Logic behind sales of "Expedition to Castle Greyhawk"?

[Pants]

I don't understand their logic.

I do, although the reasoning was explained much better by people more knowledgeable than me in previous threads.

To put it simply, Greyhawk fans, as a whole, are fractious. You have fans that like 1e Greyhawk, Gary Greyhawk (Gary's 'original vision' though I'm not really sure what exactly this is..), and 'From the Ashes' Greyhawk.' Releasing a Greyhawk CS book might be a waste of time because whole swathes of GH fans might not buy it because it 'isn't THEIR version of GH.'

If lots of people buy the adventure, that shows that WotC (hopefully) didn't mess it up and that GH fans are willing to buy into the setting. If it doesm't, then well, either they sucked it up or the GH fans are too fractious to support a revival of the setting.

This includes a lot of generalizations, but that is the situation as I see it.

 

[Crothian]

It makes sense to me. I'm sure this plus a lot of other factors will help them determine if they should do more greyhawk books. I'm also sure if the Web Pits thing did awesome in sales and they got other feedback that made them think a return to Planscape would do well they would do that.

 

[ivocaliban]

Here's the thing. I'm a big fan of the Greyhawk setting and would gladly give WotC fistfuls of cash for setting material and sourcebooks, but I don't buy adventures. Particularly not long, extended adventures. The biggest adventure I've ever bought in the fifteen or so years I've been gaming, is the Maure Castle issue of Dragon magazine (#112). Why did I buy it? One word: Greyhawk. How much of it did I use in my recent Greyhawk campaign? Zero.

So for me, Expedition to Castle Greyhawk is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, I want to support Greyhawk and I would love to see more attention paid to the Greyhawk setting (as opposed to the generic default versions that appear in almost every D&D accessory). On the other hand, supporting Greyhawk would be the only reason I would ever shell out money for a relatively expensive hardcover adventure.

In the end, I'll probably pass on Expedition to Castle Greyhawk. I'm not happy about it, but I'm not the sort of person to buy something just to stick it on a shelf.

 

[Campbell]

Personally, I'm excited to see Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk. Adventures, especially the lengthy adventures of the Expedition series can serve to showcase the feel of a setting and with care can serve as a useful venue to develop a setting in a more organic manner than setting supplements because their emphasis is on actual play. Adventures bring the lens in a lot closer than setting supplements usually do.

 

[Nifft]

It's interesting to consider Greyhawk purely as a brand-name, which might be what WotC is doing.

I'm sure we can all disagree about the degree of sales correlation across the Greyhawk brand, but still recognize that the correlation exists, right?

Cheers, -- N

 

[James Jacobs]

Here's the thing. I'm a big fan of the Greyhawk setting and would gladly give WotC fistfuls of cash for setting material and sourcebooks, but I don't buy adventures. Particularly not long, extended adventures. The biggest adventure I've ever bought in the fifteen or so years I've been gaming, is the Maure Castle issue of Dragon magazine (#112). Why did I buy it? One word: Greyhawk. How much of it did I use in my recent Greyhawk campaign? Zero.

In the end, I'll probably pass on Expedition to Castle Greyhawk. I'm not happy about it, but I'm not the sort of person to buy something just to stick it on a shelf.

For a setting that was originally built up solely on adventures, it strikes me a bit strange that one would resist buying a new adventure set in Greyhawk solely because it's an adventure. There's an AWFUL lot of new information about Greyhawk (and a lot of fun easter eggs and nostalgia as well) in this book. Sure, a fair amount of it is hidden in the form of encounter areas and NPC histories and the like, but it's still there.

And in any event, there's a whole chapter of background information about Greyhawk City, and a whole chapter of background information about the castle and its ruins in the book too. Plus dozens of NPCs, maps, and locations you can steal to fuel your own campaign, including quite a few illustrations of key NPCs who've rarely or never been illustrated.

Of course, being an adventure-peddler myself, I'm biased. But I don't understand the resentment some folk have toward adventrues, when they're really the perfect place to go to grab inspiration or elements (be they maps or stats or traps or new monsters or whatever) to build new adventures out of. After all... that's pretty much how Greyhawk got built up as a setting in the first place: via a large number of adventures.

 

[JoeGKushner]

1. People who don't like the adventures WoTC does due to format, pricing, etc...

2. People who only home brew and find it more trouble some them worthwhile to read through adventurers and steal the elements they want.

3. People who feel that for the price tag, that it should be a sourcebook, not an adventure (I believe many FR fans picked up that one with a few of the adventure hardcovers lately.)

Adventurers aren't for everyone. Saying you can customize them is fine, but really, I can pick up ANY book and do the same thing. Sometimes with less effort.

 

[Jason Bulmahn]

...all written by berserk Greyhawk fanatics.

Woo Hoo.. I am a berserk Greyhawk fanatic.

In all seriousness though. I do not believe Wotc plans to base any future GH products of the sale of this one adventure.

It is the delve format of course, as are all the other Expedition adventures (AFAIK).

Jason Bulmahn
Berserk Greyhawk Fanatic
Managing Editor of Dragon

 

[Mempter]

For a setting that was originally built up solely on adventures, it strikes me a bit strange that one would resist buying a new adventure set in Greyhawk solely because it's an adventure. There's an AWFUL lot of new information about Greyhawk (and a lot of fun easter eggs and nostalgia as well) in this book. Sure, a fair amount of it is hidden in the form of encounter areas and NPC histories and the like, but it's still there.

And in any event, there's a whole chapter of background information about Greyhawk City, and a whole chapter of background information about the castle and its ruins in the book too. Plus dozens of NPCs, maps, and locations you can steal to fuel your own campaign, including quite a few illustrations of key NPCs who've rarely or never been illustrated.

Of course, being an adventure-peddler myself, I'm biased. But I don't understand the resentment some folk have toward adventrues, when they're really the perfect place to go to grab inspiration or elements (be they maps or stats or traps or new monsters or whatever) to build new adventures out of. After all... that's pretty much how Greyhawk got built up as a setting in the first place: via a large number of adventures.

Agreed. One of the biggest reasons I've been buying into the recent DUNGEON Campaign Arcs (including the Shackled City hardcover) is for the lore that's inserted into every adventure.

 

[Mortellan]

I believe Castle GH will blow all the Expedition mods out of the water saleswise and in the end it won't make a shred of difference to WotC bringing Hawk back. Paizo had kept up GH's popularity through the Adventure Paths for years. If that wasn't enough to revive the setting in print, this book won't do it either.

/end cynical rant