Dreadfox products cost $4.99 because each one represents a month of full-time development.
-We research history, game mechanics and popular opinions related to the product.
-We design and draft the product.
-We continue drafting new material so that we can afford to cut things we're not happy with later.
-We play the product, then we refine it.
-We analyze the product, then we refine it.
-We repeat the iterative steps above to ensure that the product is flavorful, balanced and fun during actual gameplay.
-More iterative design (testing and refining).
-We host an open playtest to collect insights from local players.
-We refine the product based on what we saw/heard at the open playtest.
-We host an open playtest to collect insights from local players.
-We refine the product based on what we saw/heard at the open playtest.
-We squeeze in some work on a product to be released 4 months in the future, so that we can look at it with fresh eyes 3 months later.
-We edit the pending release to ensure that it's as polished as possible.
We spend a lot of time making sure that a relatively small amount of content is highly polished by the time it hits our servers. Our goal is to make each product flavorful, balanced and fun. This means that we have to be creative when designing the product, then make enhancements so that it "feels" like it is what it's supposed to be in-game. It also means that we have to play each product to death in-house and compare it side-by-side with things that aren't the product during actual gameplay so that we can ensure an acceptable degree of balance. We get 1 chance: if we make you the most powerful character at your table, your DM will forbid our products and we're done; if we make you the weakest character at your table, you won't enjoy our products and we're done. We spend hundreds of hours tweaking each product in an attempt to place it somewhere in (and within) the upper half of Pathfinder's power curve. We also have to make sure that our products can be managed during gameplay in a timely fashion - a huge part of "fun" is just not slowing the game down. This means crash-testing products to ensure that a spell doesn't take 5 minutes of real-time to resolve and a class isn't making a vague reference to information that you have to argue about.
We appreciate that $4.99 is more than most people are accustomed to paying for 3rd party products.
However, we ask that you give our products a chance in actual play - good gameplay is what our unique development cycle is all about.
I appreciate that you gave us this run down, but in my honest opinion all you have to do is give us a good product and we will purchase it.
I've been known to purchase $5 PDFs and will continue to do so if the product is good.
I will look at what you have put out because you are new to me. So far I've been happy with the other 3pp I've purchased.
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While it does in fact appear that you are doing a fair amount of research, design and development, I would point out that every step you mentioned, short of your companies open roll call for playtesters is all part of what every good 3pp does with their products.
The price range you are within is not that far off from the standard of pricing, although I can't help but think you would do yourselves a world of good by encouraging more folks to review your products, as at the time of this writing the only review of your work I could find was Endzeitgeist's 3 star review of Gypsy. In a market dominated by books averaging twice the size for less money, or the impulse books that are half the price but the same size, a handful of reviews would help folks make that decision to give you a try.
The fact that there was a firestorm of comments for that product did not detract from the fact that every question regarding the actual product was answered by you, as you obviously are of the business mindset that communication with your potential and existing customers is a good thing.
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While it does in fact appear that you are doing a fair amount of research, design and development, I would point out that every step you mentioned, short of your companies open roll call for playtesters is all part of what every good 3pp does with their products.
The price range you are within is not that far off from the standard of pricing, although I can't help but think you would do yourselves a world of good by encouraging more folks to review your products, as at the time of this writing the only review of your work I could find was Endzeitgeist's 3 star review of Gypsy. In a market dominated by books averaging twice the size for less money, or the impulse books that are half the price but the same size, a handful of reviews would help folks make that decision to give you a try.
+1. It took me quite a bit to buy your offerings.
Your open playtests may be great and work, but other 3pps also test their classes. Take SGG and RiP, they just offer more content for the same price. When it comes to 3pps, we are almost always (with some notable exceptions) dependant on the class-support we get in the supplement. No archetypes, items etc. COMBINED with the price-point makes not for the best ratio.
I really like the boldness of your designs, but in direct comparison, the result of what I've seen so far is not above your competitors/fellow 3pps as to warrant the increased price. "The Investigator" for example, as a direct comparison in price and content.
Next week, I'll put my review of Grimoire Facilitas out and while I did like it, Advanced Arcana II offers almost thrice the content for the same price.
Premium products are fine and cool and I'm first to jump the chance, but so far, I'm not exactly sold on why it's justified when compared to other 3pps, who also do an excellent job.
