Quote from: ggroy;353373Wonder if WotC is happy about 4E 3PPs failing and going the way of the dodo.

It would be kind of funny if that was their plan all along. :duh:

Quote from: CRKrueger;353375It would be kind of funny if that was their plan all along. :duh:

WotC's secret plan:

- destroy all competition
- take no prisoners
- show no mercy

:banghead::rotfl:

Quote from: T. Foster;353248The only thing surprising about this is that it's taken Goodman Games this long to come to this point -- everybody else was there in about 2005 (which is why we saw the multiplication of d20 variants that he mentions). My personal recommendation is that they license OSRIC and go full-bore old-school.

LOL! Good one.

Oh wait...you were actually serious... :jaw-dropping:

If I recall correctly, Goodman Games original slogan was "3rd edition rules, 1st edition feel" or something of that nature.

The idea here is to use a current living ruleset that people are actually playing to create modules that are evocative of the adventures of yore.

4E's webtools basically made it an insular creature and any 3pp that supports that system is essentially a barnacle attaching itself to a sperm whale...so supporting that module is a wash (which pains me to say, because I quite enjoy the Punjar modules they produce)

Likewise, supporting OSRIC is a bad idea, because only a fringe group of grumpy old men and retrocult hipsters are playing it.

Goodman Games best bet is to either come up with their own system (not likely as Goodman Games is really only a vanity project for Joseph Goodman by all accounts) or simply jump on the Pathfinder RPG ship.

Quote from: Ronin;353369
Doesnt really explain much to me. Is he one of the billion halfass d20 publishers that shouldnt have been allowed to clog up the intarweb with shit?

Basically, he's the worst of the worst of the worst of those.  Not only are his products shoddy, ill concieved, derivative tripe, but frequently actively plagiarized or deliberately set up to manipulate the market to pull shoppers away from real products.  

Say you make a "20 Alternate Planes" PDF and throw it up on RPGnow.  The second you hit X number of sales, LPJ slaps together his own "21 Different Dimensions" the next day, usually with design elements deliberately lifted from the existing work (similar cover, typeface, obviously similar rules, etc.), or in a number of cases, stealing whole texts or manipulating the OGL wording to get away with reprinting your own shit under his name.

For a while there, him and Skarka had quite a row over it, and resorted to essentially running amok reselling each other's work in a game of plagiarism chicken, all while slagging each other off in the press as much as possible.  

I believe there's been several attempts to get him removed from RPGnow in the past, but since RPGnow are themselves a bunch of shady curs who basically don't give a fuck what happens on their network, I'm not sure anything ever came of it, and it sure wasn't permanent as he's still listed there.

I vote against the Goodman plan.  I don't want a module in one hand and bunch of download stat sheets in the other.   Instead, publish the mod for whatever system has the most customers and then re-do the mod as a PDF in Old School and whatever other systems you want to support.

BTW, has anyone purchased Dungeon Alphabet?   Any good?

Quote from: Shazbot79;353382If I recall correctly, Goodman Games original slogan was "3rd edition rules, 1st edition feel" or something of that nature.

That was actually the slogan of Necromancer Games.

Quote from: Shazbot79;353382Likewise, supporting OSRIC is a bad idea, because only a fringe group of grumpy old men and retrocult hipsters are playing it.

Except that Goodman Games already appears to have experimented in doing that.

Quote from: J Arcane;3533254e is made to cater to the "official" mindset.  It's inevitable then that should they succeed, 3rd party would be more or less dead to it and it's players.

Oh it's not the mindset but the supporting software on DDI. Basically any thing Goodman cooks up - any feat, new class feature, monster or trap - can't be entered into the database for the Character Builder or the Adventure Builder. I already have trouble implementing some house rules while keeping these e-tools fully functional, but that's nothing compared to what the situation is like for a 3PP publisher in 4E, and the hassle it generates for DMs using his material.

(Clarification: I'm not saying all 4E customers are DDI long term subscribers. (I, for instance, am not, and all DDI-exclusive material is banned from my 4E table to prevent the DDI/non-DDI rift in my players.) But I guess 90% of 4E DMs have signed up for the DDI for at least one month at one point to get a copy of these e-tools.)

