Paizo Paizo Price Increases and Sustainability Efforts

Paizo announced a new pricing structure for their entire product line. The changes will go into effect for PDF products (Bounties, Quests, and Scenarios) effective October 25, 2023, and will apply to all PDF products. No other PDF prices will be changed. The new MSRP changes go into effect in April 2024 for all print products.

The first printing of the new Pathfinder core rulebooks – Player Core, GM Core, Monster Core, and Player Core 2 – will maintain the current $59.99 MSRP for at least the first printing as “We feel these books are essential first purchases for Pathfinder players and want to hold the line on price increases as long as possible to reduce the barrier of entry for new players.”

The new pricing structure:

• Bounties/Quests1 from $4.99 to $5.99
• Scenarios2 from $5.99/$7.99 to $8.99
• Special Interactive Scenarios from $14.99 to $19.99
• Flip-Mats from $16.99 to $19.99
• Flip-Mat Multi-Pack from $24.99 to $29.99
• 96-page Adventure Paths from $26.99 to $29.99
• Pocket Editions will range from $24.99-$29.99 to $26.99-$34.99 (varies by page count)
• Hardcover Prices will vary by page count:
  • 128 Page: $44.99
  • 192 Page: $59.99
  • 256 Page: $69.99
  • 304 Page with map: $79.99
  • Special Edition covers add $20 to the retail price

1: Bounties and Quests are short, stand-alone digital adventures designed for 2-hour sessions

2: Scenarios are Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society adventures previously priced based on play tier with higher-level adventures costing more. The prices will now be the same regardless of the level of the adventure.

Paizo also updated its current environmental and sustainability actions. The company already printed using soy-based ink that requires less ink per page with no toxic chemicals. Paizo is changing to FSC-Certified paper coming from ecologically sourced forests that prohibit deforestation and require protection of old-growth forests and biodiversity as well as protections for the rights of Indigenous peoples. Changes have also been made to shipping from the Paizo warehouse by changing shipping product partners and moving from foam packing materials to starch and cardboard. Full details are available on the Paizo Blog.

 

[Reynard]

I use a Chromebook with removable keyboard. It's been pretty good, overall.

I bought a tablet chromebook for the purpose and really dislike it. I previously had a samsung tablet I liked much better but it got old.

 

[doctorhook]

I’m bummed about the price increases but I understand it. Rising costs are gonna be one of best pressures to decarbonize—print less and ship less.

 

[Abstruse]

At the risk of this becoming an Apple/Android debate, this in a nutshell is why I went with iPad over Samsung. My 6 year old iPad just fell off of Apple's supported list for feature updates with iOS 17, but still received a security update a couple weeks ago despite the drop in support. I'll likely replace it in the next couple months if I find one at a good price. Overall they seem to handle PDFs fine in the default books app.

This seems to be a Samsung problem and not an overall Android tablet manufacturer problem. Aside from the companies churning out super-cheap tablets with sketchy specs from brands nobody's ever heard of, most of the companies are updating their tablet models from the last year or two to Android 14 and even the Samsung tablets will get security updates through to 2025. It's just...Samsung has a habit of doing stuff like this IMO because they think it'll force people to buy the latest and greatest model when it's just more likely to make people angry and switch to another brand. Apple had the same problem when they got busted several years ago for intentionally making iOS devices slower with updates in order to push people to upgrade (something they've apparently stopped because of fines and oversight in the EU over the whole thing and also why they can't force people to use their proprietary lightning cables anymore).

 

[Morrus]

Sold as loss-leaders. That's what I'd expect.

Not a realistic or fair expectation.

 

[Doctor Futurity]

On this note, Samsung Galaxy and Apple will have lots of bells and whistles included. They do tend to rasie the price 1.5 to 2X the cost. Though, we are not talking hundreds here either. Galaxy probably in the 130-180 range and Ipad 175-250 (unless you get refurbished). I'll admit I thought the fire would be a single use paperweight that couldn't hold up to additional use, but its been a huge value for 50 dollars.

The latest Fire is actually a nice and affordable option. I got very used to a high end 10.2 inch Galaxy S7 (iirc) with stylus and high res screen and used it for several years before accidentally destroying it on vacation last year. Following that I tried an iPad Air which I liked a lot, but then I got the OnePlus Pad and haven’t looked back since. I do recommend that if you can afford a higher quality tablet, do so and don’t settle for something like a lite model if possible. Better size, better screen resolution are huge quality of life improvement for pdf reading.

 

[ReshiIRE]

And it doesn't help that the APG has terrible options like the Witch and Oracle. The game is worse for having them. Sometimes more options isn't better for players - especially when they're poorly balanced with options from the core game.

Well:

a) the Witch is about to be significantly improved in Player Core 1, so that will be handled.
b) While we're still at level 3, having GM'd an Oracle for nearly 3 full levels and about to do our 20th Session, I really don't think Oracles are terrible; limited in some regards but their Mysteries can be quite good, especially their Focus spells - the Tempest Mystery my Oracle player has been using has been used to great effect. Granted I mainly use moderate encounters with a scattering of enemies rather than +2 bosses, but that doesn't mean the players haven't had scary combats once in a while.

Things are all relative of course; being a Spontaneous caster in PF2e is pretty good overall, from a GMing perspective.

 

[ReshiIRE]

Not a realistic or fair expectation.

My assumption is that the core books of any system are going to be the primary sellers; them being loss leaders seems to be a bad bet to make.

Especially since Paizo more than likely doesn't sell as much of those books in proportion to other companies due to Archives of Nethys existing; the core books need to be profitable by themselves.

 

[Staffan]

My assumption is that the core books of any system are going to be the primary sellers; them being loss leaders seems to be a bad bet to make.

Paizo is (or at least used to be) a bit different than most companies because their bread and butter is the Adventure Path, which grew out of their publication of the Dungeon and Dragon magazines. Their original purpose in making Pathfinder 1e was "We want to continue making adventures, but the system we're good at making them for is going out of publication, so let's make a clone of it and use that instead."

That probably doesn't mean that it makes sense making the core books loss leaders, but their incentives are a bit different from the rest of the gaming business.

 

[Abstruse]

Paizo is (or at least used to be) a bit different than most companies because their bread and butter is the Adventure Path, which grew out of their publication of the Dungeon and Dragon magazines. Their original purpose in making Pathfinder 1e was "We want to continue making adventures, but the system we're good at making them for is going out of publication, so let's make a clone of it and use that instead."

That probably doesn't mean that it makes sense making the core books loss leaders, but their incentives are a bit different from the rest of the gaming business.

They could get away with that with PF1 because it was basically D&D 3.5 with heavy errata and extra options, but with PF2 being a completely new system they pretty much can never sell more copies of the Adventure Path than they sell core rulebooks because you need those rules to play the adventure paths.

 

[GamerforHire]

I have one foot of my gaming interests squarely in the old-fashioned boxed, hex-and-counter wargames hobby. In that niche, one refrain I hear regarding the increasing price of boxEd wargames is that these prices should be evaluated on the basis of how many hours of enjoyment/entertainment you will get from the game, and what that works out to on a per-hour basis. Then compare that per-hour cost for your game against almost any other expense in your entertainment expenses category: movies; streaming subscriptions; music; vacations; etc.

This is particularly true with regard to roleplaying games: think about what your per-hour entertainment cost works out to for any set of RPG rulebooks, supplements, or adventures. A one-year, two sessions month, four hours a session net cost number is startlingly low, I will assure you.