Piecemeal supplements...

[Heretic Apostate]

Great, just great. I've found yet another supplement I want only because of stuff that is on less than 20 pages... (If you're wondering, I want to find out about the social feats from Holistic's Fading Suns d20.)

I really admire Monte's decision to release multiple PDFs which allow the buyer to pick and choose what parts of Arcana Unearthed they want to buy. I wish a lot more publishers would follow suit.

I know that there are many supplements that I avoid buying, simply because I can't imagine paying $25 for 20 pages. That is money that is lost completely by the publisher, because I simply can't justify the expenditure.

How many publishers are doing the whole piecemeal supplement thing? Is it just Monte, and then only with regard to AU? Do I have to wait until the products are long out of print, and then hope to pick them up when they get placed on rpgnow as PDFs?

Enquiring minds want to know.

 

[jmucchiello]

Great, just great. I've found yet another supplement I want only because of stuff that is on less than 20 pages... (If you're wondering, I want to find out about the social feats from Holistic's Fading Suns d20.)

Just a question? Which 20 pages are you interested in? How many other people do you think want exactly those 20 pages and not 15 of those pages and 10 other pages? IOW, what demarkation would be logical for these piecemeal supplements? If you only like feats you have to buy two of Monte's AU PDFs.

I know that there are many supplements that I avoid buying, simply because I can't imagine paying $25 for 20 pages. That is money that is lost completely by the publisher, because I simply can't justify the expenditure.

This will only raise the price for other buyers since someone has to pay the editing and layout costs for creating all of these mini-books. Some even require the designer's involvement to make sure nothing crucial is left out. What good are all the feats if some of the feats are "you can perform the Fubaz ritual" unless that ritual is also included in the book?

How many publishers are doing the whole piecemeal supplement thing? Is it just Monte, and then only with regard to AU? Do I have to wait until the products are long out of print, and then hope to pick them up when they get placed on rpgnow as PDFs?

Last question first, yes, but isn't that better than never? First question, none really but Khan's Press seems to have a similar concept. They just recently released a set of books gathering in one place all the Prestige Class and all the Spells from their other books. Not exactly what you are looking for, but, IMO, a better deal for the publisher. The collection book has some heft. Selling 20 page PDFs is a losing proposition over time.

How much would you pay for the 20 pages (out of 200) that you are interested in? How many others would too?

And what should have been my first question: have you written an email to Holistic asking about the pages in question? Perhaps they'd give you the OGL portion of the pages if you asked nicely? Perhaps not. But it can't hurt to ask.

 

[malladin]

We at Malladin's Gate are using this method to publish our own game settings. We published the Campaign Primer for DarkLore recently (it's got multiple 5* reviews, btw ) and are intending to release expansion supplements that cover the different regions and classes of the game in more detail. The campaign primer is 80 pages of rules and background to help players get started in the DarkLore world and the supplements wil complete the picture. We're intending a similar plan with our Etherscope project, with a campaign primer that gives you teh bare bones ad supplements that expand it out into something nearer the 300 page hardback that (in our dreams) we would produce. We're mainly doing this due to our resources (only 2 of us writing and fitting it alongside real life) and the limitations of the pdf format (the DarkLore campagin primer was 9Meg, I'd hate to think what 300 pages ould have been).

Cheerio,

Ben

 

[philreed]

Forbidden Arcana Series

A series of PDFs I've been releasing are designed as plug-in pieces. Each PDF focuses on one thing and is easy to use or ignore without need of the others.

Most of the releases in this series are 12-14 pages in length and priced at $1.85. There are also two free releases. Click the link below for a complete listing of the PDFs in this series.

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=2219&

The more I work with PDFs the more I find that they're best suited to short (1-30 page) supplements. Anything larger than that is almost too much trouble to print and use.

 

[Cergorach]

Heretic, is it only the feats you want or also the Noble class itself? Btw, the stuff you want from the book you mentioned is almost all OGC, the only things that are PI are some of the house names and stuff.

I don't think that splitting whole products up to satisfy a few customers is a good idea, it either says that the rest of the product isn't as useful, or it just confuses customers.

 

[Heretic Apostate]

I'm interested in the concept of social feats. I'm always looking for new stuff that isn't all munchkin-y, and I've heard several people touting the social feats from Fading Suns.

I'm not interested in the setting, nor in the classes, so it's pretty much just those 20 pages.

Maybe I'll try contacting Holistic, as suggested.