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Sure, I do it all the time. As long as the NPCs "make sense" to the players (i.e., they don't show obviously contradictory abilities), it's a great time-saver. Note, however, that some players will be miserable if you think you are skimping on the all-important rules. I think they're silly for...

The situation may be a little more complicated than that, trancejeremy. Heroclix was far from a "sure thing", and many retailers ordered lightly when committing to initial preorders. Once it became clear the product was a winner, demand spiked, and it has been somewhat difficult to get (or...

Another way to look at it is that Yoda doesn't use the Force unless he has to. Contrast this with Anakin, who thinks using the Force is fun and does so whenever possible. yours,

IMHO, professional presentation is like porn. You know it when you see it. No, I don't think that's what bottom-middle-top is about at all. What you're describing is the difference between lousy product and good product. But as James Ernest proved, cheap doesn't have to mean bad. Look at...

As I understand it -- and this is based more on reading smart people writing about business than my own limited opportunities to test what they say -- there's two important factors. First, people aren't nearly as rational about price as they think they are. Second, most people see prices as...

I would be very curious to know what you consider the "average run-of-the-mill" gamer -- and what information you base that on. (edit: hit "send" mid-post, grr)

Fair enough. If game retailers have no value to you, that's cool with me. However, I think you'll find that we do have value to your favorite publishers -- and it's their opinion that matters on this issue. Game distributors and retailers handle the vast majority of most publishers' sales. The...

At 50% off? It's inventory clearance. (Which is just as true a sale as anything else is, mind you.) Based on the reports I've heard, Chainmail has been a hit or miss thing for retailers. Some retailers have done very well with it, but it's died on a lot of shelves. I don't know the managers...

Possibly. The thing to remember is that the industry as a whole didn't start seriously discussing price until about a year ago. There's a great deal of debate about the concept, and most companies are just beginning to take actions based on it. Change takes time. yours,

FWIW, I think that's part of the business plan. Let me elaborate a bit on some of John Nephew's earlier thoughts. OK, you got into GW. You bought plenty of core books, basic minis and key supplements. You got your army set up pretty much the way you wanted it. What are you going to buy next...

Speaking as a very minor author, I'd be thrilled to see my open content appearing in Big Books of Spells and the like. Quite aside from the ego-boost of it all, I figure that if the material is properly credited it's a free advertisement for the rest of the product it's taken from. yours,

What depresses me a little is that had Asimov publicly discussed his illness at the time, it might have done a lot to decrease prejudice and raise AIDS awareness. OTOH, how you die is your own business. I can understand wanting to go out in peace and quiet and private rather than wasting your...

> I'm baffled as to what > exactly the problem is? Unless I'm confused, the problem is this: 1. Locus reported that Dr. Asimov wanted to publicly reveal the exact cause of his death, and that his wife, Dr. Janet Jeppson, talked him out of doing so. 2. Dr. Jeppson says that this is untrue...

We came to work here at the store a little before 11 a.m. EST, and found a notice about what was happening on an industry forum. Deb and I spent most of the rest of the day sitting in the front of the store listening to the radio. I don't think we really believed it until we went home and saw...

IMHO, there's nothing risky about it. This is what the OGL is *intended* for, and has been intended for from the beginning. The reason everything has been D20 so far is because everyone has wanted to do projects that benefited from the D&D brand. Everquest is a very strong brand that can sell...

I tend to use this kind of situation more as a plot-launcher than a punishment. Were my PCs to get caught in a similar situation, I'd have whoever's in charge present them with one of the awful (perhaps terminal) punishments described above, then offer them a choice: be punished or repay their...

Me too. I was in college in 1989, and our gaming clique all hated 2nd edition, mostly because we were college sophomores and didn't know any better. (In retrospect, I think we were right -- AD&D2 was poorly designed compared to AD&D1. But at the time our disdain had more to do with our egos...

Masters of the Wild's official street date is Friday, February 15. Wizards of the Coast seems to actually be taking the street date seriously for a change -- they've been rather lax about this in the past, resulting in a great deal of hobby retailer anger being directed at them -- so in many...

Eep. As a store owner, I can think of only one justification for buying 12 copies of "Slaves of Fate". If you sold 25-50 copies of Dragonlords of Melnibone when that product first came out, you might expect to sell 12 copies of "Slaves of Fate" in about the same amount of time. Even if that...

Bummer. But it sounds like everybody had a pretty good time, so your best bet is probably to declare victory and move on to the next plot (or campaign, if this one is essentially over). yours,