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Message: <blockquote data-quote="malladin" data-source="post: 420923" data-attributes="member: 8230">Perspective from the little guyHi,  Ben here from Malladin's Gate Press.  Just thought it might be nice to add a few of my own perspective, from the point of view of a new, small d20 publisher.Malladin's Gate are a brand new company. We've been up and running for less than a month and have only one product available on PDF through RPGNow (sorry if that sounded too much like a plug, but I'm trying to give a bit of background as most of you probably won't know who I am).  Needless to say we are what Shane described as 'lower tier' publishers who are just writing games in our spare time. Hmm, where to start, this thread has become a bit all-encompassing...The d20 system has given us a start that we might never have gotten before OGL.  Along with RPG Now we were able to set up for very small start up costs (that have already been more than recouped through sales of our first book).  Not that we're ever going to be able to make masses out of it, but we'll hopefully get to keep writing.  I think that its because of this that d20 will stick around for a good while yet.  Small 'publishers' like our selves can get our material out without having to find a publisher.We started out writing game material a few years ago now and have been touting our own game (non d20) around pulishers.  When this failed we tried to break in to the d20 market.  Again we had to take rejection from many publishers before we found that we could actually produce and sell PDF games ourselves.  Given the imprint deals that are going around it seemed like our best avenue to get oursleves properly published (whether or not this will hapen remains to be seen).  This way we don't have to spend money we don't have and can write our best ideas rather than trying to squeeze them into an existing system.As for the relative value of d20 over other systems, I like both.  I personally grew up on basic D&D (not AD&D, the basic, expert, companion and masters boxed sets with the great Elmore art on the front),  When 2nd edition came out we switched to it (as basic D&D seemed to be dying out at the time).  However, this all occurred before I went away to University.  There I was eductaed in numerous other game systems that I had previously been unaware of.  This led me to completely reject AD&D (2e) and I spent most of my time slagging it off and playing a variety of other systems, such as White Wolf, GURPS, Amber, Live Roleplaying games, and many others (including some unpublished ones).  The reasons for not liking D&D at this time were due to the lack flexibility for me as a GM and as a player when compared with other systems (IMO, obviously).  When 3E came out I didn't bother with it.  It was only when friends I knew who had similar opinions of older D&D told me that it was worth a look that I gave it a go.  Now I love it.  Its the only game I play regularly.  Is it better than other games?  Probably not, but many of the games I was into in the 90s seem to be running rapidly out of steam (Vampire, Deadlands).  Is it any worse?  I don't think so.  To a large extent there's not much thats very different.  Like all other roleplaying systems it has stats and skills that add together and you compare it with the result of a dice roll and a rough idea of the difficulty of the task undertaken.  On top of that there's a combat system that involves adding an action ordering an targetting system on top of the basic resolution system.  Neither is this new or bad (IMO).I think the recent demise of other systems is more to do with the way in which people like PEG and WW have flogged their old ideas to death and left all but their hard-core without anything they really want to play.  Okay, with d20 system I can produce a 'Splat' book that is largely rules and little flavour and no game background. Speaking as a GM, I want to make my own game worlds up, so why would I bother with someone else's world?</blockquote>

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