Yeah, I have to say that there's a dilemma here. As a customer I strongly prefer print. I've bought Tome of Secrets, Pathfinder Companion, and Sunken Empires in print. In PDF, I may have bought one or two items, but mainly the sprinkling of PDFs I have came from "Haiti Relief Mass Bundle" kind of things. It's obviously easier for a publisher to do PDF; it removes a chunk of the work and much of the expense and most of the risk. But here's the problem with PDFs.
1. Hard to use at the table. Unless I print them out, which on a home printer is unbound, single sided... I have a lot of printouts from back in the day (Oerth Journals, etc.) I printed on the sly at work because I thought I'd use them - the resultant printout just sits there in a box because it's such a bad reading experience. Sure, I have a computer at the table sometimes, but it's being used for players Skyping in and typing up session notes and frantic Googling about the diet of tropical spiders and the like. As a Pathfinder GM I am having to carry a metric asston of books to my game every week - about 100 lbs. worth, and no that's not an exaggeration (all the rule books, and the Golarion books, and the AP, and the third party stuff, and printouts and minis and screen and dice, it's 2 duffel bags worth) - but frankly I'd rather do that than use PDFs. I really enjoy having the pdfs in addition to the print books for game prep time, but not for in game. Some of this is formatting - unless you have a 24" screen, the normal portrait, small print PDF on the normal landscape, small screen laptop means zooming in so you can only see half the page at once and scrolling about like a chump,and having multiple PDFs open instead of one with bookmarks makes it even worse. Of course, a lot of the content consumers aren't actually playing the game, so that may not be a concern of theirs. But that's not me.
2. Tend to not be tempting content due to the short format. I'm really not interested in "10 clever feats!" unlinked to anything else. I like stuff that has more coherency, like Sunken Empires has content that all actually works together for undersea adventuring. Some folks like LPJ try to address this by having bunch of little PDFs that work around one theme or setting, and that's better, but then I'm left trying to figure out which of the 30 PDFs I need, and realize that once I piece together 20 PDFs into a 200 page amount of content (1/10 of which is OGL notices and title pages) I am paying about twice what I'd expect to pay for a 200 page print book.
3. For some reason, PDFs are not priced right a lot of the time. Sorry some people took a bath on the "1.99 app priced PDFs" thing, and maybe that's not the right price point, but I never have and never will buy a PDF that is 50% or more of the cost of a comparable printed product. Yes, you skipping the printing and me paying all that money to you instead would be great from the publisher perspective, but I don't feel like I'm getting sufficient value for my money, and it trips my "they're charging me $20 for something that takes 25 cents to make in China" button.
4. And to be honest, PDFs tend to be poorly edited. It's natural - if you are paying for it to be printed, and those words will be fixed for a long time, you take more effort. It's the print->pdf->blog->Twitter continuum of effort spent on editing and proofing and coherency. Some people tweet as much content as a game book every month, but I've never been tempted to pay for someone's Twitter feed.
So two messages here. One, I (and all the gamers I know and game with) prefer print in general. Two, you can make PDFs more desirable if you would 1. format them for game use (small screen laptop), 2. Bundle them into coherent larger products, 3. Price them to where they aren't competing with print in my mind/budget.
3. For some reason, PDFs are not priced right a lot of the time. Sorry some people took a bath on the "1.99 app priced PDFs" thing, and maybe that's not the right price point, but I never have and never will buy a PDF that is 50% or more of the cost of a comparable printed product. Yes, you skipping the printing and me paying all that money to you instead would be great from the publisher perspective, but I don't feel like I'm getting sufficient value for my money, and it trips my "they're charging me $20 for something that takes 25 cents to make in China" button.
4. And to be honest, PDFs tend to be poorly edited. It's natural - if you are paying for it to be printed, and those words will be fixed for a long time, you take more effort. It's the print->pdf->blog->Twitter continuum of effort spent on editing and proofing and coherency. Some people tweet as much content as a game book every month, but I've never been tempted to pay for someone's Twitter feed.
I'm just going to address a couple of your comments and leave the others for someone else if they like.
Our PDF-only products go through the same editing and layout steps that our products destined for print do (with the exception of a tiny handful of our earliest PDFs), so that we can be sure customers are getting the best product we can possibly produce for them.