Other examples would be Fire Mountain Games - I can either buy one 100+pdf of adventure path quality-adventure or about 20 pages of new classes by you guys for the same price. Heck, for 10 bucks, I could buy Northlands by OD or SoZ.
What I'm trying to say is: Try to find a way to offer more bang-for-buck - open playtests alone are not a valid selling point, at least for me - and I gather the same holds true for a variety of customers. Additional content, though...prolonged support...now that's something different.
Just my 2 cents, of course and I look forward to seeing more from you guys!
Here is an opinion from a another 3PP. Based on your numbers from Ritualist, you charge 45 cents per page for B&W.
For my Enemies of NeoExodus: Crimson Hand we charged 13 cents per page for full color.
SGG does The Genius Guide to Hellfire Magic which they charge 24 cents a page for full color.
RiP does 101 Barbarian Feats which they charge 26 cents per page for color.
In my experience it is bet for book per page price rages to fall between 10 to 17 cents for B&w; 18 to 26 cents for color. These are numbers that will make your products consistent sellers. Just a thought.
I appreciate everyone's feedback. However, my original post may not have been 100% clear.
We spend hundreds of hours every month playing, refining, analyzing, refining; playing, refining, analyzing, refining; (loop continues dozens more times) one product. I'm afraid that my original post made it seem as if we only run this cycle a few times as opposed to dozens of times. Open playtests represent a very small portion of this time.
This lengthy and deliberate process is what raises the price of our relatively short products. Our prices are a factor of [development time]:[cost] rather than [product length]:[cost].
Iterative design's merits are typically not apparent upon reading iteratively designed material - they typically become apparent upon playing iteratively designed material.
The evolution induced by iterative design is very subtle - the necessity and magnitude of each change are likely to escape a reader's attention until the effects come up in actual play. If the necessity and magnitude of these changes were apparent without playing the material, we wouldn't take the time to play the material dozens of times.
The rogue is a great example of iterative design. 3.5's rogue looks perfectly feasible on paper. If you've ever played 3.5's rogue, however, you probably have a few complaints. 3.75's rogue is vastly improved. If you've played both rogues, you can probably appreciate 3.75's improvements. These improvements are the result of observations during gameplay, the driving force behind iterative design and the driving force behind Dreadfox Games' development cycle.
We pour hundreds of hours into the iterative design of each product so that we can make subtle improvements that will have a positive impact in your game.
That is why our products cost $4.99.
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While I appreciate your explanation, even though I missed the original firestorm, I would point out that if you price your item so high as to affect your number of sales, your time spent developing the product is not repaid as highly as it would be if the price were lower and you sold more units. That is, it would seem to me, return on your time is affected as much by the number sold as it is by the cost of the item. A $2 profit on 20 units sold gives you less in the end than a $1 profit on 50 units sold. Of course you can also price your items too low. Finding the sweet spot to maximize profits and sales simultaneously is the trick. Just something to consider.
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't that an implication that other 3PPs aren't as rigorous in their production values, because they don't charge as much? Essentially that seems to be what you're saying: We charge more because we produce a better product. I'm personally not familiar with your company's products, so perhaps they are exceptional. But there are a lot of quite good 3PP products out there who offer good value for money.
As an example, the Gypsy is 13 pages, 10 pages of content. That averages out to at best $0.38 a page. Conversely, Rite Publishing's 101 Renegade Class Feats is 21 pages, 16 of content, for the same price. That's at worst $0.31 per page. And that's a better product, going off the reviews.
That is NOT what we are saying. At all.
We are comparing our products to our products. We are not comparing our products to any other developer's products.
This post was intended to explain why our products cost $4.99, even though they are short, because it is not necessarily apparent without playing them. This cost is a factor of development time, not length. We spend hundreds of hours playing, analyzing and refining each product. This does not make our development process or our finished products better than anyone else's. It simply makes our finished products better than our own alpha products by an substantial margin, and it makes our products very smooth in-game.
That is NOT what we are saying. At all.
We are comparing our products to our products. We are not comparing our products to any other developer's products.
This post was intended to explain why our products cost $4.99, even though they are short, because it is not necessarily apparent without playing them. This cost is a factor of development time, not length. We spend hundreds of hours playing, analyzing and refining each product. This does not make our development process or our finished products better than anyone else's. It simply makes our finished products better than our own alpha products by an substantial margin, and it makes our products very smooth in-game.
