I feel your pain Zeromanex. I periodically bring up Paizo's DriveThru Cards commitments and sometimes Vic Wertz responds.
It's been a busy year for Paizo and Lone Shark, and there are some dependencies on errata changes that need to be made to both the Class Decks and various retail box sets (RotR, S&S, WotR.) Vic said he'd try to get to this in December; but I guess he was only partially successful.
It's unclear to me why the errata cards also impacts the organized play (Season) cards, but it's been implied there's a dependency. I suspect it has to do with Vic blocking out the time to do the work, and then coordinating the card releases with DriveThru Cards.
Card lists require work from both the PACG team and the web team to release digital files. I suspect that most of Paizo was super busy with holiday sales and shipping from November to December, and now everyone's on vacation.
I made a mental note to mention the errata cards again in March 2017, but I'll lend my torch if a revolt starts sooner. :)
RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16
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I feel your pain Zeromanex. I periodically bring up Paizo's DriveThru Cards commitments and sometimes Vic Wertz responds.
What I can't figure out is why they're going through drivethrucards. It can't be making them as much money as just selling me cards at least I assume that's why releasing the season decks never gets done.
So why can't I just go down to my local store and buy these adventures the same way I did the last set of adventures? I mean Paizo's clearly in the business of selling me cards, why am I having such a hard time getting them to take my money?
Because they would have to do a full print run of those cards (thousands of cards, at least several hundred copies each), and they don't have enough data to support that they'd be able to actually sell that many copies of the Organized Play scenario cards. So, for those few of us who are willing to buy the cards, they are doing the drivethrucards option.
It's either that or only proxies forever.
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RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16
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Do you actually know something I don't?
Because sure, if you're right and this game's wildly unpopular than that certainly explains things but considering how they just keep pumping out products for it I have a hard time accepting the guess that they just plain can't sell scenario decks.
I guess not releasing the descks for years after the seasons come out's probably shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to demand but could they really not sell a few hundred decks for a season before it came out? Really?
Or sell the deck with the season? Anything other than only proxies forever because that's what we've got now...
I think you're missing the point of the "Seasons". The point of those adventures are to support an organized play campaign, which in turn supports sales of base sets and class decks both. But you have to realize that this is a card game first... they're not selling the vast majority of their base sets to organized play players. However, the main audience for the organized play seasons ARE organized play players, and I'm suggesting that they probably don't think that they can sell enough copies of such a deck to justify doing a print run of them.
Don't forget that a commercial release would require not just cards, but either a large booklet and a pack of cards or an extensive reworking of the current content to appropriate size (whether as a small booklet or cards). Even at 8.5" x 11" some reworking would be required to remove the proxies and prepare for commercial printing.
As far as popularity goes, Paizo did just come off of putting the main product line on hold for more than half a year. If the main content isn't selling through as quickly as hoped, would a niche product only useful to those who bought an entire set be worth it?
but could they really not sell a few hundred decks for a season before it came out? Really?
Or sell the deck with the season? Anything other than only proxies forever because that's what we've got now...
That would require massively delaying the seasons. Often, tweaks are made to later scenarios while the seasons are in-progress. Printing decks not only prevents that from happening as easily (harder to errata physical cards), but would add months of printing and shipping time in front of the season release. Selling post release means most people have already played the content, so less demand for the decks which could make printing uneconomical. There's a Vic post explaining this and other things in more detail, will try to find it when I'm no longer on phone.
Selling post release means most people have already played the content, so less demand for the decks which could make printing uneconomical. There's a Vic post explaining this and other things in more detail, will try to find it when I'm no longer on phone.
I don't have any data to back it up, of course, but I suspect that the target audience of printed Seasons would be people -like me- who *wouldn't* play the Seasons *at all* otherwise (i.e with proxys, or printing them by themselves, or ordering from DT, etc..)
Sure, if Vic claims it doesn't make economic sense - I should think Paizo have done their homework and have crunched the numbers. Unfortunate for players like me, who'd love to throw some more money that way.
