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Message: <blockquote data-quote="El Mahdi" data-source="post: 5265586" data-attributes="member: 59506">Entirely my opinion...I don't think WotC understimated the effect. I think what we are talking about is what would have been the state of things if WotC had brought Paizo in as a partner from the start of 4E.  The posible forms I think that may have manifested as were: renewing Dungeon and Dragon for Paizo; working with Paizo to develop and possibly host DDI; and/or having Paizo as a third party publisher of 4E materials, or as an official publisher.  And would there have been Pathfinder. First, I don't think Paizo would have been able to develop or host DDI.  So that's probably a non-issue.  As far as allowing Paizo to keep Dungeon and Dragon: I don't think it would have been economically feasible or beneficial for either WotC or Paizo to do so, considering the plan of making it an integral part of DDI.   As far as Paizo as a third party publisher or official publisher?  I think WotC is exactly where they want to be as far as 3pp's are concerned.  I don't think they necessarily wanted to eliminate 4E products from 3pp's, but I also don't think they'd really care if there weren't any 3pp 4E products.  They don't mind that there is, just as long as they could finally and truly control the type of D&D products in the market.  With the limited amount of official 4E products (compared to the height of 3E), I really can't imagine what 4E products Paizo could have published that would have been financially worth it (for Paizo or WotC).  As far as selling WotC's 4E products, Paizo already does that...so no real change or effect there. As far as Pathfinder, maybe Paizo wouldn't have developed it or maybe they still would have, but I don't think it's a factor.  Pathfinder has not stolen players from 4E and is not a competitor of WotC.  Pathfinder came out well after 4E...and well after the fan base was already polarized.  I think people that picked up Pathfinder (for the most part), were those who had already decided they didn't want to go the 4E route, but still wanted 3E support.  WotC has lost nothing because of Pathfinder.  3E fans have gained significantly because of Pathfinder.  Not necessarily a Win-Win, probably more of a Win-Didn't Lose scenario...which is probably all that really matters as far as WotC is concerned. However, I do believe that some of WotC's actions since the release of 4E has cost them customers.  That's where the underestimations or miscalculations occured.  Quite likely, those actions only cost them customers that may have made occasional purchases of 4E products, and some DDI subscribers.  But, even occasional purchases equate to money, and although not a lot, probably not insignificant.  Where they hurt themselves the most in my opinion, was in losing possible DDI subscribers.  At a recurring $10/month per customer, DDI could potentially make WotC more money than all of the 4E products (books) sales combined (and maybe already does?).  Marketing should be done with the goal of bringing in those lapsed gamers in order to get them subscribing to DDI.  Selling books is secondary (except as a hook to bring them in).  Fixing the things that are keeping fans from getting a DDI sub should be priority.  I think they've done this somewhat with the Essentials line, but they have further to go yet (namely pdf's). Now, if you want to really ask a question about something that WotC may have underestimated...start a thread asking if WotC underestimated the impact of pulling pdf's...<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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