Quote from: J Arcane;3533254e is made to cater to the "official" mindset.  It's inevitable then that should they succeed, 3rd party would be more or less dead to it and it's players.

Which, in retrospect, makes their failed 5000 $ GSL early adopter offer even more dubious than it was already.

Quote from: jeff37923;353389Except that Goodman Games already appears to have experimented in doing that.

It doesn't look like the experiment was anything more than throwing out some 1E conversions of existing 3x Goodman modules. And if those modules outsold his 3x stuff, I'm sure Goodman would have switched to making exclusively 1E or OSRIC stuff already.

Look, the economic situation that Goodman outlines in the OP isn't that hard to understand. Goodman wants to remain a viable business - that is make professional quality books at a profit, without worries that a single failure will bankrupt the company.

With the gradual decline and fracturing of the 3x market he decided to jump to 4E, anticipating that his 4E books would sell at or near the volume of his 3x books. Turns out he was wrong.

But that doesn't mean Pathfinder, or OSRIC is his best bet now. It could very well be that neither of those markets is big enough to make them attractive to 3rd party publishers. It's all about economies of scale. A book that is profitable with a 2,000 unit print run may very well be unprofitable with an 800 unit print run.

So those indulging in schadenfraude should stop and consider that maybe it isn't good news that Goodman is getting his 'comeupance'. Maybe this is another sign than the RPG market has declined and fragmented to the point where it simply isn't a viable business anymore even at Goodman's micro-press, barely-break-even scale.

And for those ready to jump in and say they don't give a shit about publishers and don't need the RPG industry, why in fuck are you reading a thread about Goodman Games in the first place if you don't need publishers? Why do you care one way or another what publishers do if you hate them all?

Quote from: ggroy;353373Wonder if WotC is happy about 4E 3PPs failing and going the way of the dodo.

I don't get the sense they really give a rat's ass. GSL said a lot of things but it said one thing loud and clear "Fuck you if you're not WotC".

Quote from: Spinachcat;353384BTW, has anyone purchased Dungeon Alphabet?   Any good?

It's not been released yet. However, having seen the original blog post and Fight On! article, reading Michael Curtis's Stonehell book... yea, it's going to be good.

Quote from: Shazbot79;353382Likewise, supporting OSRIC is a bad idea, because only a fringe group of grumpy old men and retrocult hipsters are playing it.

If you play AD&D 1e, which still seems (anecdotally) to command a good following, then you're playing OSRIC. Vice versa. Supporting OSRIC/1e isn't a bad idea, it's a limited market, but not a bad idea.

Quote from: estar;353301There is a significant "If it is not Wizards I don't care" attitude among 4e fans.

Not that I've seen. Not any more so than with 3e. Or, more accurately, than there was during the crash of the d20 market. Because it was that, shelves and shelves full of crap products, which is, I think, causing folks to shy away from third party publishers.

I think ggroy has the right of it when he says that it's the Character Builder that's causing the problems - third party products can't appear in it and so why bother?

Seanchai

Quote from: Seanchai;353456I think ggroy has the right of it when he says that it's the Character Builder that's causing the problems - third party products can't appear in it and so why bother?

Seanchai

Yeah, that's not a bad analysis.  I think it also got off on the wrong foot with the delay/trouble/confusion over the GSL--companies like Paizo and Necromancer didn't get anything going.  And now it looks like perhaps that was for the best.

Of other companies, I know One Bad Egg and Mongoose seem to be done with 4e endeavors.  One Bad Egg had some awesome stuff that I used outside of 4e, even.

Quote from: Chgowiz;353448If you play AD&D 1e, which still seems (anecdotally) to command a good following, then you're playing OSRIC. Vice versa. Supporting OSRIC/1e isn't a bad idea, it's a limited market, but not a bad idea.

I'm not a 1e fan, but I think OSRIC is a great idea. However it's a great idea with a shit name.  The other two big retro clones (S&W+ LL) have evocative names. When I read or hear OSRIC I think of an old fat guy sipping tea by the fire complaining about his gout.