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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MerricB" data-source="post: 2632214" data-attributes="member: 3586">That's mostly my reading of it; although I will add that there *is* a market for adventures, and thus producing adventures (as Necromancer Games has shown) can build a profitable business. There was a great thread by Clark Peterson somewhere on ENworld about what sort of adventures made Necromancer Games successful. However, and here's a factor that I don't think Charles Ryan (or Ryan Dancey) took into account, the distribution model RPGs use is heavily weighted against adventures in general, and non-Wizards adventures even more so.I suspect it was better in the very early days of the d20 System. (Ask Clark about early sales of Rappan Athuk). However, because of the glut of just plain bad product in first days of d20, distributors and retailers were burnt badly by non-Wizards products - and particularly adventures.The market may now be recovering somewhat, thanks largely to the stable d20 System publishers.I will say, as an aside, that it is extremely difficult for me to get non-Wizards products. My FLGS doesn't really carry them. Those that *really* attract my attention, I can get, but mostly I am restricted to Wizards products. What helps greatly is that I love what Wizards make. I am not alone in these buying patterns, although I sometimes feel that way on ENworld.Returning to Charles' comments, and setting aside his belief that Wizards' products have better content (debatable at the best of times), there's some rather good advice there.Quite frankly, if Wizards puts out a book like Complete Warrior, how could a publisher compete by putting out a book like "The Essential Fighter"? They need an edge. Wizards has a distinct advantage in the combination of production values and lower (relative) production costs on bigger books. Economies of scale and all that. "Better content" is so much a problematical scale. There are books that are so bad that it's obvious, but you're very rarely going to get a Wizards' book like that. At the level at which you're competing, we should assume that content isn't going to be a deciding factor. The official status of Wizards' D&D products hold more weight for the majority of consumers. Yes, you'll get some people who'll support you, but will it be enough?Being first tends to help. (See the Creature Collection). I've a feeling the Quintessential books of Mongoose also fall into this category, and once they had the initial surge, they could continue with their own branding and popularity.However, if you can't be first, and you're competing directly with Wizards - not so good. Better to be producting something that doesn't compete directly with the Wizards products.Once a company is established with a fanbase - and does so by being first, being different from Wizards, or such like - then it is more able to compete directly with Wizards, but you still have the ongoing problem of any directly competing product splitting the buyers, and mostly likely the balance going in Wizards favour.What are the current successful d20 publishers doing? There seems to be a surge of alternative rule sets and settings at present. What else? In what areas are they different from Wizards, and what areas are they directly competing?Cheers!</blockquote>

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