OK I can't seem to find the Vic post, so perhaps I was imagining him saying that.
There is this post stating that demand is low for errata decks, which is why those are only available print-on-demand. I cannot find any similar post citing the season decks, however. For Season of the Shackles, this post indicates that at least one of the reasons was that they wanted to ensure there was no errata/FAQ that needed to be made on the cards themselves after they were printed. That reasoning may be carrying through for the other seasons as well. This post indicates that the physical season decks are intended to be an accessory, and not required to play the season (in other words, proxying is the default expectation). This keeps costs down for organizers, so I'm in favor of that decision personally. It seems, however, that the main reason these aren't available is time; it appears to be far enough down the list of priorities that other things continually overtake it so it reaches a near-perpetual delay state. The last linked thread seems to hint at that, at least. My somewhat-educated guess is that Vic is the primary (or only) one that handles these cards, and the entire paizo team is all-hands-on-deck for the Starfinder release next year.
Also, if you use sleeves, you don't need to remember the proxy. Print out extra copies of the cards you need, cut them out, and insert the paper in the sleeve above some other random card you don't need.
Chief Technical Officer
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Large-scale card printers are exactly that—large scale. They are optimized for print runs in the thousands of units; smaller jobs are cost-inefficient for them. That's the very reason that DriveThruCards is able to exist—they are optimized for much smaller runs.
We would have to sell roughly ten times as many copies of Season of the Shackles as we have to date for it to become viable to print and distribute the way we do Adventure Decks and Class Decks. (Which is also why I will always prioritize Adventure Decks and Class Decks above season decks.)
That said, I think I'm going to have the opportunity to push a couple of smaller decks through in the near future.
Ouch, I'm sad to hear that the adventures which are made better by having a story are that much less popular.
We would have to sell roughly ten times as many copies of Season of the Shackles as we have to date for it to become viable to print and distribute the way we do Adventure Decks and Class Decks.
Well, don't forget - the entire issue here is that they're *sold* in a much less popular format. I suspect Vic & co are making at least a somewhat educated guess about the prospective sales, but the truth is - we have no 100% sure way to know how much physical Seasons would sell, *until physical Seasons are actually being sold*.
That said, I think I'm going to have the opportunity to push a couple of smaller decks through in the near future.
ENORMOUS THANKS Vic if you can spare the time for that.
Greatest news today.
Curious if people go the effort of making their own versions of the OP cards on DriveThru (or if it's even permitted to do so)? I think I've said this here in the past, so sorry if I'm repeating myself, but having the real cards for the S&S OP greatly improved our experience (especially in the final scenario with all the boat locations), and playing the WotR OP has been a lot slower for us, in part, because of having to proxy all the cards being less fun.
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SotRi also had a LOT of proxies. They lowered the amount of necessary proxying in later seasons partly because of feedback about the irritation caused by proxies. (Though wise minds may and do disagree about their willingness to proxy.) I think SotRu had a much more manageable number of proxies, as does PluTo so far.
I see that two threads have been opened with the Deck Lists for SotRi and SotRu, so perhaps we will see the DriveThru Cards sooner than later. ;)
In SotRi it's because we also proxied existing cards, like Demonic Platoons and Vulture Demons. It has less new cards total, but those existing card numbers push it over the top by a healthy margin.
Selling post release means most people have already played the content, so less demand for the decks which could make printing uneconomical. There's a Vic post explaining this and other things in more detail, will try to find it when I'm no longer on phone.I don't have any data to back it up, of course, but I suspect that the target audience of printed Seasons would be people -like me- who *wouldn't* play the Seasons *at all* otherwise (i.e with proxys, or printing them by themselves, or ordering from DT, etc..)
Sure, if Vic claims it doesn't make economic sense - I should think Paizo have done their homework and have crunched the numbers. Unfortunate for players like me, who'd love to throw some more money that way.
Yeah, me too. I got quite confused when the organised play program started. As I understand it there's PDFs and cards from drivethrurpg and who-knows-what-else (proxies, whatever they are).
