Age of Worms H/C - unlikely :(

[Ron]

However, there are signs that comic compilations are eating into monthly magazine sales. In fact, it was just announced that comic collections are outselling comics right now (i.e. the total sales of all compilations is higher than sales of all comic books).

This isn't necessarily a bad thing from a business sense, though.

It is just a change of consumer expectations. I was called crazy by my friends when I gave up buying comics and limited my purchases to TPs in 1993. Today I am a regular consumer. Fact is magazines sales in general are being eroded by the Internet and other media. Offering the same contents in different will reach new consumers and thus benefit Paizo. It is a good move.

 

[trollwad]

I have to disagree wtih Erik about one thing. I really dont think that he is selling as much nostalgia as he thinks he is. Look, Im not interested in 'Return to Puppets.' Maure Castle and Isle of Dread were interesting long ago modules with interesting settings. Dungeon got good people to write the 3.5 expanded versions with more goodies in them. They have good art in those adventures. The fact that that product then sells is NOT nostalgia in my opinion.

When I see someone (even someone that seems like an astute businessman like Erik) attributing product after product to 'nostalgia' , it seems like a clever dodge rather than a critical analysis. Here is my simplistic (noninsider) view: Erik and James' Paizo is filling a void. To be sure, Goodman's DCC has been a success but other than that, there arent that many good adventures out there. Red Hand of Doom was good but Expedition to Ravenloft somehow missed the whole character thing with perhaps the most compelling nostalgiac character in the entire history of rpgs and made the module a simple series of Delve miniature combats without any Ravenloft atmosphere. Shattered Gates of Slaughtergard has superb production values but is an absolutely miserable module. Barrow of the Forgotten King sounds like the exact thing. It is amusing to me that (with the exception of Red Hand of Doom), 20 years later and with far superior production values, those adventure authors are less proficient in creating compelling settings than Ravenloft, Steading of the Hill Giant Chief, Cult of the Reptile God, the Isle of Dread, Maure Castle/Greyhawk, Village of Hommlet, etc.

Maybe its because so many people at WOTC think they are "designers" rather than gamers. Really talented guys like Mike Mearls are spending time debating silly little things like dead levels rather than writing the next Dead Gods. In the 1e day, right or wrong it seemed like Gygax was a professional dm and adventure creator who occasionally threw today (some slightly contradictory rules). He seemed more interested in running people through his creations than in talking about the nth iteration of the rules.

Any other thoughts are welcome. Do others think it is nostalgia or its just a return to compelling locales and plots for adventure.

 

[JoeGKushner]

There are more DMs who don't buy Dungeon than do. While they might not be able to sell an AoW HC to you, it'd sell to me and many others who either don't subscribe or didn't discover the series in time.

Wait... people who don't buy Dungeon magazine are MORE likely to buy a $75 hardcover? Possible but...

 

[Cthulhudrew]

It is just a change of consumer expectations. I was called crazy by my friends when I gave up buying comics and limited my purchases to TPs in 1993. Today I am a regular consumer. Fact is magazines sales in general are being eroded by the Internet and other media. Offering the same contents in different will reach new consumers and thus benefit Paizo. It is a good move.

Not to derail the thread overmuch with comics talk, but I think a big part of the TPB phenomenon has to do with the prospect of getting an entire story in one sitting, rather than having to wait several months as it is serialized (not to mention not having x pages of advertisements breaking it up). The whole concept of "decompressed" storylines (aka, "writing for the trades") has kind of grown up around the notion that these stories will be collected in a tpb at some point, and thus you get a lot less of the "done-in-one" single issues that used to be a hallmark of comics, and eased the month-long wait between fixes. Nowadays, there is far more of the story-arc mentality going on, where you'll get a 6 issue arc, spread out over 6 (or more) months of real time, and a tpb bypasses that wait (although there is a subsequent wait for the entire period to be over, real time).

Personally, I'm in agreement with a comic retailer friend of mine who thinks that the comic companies would do better to go direct to trade and do away with the monthly "floppies" (as he calls them) altogether. Not quite sure how that would affect them in terms of advertising revenue, which is a major part of their bottom line, though.