And other 3PPs that charge less don't have all of those costs? They don't invest the same amount of effort and time? I know that 4WFG does, and I'd bet money - rather, I have paid money for their products - that Rite Publishing, Super Genius Games, et al, do as well.
You're explaining something that is essentially a given for all similar products, and so I'm afraid I still don't get it. Yes, you want to get paid for your time, and rightly so. But you're charging quite a bit higher than the going rate for your level of product, and this "Explanation" doesn't seem to explain anything.
As an example, a product I worked on - Luven Lightfinger's Gear & Treasure Shop - retails as a print and pdf combo for $18.95, and for that you get 92 pages of content with extensive art, dozens of new products, rules for piecemeal armor (it predated Ultimate Combat by over a year), NPCs, and adventure hooks, not to mention the substaintial cost of printing. It averages to about $0.20 cents per page. You're asking double that.
well regardless of the reasons behind your explanation or otherwise it got me curious enough to take a look. I picked up the Ritualist from Drivethru and I have to say it looks very interesting. I'll see how it plays in my campaigns and if it works out well I don't think I have much problem dropping $5 here and there for more cool options
You charge what you charge, if people think it's a fair price they'll pay it.
There are roughly 170 working hours in any given month. Short of imposing inhumane working conditions, it does not seem possible to devote 100+ hours to more than 1 product per month. By limiting our development to 1 product per month, we are able to spend 100+ hours playing, analyzing and refining each individual product many, many times.
This development process and the subsequent price:length ratio will not satisfy everyone. We accept that. We simply want the community to know that we aren't charging $4.99 for 10 pages of content to try and "rip you off." $4.99 reflects 100+ hours of development - in ways that generally don't become apparent until a player plays the product (and even then might go unnoticed - imagine playing a 3.75 rogue without first playing a 3.5 rogue; you would have no idea how much improved the 3.75 rogue was).
If a player is not convinced that the impact of 100+ hours of iterative design is worth $4.99, they have several options:
1) Subscribe long-term at dreadfox.com and get the product for $2.99.
2) Subscribe short-term (as in, for a few seconds) at dreadfox.com and get the product for $3.99.
3) Wait for a promotion, and get the product for as little as $0.99.
4) Pirate the product. No, really. We don't watermark our PDFs - if you truly can't afford to spend $3.99 on something that will provide hours of entertainment, the least we can do is look the other way while you pick our digital pockets for something that will make you happy.
We survive on the support of Pathfinder players. Without this support, Dreadfox will die, and no further Dreadfox products will see development. $4.99 is what it takes for us to survive, given the amount of time each product takes to develop, the number of people involved with development and our projected sales figures.
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There are roughly 170 working hours in any given month. Short of imposing inhumane working conditions, it does not seem possible to devote 100+ hours to more than 1 product per month. By limiting our development to 1 product per month, we are able to spend 100+ hours playing, analyzing and refining each individual product many, many times.
All I will say is the market will bare what the market can bare and that will be the final judge of what a quality product is. If it takes a second to do or 5 years, the market will determine which is the better product. There really is nothing fairer than that.
Here is an opinion from a another 3PP. Based on your numbers from Ritualist, you charge 45 cents per page for B&W.
For my Enemies of NeoExodus: Crimson Hand we charged 13 cents per page for full color.
SGG does The Genius Guide to Hellfire Magic which they charge 24 cents a page for full color.
RiP does 101 Barbarian Feats which they charge 26 cents per page for color.
In my experience it is bet for book per page price rages to fall between 10 to 17 cents for B&w; 18 to 26 cents for color. These are numbers that will make your products consistent sellers. Just a thought.
QFT. I don't normally chime in on threads on Paizo's boards, but as some one who was interested in Dreadfox Game's offerings the first thing I did was do a cost analysis on your page count. Price is a very important part of the equation on whether I will buy a PDF product (along with writing quality, layout & graphic design, art and technical presentation [bookmarks, internal linking etc.]).
As Messr. Porter pointed out your products range ¢13.5-¢45 per page. The upper price range of your products is exorbitant for what you are offering. Your two most recent offerings are priced far more competitively based on the amount of content. They are priced slightly higher than my standard B&W non-tier one publisher price point of 10¢, but I would consider an impulse purchase of either book in the Grimoire series. Even at subscription prices your first two products are still too expensive while your third and fourth products are competitively priced. Finding a happy between content and pricing should be a high priority for your company and I wish you the best of luck.
