To preorder or not to preorder, that is the question.


General Discussion


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Which method is likely to provide me with the book the earliest;
Preordering and having it shipped to me OR
Picking it up at my Friendly Local Gaming Store?

It is my understanding that the goal is to start shipping the book on opening day of Gencon on the 17th. Do preorders or store orders get filled first?

Liberty's Edge RPG Superstar 2008 Top 8

I also am debating because of this....also vs a subscription....

Inquiring minds want to know...


I would think pre-order and convert to a sub if/when it is announced would be the best bet.

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

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The first day of Gen Con is the release date, not the day we start shipping. Assuming the books arrive in the warehouse on time, we'll start shipping weeks before that.

And the order we ship them isn't as meaningful as you might think. In our industry, we sell products to distributors, who in turn sell them to retailers. We therefore ship to distributors first, because it takes an extra hop to get to the retailers. Shipping distributor orders first means that most retailers should be able to have product in store on or before the release date. But regardless of when they receive them, they aren't allowed to sell them until the release date.

We usually start shipping customer orders after we ship distribution orders (though we sometimes start customer orders before we finish distribution orders). Our goal is to get most customer orders to most of our US customers on or before the street date, but we can't guarantee it.

The bottom line here is that if you order it from us, there is a chance you will get it prior to the release date—but there's also a chance that you will get it on or even after the release date. If you buy from a store, you won't get it early, but (assuming your store has ordered enough copies, and ordered on time), you should be able to get it on the release date.


My biggest question would be: are there things I can get through preorder that I can't get at the store?

My gut call would be to look at the book at the store and then decide if I think my group will play it, but if there are any preorder-exclusive goodies I'd consider the preorder route. (I run into this issue a lot with kickstarter products, such as 13th age that came with a special die in kickstart but you can't buy it anywhere after.)

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

We don't offer preorder incentives. If you subscribe to the line, on the other hand (which you can't actually do quite yet), you'll get a free PDF edition.

The Exchange

I hope there are no exclusive product at Gen Con. I think I will wait until June or July to preorder from a store that will order from their distributor.

Since I'm in Canada, the exchange rate is not great to order from USA.

Dark Archive

Will subscriptions be available by early May? There is some delayed gratification, but that would be ideal for gift giving in my neck of the woods.

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