Should Dungeon and Polyheadron be in the same magazine

[jeffh]

I understand the business concerns that underlie the current format of Poly/Dungeon, but it doesn't change the fact that the current situation is, from a consumer's standpoint, absurd. It's not petty to point that out, it's just recognizing reality.

Suppose Seventeen and Guns & Ammo both found that, for whatever reason, they were losing money, or maybe just not making as much as the publisher wanted. I don't think either readership would put up with merging them into one magazine with seperate sections for each. That's what the current format is like. It's ridiculous.

The point about price is also well taken; right now you pay nearly twice as much for the same overall amount of content you got when the magazine was bimonthly, less if you're one of those who prefer Poly. I didn't mind paying an extra dollar once every two months for content I hardly use (Poly in my case), but I sure as heck mind paying, in effect, an extra $8 Canadian every month. So I don't. I only buy about every second or third issue, these days, whereas I used to buy every single one (#99 was the first one I didn't buy since 3E came out).

What I'd like to know is, what was wrong with having Polyhedron as a benefit for RPGA members? That's what it was for something on the order of twenty years, including what I understood to be a successful run for about a year after 3E came out. As far as I can tell, there was nothing wrong with the old arrangement, and the whole problem started in 2001 or so with someone trying to fix something that wasn't broken.

 

[Ranger REG]

I doubt that the publishers of Seventeen and Guns & Ammo are one and the same. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that is a poor example.

As absurd as it is -- although there are far more absurd things in the world than this -- it's the only way to maintain survivability in the same subject area of roleplaying game. If you don't like it, don't buy it, and if Paizo had to cancel the circulation due to low sales and readership, you can pull a Nelson Mundt's "Ha! Ha!"

 

[Sir Whiskers]

RE: #1
They pushed from bimonthly circulation to monthly circulation to increase sale and hopefully readership. To go back would decrease the sale, especially if the split revenue may not support both magazines individually.

This it the part that has always confused me. Printing and shipping a magazine is a significant element in its costs. Am I to believe that their subscriber base increased enough to cover these added costs solely because it moved to a monthly format? How many readers were really saying, "Gee, I'd like to get a subscription to Dungeon, but it's just not worth it unless I get it every month..."? I just don't see it.

Anyone want to take a stab at explaining this?

 

[Dion D Ritter]

I just have a question for all of you. How many of you like the fact the Dungeon and Polyhedron are in the same magazine? When this first occured I was perfectly okay with it. However, over the last year I have noticed that there were less adventures in the Dungeon side and it's been frustrating me. I still like Dungeon Mag a whole lot and think the adventures are definitely worth the cost. But I'd rather see more moduals and less or no Polyhedron.

I don't like the Polyhedron/Dungeon combination. Polyhedron was a great fantasy/science fiction source before it was combined with Dungeon. I think I'm going to drop my subscription and invest in a diferent d20 magazine. Dungeon was a good magazine, but now it has made Polyhedron less critical.

 

[Ranger REG]

This it the part that has always confused me. Printing and shipping a magazine is a significant element in its costs. Am I to believe that their subscriber base increased enough to cover these added costs solely because it moved to a monthly format? How many readers were really saying, "Gee, I'd like to get a subscription to Dungeon, but it's just not worth it unless I get it every month..."? I just don't see it.

Anyone want to take a stab at explaining this?

Dungeon readers wanted more adventures than what a bimonthly magazine can give.

When you compare to the bimonthly issue from 2002, where it offered a page count of 180 to two monthly issues with a page count of 100 each, you get about 20 pages more. Let us not forget the fact that they allocated less pages to Poly except when it offers a mini-game only 4 times a year, Dungeon readers get what they wanted.

 

[Ranger REG]

I don't like the Polyhedron/Dungeon combination. Polyhedron was a great fantasy/science fiction source before it was combined with Dungeon. I think I'm going to drop my subscription and invest in a diferent d20 magazine. Dungeon was a good magazine, but now it has made Polyhedron less critical.

I like Poly when it became a commercial magazine combined with Dungeon rather than my having to join the RPGA network to get it.

But due to increasing demands and dare I say, hostile threats, the current Poly is not as appealing as it was in 2002. So I only buy the more relevant issues, rather than have a subscription.

 

[Simplicity]

Dungeon readers wanted more adventures than what a bimonthly magazine can give.

I don't buy this for a second. Take out an old bi-monthly Dungeon and
compare the number of adventures in it to a monthly Dungeon. Most monthly Dungeon magazines have two adventures in them. Two. Most bi-monthly Dungeons had four to five. Now compare the latest Adventure Path adventures to the ones in the bi-monthly magazine. The adventures literally go from being 2 fifty room dungeons per adventure to 2 twenty room dungeons per adventure. That's not cutting in content in half. That's cutting content in a quarters (half as many adventures, and half as long each). I actually think we were getting quite a lot more adventures (and adventures of greater length and quality) in the bi-monthly Dungeon magazine.

The real reason to go to monthly is that you can get twice as much filler. Twice as many dungeon letters, tables of contents, next issue columns, smaller adventures mean more boilerplate setup text, etc.

I would be happy if they went back to bi-monthly, personally.

 

[Ranger REG]

Whatever. All I want is appealing articles on the Poly side. I'll take whatever supports and ideas they can give for my other WotC's non-D&D RPG.

 

[Vocenoctum]

This it the part that has always confused me. Printing and shipping a magazine is a significant element in its costs. Am I to believe that their subscriber base increased enough to cover these added costs solely because it moved to a monthly format? How many readers were really saying, "Gee, I'd like to get a subscription to Dungeon, but it's just not worth it unless I get it every month..."? I just don't see it.

Anyone want to take a stab at explaining this?

Simple, they went to the monthly magazine, but didn't reduce the price by half. Therfor more covermoney.
You also have 12 issues with ads, vs 6 issues with ad's.

I like the monthly better myself. I look forward to the stuff.

I still think it's a better value than a lot of stuff out there, and Poly is part of the fun. I do wnder about the times they use Poly for D&D material though. This months DS issue was good, but it was definetly D&D, and took Poly.

 

[Erik Mona]

>>>
The real reason to go to monthly is that you can get twice as much filler. Twice as many dungeon letters, tables of contents, next issue columns, smaller adventures mean more boilerplate setup text, etc.
>>>

The lack of faith some readers show us is absolutely astonishing sometimes. Suffice it to say, doubling up on letters has _nothing_ to do with why we switched to a monthly format.

100 pages every month is 200 pages every two months, some 20 pages more than we used to edit on the old schedule. The additional ads and, as you say, "boilerplate" stuff accounts for most of these pages, so in terms of pages of material, it comes out about even (although, to be fair, editing two letters columns is still twice the work of editing one, even if that work is easier than developing an adventure or mini-game).

But it's twice the contracts. Twice the deadlines. At least twice the stress. Editing a monthly magazine is _in no way_ easier on us than editing a bi-monthly magazine. I look back at my time on a bi-monthly as an extended vacation by comparison, and am envious of colleagues here at the office who get the luxury of working on such a slow-paced magazine.

Basically, it comes down to economics.

1. CASHFLOW. A monthly magazine receives payment from distributors twice as often as a bi-monthly magazine. That helps the company in more ways than I can list.

2. ADVERTISING. A monthly magazine has (theoretically) twice as many opportunities to sell ads.

If I could switch the magazine back to bi-montly I'd do it in an instant. Paizo doesn't make decisions with the sole criteria of "how much easier does this make Erik's job," unfortunately. But since we're in business to make money, that's probably a good thing.

--Erik Mona
Editor-in-Chief
Dungeon Magazine