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This development process and the subsequent price:length ratio will not satisfy everyone. We accept that. We simply want the community to know that we aren't charging $4.99 for 10 pages of content to try and "rip you off." $4.99 reflects 100+ hours of development - in ways that generally don't become apparent until a player plays the product (and even then might go unnoticed - imagine playing a 3.75 rogue without first playing a 3.5 rogue; you would have no idea how much improved the 3.75 rogue was).
To me, it does not matter if you spent 100 hours or 500 hours. The content is what matter. Trying to tell me your product is worth the price because of the time put in, is not going to make a difference either. I could take 3 months to put out a 1 page class, and it could be crap. I could increase the time it took to make that to 6 months, and still get the same piece of crap. It is the quality and quantity that determines if I buy something at a certain price.
If another company Doesn't spend as much time as you, and still puts out a product as good or better and does it cheaper then simply put, they are better at this, and deserve my purchase.
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
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Havings spent the last 6 years working in pricing, I just wanted to comment (and echo a few other posts) that there are two important ways you want to consider your pricing. The first is what you're doing here in this thread, examining your costs, and pricing with your target markup over that cost, to achieve the margin you're looking for.
However, you also need to do a competitive analysis and make sure you're priced appropriately for the marketplace. There's also issues of total profit based on quantity sold, price elasticity, and other factors, such as using your price to convey product messaging. It sounds like you're using this later strategy to use your higher price to communicate that you have a premium product, which is worth the extra money.
Generally though, you need to establish that your product is high quality before you price it that way, and once you've earned that reputation, then you can successfully price based on that. Your subscription options do provide a way for customers to sample your products at a lower price to determine for themselves the premium value of your products, it's also at least marginally more involved for a customer to subscribe to something (as well as mentally making a committment to something they might not have determined is worth the price).
I would recommend pricing one of your next releases at a lower price. This would a) provide a sample product that's easier for a customer to justify an impulse buy for, regardless of when they discover your products, and whether or not there's a sale going on, and b) give you the opportunity to test the waters on different pricing, and see if you actually make more total profit based on increased unit volume. You could even experiment with a few different prices and see what the sweet spot is (such as one product that's regularly priced at 2.99, and another at 3.99) and see how their first month's sales compare to other products sales in the same time period.
Raging Swan Press
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Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't that an implication that other 3PPs aren't as rigorous in their production values, because they don't charge as much? Essentially that seems to be what you're saying: We charge more because we produce a better product. I'm personally not familiar with your company's products, so perhaps they are exceptional. But there are a lot of quite good 3PP products out there who offer good value for money.
As another 3PP, I didn't get that impression at all. While I don't tend to publish new classes I totally get why Deadfox playtest them so much. We've got several play test groups that work through our adventures and suchlike but I'm rather jealous of Deadfox's local gaming scene! I think it's great that Deadfox gives us this behind the curtain view - thanks Deadfox!
Thank you to everyone that has taken the time to read this thread and comment on it. There are some really insightful posts above this one.
I want to jump in really quickly and ensure that I am not accidentally raising false hopes. Our pricing model is currently succeeding, due in large part to subscriptions. We do not have any intentions of changing our development cycle or pricing model in the immediate future. This thread was written to increase awareness of our development process and explain our pricing model to players who find themselves dissatisfied with a product's cost:page ratio or the apparent ineffects of iterative design without having played the product. It was not written to find a more profitable development cycle or more profitable pricing model. For the time being, we are quite happy that this ship is sailing smoothly.
That said, there are some really good ideas in this thread and I'm already planning to incorporate some of them into our springtime specials. So please, keep the opinions coming; I read every post and love hearing what's on players' (and developers') minds.
Pathfinder players (or at least Dreadfox players) are keenly intelligent. They have demonstrated this to us this multiple times at playtests, via our website's feedback tab and through email correspondence. Your intelligence is actually a great source of inspiration for us, as it gives us the freedom to design material that is difficult to play effectively (you're smart enough to handle it). We also get great feedback and ideas from you.
But intelligence has as much to do with iterative design's inherent obscurity as it does with a wall's inherent opacity. It doesn't matter if you have an IQ of 88 or 202, the effects of iterative design are inherently unapparent. It's the process; it's not you.
Running multiple tests at the same time introduces a lot of confounds. While they might have no effect on the process in a given run, they might also totally upset the process in a given run. We'd prefer to keep each run steady and reliable, as 1 month of full-time development is a lot to jeopardize.
