D&D 4E What was Paizo thinking? 3.75 the 4E clone?

[JoeGKushner]

And the one thing people are either deliberately ignoring or closing the possiblity of, is that Paizo isn't competing with WoTC.

They don't have to dethrone 4th edition.

They just need to make enough market to keep going.

Rolemaster Classic, HARP, Fantasy Hero, Exalted, GURPS Fantasy and other fantasy games are all alive despite the announcement of 4th edition.

But those aren't games based around the d20 engine.

Okay. How about True 20, Mutants & Masterminds and Conan? I don't recall Green Ronin announcing with a tear in their eye that 4th edition has caused the complete collapse of all their product lines and that they are closing down.

The market can and will support multiple game systems. Will any of them be D&D? No. Do they need to be? No.

 

[TrainedMunkee]

Sort of a lot of assumptions there considering we have only seen the first 60 pages of an incomplete alpha.

You seem to be making a lot of assumptions about 4e, without seeing any of the rules. I'm not pro 4e. I'm pro wait and see the rules instead of pro 4e will kill my game.

 

[Rauol_Duke]

Doesn't mean I think that PF 3.75 will tank, merely that 5k downloads mean very little.

What it does mean is that there was/is widespread interest in this - which is good for Paizo's business.

 

[Firevalkyrie]

Umm.. I was working at IBM, on OS/2 in fact, at the time. Now granted, I was just one of the peons, but no one I knew at IBM thought we had a handshake agreement with Microsoft over Windows 95!

If this was true, it was a big, big secret at the time, because IBM professed , both internally and externally, to be going after both consumer and business customers with OS/2. What is your source?

Ken

I read that in an editorial several years after the fact, so if it's bad information it's at least secondhand bad information. I yield to the greater knowledge on this.

 

[Firevalkyrie]

You know, even though I have seen this sentiment expressed more than once, I have to say I don't agree with this at all. I really think Paizo is making a smart move in avoiding getting lost in the release of 4e...why try to compete directly and around the same time? Doesn't make sense.

To be honest, Pathfinder doesn't make sense. It's gratuitously incompatible with 3.5 despite advertising compatibility with it. 3.5 adventures played with Pathfinder characters are going to need a lot of work to make sure that the adventurers don't walk through the module, while Pathfinder adventures are going to grind up rules-as-written D&D 3.5 characters. It's a bad decision either way, but I'm not sure if it's the least bad of the presented bad decisions (wait for the GSL, continue publishing 3.5 OGL adventures or publish a brand new 3.5-derived game) or the most bad.

Secondly I think that those who are sticking with 3.x are going to be following the design of Pathfinder already...what waiting till 2009 for the finished product does is open up the possibility that those who, after playing 4e for a longer amount of time, find it not to their liking (you know like the same way it took time and actual play beyond 1st level for 3e's so called "problems" to be brought to light) may be more apt to pick up Pathfinder if 4e has dissapointed them in the long-term.

I think that most of those who are sticking with 3.x are done buying new rulebooks, just as most of those who stuck with AD&D 2nd Edition didn't care all that much about Hackmaster.

Counting on the scraps of another company's business is a bad business plan, and I would certainly hope Lisa Stevens and Erik Mona are smarter than to have that built into their plan for Pathfinder. For the vast majority of players, D&D will be "good enough," just as it has been for the last 35 years. It will build on the same network externalities as the previous versions of D&D - and that's not just business speak we're talking about here. Network externalities are found in action every time somebody opens a thread on a message board saying "Why can't I find a group for my beloved game, World of Synnibarr?" (if you're playing World of Synnibarr you've got other problems, but that's neither here nor there ).

Pathfinder has no visible presence whatsoever outside of the internet and a few meager square feet of shelf space at your friendly local game store. When the Pathfinder RPG comes out, it's going to be fighting for shelf footage with all of the other 3.5-derived games sitting there collecting dust. Many of which have just as impressive production values and are just as interesting in their own right as Pathfinder.

 

[Firevalkyrie]

What it does mean is that there was/is widespread interest in this - which is good for Paizo's business.

It's not really all that widespread.

There are about an estimated 5.5 million people playing D&D regularly (defined as once or more a month). That 5,000 downloads is less than one-tenth of one percent of the total number of active D&D players. I'd also be interested in knowing the churn rate of those downloaders - what percentage of them, having read the rules, intend to purchase or play the finished product.

 

[Rauol_Duke]

That 5,000 downloads is less than one-tenth of one percent of the total number of active D&D players.

