Pathfinder 1E Paizo Annoucement!

[Hunter In Darkness]

OK yeah there gonna sale print copys of the beta but you can get A PDF for free so I dont see an issue I mean WOTC sold folks 4e adds in 2 diff books after all.so a print copy of rules which cost money to print isn't an issue .after all you can still download it free.

 

[Maggan]

Oh I doubt that very much. Maybe a few decimals into a percentage point here and there.

Especially since the Pathfinder rulebook will be out in the shops in 2009. Fourth edition is hitting the shelves in may 2008 or something like that. I can't see a significant portion of prospective D&D customers drop their spending on D&D and wait a whole extra year for Pathfinder.

Sure, there are some who might have been swayed to 4th edition who will not take the plunge due to Pathfinder RPG being released, but nowhere close to a commercially significant portion for WotC. Again, especially in light of the fact that when Pathfinder hits the street, D&D 4 will have been out for a year.

EDIT: Please note that I'm saying Pathfinder RPG is doomed. I think it's a bold gamble, that will not pay of in spades for Paizo, but which might become the de facto choice for those who have decided to not go to 4e already. How large that market is or might be, Paizo knows far, far, far better than me. But I don't think Paizo will position Pathfinder to take on D&D4. They will position it as the game for fans of Paizo stuff, and are banking on the Paizo fans being a large enough group to sustain Paizo as a company.

EDIT 2: Thinking about it, my take on the one year playtest is that it's a one year marketing campaign, designed to keep the game "alive" and "current" in the collective hivemind of gamerdom.

/M

 

[Mortellan]

For me this announcement makes up for last gencon. Great news and best of luck to paizo!

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Well doesn't this just beat all?

I'm a big Paizo fan -- they do great work, and I was sad to see them lose Dungeon & Dragon. I recently dropped my Pathfinder subscription as I didn't think it was giving me the material per dollar that I wanted, but it is a great product. This is a bold, daring move by Piazo, and I respect them for it (moreso that they didn't close the door on their options, too).

But it puts me in a quandry. I'm only going to support one game system ... 4E or Paizo's "3.75"? I've got a massive investment in 3.5 so staying seems wise, but the market will move to 4E, and finding players & games will likely be easier there. Hmmm, much thikning to do.

 

[Spatula]

I'll try to be more clear this time. I'm saying that Lisa Stevens could have written her announcement letter in language that was far more conciliatory than what she actually chose to use. She implies quite strongly (and I'm being generous in using the word "imply") that the reason for not going with 4E is because it sucks. This is a statement that, unless she's got a friend at WotC whose given her access to a copy of the PHB, she's in no position to be making.

If you can parse out how I'm criticizing someone's playstyle from the above paragraph, I'll bake you a cookie. Maybe even a whole dozen.

Saying that any one game is "better" than another is obviously a matter of personal preference, no? Unless you have discovered some objective scale for evaluating gaming systems (if so, perhaps you could demonstrate it over at Dragonsfoot). So, yes, it was a statement of playstyle ("3e is the best D&D system" is obviously true for some people and not for others) and to interpret it as hostile is rather silly. Not to mention overly defensive.

 

[Jack99]

I think you're a bit unfair here. If we look at the RPG market (including indie RPGs), I doubt you will find much that is truely original. 4E D&D isn't different in that regard. It is more a matter of arranging good ideas so they work together and presenting it as a game. There is still a lot of detail work after finding the good ideas, but there is rarely something that's really original in the sense of "Nobody ever thought of this before!".

Yeah, maybe I should have used "good" instead of "original". But that would have been neither fair nor true. I guess I just found their alpha (mind you, this is from a quick read-through) to be ....... disappointing.

Either way, I wish Paizo the best of luck, and I am happy that those who wish to stick with 3.5 will have a great company creating stuff for them.

 

[trancejeremy]

The more I think about this, the more I am amused at the irony of two game companies that focused on the AD&D "retro" feel are supporting 4e, while Paizo, which I always considered modern or "progressive" (for lack of a better world) is sticking with 3.x, in part (if you read their CEOs) statement, it sticks closer to classic fantasy tropes (to paraphrase)

 

[Nebulous]

I've seen too much that i love about 4e to even vaguely consider another 3.75 patch slapped on the last version. Even if i DID adopt Paizo's version, it is inevitable that i would start sneaking in 4e rules, probably to the point eventually that i might as well switch to 4e.

It's a brave choice for them though. I wish them luck.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I think Paizo just reduced 4E's initial sales by at least a quarter. Possibly as much as by half.

My take is 10%, maybe as much as 20%. Whoever at WoTC caused the GSL to not be ready at GenCon 2007 is really the main cause of this. The GSL and keeping Paizo in the D&D camp should have been one of their highest priorities.

 

[TerraDave]

3.75....

Some of us dared whisper 3.75

Not expecting trumpets to reply

But a whisper is not a promise

To buy









EDIT: So nice I posted it twice...here and in its own thread...without realising...and why dont we have more poetry?