]

And, FWIW, Amazon is a much different company now.
I think comparing even really good Amazon data head to head between 2010 and 2020 would be difficult to interpret.
A lot of brick and mortar game stores went under since 2010.

I read somewhere that the board game boom brought a lot of new ones along with the resurgence of magic. At least it did around here, though most of the card only shops are now gone too, but that was recent. I think all of them were new since 2010.

 

[fearsomepirate]

Paizo built their product on somebody else's brand, the basic marketing being, "We're keeping the definitive version of the brand name product going!" In other words, it kinda depended on 4e not being embraced by the market as 3.x's successor. Long term, that's an extremely fragile strategy, because the brand's owner is still in a much better position to release the definitive successor product than you are.

Since that's exactly what WotC did, with 5e being roundly embraced and 3.5 fading into the mist, Paizo had a list of mostly unattractive options, since none of them were, "continue to be the publisher of the most popular version of everyone's favorite elf game." So they chose, "make a different elf game." They've got enough of their own name recognition to do better than 13th Age, but those halcyon days when it seemed like they might dethrone WotC for good are over.

 

[JFranklin3000]

I do feel like the APG release is going to be the next real telling point for 2e. That was really the turning point for PF1 and it could really be the same for PF2. Not that it will catch 5e that isn't happening, but where it establishes itself.

 

[BryonD]

Why does "catch 5E" keep coming up? Nobody is saying that. It seems a really false standard and presumes failure. They can be very far behind 5E and be a success.

If APG can create a change then that will be awesome. I suspect they will get another bump with that as a Gencon release, at a minimum. I think Summer 2021 will be telling. Maybe sooner, but maybe not.
If they are in bad shape in October 2020, that will be kinda worst case.

But APG will need to bring some real changes. People who simply don't like PF2E are not going to pick it up just because of a few new classes. In the PF case, PF was already really moving strongly forward. Doubling down on success is one thing, changing the trajectory is another.

But, certainly. time will tell.
Obviously I'd love to see them do something amazing and rebaseline the appeal.

 

[JFranklin3000]

Why does "catch 5E" keep coming up? Nobody is saying that. It seems a really false standard and presumes failure. They can be very far behind 5E and be a success.

If APG can create a change then that will be awesome. I suspect they will get another bump with that as a Gencon release, at a minimum. I think Summer 2021 will be telling. Maybe sooner, but maybe not.
If they are in bad shape in October 2020, that will be kinda worst case.

But APG will need to bring some real changes. People who simply don't like PF2E are not going to pick it up just because of a few new classes. In the PF case, PF was already really moving strongly forward. Doubling down on success is one thing, changing the trajectory is another.

But, certainly. time will tell.
Obviously I'd love to see them do something amazing and rebaseline the appeal.

Mostly I just mention it isn't supposed to happen, even if PF 2 was the greatest game ever, with the current 5e success they wouldn't have comparable numbers this time around.

Definitely agree that next Summer is really when we are going to know something. What they announce at PaizoCon will be interesting as well, what is the direction after the APG gets out.

To me the biggest thing the APG represents is the first set of major options for the game. Whatever you think of PF2 there is a whole group of people that don't think the CRB has enough options to build their characters in 2E so they won't look at switching until after that. This might change that for some people, or not we will see.

 

[BryonD]

But there is no need to mention it at all. Nobody is suggesting otherwise.
It comes off as saying "well, OBVIOUSLY it was going to fail, 5E was an impossible standard." There is no other reason to even bring it up. It sounds like an effort to get out in front of bad news and make it sound less bad.

I would like to see what they say at Paizocon and if they have any thoughts toward expanding the appeal of the game.

The only people talking about wanting more options, IME, are people who ARE playing but do want more. I'm sure that you can find exceptions. But the "tried it and moved on group" is well bigger than the "excited but completely refuse to buy or play because we need more options" group. Paizo has made a big deal about how there are way more options in the PF2E core than there were in the PF Core. And yet PF boomed without those options. Do you really see the future of PF2E hanging in the balance based on fans who are that marginal?
It seems like grasping at straws there.

 

[JFranklin3000]

But there is no need to mention it at all. Nobody is suggesting otherwise.
It comes off as saying "well, OBVIOUSLY it was going to fail, 5E was an impossible standard." There is no other reason to even bring it up. It sounds like an effort to get out in front of bad news and make it sound less bad.

I would like to see what they say at Paizocon and if they have any thoughts toward expanding the appeal of the game.

The only people talking about wanting more options, IME, are people who ARE playing but do want more. I'm sure that you can find exceptions. But the "tried it and moved on group" is well bigger than the "excited but completely refuse to buy or play because we need more options" group. Paizo has made a big deal about how there are way more options in the PF2E core than there were in the PF Core. And yet PF boomed without those options. Do you really see the future of PF2E hanging in the balance based on fans who are that marginal?
It seems like grasping at straws there.

Everything is grasping at straws though. We know there is a vocal group of PF 1 players that don't like it, but no way to know how big they are. We have Amazon sales that are vague at best all we know for sure there is that it is the number one not 5e TTRPG game (which I don't think tells us much). We have Diamond sales numbers that the top 4 products are PF2 (but limited to what they actually sell). Fantasy Grounds PF1 is 2 and Pf2 is 3 for number of games currently (doesn't really tell us much). And then Paizo saying they are happy with the sales, which could just be marketing.

My point being there is no real good way to tell what the adoption rate really is. Which means we have no idea if more options will be what the game needs or not. Basically it is all just fun guesswork.

 

[Parmandur]

Everything is grasping at straws though. We know there is a vocal group of PF 1 players that don't like it, but no way to know how big they are. We have Amazon sales that are vague at best all we know for sure there is that it is the number one not 5e TTRPG game (which I don't think tells us much). We have Diamond sales numbers that the top 4 products are PF2 (but limited to what they actually sell). Fantasy Grounds PF1 is 2 and Pf2 is 3 for number of games currently (doesn't really tell us much). And then Paizo saying they are happy with the sales, which could just be marketing.

My point being there is no real good way to tell what the adoption rate really is. Which means we have no idea if more options will be what the game needs or not. Basically it is all just fun guesswork.

The VTT numbers are the most telling, as they suggest that the vocal PF1 players might easily be in the majority. Paizo has a long and stories history of saying everything is great until it explodes (Goblin Works...)