Pathfinder 1E Lisa Stevens, CEO of Paizo, commenting about ENWorld

[Sunderstone]

I know my opinion isnt much here, but I see ENworld as firmly in 4E's camp. Anything anti-4E and/or Paizo related seems to quickly turn into flames and snarkyness with moderation seemingly active on a whim.

YMMV <--- Note this before flaming me. Its just what I see here most of the time.

With the 4E announcement, this place began to change fairly quickly. All of a sudden alot of people seemd to dislike or hate 3E etc. and this place seemed to be taking sides sight unseen of the new edition.

With all the 4E new topics (im still talking pre-release) the mods seemed to be taking a firmer hand to the anti-4e crowd, and I cant help feeling that this was done to avoid the possibilty of angering the execs at WotC by stamping out any negative sentiments toward their upcoming edition. Similar to the on-the-fence designers that may not have liked the flavor of 4E but praised it from an "I need the work, so I'll say its great" standpoint.

I saw ENworld as many did, the foremost D&D news site. And I think they firmly planted their flag with 4E as to not lose that status no matter the cost.

Thats my opinion of it at least. Take it with a grain of salt.

All this said, I still frequent other what I like to consider as "pro-4E forums". These are at Goodman (the most peaceful of them all) and Necromancer (also a much more hospitable to the Pro-3.5 types).

Paizo's forums, IMHO (again) , is definately more prone to friendlier discussion despite what posters from here might say. You can tell by any thread there that devolves into flames. Moderators there are primarily the designers and you see vocal people cooling almost immediately after one of them asks for people to regain their senses.
The Paizo staff also seems to always say good things about WotC, ENworld, etc. despite what goes around elsewhere about them and Pathfinder. To my knowledge, the only poster Ive seen get any firm moderation (temp ban i believe) was some "Frank" person.

I dont know what the OP hoped to accomplish posting this here (especially as I see this place very slanted yet again IMHO), but I find that lately having a thread here with the word Paizo in it usually sparks a war and folks are only to eager to take something like Lisa's comment as an open invitation to war.

 

[cangrejoide]

I was just about to post this exactly, thanks Mistwell. Very unprofessional.

As an ex-Paizo fanboy, I was pretty interested in Golarion when it was looking to be system neutral, but when Paizo started waving the 3E/PF flag, I went elsewhere. I had a hard time learning anything about it without slogging through the mire that was the Paizo MB over the past year and lost interest.

A part of me still wants Golarion as a system neutral setting. Is it wrong to want this for other games like Runequest?

 

[El Mahdi]

People who like 3e and dislike 4e think ENWorld is anti-3e.

People who like 4e and dislike 3e think ENWorld is anti-4e.

I'd say things are fine, and any supposed "bias" is completely in the observer's head.

Agree 100%.

However, just to solve any "perceived" bias, I think ENWorld just alternate the order of 3E and 4E forums on the main forum page. How about every day divisible by 3 (for 3.xE), 3E forums come first - on every day divisible by 4 (for .....

Okay. I'll shut up now.

 

[Obryn]

I know my opinion isnt much here, but I see ENworld as firmly in 4E's camp. Anything anti-4E and/or Paizo related seems to quickly turn into flames and snarkyness with moderation seemingly active on a whim.

You must not have been hanging out in the 4e Rules forum where, until fairly recently, most every discussion of a 4e mechanic was considered an invitation for folks who dislike 4e to talk about how dumbed-down it is.

What I'm saying is the board isn't biased. Some people on the board have biases. And most talk about "bias" is simple psychology and confirmation bias.

-O

 

[Sunderstone]

But by pitching their tent so firmly in the 3e camp, Paizo drove away some of the folks who would have bought their 4e-compatible products and tools in the last year.
.

umm... yeah. about that.

Paizo SHOULD be a pro-3E/Pathfinder environment because that is what Paizo has chosen to publish and make products for. The same with WotC and 4E because thats what they publish and sell.

ENworld on the other hand shouldnt have pitched a tent firmly into any camp and remained neutral. Isnt this place supposed to be the premier news site for tabletop RPGs? Shouldnt all news sites be neutral?

This place could definately be seen as planted in the 4E camp from the early days of WotC's announcement. Its toned down some, but it still feels plenty 4E focused to some.

 

[El Mahdi]

There were times I felt like the boards were pretty anti-4E. (I no longer feel that way, except for a few specific people.) I know people who felt they were anti-3E. I'd have to say that, with so many disparate views, the truth really does have to lie somewhere in the middle.

Ari is wise.

I really enjoy reading both the 3E and the 4E forums. Even though I'm not switching to 4E, and sticking with my houseruled 3E (not going with Pathfinder either, although I still want their adventures), I find useful things on all of the different forums. Despite mechanical differences, both games are Roleplaying games, and Roleplaying is not system dependent. Concepts are 100% transportable from system to system, and most mechanics (with a little bit of modification) can also go from system to system.

So, I don't see ENWorld as 4E centric or 3E centric, I just see it as Roleplaying centric (and, looking at some of the people who post, a little eccentric).

I don't know if Morrus's actions or emphasis after the 4E announcement affected sale of ENWorld 3E pdf's or not, but from listening to other game industry people here on ENWorld, it sounds like 3E sales had fallen off even before the anouncement, for pretty much all sellers and game companies across the board. If there was a pronounced drop-off in sales, it seems to me it's just a blip in an already descending trend.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

For the record, while I don't agree with the "Lisa" bashing (another reason I don't come here much any more as it was a pretty harmless comment)

Sometimes I have the feeling that people have "grown" a little to thin skin here. Not everything is a personal attack or bashing someone or something.

If I said "All 4e fans are idiots", that's me insulting them...if I say "I see 4e as a complete abomination" (which is more extreme than my own real view), then why can't people be secure enough on their own to not find offense in that? Are people really that insecure that they can't allow anyone to speak ill of their favorite version of a little game where you pretend to be wizards?

You think there is really that big as a difference? If I like a "abomination", does that set me in a good light? It is very hard to make a distinction here. Especially because it is nowhere clear that the poster has one in mind.

 

[Halivar]

Isnt this place supposed to be the premier news site for tabletop RPGs?

No, it was supposed to be the premiere news site for D&D. Incidentally, it has accepted (or had forced upon it by the commons) the mantle of "the place to be" with regards to RPG's in general. Heck the front web-page says it all: "This is En World, the largest single Dungeons & Dragons fan site on the entire internet."

 

[Grimstaff]

Here we have an object lesson - smilies do absolutely nothing to keep people from thinking that a post is snarky and insulting. I'm sorry, but it is the truth - smilies have been used a as a dodge too often for it to be a valuable cover.

If you can't say it without smilies and not cheese people off, you can't say it without cheesing people off, period.

Personally, I use smilies to denote the difference between "wryly amused" (as previous) and "angrrry".

I hope these boards haven't come to the point where we can't poke a little good-natured fun at each other.

 

[Morrus]

The only vibe I get from ENWorld lately is numbers. Cold, hard numbers. It seems that the number of 4E people out weight the 3E people by a rather large margin. I wouldn't say that 3E people are unwelcome, just a minority. Perhaps the largest minority, but still less then a quarter of the total regular posters. That alone keeps me from coming here on a regular basis since there is little for me to read. And when I do come here, I generally look more in the OGL rules section or the legal section then I do in the main section anymore.

So, to make sure I understand what you're saying - when you come to EN World, and you loko in the 3.5 DD specific forums, you find that 3.5 fans are the minority and that the 3.5 forums are filled with 4E fans?

My own observation does not bear that out; but if that's your opinion, then fair enough.