This is not dismissive toward any 3pp. There are many wonderful 3pp products out there. Ours are not better or worse than anyone else's, they are just different. We consider each Pathfinder 3pp our brother and not our competitor, as each of us that succeeds helps the others (and based on DTRPG data, 3pp players have room in their hearts for several of us at once). We are simply drawing a correlation between our prices and our method, and making a concerted effort to make our method transparent, as our method makes itself invisible when instituted properly.
The design process doesn't matter. Content matters, because that's what your customer gets. When I'm looking at products, and I think, "That's a bit much for 10 pages of content," I don't really care what the design process is, whether it's repetitive play-testing or using the ink from freshly squeezed cherubs. As a player, I'm being asked to pay more for less, and it has to be worth it. There are a lot of ways to increase the value for money - great art, options to increase versatility, adventure hooks, ways to tie your content in to a variety of campaigns. The customer has to feel, "This was really worth paying more for." And knowing your design process doesn't even enter in to that.
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As everyone says content matters. With that said if you think your products are of superior quality then be willing to put yourself out there and give a free sample.
Real Life Example:
Super Genius Games popped unto a discussion about the lack of approval for Pathfinder's Assassin PrC. They offered the Shadow Assassin for free for a limited time.
Since then I have purchased 11 SGG products. Had I read their free product and not been impressed they would not have received my money 10 more times. They would however have gotten a negative review if I thought it was really bad. That free sample lead to free product reviews which other gamers look at, and more money for them. Their name is also constantly brought up when a 3pp is mentioned. Once you establish a reputation the the name of the company alone will sell many of the products.
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Dreadfox... I don't think there's a "win" for you here. I hear what you're trying to say, but it won't work. I applaud you for even trying, but it still won't work.
You're trying to explain why your products cost X while other companies' products cost Y. By definition you're comparing yourself to others... through our expectation of pricing. Nobody's going to read anything different from this thread.
That brings you down to: we have a process that is such-and-such and it costs twice as much as the process everyone else is using.
Okay.
I'm pretty darned happy with whatever the "everyone else" is doing. I'm also pretty darned with the price of their products. Given $5 burning a hole in my pocket, I'm more likely to buy two of theirs than one of yours.
Understand that some of the 3PP companies out there have raised the bar very, very high. It's difficult to fathom that while SSG and FGG and Dreamscarred Press and a few others are a 10/10 you redefine the scale up to a 20/10.
Maybe instead of telling us how awesome you are, you should be showing us that. I'd guess if there's truth in what you're saying, you should be playing drug-dealer and making the first one free, to hook us, so we don't want to buy the lesser-value products from your competitors.
I'm not trying to argue... just explain what this thread does and doesn't convey to a reader.
As everyone says content matters. With that said if you think your products are of superior quality then be willing to put yourself out there and give a free sample.
Real Life Example:
Super Genius Games popped unto a discussion about the lack of approval for Pathfinder's Assassin PrC. They offered the Shadow Assassin for free for a limited time.
Since then I have purchased 11 SGG products. Had I read their free product and not been impressed they would not have received my money 10 more times. They would however have gotten a negative review if I thought it was really bad. That free sample lead to free product reviews which other gamers look at, and more money for them. Their name is also constantly brought up when a 3pp is mentioned. Once you establish a reputation the the name of the company alone will sell many of the products.
Agreed my first 3pp Pathfinder product was the Genius Guide to the Godling, it was well written and fun to play and it also got me to buy more from Super Genius Games. Offer a superior product and don't be afraid to lower a price point to drive sales. Also don't overlook the selling power of a $1 dollar product.
I don't know who you guys are and therefore don't care much about your products. If you want people to care about your products you need to put yourself out into the market and create a business model that works. It's all about quality, publicity, and money my friend.
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Dreadfox, I have to say I agree with the majority of those who have posted.
The amount of time you put into your design / development process doesn't really matter as much as the quality of the final product.
If you put 1,000 man hours into a given release but the end result is sub-par, then do those 1,000 man hours still justify a high price. Conversely, if you only spend 4 or 5 hours designing and developing, but the end result is fantastic, should the price be reduced?
Frankly, even if you didn't intend it, the implication is still there - you feel your stuff is worth more than other 3PPs becasue you put more development and playtesting time in. The truth is, ANYONE creating material for sale as a 3PP should be doing what you outline. The fact that you detail your steps out, or that it appaerently takes you longer to get your material into publishable shape than many other 3PPs, shouldn't be a justification to charge more.