If I could preorder a season and get everything, then I would in a flash. It would need to be all nicely printed though. I'm too old for part-virtual, part-real games, unfortunately.
It's disappointing to get old. :(
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Chief Technical Officer
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As I understand it there's PDFs and cards from drivethrurpg and who-knows-what-else (proxies, whatever they are).
The Adventure Card Guild Scenario PDFs provide everything you actually *need* to to run new scenarios for an existing Adventure Path. Each season provides an Adventure Path, a set of adventures, and a set of scenarios, just like you're used to. Only instead of being card-sized, they're 8.5"x11", so we get to give you a bunch more story text than we can when they're cards.
Some of these scenarios include new cards (most commonly, villains and henchmen, though we've also done new locations and support cards). These new cards are included digitally in the PDFs that use them, and the scenarios tell you to use proxies for them. Proxies are just cards that you already have that serve as a stand-in for the new card.
For example, one of the early scenarios in Season of the Runelords has a new villain called Big Chief Wortus. The scenario tells you to proxy the Rise of the Runelords villain Gogmurt for Big Chief Wortus, meaning when you add the villain during setup, you add in the Gogmurt card. Then, when you find the Gogmurt card, you treat it as though it's the Big Chief Wortus card, referring to the PDF for Wortus's card text. (It's a lot easier than it sounds!)
If you're a bit more industrious, and like using sleeves, you can instead print out the new cards from the PDF, sleeve them up, and skip all the proxying—so instead of adding Gogmurt as a proxy for Wortus, you just add Wortus.
The Season decks at DriveThru make it even easier—they're just professionally printed copies of all of the new cards you'll need for each season.
Thanks, Vic.
(It's a lot easier than it sounds!)
I realise most people nowadays don't really comprehend IT-phobia, but I can't get itunes to work, which is apparently 'intuitive'. I can work internet explorer, excel and word and not much else. Having said that, I have managed to work out how to download things from paizo though...
So is this right?
I could buy a season from you, download the PDF, print it out and then order the corresponding deck of cards from Drivethrurpg (which I presumably mix in with the boxed set basic cards?) If I followed those steps, would the only difference between playing that and playing through the 'original' AP be that the AP and scenario cards would be on paper, rather than on cards?
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iTunes ia a lot of things, but intuitive isn't one of those.
I wonder if one of the things 'hurting' Season sale numbers is the OP program itself. My store owner has download access to the PDFs at no charge. He gives them to me to run.
I hope Paizo records that as a zero-cost sale, so that even if it does not compensate their effort, it at least informs them of our continuing interest (beyond my play reports, of course).
I could buy a season from you, download the PDF, print it out and then order the corresponding deck of cards from Drivethrurpg (which I presumably mix in with the boxed set basic cards?) If I followed those steps, would the only difference between playing that and playing through the 'original' AP be that the AP and scenario cards would be on paper, rather than on cards?
You are correct, but only with regards to Season 0, which is built for Skull & Shackles.
One of the things everyone upthread is talking about is how none of the other seasons' cards are available from DriveThru. Though that might change soon.
Ah, okay. Thanks.
Maybe I'll give season zero a shot then and see if it makes sense. Cheers.
Hi Vic. I have another question - is there anyway to tee things up so I can order the cards from you rather than drivethru?
The cards are showing as unavailable, so it kind of looks like you used to (or planned to) sell them directly, but maybe volumes/margins make it infeasible...? (I could imagine POD outlets not having a lot of room to give distributors/retailers a meaningful cut).
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Chief Technical Officer
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So is this right?
I could buy a season from you, download the PDF, print it out and then order the corresponding deck of cards from Drivethrurpg (which I presumably mix in with the boxed set basic cards?)
Yes (though you wouldn't mix the whole deck in at once—it contains cards for all of the adventures in that season, so you would add the cards for Adventure 2 when you add in the regular Adventure Deck 2 cards, and so on).
If I followed those steps, would the only difference between playing that and playing through the 'original' AP be that the AP and scenario cards would be on paper, rather than on cards?
