Pathfinder 1E Paizo no longer publishing Dungeon and Dragon

[BlakeT]

I will just add in another voice of a subscriber (Dragon) and say that I'm not at all happy about this. Pazio has don't a great, great job with both magazines and I hate to see them have them taken away by WoC.

I will not touch the web-content myself, either. If it were content that was put out there in addition to the printed magazines I might be talked into buying it, but not at the expense of one of my most beloved magazines. I can honestly say I've probably read every single issue over my lifetime, I'm thirty-six so was around for most of it.

Sad to see them go.

 

[Friadoc]

Why couldn't it be "this is hurting our bottom line, so let's pull the rug out from under them"? Or, "they're pushing Greyhawk too much, which doesn't fit our business plan of FR and Eberron only, so time to tie up some loose ends"? Or even, "hey, there's money in these adventure path things after all, maybe we'd better corner that market"?

There's all sorts of plausible managementhink ways to justify it. Throw in the wild card of what 4E entails, and anything's possible - they might be putting a bullet into RPG-oriented Dragon and Dungeon in order to move the focus to 4E D&D Miniatures Wargame for all we know.

Oh, it could most definately be that, too.

My main point was that this was not a "Woohoo, we wanna make people cry, let's hit their gramma with a flail made from their childhood pet we killed" type thing.

I doubt the choice was made with malice, obviously what they feel is best for their business was a huge factor, which means they would have to consider their customers, too.

I think the key mistake is somehow, somewhere, someone fumbled the PR ball and, if not for Paizo making it clear that they held not hard feelings with WotC, it could have been a lot worse.

They're making an effort now and I, for one, would like to hear from them about it, in addition to what we'e heard so far.

 

[3catcircus]

New Coke was one of the best things Coke ever did in the history of their company though. They released it, and when people complained they released Classic Coke along with it, and discovered and amazing thing: even if nobody drank new coke, they were getting double the shelf space by doing it, squeezing their competition off the shelves in the process. Hence they dropped New Coke and released a half a dozen different varieties of coke. This was followed by the death of some of their competition, and Pepsi deciding to do the same thing or die.

Change was good, even for a good thing. It wasn't the change they expected, but it ended up being a huge benefit for Coke that they experimented the way they did.

I'm all for capitalism and making a living, but the problem with this is that the suits forgot that they aren't just selling paperclips or lumber. They are selling an experience and a brand that people had grown loyal to after a hundred or so years.

 

[DaveMage]

Im just posting my opinions same as the next guy.

Should I be quiet because I'm in the minority?

Nope.

Carry on!

 

[DaveMage]

Wow. Well, better late to the party than never.

When I went to the Paizo messageboards the other day, I knew that something was wrong. I think I saw something about "transitions" and I said, "Oh no... this has got to be a joke!" I read Erik Mona's announcement and got that popular "punched in the gut" feeling. I came to browse ENWorld and I found this thread. I saw a lot of anger and disappointment, and an almost unanimous agreeing with my feeling that this is possibly one of the worst mistakes that Wizards had ever made. I went to their messageboards to see if I could gain any more insight, but all I found there was people spouting even more venom than I'd seen here. So I came back to this thread, and I saw assurances from Erik Mona, Joshua Frost, and the other Paizo staffers assuring us that the sky was indeed not falling. While still notably upset about this occurance, I calmed down a bit.

From the sound of things, Dragon and Dungeon are not going to be totally thrown out, even if they are changing drastically. They'll probably become some sort of e-magazine. I hate the idea, personally. If they don't have some kind of way to preview the content, I'm sure I won't get any of it. I may not anyway, depending on how things look. I can't take any attitude but "wait and see," and my feelings are very pessimistic at the moment. I can only hope that sales numbers will lead to a return to a print format. Look at any magazine rack in any store. Does it look like they're reducing stock? I haven't seen any such thing. I guess we'll see what Wizards' has in mind, but to quote Han Solo, I've got a bad feeling about this.

Kevin "BOZ" Baase

As I reflect on the whole thing more and more, my biggest disappointment in losing Dragon is the loss of three things: the Demonomicon articles, the Order of the Stick monthly bonus, and the advertisements/previews of non-WotC products that I will now no longer get to see. I have a feeling that most of the other things Dragon has to offer will be part of WotC new initiative, and having those in electronic format vs. print doesn't really matter that much to me.

As for Dungeon, with Goodman Games, Necromancer Games, and Paizo still producing top-notch adventures (not to mention WotC), I'm pretty sated. I don't think I'll miss Dungeon all that much.

 

[Shawn_Kehoe]

I just realised something!

The final issue of Dragon is the September issue, but that means...

we're missing the October HORROR issue!

NOOOOoooo...

Shawn

 

[Nightfall]

Dave,

I do agree that I'll probably miss Dragon more than Dungeon. (Demononicon, Core Beliefs and Class acts were/are major draws). And the fact we have other options are still there for adventure modules. But in any case what I will miss is having Orcus on the front cover of magazine any time soon.

Boz,

I completely agree with you and Han on this. But we'll see.

Friadoc,

Yeah man I want to as well. So far you and I seem to be the voices of reason....sort of.

Shawn,

Yeah that meant we might have gotten Core Beliefs: Nerull then.

 

[Altalazar]

I sent my letter of protest already.

I'm a book whore, as I've freely admitted. I buy every single last thing WotC puts out on D&D each month. I buy minis for use in roleplaying. I buy multiple copies of books for convenience sake. I have even multiple copies of the leatherbound special edition books. In short, I'm WotC best customer - the customer they wish every gamer would be.

I also have every issue of both magazines.

And now, I'm so disgusted I wonder if I'll buy any more WotC products. I certainly will no longer just buy them all, as I did, as part of not only my enjoyment of books, but as a loyal customer wanting to support the corporation that owns the hobby I love.

I've heard it said elsewhere that subscribers and readers of these magazines were only maybe 50,000 customers out of several million. But I hope anyone who reads this who works for WotC is up at night sweating bullets over what I say next. Perhaps there is a strong correlation between those who were the subcribers of those magazines and those who, like me, bought everything they put out. Sure, there were lots of gamers who never or almost never bought Dragon or Dungeon. But then those could very likely be the same gamers who only buy one or two books here and there. In other words, it could be that those 50,000 represent the main bulk of WotC's profits as a whole, despite their not representing most gamers. In which case, alienating one of us is like alienating 100 "average" customers.

E-content just isn't the same. Beyond that, killing the magazines makes me not even want to look at whatever e-content they do. And I'm not some computer-phobe - I used to be a full time professional computer programmer, and no, it wasn't Cobol and mainframes, it was PCs and web-based content. I love the web and computers and use both extensively. I'm exactly the sort of computer-saavy gamer they are probably hoping their e-content would appeal to. And yet they already have lost me.

 

[Nightfall]

Al,

I feel you on this and I'm glad to see you managed to keep your anger down to a dull roar.

 

[Friadoc]

Friadoc,

Yeah man I want to as well. So far you and I seem to be the voices of reason....sort of.

Dude, if that's the case, then it's a sad state of affairs, as even my loved ones know I tend to be an unreasonable jerk.

Actually, they never say that, but the actual terms aren't something for polite company.

*chuckles*