Akrasia's page

That one is easy. Keeping with the established line and bringing more costumers to that is always more profitable.

But the claim that it is "always more profitable" is obviously false. You're asserting this as though it is an a priori truth, but it simply is not.

If the gains of bringing in more customers to a 'new' line exceed the losses of some subset of those customers who otherwise would have moved to the old line, then it is a profitable strategy to introduce the new line! Really, this is Economics 101 stuff.

Companies engage in profitable 'cannibalization' all the time. Gillette sells a variety of different kinds of razors, all of which do essentially the 'same thing.' Sale of some Gillette razors perhaps cut into the profits that could have been made from the sale of other kinds of Gillette razors. But the strategy makes sense because, overall, the additional razors Gillette sells takes disproportionately away from razors that Bic would've sold (or electric razors, or whatever).

Putting out different versions of the same product is *not* always unprofitable. Sometimes it is -- and perhaps in Paizo's case it would be -- and sometimes it is not.

Every sale lost to the new line huts the over all company profit. People like you who have no interest in the product are not lost as you never where.

But I *am* a new customer. I just purchased the PF BB!

However, I will never move up to the PF corebook. So the question is whether trying to *keep* customers like me makes sense for Paizo.

If Paizo has calculated that the loss of customers like me (after we simply purchase the BB) is preferable to potential profits lost by producing additional BB-style products, then that's fine. I'm cool with that. But they've lost my custom, at least.

Yes it is. People get confused over the pathfinder setting and the freaking Rules. Right now there is no confusion as the beginner box works with the full line. It is not a "Basic" product. You can use it and run level 1-5 stuff with no issue at all.

If you add in a "Basic" that does not work with the setting books or the RPG line you just add more confusion.

Then surely the key would be to ensure that "Basic" PF work with PF products (at least those targeted at the same level range), no?

It's already been done with PF BB. How difficult could it be to extend that compatibility?

Look up the history of TSR, its death was caused by lower profits from competing lines.

Correct, a huge number of competing *settings* caused problems for TSR.

However, TSR stopped supporting 'D&D' as a separate line from AD&D *years* before it went under (aside from a couple of 'intro' sets that were far less ambitious than the PF BB).

So I think that claims that the D&D-AD&D split caused the downfall of TSR is something of a canard. Moreover, the split has been exaggerated. I had no problem with using D&D material with the AD&D game, and vice versa, throughout the 1980s. This was true of most people I knew. The two systems were so similar, it was easy to use material for one system with the other. PF BB and PF are be even closer!

But, hey, whatever. I already have the PF BB, and am happy to just use that for any PF/3.5-style games that I want to play for the indefinite future. It would be nice to have additional material to consider purchasing, but there's no way I'm going to full PF (or back to 3.5).

It is splintering the base and cutting into profits. It is not people like you with no interest in PF that it takes, but people who might have moved on to the full game, people who they might bring in and products they might buy. They have not lost you, as you never planned to be a customer. They might loose Pete, Mike and Larry who might move on to the full game however.

Then the question becomes: is the profit available from selling additional products to "people like me" likely to be greater than the profit lost to people like "Pete, Mike and Larry", who might choose to stick with PFBB instead of moving on to the full system?

Farther more they confuse the customer base,

Is it really that confusing? One can play either 'BB' of 'full' Pathfinder. Both products already exist now!

and each new player for the new "Basic" line is one lost customer for everything else including the Ap lines which is the money earner.

But this is obviously false. I'm a "new player" for the BB, and I would *never* have been a customer for "everything else". And I'm not alone.

The question (as I've already noted) simply is whether there are enough folks like me to make *expanding* the range of BB products profitable.

Every new drinker of Coke is not necessarily one less drinker of Diet Coke.

It takes roughly the same amount of time and money to make both "lines" yet now each line earns less profit as people now buy one or the other. Stings for the basic line are not useful or wanted buy full RPg gamers and Full RPG products are not wanted by the basic gamers.

Is it really that difficult to make products for both BB and full PF? It seems that many products already produced for PF can be used with BB 'as is'. And the BB DM book includes guidelines for using existing low level PF adventures with the BB.

I think that the difficulty here is being grossly exaggerated.

multi care brand issue.

Sometimes it makes sense to offer different version of the same product to *expand* a company's consumer base (yet again, consider my example of Coke and Diet Coke).

Sometimes different versions lead to counter-productive 'cannibalization'.

It simply cannot be asserted with a priori certainty that multiple versions of the same product invariably leads to 'splitting the fan base'.

In any case, the BB is *already* out there. It is a complete, if limited, game. I look forward to playing it. I'll *never* GM full PF (I quite DM'ing 3.5 six years ago for a reason!).

You bring me Coke and Diet Coke, I give you 32X vs. Sega CD vs. Saturn :)

Um, okay, I'm not sure what that means. :/

My point simply was that there are some people who will *never* want to purchase or play 'full' PF (or who have *quit* 'full' PF/3.5 because of the crunch, etc.), but who would want to purchase and play BB PF. In that case, supporting BB is not 'splitting' the fanbase, but instead expanding it.

Since BB and full PF are essentially the same system, there is compatibility between them (so two incompatible products are not being produced). But a BB-line would be available for people who prefer not to deal with a 570+ page book, etc.

Really, though, I don't have a horse in this race. I like the BB, and simply have no interest in full PF. Perhaps there are not enough people like me to make producing more than BB worthwhile for Paizo. If so, c'est la vie.

Splinting the fan base is not "More profitable". I myself would not mind a more rules light game, but that is not what we have. Anyone saying breaching the BB out into yet more boxes and a second line is not splinting the fan base and lowering profits is simply fooling themselves.

If the BB brings in players who have not, and will not, play 'full' PF, it is *not* 'splintering' the fan base. This is because these additional customers and players were not, and will not, be part of the 'core' PF fan base.

Does having both Coke and Diet Coke 'splinter' the Coke 'fan base'? If Diet Coke drinkers would never drink regular Coke it does not. Making Diet Coke available *expands* the fan base. (And the converse is also true. I would never drink Diet Coke.)

In any case, I find these worries over 'splintering' the fan base ridiculously overwrought.

...Of course I can always go play Swords And Wizardry or Castles and Crusades or Crypts And Things or....

I have it on good authority that 'Crypts and Things' will rock with mighty thews! ;)

...

To be frank, the point of the Beginner Box is to bring new players to the full RPG, and to our Adventure Paths...

Well, I'm afraid that I have no interest in the full RPG, and will not be purchasing it or APs that require its use.

OTOH, I dig the BB, and am happy to run it, or a version of Pathfinder with approximately the same level of rules complexity.