... in the 48 hours after the announcment was made. I'd say that's pretty good, and so does Paizo. Please remember that Paizo does not need everyone, nearly everyone, or even mostly everyone who plays D&D to purchase their products for them to be successful.

 

[Rauol_Duke]

To be honest, Pathfinder doesn't make sense. It's gratuitously incompatible with 3.5 despite advertising compatibility with it. 3.5 adventures played with Pathfinder characters are going to need a lot of work to make sure that the adventurers don't walk through the module, while Pathfinder adventures are going to grind up rules-as-written D&D 3.5 characters.

Really...? Have you playtested this? Any evidence to this besides your eyeballing it?

 

[Imaro]

To be honest, Pathfinder doesn't make sense. It's gratuitously incompatible with 3.5 despite advertising compatibility with it. 3.5 adventures played with Pathfinder characters are going to need a lot of work to make sure that the adventurers don't walk through the module, while Pathfinder adventures are going to grind up rules-as-written D&D 3.5 characters. It's a bad decision either way, but I'm not sure if it's the least bad of the presented bad decisions (wait for the GSL, continue publishing 3.5 OGL adventures or publish a brand new 3.5-derived game) or the most bad.


I think that most of those who are sticking with 3.x are done buying new rulebooks, just as most of those who stuck with AD&D 2nd Edition didn't care all that much about Hackmaster.

Counting on the scraps of another company's business is a bad business plan, and I would certainly hope Lisa Stevens and Erik Mona are smarter than to have that built into their plan for Pathfinder. For the vast majority of players, D&D will be "good enough," just as it has been for the last 35 years. It will build on the same network externalities as the previous versions of D&D - and that's not just business speak we're talking about here. Network externalities are found in action every time somebody opens a thread on a message board saying "Why can't I find a group for my beloved game, World of Synnibarr?" (if you're playing World of Synnibarr you've got other problems, but that's neither here nor there ).

Eh, different strokes for different folks I guess...I mean according to this logic, no one anywhere is playing anything but D&D and every other rpg publisher is appaently publishing books for the love of it rather than making a profit. In other words anyone who isn't WotC is just wasting their time. I just don't see it that way. I play a multitude of games and D&D is just one amongst them, with WW actually garnering more of my money than WotC did this past year.

no[/i] visible presence whatsoever outside of the internet and a few meager square feet of shelf space at your friendly local game store. When the Pathfinder RPG comes out, it's going to be fighting for shelf footage with all of the other 3.5-derived games sitting there collecting dust. Many of which have just as impressive production values and are just as interesting in their own right as Pathfinder.

Isn't this the case with any rpg? Again by this logic no one would ever try to break-in with a new game. I think the people at Paizo actually have a strong enough understanding of the fanbase for Pathfinder because it is currently based on a subscription model. They probably,(through this and through the amount purchased in stores), have a pretty good idea how large their fanbase is and apparently believe it is large enough to go with a Pathfinder brand rpg. In the end Paizo is creating a rpg to go with a brand that has been out for over a year and no one, except those employed at Paizo, knows what those numbers really look like. They don't have to be D&D profit numbers...they only have to be Paizo profit numbers.

I personally feel WotC didn't give Paizo a choice...they snatched Dungeon and Dragon from them...didn't allow them to compile and publish the Age of Worms adventure path (which may have given them the revenue to wait a little longer), decided to charge $5,000 for a license which, while promised in January, no one still knows when it will be available (or whether it will allow the products Paizo wants to publish under 4.0). I mean really everyone claiming how Paizo fumbled the ball as far as 4e , really needs to look at the plays WotC decided to call throughout the marketing and production of 4e with the 3rd party publishers.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

To be honest, Pathfinder doesn't make sense. It's gratuitously incompatible with 3.5 despite advertising compatibility with it. 3.5 adventures played with Pathfinder characters are going to need a lot of work to make sure that the adventurers don't walk through the module, while Pathfinder adventures are going to grind up rules-as-written D&D 3.5 characters. It's a bad decision either way, but I'm not sure if it's the least bad of the presented bad decisions (wait for the GSL, continue publishing 3.5 OGL adventures or publish a brand new 3.5-derived game) or the most bad.

Man, I knew they were offering the finished rules for preorder on their website, but I didn't know they were handing them out for secret preview ALREADY! All I got was this Alpha 1 pdf, and that only has the first proposals for rule changes and expansions. And oddly enough, I'd say at least 75 % of what I've seen is easily compatible to 3.5E. We definitely must be looking at different documents.

Now can you tell me where you got that pathfinder book? I'd like to be in on the secret playtest group that got it already.