If it takes you that many hours of playtesting and refining to get your products to the point at which you feel they are as good as they can be, then so be it. Those additional hours do not necessarily justify a higher price. If other 3PP writers and designers have more skill, experience and/or overall design chops, chances are they can produce work that is as good, if not better, in much less time. That's a good thing - it's why those top tier Pathfinder 3PPs are where they are.
I also have to ask about the "We owe you an explanation of why our products cost $4.99."
Why?
Was someone asking about it? I certainly might have missed it, but I don't recall a thread here on Paizo in which people were asking. Quite honestly, this seems more like a somewhat ill-conceived PR stunt than anything else.
As others have said, perhaps you should just spend whatever amount of time you need to get your products to the highest quality level you can and then price them however you see fit. The market will determine if that price, regardless of how long it took you to create it, is appropriate.
Just a thought.
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Just as a note, when it comes to game design, sometimes the incredible number of hours you may invest into writing and balancing a specific content has few meaning, when compared to the spark of creativity and insight that can make you write a near-perfect content in little time from the first few tries.
I believe that this is what the major 3PPs are able to achieve. Let's take a comparison with a marksman ballista user trying to hit a target :
1. The first shoots and misses the target by 3 meters. He spends several days calculating the speed of wind, the angle of the ballista, breaking down and revising the siege weapon with professionals before crafting it back, asking for satellite pictures, analysis from the world's 30 greatests minds and triangulating the exact point where he has to shoot for the ballista to hit straight in the target. After lots of tries, the target is wonderfully hit. Yet another epic win !
2. The second one shoots and misses the target by 3 meters. He moves the ballista some inches to the right, and shoots again. The target is missed by 4 meters. The marksman moves it some inches to the left, knowing by experience and instinct how he can resolve the problem, and shoots again. 2 meters gap. He now takes some hours to perfect the next attack, asks for advice from fellow marksmen, and frees his mind to see the whole problematic in a new perspective. Three tries and one day later, the weapon isn't much moved from it's original position and the target is wonderfully hit. Yet another epic win !
The castle's lord is proud and grateful ; the target (the enemy's door) is now opened to a treasure of goodness, and he can now pay you for the work !
- The first method sure is efficient and impressive to come up with. On the same time, while being professional and showing great skills and knowledge, it is highly time and ressources-consuming. The marksman asks 100 GP for the service.
- The second method is more artisanal. Experience, feeling, knowledge of the system used, and extensive testing with people who also know how the system works as to see the issues that the marksman himself missed at first. The marksman asks 60 GP for the service.
Well, the lord's probably going to pay the second marksman.
Because whatever method you used to open the door, it did the job you asked for, and for less money. Because someone didn't use 30 of the greatest minds on earth on a regular basis doesn't matter if the same other 10 dudes did it in less time, while providing the amazing 10/10 hole you were searching for at a cheaper price.
Hence what I believe major 3PPs already do and are able to achieve : providing high-quality content for a cheaper price, not because the quality control or design methodology is of lower quality, but because they can do the same (or better) for less, and thus ask less money for it. And finally, all we players want is an amazing hole at the cheapest price, whatever the method used to achieve it.
I get what you are saying in this thread, but I don't feel like this is enough for people to change their minds if they weren't interested to begin with. Consumers want bang for their bucks. And when you want more bucks, they will not even expect amazing bang if someone else already provides it.
That's your own problem to reduce costs -and- prices if you expect people to buy more your products. From my own point of view, the time spent working on a product isn't enough of an argument to make me spend more. Only the final quality matters. Sure, logic would argue that the most time you spend on it, the best it will end up. I agree that when a 3PP says a lot of time has been spent on a specific supplement, I'll expect it to be mechanically fine and balanced before even reading it. Sometimes it's true and you can feel the cruel lack of luster ; sometimes it isn't, and you can find awesome content in the cheapest documents and in a regular basis...
@Dreadfox: Here is an idea, try introducing a page of feats or a free archetype for each or your base classes something that takes up one page or so, that will spark interest in your $5 base classes. This has worked for others, even a page of feats for a dollar has done wonders for Rite Publishing (10 Luckbringer Feats) and Super Genius Games did well enough with them they have a whole line (#1 with a Bullet Point).
You put out a nice looking product, once you get a good name for your self I'm sure you will do very well.