For our PDF-only products also, the prices are always less than $7.00, and usually significantly less than that. The reason is because the length of the product does not, to us, warrant higher prices than that. The PDF versions of our print products are more than 50% of the print version because it costs us significantly more to produce those products (which range so far from 50 pages (priced at $7.99) to 108 pages (priced at $10.95)) than it does to produce a 5 to 10 page PDF only product that may or may not have any art and if it does it's most likely stock art. Thus we can sell a 10 page PDF-only product for $1.99 and make a profit. It just doesn't work like that for larger products, though.
The best thing we do for customers as far as PDFs of the print products is make available bundles where you get the PDF at no extra cost when you purchase the print product. Our bundles are available here and at Indie Press Revolution. But what if you buy your print products at a FLGS? If that store is a part of the Bits & Mortar coalition, you can get the free PDF through them as well.
Robert
4 Winds Fantasy Gaming
I agree with everything hunter said in the post above.
I just want to add that (to my knowledge) none of us print in China. Paizo being the only exception. None of us sell in the quantities that make printing in china economical. My book for example have been printed in Kentucky, Arkansas and New York. I'd consider printing in Canada if I knew of any Canadian printers (which I don't). But printing in China for a print run of a few hundred is not really economical.
I just want to add that (to my knowledge) none of us print in China. Paizo being the only exception. None of us sell in the quantities that make printing in china economical. My book for example have been printed in Kentucky, Arkansas and New York. I'd consider printing in Canada if I knew of any Canadian printers (which I don't). But printing in China for a print run of a few hundred is not really economical.
That is very, very true. In fact, everything I've had printed has cost (depending on page count) anywhere from 15 to 20 times "25 cents" per unit, or more.
Yeah, I have to agree with Hunter here, all the work and cost for creating a print book or a PDF book are identical, noting that printing is a separate cost altogether, but setup for the two are the same. Both have cover design/illustration, interior art, cartography, the same writing, editing, proofing. Before a publication goes to print the cost and the amount of work of creating it for either PDF or printing is identical.
All three adventures for my Kaidan setting - The Curse of the Golden Spear: Part 1 -3 are being created as bundled PDF and print compilation being done by Cubicle 7, scheduled for June - August 2011, priced at $19.99 for each printed book.
Compared to our 16 page In the Company of Kappa book, although the page count is much less, so there's less work involved than our 60 page adventures, still the amount of work it took to create the Kappa book was hardly different than the work for the adventures - covers, interior art, writing, editing, proofing, page-layout. Aside from less work due to less pages, compartively the work was identical.
GP
I'm glad y'all edit your PDFs well, but the problem is that in general PDFs, in my experience, aren't well edited. Therefore the problem is that the general level of the field reflects on your stuff, merited or not. It becomes difficult to differentiate from the field (especially when someone can't browse through the product to judge quality before buying...)
Of course, if it is also available as print, then in my random, prejudice-framed mind, I'd assume the PDF editing quality is good. And yay to Bits and Mortar.
This wouldn't work for short PDFs but would a two-page (or more) preview like this give enough of an idea about product quality to make a purchase decision?
BTW, I've bought plenty of printed products from {companythatiwillnotnamebutisnotpaizo} that I've gotten home and realized how bloody poorly they were edited only after the fact.
M
I would hope that folks would not assume that just because the PDFs by one (or more) 3PP are poorly edited, that means that all of them from all 3PP are. I mean, that's like assuming that because a Dodge craps out on the drive home then Toyotas will do the same, because its a car, too. I don't mean to be snarky, but that really is the same sort of comparison. Each 3PP should be judged on their own individual merits and not on any standards (or lack thereof) of other 3PP.
Everything we sell here at Paizo, we also sell at DriveThruRPG, and at DriveThruRPG customers can see multi-page previews of each and every one of our products.
I would hope that folks would not assume that just because the PDFs by one (or more) 3PP are poorly edited, that means that all of them from all 3PP are. I mean, that's like assuming that because a Dodge craps out on the drive home then Toyotas will do the same, because its a car, too. I don't mean to be snarky, but that really is the same sort of comparison. Each 3PP should be judged on their own individual merits and not on any standards (or lack thereof) of other 3PP.