In any event, to try and bring this back to the topic at hand- collecting all the AP in one easy to use volume would in many ways be the same as the tpb format- you don't have to wait a month between issues, you don't have extraneous information (other adventures, ads, etc.). The downside is that you do have to wait for the entire thing to be complete (a year+), but to address JoeGKushner's point about non-subscribers being willing to buy, I'd say there is definitely quite a bit of precedent for it. Paying $75 for all 12 issues plus a lot of the extras that appeared in Dragon as well as Dungeon, as opposed to paying upwards of $96 just for those issues of Dungeon magazine (more if you throw in the Dragon bonuses).

(Yes, a subscription would be considerably cheaper, but I'm assuming we're talking about people who aren't regular Dungeon readers, and who are only interested in the Adventure Path itself.)

 

[wingsandsword]

Besides, once again, WotC steps on the little guy just so they can keep the extra two cents for some reason.

WotC isn't a charity, they are a business. They aren't required to do things to help "the little guy", especially when it costs them. I seriously doubt they are producing adventures just to spite small press companies, they are doing it because it is profitable for them to do so.

WotC needs to keep profits up to keep Hasbro happy. This is that scenario that has people fearing the coming of 4e. For now, it looks like producing adventures is one thing WotC is doing to keep their sales going without needing a new edition.

 

[Steel_Wind]

I subscribed to Dungeon for the purpose of having every AoW magazine and picked up at the newstand every copy of Dragon for the purpose of having the Wormfood articles and a few ecology specials.

As it turns out, Dragon's quality increased during this period too - so it was a nice bonus.

I am running AoW and have ben for the past 18 months. For all that, I also laboriously scanned in every bloody module and article, and integrated the online supplementary material too.

I use the .pdf for adventure prep on the bus and so forth.

(And no: I never posted it and don't bother asking).

The part that I find really regrettable about all of this is that if people want the damn issues for free via the other .pdfs that exist - they are going to get them.

So instead of approving a product for sale and at least reap a royalty, they drive the overwhelming majority of those who held off to piracy.

Yes - they could backorder the issues via snail mail - although one or two of those are out of print at Paizo as I recall. So a complete physical compilation via back order is not only cost prohibitive - but not possible in any event.

I have a difficult time reconciling all of this with logic, but I presume the main issue is that a group playing AoW is not going to be buying the new FR Adv Path - or other adventures, given that the length of the book and ensuing campaign is about to eat up 1-2 years of a gaming group's time.

And that the royalty on such a book deal is less than the money to make by publishing a entirely new one under their own label.

Oh well. Regrettable - but at least I got mine.

 

[Kafkonia]

However, there are signs that comic compilations are eating into monthly magazine sales. In fact, it was just announced that comic collections are outselling comics right now (i.e. the total sales of all compilations is higher than sales of all comic books).

<threadjack>
I've actually stopped collecting comics in recent months because the only ones I was interested in I knew would be collected in TPB. Some (the new Morrison-helmed Wildstorm books and Batman) I didn't even pick up one issue of out of that expectation.

I feel dirty.

</threadjack>

 

[Nightfall]

People are attracted to quality and D&D nostalgia. Who knew?

Oh yeah, that's right.

I did.

--Erik

Well I had suspicions too.

Steel,

WotC should just try to sever all ties to a toy company that has outlived it usefulness. Honestly what has Hasbro given WotC? Nothing but layoffs, more "we want crunchy to fill our coffers!" and other stuff. Business is one thing. But it shouldn't be at the expense of devaluing the customer.

*would argue with trollwad but made it a point never to feed trolls.*

 

[Cthulhudrew]

WotC should just try to sever all ties to a toy company that has outlived it usefulness. Honestly what has Hasbro given WotC? Nothing but layoffs, more "we want crunchy to fill our coffers!" and other stuff.

I've long been kind of curious as to why Hasbro hasn't used its WotC ties to produce D&D action figures. With the action figures available today, could you imagine what all those LJN characters might look like?

 

[Wraith Form]

Hell, I own the entire AoW in magazine format, and I''d STILL buy the hardcover.

Usually, I'm pretty neutral (or at least I try to be!!) about WotC, but this decision gets the big "Thumbs Down" and a hearty BOOOO! from me. :\

Me too, and...me too.

Would a petition influence WotC at all? Is there anything, short of mailing them wads of cash, that would convince them to reconsider?