Well, I do have one teeny bit more of complexity to throw at you.
PFSACG scenarios can actually be used a couple different ways. You absolutely can just play them like a new Adventure Path using the set you already own, building new characters out of the box as before, and going through the whole season in order. Doing this doesn't count as official Pathfinder Society play, but it's a completely viable way to do it. You just need to make one small adjustment by adding the following rewards: After the first scenario of each adventure, gain a skill feat. After the second, gain a power feat. After the fourth, gain a card feat. (You will also ignore any rewards that specifically apply to Adventure Card Guild characters.)
For your play to count as official Pathfinder Society play, instead of building your character out of the Base Set box, you build your character out of a Class Deck using the rules outlined in the Pathfinder Society Adventure Card Guild Guide.
Cheers. That makes sense (it would just be for us at home, not as part of organised play). I've downloaded season zero and ordered the cards - I'll see how it goes. Thanks. :)
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Chief Technical Officer
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I wonder if one of the things 'hurting' Season sale numbers is the OP program itself. My store owner has download access to the PDFs at no charge. He gives them to me to run.
I hope Paizo records that as a zero-cost sale, so that even if it does not compensate their effort, it at least informs them of our continuing interest (beyond my play reports, of course).
Unfortunately, we have no way of knowing how many people are playing the scenarios we give them. This is why your session reports are appreciated!
When we look at the health of the program, we do look at how many retailers are part of the program as well as how many PDFs we have sold, but session reports are the thing we want to see most.
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Chief Technical Officer
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Hi Vic. I have another question - is there anyway to tee things up so I can order the cards from you rather than drivethru?
The cards are showing as unavailable, so it kind of looks like you used to (or planned to) sell them directly, but maybe volumes/margins make it infeasible...? (I could imagine POD outlets not having a lot of room to give distributors/retailers a meaningful cut).
Sorry—we don't have a good way to do that. (And we've never planned to—the product page looks the way it does out of necessity more than out of desire.)
No worries. They're so cheap, I figured there was a good chance there isn't a way for everyone to make enough money to justify the effort. It just would have helped with shipping.
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Ouch, I'm sad to hear that the adventures which are made better by having a story are that much less popular.
That's where Byron "Kittenhoarder" Campbell and I step in. There are Adventure (story) Guides for all three base sets - RotR, S&S, WotR. The fourth guide for MM is already underway!
Curious if people go the effort of making their own versions of the OP cards on DriveThru (or if it's even permitted to do so)?
I've made the same observation from the standpoint of "people could do this, so why aren't they available?" It's good to read some comments on this thread about "the cards might change", so at least there's some conscious thought going into the decision vs. organizational inertia and indifference.
If you're a bit more industrious, and like using sleeves, you can instead print out the new cards from the PDF, sleeve them up, and skip all the proxying—so instead of adding Gogmurt as a proxy for Wortus, you just add Wortus.
There's also the option of using an Internet printing service like PrinterStudio.com, provided you aren't creating galleries to share the cards out to others so they can print their own cards too. I'm not a lawyer and I don't hold this out as legal advice, but I think this falls under "fair use" for U.S. copyright laws, otherwise you couldn't legally do the home printer option either. PACG is available internationally, so the laws may be different in your country of residence. On a practical level, provided you aren't distributing your cards to other people, you'll likely be safe from an enforcement perspective.
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Chief Technical Officer
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There's also the option of using an Internet printing service like PrinterStudio.com, provided you aren't creating galleries to share the cards out to others so they can print their own cards too. I'm not a lawyer and I don't hold this out as legal advice, but I think this falls under "fair use" for U.S. copyright laws, otherwise you couldn't legally do the home printer option either. PACG is available internationally, so the laws may be different in your country of residence. On a practical level, provided you aren't distributing your cards to other people, you'll likely be safe from an enforcement perspective.
Sure, but if you're going to pay somebody to print them, you might as well pay DriveThru, and get them in actual card form with color-matched cardbacks!
(...At least, once they're all available there...)