Do any common stereotypes about "American cars" vs. "Japanese cars" come to mind when you say that? How many people do you know personally who have said "I'd like to buy American, but they're so unreliable and gas guzzling..." I must have heard that at least 100 times, and so have you. So maybe Chrysler's newest model is just great but it's part of a field that isn't. There are some common factors in the American car industry that tend towards those factors, so exceptions are seen as being exceptional. Sorry man, life isn't fair.
Similarly, sure a PDF publisher *can* put in great editing and all, but because it's so easy to PDF publish you have loads of folks that don't. And yes, you can build an individual brand reputation for quality, but it's harder, as you need to convince people to look more vigorously into it, and all us customers are pretty lazy you know.
And the DTRPG previews are very helpful. That's a big step in making me personally comfortable with a product. I'm not saying that's impossible or anything, I am just noting there are some common things that make me not exactly go nuts perusing the newest pdf releases each month. And I think I represent a pretty large bloc of customers. Just sharing to help you understand the challenges, and I'm glad many of you are doing things like bits & mortar and DTRPG previews to overcome that; getting the Paizo store to do similar previews, etc., might then be a useful takeaway on how to overcome some of these issues. Formatting PDF-only releases in landscape might be another. Anyway, didn't come here to tell you you are awful people and your business model is inevitably going to be ground to meal by ogres, but just wanting to explain from a representative customer standpoint why maybe 1/100 of people (that's probably generous) buy PDF products, and "we haven't learned how to use computers yet" isn't that reason.
I understand where the stereotype comes from. 10 years ago White Wolf had just as much experience with the system as some guy that just picked up the core book. And there was alot of broken material produced.
But that was 10 years ago.
Many of the designers for 3rd party publishers have been writing for the 3.x engine for 10 years and started writing on Pathfinder since Beta. Even if we haven't been publishers for 10 years, many of us have been tinkering with the system for quite some time.
The funny part is the #1 producer of broken material during the 3.x era was Wizards of the Coast. Yes, the 1st party publisher produced so much unbalanced material they had to come up with 3.5 so they could have a fresh start. Then there's the Book of 9 Swords and the late Complete books that WotC admitted were a 4E playtest. Meanwhile, companies like Green Ronin and Paizo (3rd party publishers) were producing some of the most balanced material for the system. While none of us are a Paizo or a Green Ronin, we also didn't pick up the core book for the first time yesterday either.
So while the stereotype was true 10 years ago, today is an entirely different story.
and all us customers are pretty lazy you know.
I hear there's a succubus that does some excellent reviews...
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I understand where the stereotype comes from. 10 years ago White Wolf had just as much experience with the system as some guy that just picked up the core book. And there was alot of broken material produced.
But that was 10 years ago.
Many of the designers for 3rd party publishers have been writing for the 3.x engine for 10 years and started writing on Pathfinder since Beta. Even if we haven't been publishers for 10 years, many of us have been tinkering with the system for quite some time.
The funny part is the #1 producer of broken material during the 3.x era was Wizards of the Coast. Yes, the 1st party publisher produced so much unbalanced material they had to come up with 3.5 so they could have a fresh start. Then there's the Book of 9 Swords and the late Complete books that WotC admitted were a 4E playtest. Meanwhile, companies like Green Ronin and Paizo (3rd party publishers) were producing some of the most balanced material for the system. While none of us are a Paizo or a Green Ronin, we also didn't pick up the core book for the first time yesterday either.
So while the stereotype was true 10 years ago, today is an entirely different story.
and all us customers are pretty lazy you know.I hear there's a succubus that does some excellent reviews...
But can you trust a succubus? I mean they are demons after all.
I find it's instructive to read reviews and see which publishers are commonly called out for having obvious errors, and which are not. It's a good way to get information on a product without buying it. That's also why publishers like getting reviews - while we'd like you to take our word for it, seeing what another customer has to say can really help you make a more informed decision.
Honestly, I don't see the majority of 3PP pdf products being called out for having "lack of editing" or "lack of proofreading" mistakes. I see a couple that are consistently commented on for that, but a few does not make it endemic to the format. I'd say that most of the 3PPers here probably don't enjoy being characterized as being among the sloppier companies, when they manifestly are not.
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I find it's instructive to read reviews and see which publishers are commonly called out for having obvious errors, and which are not. It's a good way to get information on a product without buying it. That's also why publishers like getting reviews - while we'd like you to take our word for it, seeing what another customer has to say can really help you make a more informed decision.
