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<blockquote data-quote="Dire Bare" data-source="post: 5936429" data-attributes="member: 18182"><p>I'm pretty sure that most of the back catalog was scanned in, and only a relative handful were missed . . . . but I'd have to go research that, and I'm waaaaay too lazy.</p><p></p><p>But, yeah, for the most part, the quality was crap. WotC began scanning the physical books in house, not with equipment any better than your average home PC scanner and accompanying software, and it certainly was never made a priority for better equipment, software, or serious manpower. After a time, WotC outsourced it to a former employee who was running his own d20 business (can't remember the guys name or the company name) and the quality dropped even further. I don't really blame the guy WotC outsourced it too, he did the best he could with the resources given. Remember this was actually BEFORE the sale of game PDFs became "standard", WotC was ahead of the curve. And the value of taking the time to do it right wasn't the priority, it was being done simply for fan service and received very little resources.</p><p></p><p>The outsourced guy even asked the fans to contribute hard copies of back catalog items WotC didn't give him, I know because I contributed. The outsourced guy and the fans involved knew what kind of quality we were getting into, but felt a crappy quality digital record was better than none. Kinda odd, considering the recent announcement that WotC just had a rather complete (sounding) archive shipped from Wisconsin to Washington.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Yup. If WotC took the existing pre-3E scans to sell now, the would get reamed for pushing a poor quality product, they are most definitely the company that cannot win to a certain segment of their customer base, of D&D fans.</p><p></p><p>My hope is that WotC is taking the time now to do it right. Good quality reproductions or scans made available digitally, either individually or as part of a DDI subscription deal, or perhaps even both. I doubt the format will be PDF, but we'll see . . . . well, hopefully we'll see, at some point, that is.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Dire Bare, post: 5936429, member: 18182"] I'm pretty sure that most of the back catalog was scanned in, and only a relative handful were missed . . . . but I'd have to go research that, and I'm waaaaay too lazy. But, yeah, for the most part, the quality was crap. WotC began scanning the physical books in house, not with equipment any better than your average home PC scanner and accompanying software, and it certainly was never made a priority for better equipment, software, or serious manpower. After a time, WotC outsourced it to a former employee who was running his own d20 business (can't remember the guys name or the company name) and the quality dropped even further. I don't really blame the guy WotC outsourced it too, he did the best he could with the resources given. Remember this was actually BEFORE the sale of game PDFs became "standard", WotC was ahead of the curve. And the value of taking the time to do it right wasn't the priority, it was being done simply for fan service and received very little resources. The outsourced guy even asked the fans to contribute hard copies of back catalog items WotC didn't give him, I know because I contributed. The outsourced guy and the fans involved knew what kind of quality we were getting into, but felt a crappy quality digital record was better than none. Kinda odd, considering the recent announcement that WotC just had a rather complete (sounding) archive shipped from Wisconsin to Washington. Yup. If WotC took the existing pre-3E scans to sell now, the would get reamed for pushing a poor quality product, they are most definitely the company that cannot win to a certain segment of their customer base, of D&D fans. My hope is that WotC is taking the time now to do it right. Good quality reproductions or scans made available digitally, either individually or as part of a DDI subscription deal, or perhaps even both. I doubt the format will be PDF, but we'll see . . . . well, hopefully we'll see, at some point, that is. [/QUOTE]
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