Pathfinder 1E Did WOTC take one for the team, help Paizo?

[Steel_Wind]

I was under the impression WotC had NO IDEA that Paizo was producing Pathfinder. It was in-house and not shared with WotC from what I have heard...

Then Paizo presented it that they would offer credit to subscribers for their "products" without being specific as to what those products were.

At which point - kudos to Lisa Stevens for being clever enough to see the opportunity and keep it under wraps.

The timing right before GAMA seems more than a little favorable.

 

[delericho]

May I be bold enough to state that MAYBE the WOTC team felt some responsiblity to help the smaller company by allowing for an early announcement, knowing full well that they'd get raked and counting on the fact that once the DI comes on board, that all this huff-and-puff would go away and the world would settle down again. Maybe, just MAYBE, they "took one for the team" and let Paizo get out their announcement for GAMA.

I very much doubt it. I'm pretty sure it happened now because the license was up for renewal now.

WotC didn't consciously 'take one for the team' because corporations don't do that. And, bluntly, that's the way it should be - their job is to maximise shareholder value, not to be nice to the competition.

(Honestly, place yourself in the boots of a Hasbro shareholder who doesn't care about D&D, Dragon, or any of this. You learn that one of Hasbro's divisions has gone out of their way to help their competition, potentially causing you to lose money. Would you not be angry at this development?)

That sort of subscription $$ transfer would have resulted in a triggering of the payment of 300-500k+ in cash from Paizo to WotC. It could have resulted quite possibly in Paizo going under. Certainly - it would have been grim for its cashflow even if they did not go under.

Paizo gets:

• No absolute liability to refund transfer the subscription money. This is HUGE;

Paizo are obliged to refund the subscriptions of anyone who doesn't transfer to Pathfinder (or take one of their other options). In order to persuade people to switch, they're offering Pathfinder subs/Dragon back-issues/store credit at very preferential terms. Even so, I bet they're going to have to refund a significant chunk of those 13,000 Dragon subs.

Basically, this is huge for Paizo however you slice it.

However, I think there probably is something in this being cast as the end of the magazines, rather than them going online, and it probably is to do with them not wanting to carry subscriptions over. However, my guess would be that it's just much easier to account for if they just cut the ties and have Paizo issue refunds to all, rather than have the subscriptions transfer, and then have to offer all customers the option of a refund (since an e-zine is useless if you don't have internet access).

 

[delericho]

That I'll agree with, that was good of them. But the uproar heard now would have a lot louder if Dungeon was cancelled before the AP was over, so I see it as a PR move (though still a gracious one).

Agreed. And it was probably allowed because Wizards know the DI isn't ready to go (and won't be until at least September, if then).

 

[Ghendar]

Truth is, all of us will check out the DI,

Catsclaw

Wrong. I won't.
I want a paper magazine I can hold in my hands and collect. I have no interest in e-content and will not pay for it.

 

[Ghendar]

That's interesting, Nick. If that's the case, I wonder what WotC thinks about Paizo having such a great replacement for the mag subscribers' money?

You know what? (and I say this not with anger, but rather with honesty) I don't really give a rat's a** what WotC thinks? They saw fit to cancel both mags and replace it with a medium that I personally have no interest in. Pathfinder, on the other hand, is something that looks very much like I will have an interest in.

In a general sense, I don't fault WotC for making decisions that they feel is in the best interest of their company. However, I'm not sure this decision is or will be in the best interest of their company. Time will tell, I guess.

 

[morbiczer]

Agreed. And it was probably allowed because Wizards know the DI isn't ready to go (and won't be until at least September, if then).

This is my guess also. The fact that they aren't giving us even a projected starting date suggests to me that they do't know when it will be ready, or at least that they aren't sure they can finish development by the planned starting date.

If they say now it'll start in September (or whenever), and than have to delay this, it would give a really bad signal about the whole thing, especially since many people are pissed off with Wizards right now and would happily see them fail at thier new project.

It could very well be, that tehy timed this announcemnet to GAMA, but I think it couldn't have waited much longer. Paizo needs time to market their new products and build up the hype, announcing this some months before the end was in their interest too IMO.

 

[Shroomy]

While gracious, I think the 4 month extension to finish STAP was more of a CYA move on WoTC's part. They probably needed more time to launch whatever it is they are launching and they knew that cutting off the STAP midstream would compound any negative criticism they would receive. That said, I don't think WoTC expected this level of vitriol and anger; I mean, it essentially forced them to throw something together on a Friday afternoon to appease the fanbase. We'll see what will come down the pipe in the next few days.

 

[delericho]

That said, I don't think WoTC expected this level of vitriol and anger; I mean, it essentially forced them to throw something together on a Friday afternoon to appease the fanbase.

This seems likely - the nature of the response by WotC is not what I would have expected as a planned response.

That does rather raise the question: why were they caught off-guard so badly? Surely many if not all of the design team there should have known the place Dragon has in the hearts of the gamer community, and could have warned them of the likely reaction. And Paizo's reaction (and some of the actions leading up to the announcement, when viewed with hindsight) seem to strongly indicate that they had known about, or at least strongly expected, this well in advance. So, what gives?

Unless... (and here I'm just thinking out loud, so to speak) What if Wizards had expected to be able to offer us something more concrete as a preview of the DI? Or, perhaps, what if the people who did raise concerns at the likely reaction were told that there would be such a thing. Then, if those responsible for providing the preview either dropped the ball or (more likely) weren't given enough time to do that job properly...

It's entirely possible Wizards knew and expected the reaction, but also expected to have something good to show us, something that never materialised. And so, caught without a plan, they had the design team try to reassure the fans.

Or maybe they just didn't realise how strongly certain elements in the community would react.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Not just one, two: Dragon and Dungeon. And the team was their own.

 

[Monkey King]

That does rather raise the question: why were they caught off-guard so badly? Surely many if not all of the design team there should have known the place Dragon has in the hearts of the gamer community, and could have warned them of the likely reaction. ::SNIP::

Or maybe they just didn't realise how strongly certain elements in the community would react.

I suspect ignorance and a certain mild disdain for the periodicals, rather than any real malice. There's a long history of misunderstanding between the periodicals staff and the design staff, going back to my time at TSR. When I was there, the designers felt that the magazines were.... Well, not beneath them, exactly, but not quite up to the hardcore, chest-thumping work that went into a hardback or a boxed set. That sense of designers as Alpha-geeks has, if anything, grown stronger under WotC's stewardship.

The magazine staff of my time (Roger Moore, Barbara Young, Dale Donovan, and me) was closely attuned to what the gamer community was thinking, because we got the article queries and the letters to the editor every day, just as the Paizo guys are watching the boards more closely. The periodicals staff was always listening to the audience and trying to anticipate their wishes. By contrast, the designers tended to speak down a little, or at least from a great distance, because they worked in some isolation and their first audience was an in-house editor, not the wider community. I'm generalizing, and there are exceptions, but....

I suspect that while the people involved have all changed, the overall pattern of design seeing the periodicals as less important than their own work hasn't changed. And clearly, the tighter connection between the periodicals staff and the community hasn't changed either.