Honestly, I don't see the majority of 3PP pdf products being called out for having "lack of editing" or "lack of proofreading" mistakes. I see a couple that are consistently commented on for that, but a few does not make it endemic to the format. I'd say that most of the 3PPers here probably don't enjoy being characterized as being among the sloppier companies, when they manifestly are not.
Absolutely.
Like with pretty much any product, word of mouth counts for a lot. If a release from a third party publisher looks interesting to you, check the reviews, ask around on message boards etc. You'll get a good idea pretty quickly if the product is good or not. You will also get a good idea as to which companies are known for consistantly putting out top-notch material and which companies are ... ahem, NOT known for it :)
Honestly, I've workied with / for many of these third part companies and the time, effort, rules knowledge and professionalism they put into thier products make them well worth at least checking out. Don't write someone off without giving them a try!
We at d20pfsrd.com see a LOT of 3pp content, and I can attest to what the lyingbastard above me said :)
The vast majority of 3pp do not suffer the same editing issues that a few of them never seem to fix/learn from.
Don't let a few bad apples spoil the bunch. There's a lot of really well edited stuff available.
Kobold Press
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The latest print releases from Open Design are both available here, and both shipped in the last few days.
Northlands Sourcebook
Kobold Quarterly #17
There's a few more print releases coming this summer as well.
Do any common stereotypes about "American cars" vs. "Japanese cars" come to mind when you say that? How many people do you know personally who have said "I'd like to buy American, but they're so unreliable and gas guzzling..." I must have heard that at least 100 times, and so have you. So maybe Chrysler's newest model is just great but it's part of a field that isn't. There are some common factors in the American car industry that tend towards those factors, so exceptions are seen as being exceptional. Sorry man, life isn't fair.
You really did miss my entire point. It wasn't about American cars vs. Japanese cars - I just happened to randomly pick those two manufacturers. My point was "that's like assuming that because Car Brand A craps out on the drive home then Car Brand B will do the same, because it's a car, too." Point of origin does not matter. I could very well have said "that's like assuming that because the orange you bought at the store is rotten, all citrus fruit you ever buy will be rotten, because they are all citrus fruit, too."
In the end, if you don't want to buy our PDFs because another publisher produced a poorly edited PDF, there's little I can do to change your mind.
I could very well have said "that's like assuming that because the orange you bought at the store is rotten, all citrus fruit you ever buy will be rotten, because they are all citrus fruit, too."
but that's because Oranges are clearly inferior to their citrus counterparts... duuuuuuuh
All 3PPs aren't the same. I have snagged a few of the free samples and the differences between the companies are rather large actually, artistically and writing style wise as well.
So far we have something for May, June, July, and august should be posted soon (as we are doing two print releases in August)
You can check it out HERE
Silver Crescent Publishing
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Are there other sites that have PFRPG printed copies of these items? I haven't gone through Drive-thru yet for their stuff so I'm sure I'll find a little more, but I'm a one stop shop kind of guy so would rather pick them up from here, but I will browes others if needed.
I would venture to guess that there are several 3PP who do have print products, but are unable to put the print version up on Paizo's website. I am one of those. The small profit margin I get on the Realms of Twilight book would be almost entirely consumed by the (generally acceptable) cut that Paizo needs to take for distribution and whatnot. I can put the PDFs up here, but I can only afford to sell the print volumes directly through my own site. And I believe I'm not the only one in this situation.
Also, printing requires a lot of money up front for no sure reimbursement. It can be a rather large gamble for companies that have yet to establish themselves in the RPG industry, or as Pathfinder 3PPs specifically.
Looks like we're probably going to go with them. Can't beat their rates. Thanks to Steve prompting me to get in ask Jim Searcy about it, he's putting me in contact with their LSI rep ASAP. It looks like we're going to save nearly 50% by going with LSI over Lulu, even with the set up fees, which is fantastic.Glad I could be of service. If you need any other help, just ask. I've been in this business for a long time. :)
Which reminds me, I need to email Jim my new address so the checks arrive...
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Steve
Just want to say thanks again, Steve. LSI's customer service has been topnotch and I found their website easy to navigate. Quite the opposite of my attempts to set up with Superior POD.
