Paizo Ends Pathfinder Adventure Path Softcovers, Switching to Quarterly Model

Paizo is ending its line of monthly Pathfinder Adventure Paths, with a new quarterly hardcover replacing the long-running product. Paizo announced the change yesterday on its blog, with the shift beginning next year. The new hardcover Adventure Paths will be a minimum of 256 pages and will have a retail price of $79.99, which is cheaper than the cost of purchasing four softcover adventure paths. Paizo also stated that they'll release one Adventure Path starting at Level 1, another ending at Level 20, with the remaining two falling somewhere in between. Each Adventure Path will cover 9-10 levels of play.

The first two Adventure Paths announced for this format are Hellbreakers and Hell's Destiny, which both cover the upcoming war between Andoran and Cheliax.

The Pathfinder Adventure Paths series started as an evolution of Paizo's monthly Pathfinder magazine series. To date, Paizo has released 222 Pathfinder Adventure Paths. Early Pathfinder Adventure Paths were for campaigns that lasted six issues and typically encompassed Level 1-Level 20 play. However, more recently, the Adventure Path structure has shortened and grown more flexible, with shorter length campaigns with more variable levels of play.

 

[Velderan]

On the upside, maybe the big players are finally moving away from campaign length adventures. I think one big long adventure per tier of play is a good compromise and move back toward "adventures" instead of "campaigns."

While I generally like what Paizo makes for APs, I'm in full agreement here simply because I don't have time to run everything they release that sounds fun. Smaller adventures with a more focused story arc that are easier to run due to smaller time commitment and cost less to produce and sells for less so (hopefully) the publisher makes more by selling more copies.

I currently have 3 APs (Season of Ghosts, Kingmaker, Battlezoo's Jewel of the Indigo Isle) that I absolutely want to run and the unfortunate reality is at most I will possibly run one of them. Maybe none of them depending on what releases between now and when we're looking for our next AP sometime next year.

 

[Reynard]

While I generally like what Paizo makes for APs, I'm in full agreement here simply because I don't have time to run everything they release that sounds fun. Smaller adventures with a more focused story arc that are easier to run due to smaller time commitment and cost less to produce and sells for less so (hopefully) the publisher makes more by selling more copies.

I currently have 3 APs (Season of Ghosts, Kingmaker, Battlezoo's Jewel of the Indigo Isle) that I absolutely want to run and the unfortunate reality is at most I will possibly run one of them. Maybe none of them depending on what releases between now and when we're looking for our next AP sometime next year.

Hit 2 birds with one stone and set Kingmaker in the Indigo Isles?

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Unfortunately, I haven't felt inspired to run a Paizo adventure path since Ruins of Azlant several years back.

Yay! No one ever mentions my favorite AP (although I have never run it, nor have I read the end, as I don't have volume 5 of the AP - a victim of one downside of periodical APs). I actually used vol 1 as the start of a campaign set sort of in the FR Sea of Fallen Stars...

 

[ProfessorDetective]

How is this going to affect digital products, going forward?

 

[Dire Bare]

How is this going to affect digital products, going forward?

I would assume not much at all . . . other than the price for the digital versions of the new, larger adventure paths would also be higher. I don't think Paizo has released pricing on digital-only versions yet.

If you subscribe to the physical releases through Paizo's store, you will still get the PDF for "free", as a part of your subscription purchase.

 

[Velderan]

How is this going to affect digital products, going forward?

It will be interesting to see the pricing on Foundry modules going forward. Looking at the recent AP Shades of Blood, the 3 individual parts are $35 for module and PDF or just $14 if you already have the PDF in your library. Meanwhile the combined Abomination Vaults module is $60 for module and PDF combo or just $21 for the Foundry module if you have the PDF already. That's an older AP though, so I would expect that price to go up to maybe $75 and $30 or so?

I guess we can look at the upcoming Season of Ghosts compilation if that gets a combined Foundry module to see how that gets priced.

 

[Retreater]

I think the move to hardcovers is great and the three part adventure paths are much more real life friendly. Unfortunately, I haven't felt inspired to run a Paizo adventure path since Ruins of Azlant several years back. The company really seemed to lose its adventure writing mojo IMO.

Interestingly enough, we're currently playing Ruins of Azlant (converted to PF2).

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

But it's not 80 as compared to 90. It's 80 as compared to 30. Each month, the money I would spend on things like APs is about $40. I didn't back any Kickstarters or buy any games this month, so what I did was to go see K-Pop Demon Hunter with my daughter and then have drinks with her at a custom drink shop near the theater. That's what the money went for.

Now I have plenty of money that I save for different purposes each month, but the bucket of money I have for, for lack of a better word, silly purchases, gets spent that way each month. It was either K-Pop or the Halloween Advent calendar. There are more silly things in the world than I could ever buy, so it's only a question of what I'm going to do with that money that month. This isn't like the money I put away each month for property taxes, it's what I use for impulse purchases. And to me, an AP that I just say "oooouh, shiny!" is an impulse purchase. So, at $80, it's too much for me to just buy, so I'll buy far fewer of them. Not sure how I can explain it better than that.

But just think with affirm or a similar payment plan service it could be a few dollars of impulse purchase instead ; )

(this is a joke, I find the advent of payment plans for such simple things horrifying, if probably sometimes useful for a host of reasons)

 

[Green Onceler]

Yay! No one ever mentions my favorite AP

Interestingly enough, we're currently playing Ruins of Azlant (converted to PF2).

Cool. I hope you enjoy it. I ran the first half of the AP a few years back (left in its pure PF1 form.) I found the first two modules were excellent, particularly the 2nd, and made for a great game. The third I found really dragged and was much less fun, so we threw in the towel with that AP.

I'm currently running Tales of the Demon Lord and am enjoying the light ruleset after years of Pathfinder, but am undecided where we will move once that's done. Considering Mothership.

 

[Retreater]

Cool. I hope you enjoy it. I ran the first half of the AP a few years back (left in its pure PF1 form.) I found the first two modules were excellent, particularly the 2nd, and made for a great game. The third I found really dragged and was much less fun, so we threw in the towel with that AP.

We are getting to the last part of Book 3. And I don't know why it's dragging, whether the system, the AP, or just the group's pacing. We've been playing weekly for a year and just reached level 8.

Considering Mothership.

I had a great time running a one-shot of Mothership. I don't know how well it would work as a campaign, but give it a test drive.