Which 3rd party publishers will survive?

[Gundark]

I think paizo, green ronin, and mongoose will.

The ones that won't? Privateer Press- me thinks they'll just stick to their miniatures game.

I wonder about crafty games and the Spycraft line. They might becuase Spycraft doesn't seem tied to an edition.

your thoughts?

 

[Alnag]

Except for Malhavoc Press which I have big questionmark about... what's going to happen with it if Monte is leaving desing career behind I think most of the publisher who survived so far will survive this period too.

Especially if most of them was nervously expecting new edition of DnD. The OGL will exist and with new edition there will be at least short time of boom in sales so this is good for them.

 

[Aus_Snow]

As well as ones the OP mentioned:

Would put money on, so to speak

Goodman Games
Expeditious Retreat Press
RPGObjects

Not so sure

The rest. . .

 

[Mark]

As many as wish to survive, will survive. Count on stuff from Creative Mountain Games as long as I draw breath.

 

[Bacris]

As many as wish to survive, will survive.

I echo Mark's sentiment. I think the next year might be rocky for some of the 3rd party publishers as expectations build for 4E, which may impact people buying 3.5 material, but I think any that truly want to survive, will. Perhaps in a different business model, but I only imagine those that close shop will be the ones that just don't feel like putting in the effort of keeping up with a new edition

 

[Aus_Snow]

I wonder what'll happen with Necro.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I think we may actually see a glut of new publishers pop up after 4e.

Maybe not as much as 3e (many have learned their lessons), but this "clean slate" might give a lot of folks who didn't try 3e to jump in with the lessons learned by the previous generation on how to do it "right."

 

[teitan]

I think we'll see another small boom in D20 publishers when 4e is released, people trying to fill niche products etc. that WotC won't get to for awhile.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I wonder what'll happen with Necro.

How many "in the works" projects do they have without release dates? Those are the projects I'm worried about. Do they go back to square one with the Sleeping Tsar books or restat them or release them under 3.5 in a 4E era or what?

 

[Howndawg]

Mongoose will survive. They have RQ and Traveller which are not OGL/d20, B5 and Conan which are OGL, and miniature games which are doing quite well.
Green Ronin, too. M&M + True20.
Privateer, too. Warmachine and Hordes are much too big.
Troll Lords I wonder about. If WotC makes a move with 4e to get back more grognards, C&C will take a major hit.
Crafty and other companies which depend a lot on PDF sales will probably survive.
As to the others, well...

Howndawg