Just want to say thanks again, Steve. LSI's customer service has been topnotch and I found their website easy to navigate. Quite the opposite of my attempts to set up with Superior POD.
I'm curious to find out details about LSI... Especially how they compare to CreateSpace.
Anyone have it handy and willing to let me know, drop me an email - dreamscarredpress AT gmail DOT com
Sturgeon's Rule notwithstanding, the Pathfinder publishers seem to be a more professional crowd than the wild days of early 3e and the OGL. I think a lot of that has to do with the customer base being more sophisticated too, as well as a decade of other material to compete with, and the accumulation of experience by people working with the system. It's very rare you see a Pathfinder-compatible product and think, "Dude, I could do better than that in an afternoon," whereas I think in the early days, some people did have that thought, and cranked up their favorite word processor that very afternoon...
The post about PDF versus print really resonates with me. I can turn what's in my brain into hundreds of dollars of PDF sales, spread out over the year, with no inventory worries, and quick turnaround. Further, the product itself is like an advertisement for your next project.
Looking back at this old thread, I have to report that Lulu sales have been almost nonexistent on Denarii. POD is hard to do. Trying to publish large print runs makes me nervous.This breaks my heart. This is SUCH an awesome, affordably-priced product with all the potential in the world. I've bought 7 copies at Lulu alone... surely I'm not the only one out there that wants his players to have more intelligently-balanced options?
The thing, with the collapse of the old distribution system, PDFs have a built in audience. POD doesn't. I'm not even sure, really, how to go about marketing POD copies of the book, apart from posting links on whatever gaming sites allow it.
I have seen more sales at Drivethurrpgs POD than LULUs
Speaking of print books, the Book of the River Nations went to the printer yesterday. Soon it'll be available at Paizo and your local game store can order it through their distributor. Tell your local game store about it today.
Speaking of print books, the Book of the River Nations went to the printer yesterday. Soon it'll be available at Paizo and your local game store can order it through their distributor. Tell your local game store about it today.
Dale, you are using Aldo's Impressions as your fulfillment partner, right?
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Steve Creech
DragonWing Games
I have seen more sales at Drivethurrpgs POD than LULUs
That doesn't surprise me. I haven't been keen on the idea of reformatting the book just to use their POD service, however.
Dale, you are using Aldo's Impressions as your fulfillment partner, right?
Yep. That's the one.
I have seen more sales at Drivethurrpgs POD than LULUsThat doesn't surprise me. I haven't been keen on the idea of reformatting the book just to use their POD service, however.
Why would you need to reformat anything? The layout and formating of our PDF only versions is exactly the same as the printed formatted versions, just that the printed versions come with printers marks and the PDF only does not. To the layman, there is no difference between the versions...
Why would you need to reformat anything? The layout and formating of our PDF only versions is exactly the same as the printed formatted versions, just that the printed versions come with printers marks and the PDF only does not. To the layman, there is no difference between the versions...I have seen more sales at Drivethurrpgs POD than LULUsThat doesn't surprise me. I haven't been keen on the idea of reformatting the book just to use their POD service, however.
Not entirely true. The files we used at Lulu were rejected by the DriveThruRPG POD service for not being the correct size, plus our cover was rejected for already having an ISBN and barcode on it. I'm not going to have my cover and interior layout people set up two different books just to add the DTS POD service.
Ah, I understand the problem. Yes, that is a problem. Since I do the Kaidan layout, covers and interiors, changing ISBN/Barcode is not that big of an issue, but I agree extra pain in the ass. I sure hope standard letter size would not be the wrong size, that would be an issue as well. I'm following specs of Cubicle7.
Drivethru/Lightning source is a thorny hedgemaze.
The black and white interior softcovers for lulu and LS are the same. The covers are different, so that's easy and yes you have to remove the ISBN number (or get a new one) because it is a different printing, that's with any ISBN really. The solution there is just have them cover it up and do a new cover, not optimal but not as hateful as having to relayout the interior file. .
The real benifit of Lightning Source though is the cost of color printing but its interior files are a thorny hedgemaze on fire, the big thing is you cannot have any bleed along the spine and must have a 1/8 inch blank gutter edge along the spine (no graphics or text). Oh and no printer's marks.
I have been thinking about this alot and I think it would require a new background/staitionary for Rtie Publishing, but this only affects Pathways and some of our AE patronage projects our other books are not going through LS since we have our partnership with cubicle seven.
