3rd printing of core books?

[Vayden]

I'd be more inclined to believe them if they wern't saying the same same article how well the DDI is coming along. If they are willing to lie about this (Strong word I know but I stand by it) then how seriously can I take an pronouncements about the success of 4E.

I assume you're referring to this line:

Progress on the D&D Insider applications improves by leaps and bounds every week, and the various suites of offerings have all of us in the office anxiously awaiting the moment we can share these items with you. Soon, soon.

"Progress is improving and we're excited" doesn't imply that the past performance was good. I think it's ridiculous to call this a lie - over-optimistic hype, sure. Lie? A bit strong.

I have a question on the third printing as well. Maybe I interpreted things wrong but it seemed like the first sellout was for the gift set and the individual books were still available. Is this for individual books or just the gift sets?

This is also for everyone who is questioning the size of the print runs - the # of print runs is irrelevant in this statement, the key line is here:

This means that, using the current trends, we’re going to crush our original projections for 4th Edition in 2008!

This means that the projections they made (which projections led them to believe it was a good business decision to go 4e and that 4e was sustainable) are being healthily exceeded. Does it give an exact dollar amount? No. Does it tell you how your Hasbro shares will be affected? No. Does it mean that, barring some major change, 4e is succeeding and will continue to do so with or without your support? Yes.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I assume you're referring to this line:

"Progress is improving and we're excited" doesn't imply that the past performance was good. I think it's ridiculous to call this a lie - over-optimistic hype, sure. Lie? A bit strong.

If things were really going that well they wouldn't be changing their DDI subscription model to cover just the web magazines. This change says to me that the applications are nowhere near done and that they need to start charging for something or the entire DDI project will go down the drain just like Gleemax did.

 

[dmccoy1693]

The impact of this statement is elusive without actual print run numbers which we are unlikely to get.

Its certainly possible that they shorted the print runs to increase demand.

 

[cangrejoide]

Anyone know how big the print runs are?

Because I just am not seeing them fly off the shelf here....

From an RPG.net post that asked the same thing(it even has a quote from Mearls)

Print size
3.0<3.5<4.0

That doesnt mention the numbers, but it does allude to ealier edition size. Now do we know the actual print run size of 3.0 or 3.5?

 

[Waldorf]

They did include the errata for the 3.0 books in the 2nd printing.

I'd love to know how big those print runs are.

Anyone remember the last time a module went to reprint?

... and a slightly different font, a few more things in bold, a few slightly different explanations for certain things, and yes, the errata.

Also, I somehow doubt the print run was that large since publishers love to chirp about multiple prints of any given book.

 

[Mark]

Its certainly possible that they shorted the print runs to increase demand.

I don't think I would go that far but I would suggest that they would be foolish to print beyond what it took to get the rock bottom cost per unit unless they were absolutely sure they would sell beyond that point. Warehousing costs money, too, and increases the bottomline, so that is to be avoided as much as possible. Once they figure in pre-order sales and estimate the first month or two of sales (based on previous edition sales and other trends), they are unlikely to risk initially printing too many more. One of the ways to keep the per unit cost the same for subsequent print runs is to not make any (significant) changes to content. Any changes run up new pre-press costs and requires an adjustment to per unit costs in subsequent printings.

Store owners with whom I spoke never had any trouble getting individual core books, only gift sets. This can only be due to not having created enough slip covers and gift sets. I suspect that the online sales of gift sets, specifically, far out-stripped expected pre-orders due to the low price point. I do not believe that gift sets were ever offered right at the same time as the release of the actual core books. Up until 3.5e, I do not believe that the core books were ever actually all released simultaneously, either. There is, IMO, good reason to suspect that such factors would have made estimating the print run numbers, particularly of gift set slip covers, a difficult task.

 

[questing gm]

Has errata ever been included in a new printing? (I'm serious).

IIRC correctly, my second printed 3.5 PHB has some differences with my one of my players copy of first printed PHB. We didn't look through word by word though, so I wasn't too sure.

 

[The Little Raven]

If things were really going that well they wouldn't be changing their DDI subscription model to cover just the web magazines.

It's not a change. From early on, people asked about being able to only get Dungeon and Dragon and none of the other stuff, and Wizards stated there would be a magazines-only option.

And saying "We're going to charge for the stuff we have ready, and will add more subscription packages later as more utilities become ready" is no indication of how well/bad the other things are going. It's simply an indication that they have some things ready, and other things will be ready in the future.

 

[Griego]

Back in 2001, print runs of the core books were at least 100,000:

http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/rants/rpgsaretooexpensive.html

The core books didn't have a "standard print run" of 10,000. While I'm not allowed to say what the real print run was (and I don't think I know within a ballpark of 10,000 anyway), but the print run was at least 100,000.

 

[delericho]

Has errata ever been included in a new printing? (I'm serious).

The second printing of the 3.0e PHB included the known errata. Additionally, I believe that repeat printings of the 2nd Edition PHB had included errata, because of the following:

This is not AD&D 3rd Edition!

...

Yes, there are some small and subtle changes in the rules, but you would have to read the whole book very carefully, and have a tremendous memory to find them. (The changes are the sorts of minor corrections and clarifications we make every time we reprint, and we've reprinted both the Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide more than 10 times since 1989!)