I see that RPGnow at least offers letter size; originally, only a smaller, peculier size was offered. I am nervous about printing close to the spine, but at least the interior has the potential to be usable. The cover, though... it was such a pain formatting the cover for Lulu in the first place, I am not excited to go through that again for DriveThru.
Well, we just had our account with Lightning Source set up and verified today (independent of the DriveThru POD service), so we'll see what we have to do differently than we did at Lulu. I'm willing to make changes though because of the (apparent) massive cost differences between the two.
For my next venture, I am going to experiement with CreateSpace on Amazon and see what I think of it. I want to see if the printer can deliver, even at the lower price, and it seems there are more paper choices available now, which makes the choice less painful.
Since last week, the Lightning Source deal has fallen through with us. It's a complicated situation, but since Lulu uses LSI as a subcontractor, our titles were already in LSI's computer. You'd think that would be a good thing, but it's not, as LSI can't (for whatever reason) just assign that information to our account. They want me to assign new ISBNs to books we've previously printed via Lulu, which is asinine.
So, I went to my local print shop, talked to them, and they are our printer now. I expect to approve some proofs today or tomorrow.
So, I went to my local print shop, talked to them, and they are our printer now. I expect to approve some proofs today or tomorrow.
When I started printing, I went to a good number of places near me. All of them had a per unit cost that was higher than what I was going to sell them for. So it was a non-starter. Feel fortunate that you have a local printer cheap enough to make it work.
So, I went to my local print shop, talked to them, and they are our printer now. I expect to approve some proofs today or tomorrow.When I started printing, I went to a good number of places near me. All of them had a per unit cost that was higher than what I was going to sell them for. So it was a non-starter. Feel fortunate that you have a local printer cheap enough to make it work.
I told them what Lulu was charging me to print X number of copies (minimum I need to order), and he said, "Oh, I can beat that!" Lulu was getting way too expensive, especially once shipping was included.
So, I went to my local print shop, talked to them, and they are our printer now. I expect to approve some proofs today or tomorrow.As someone who has worked in commercial printing for many years, I'm happy to hear this!
One of my very first real jobs during and right after high school was in a print shop, so when I walked in, the smell of place just brought back lots of old, fun memories. :)
For my next venture, I am going to experiement with CreateSpace on Amazon and see what I think of it. I want to see if the printer can deliver, even at the lower price, and it seems there are more paper choices available now, which makes the choice less painful.
I use CreateSpace.
My only gripe with them is they can't do 8.5x11 - they do 8x10. But their prices are far, far better than Lulu.
I told them what Lulu was charging me to print X number of copies (minimum I need to order), and he said, "Oh, I can beat that!" Lulu was getting way too expensive, especially once shipping was included.
Noted for future reference. Thanks!
I told them what Lulu was charging me to print X number of copies (minimum I need to order), and he said, "Oh, I can beat that!" Lulu was getting way too expensive, especially once shipping was included.Noted for future reference. Thanks!
If you can find a local that does POD, that's even better. The one I'm using (the only one in town) does full press runs, but they can do minimum runs of 250 books, which is a smaller number than we need to order, so that works out. If I need 20 or 40 in a hurry, I'll still use Lulu. But 400 copies of The Book of Arcane Magic from Lulu would cost me $400 more than it will cost me to order 400 from the local print shop (and LSI isn't as inexpensive as I though - as 400 copies of the same book from them would cost me $1000 more!)
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Silver Crescent Publishing
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I use Bookmobile.com for my printing. I've been extremely happy with their quality. They aren't too expensive, though I'm always on the lookout for a cheaper printer that can maintain the quality I currently have. They offer volume discounts as well, but their discount scale is a bit complex. I think their minimum run is around 25 books, but they may not have one. I'd have to look.
For my next venture, I am going to experiement with CreateSpace on Amazon and see what I think of it. I want to see if the printer can deliver, even at the lower price, and it seems there are more paper choices available now, which makes the choice less painful.I use CreateSpace.
My only gripe with them is they can't do 8.5x11 - they do 8x10. But their prices are far, far better than Lulu.
I think they offer it as a "custom size."
But really, I never noticed Psionics Unleashed was slightly smaller, anyway. So maybe 8x10 is the futue of RPG publishing. :)