FlavorableDeez's page

FlavorableDeez wrote:

I also think they didn't think things through about the model portion of it. People love these characters, PATHFINDER fans love these characters. Making really good minis of them for another game is... kind of insulting.

1) Paizo isn't making the minis, Kingdom Death is. These are Kingdom Death minis of Pathfinder characters.

2) You can use the KD and Pathfinder minis interchangeably ya'know, since they're just minis. I use my KD stuff more for Pathfinder than I do for KD.

FlavorableDeez wrote:

Here's to hoping they can make them more readily available on down the road like they said, cause as a whole this kind of comes off as a marketing flop.

3) High quality stuff costs.

4) By the amounts the pledges shot up after the announcement, I'd say it's the opposite of a flop.

1) What does who "manufactures" these have to do with anything? I'm discussing licensing agreements between two companies who wish to increase their business. Paizo signed off on letting their iconic characters be made as excellent models for the kickstarter campaign, thereby (possibly) limiting regular fans from getting them if they missed the boat. That's on them, and if it upsets people I can understand why (I'm not one of those, by the way, I just understand it).

2) Word, hommie. I use miniatures from outside of Pathfinder for my campaigns as well. A good looking, inspiring monster mini on the board makes a DM's job easier. What was the point of this again? Kind of obvious. I believe the article even says they're of similar size.

3) thanks for more of the obvious, but my statement still stands. The concept and themes of KD coupled with the cost of the game itself as well as the need for product assembly appeals to a very specific crowd. I can't see very many being enticed into buying a $200 game just because they cast Pathfinder's Iconic characters in it. It's quite the leap. And isn't that what crossover marketing like this is designed to do?

4) If that's the case, then hats off to them. As I stated in my comment I wasn't sure when this was first announced. I frequently look at Paizo's blog here and don't remember seeing anything to do with these models being made for KD until there was 24 hours to go in the Kickstarter. Of course I could have missed the initial announcement, but as I said, I like both KD and Pathfinder, so if those keywords showed up I'd hate to think I overlooked it. But if I did, that's totally on me.

But if you're referring to pledges shooting up after THIS particular announcement, I wouldn't put stock into it based on the Pathfinder models. Those familiar with kickstarters know they have an inverse bell curve during the process, where the most people pledge on the first and last days. Not saying some folks didn't put five down to hold their spot to get the models, just saying I'm sure a lot of people were just hesitant to pull the trigger on the kickstarter until the last minute.

Based on the article and the things Erik says in it, I don't think marketing really has anything at all to do with it. Paizo has some self proclaimed fans of KD, and when they got a chance to get involved with KD they took it. I don't blame them, as I said I like the core concepts of KD. I just hope they can get these character models to Pathfinder's regular fans at some point is all.

I'm familiar with Kingdom Death and have thought a bit about this, and it just has me asking:

Why?

Usually crossovers get people interested in other products they might not have heard of. That's the benefit Kingdom Death will get from this given Pathfinder's popularity (and assuming KD fans don't know about Pathfinder, which is doubtful). But I can't help but wonder how much will it benefit? Kingdom Death, while highly original and clever, doesn't pull punches and isn't for everyone. Couple that with a heavy expense just for the base game as well as detailed model assembly and you've really got a game tailored made for certain tastes.

And what does Pathfinder get? Surely most of Kingdom Death's fan base is familiar with Pathfinder, so how does it benefit from this? Some really detailed models for their Star characters? If they wanted that, they could find other... and far more fan friendly... methods of doing that besides saying "hey, peep this kickstarter with 24 hours left." (Forgive this part if this was announced earlier and I missed it).

I can't help but feel that a few folks in the Paizo office just happen to like Kingdom Death and wanted to see their creations in it. I also think they didn't think things through about the model portion of it. People love these characters, PATHFINDER fans love these characters. Making really good minis of them for another game is... kind of insulting.

Here's to hoping they can make them more readily available on down the road like they said, cause as a whole this kind of comes off as a marketing flop.

I just want to say upfront that I'm going to purchase Starfinder (might even take my trip to GenCon to do it!), so please don't mistake my comments for negativity. It's just been in my experience that when you place a roleplaying group into a vessel and constrain them to a narrow focus like ship on ship combat, the fun of a new ingame challenge wears off quickly. This leads to DMs trying to "up their game" via encounters, but eventually it wears thin and starts to feel forced, giving a stale state to ship combat. After awhile, players might even want to drop it altogether.

After all, when you look at ship combat in a roleplaying game it's like asking the players to all play a single character and decide who gets to move, attack with, or heal said character. Of course this inevitably leads to the "mixed encounters" that combine players controlling the ship while other PCs are on foot trying to accomplish something, but there's only so many times you can use that until it starts looking shoehorned.

I wish Paizo luck with this design. It's not easy to do by any means. I also hope they make me eat this words with said design.

Oh hey look, more stuff about testing the rules for starships. While I can appreciate the testing of rules, what about the use of them in context? Roleplaying games never have both sides just set up a map and throw down, so what about space combat and the use of narrative? What about keeping it interesting for ALL players involved? You mention Serenity in the article, how boring would it be to play a character like Inara, Simon, or Shepherd Book during space combat? This is what I want addressed in the next Starfinder article: how we're designing this game's space battles to keep everyone at the table entertained without things getting repetitive.

And yes, I realize a lot of that is on the DM, but if players have set roles (or none at all) for ship combat, there's not much there to work with and keep them interested without some of it feeling really shoehorned.

I'm worried about this aspect of the game. Don't get me wrong, I have faith in Paizo, but making space combat interesting for an entire party of roleplaying participants is difficult at best. Some times there's just not something interesting for certain types of characters to do without it feeling shoe-horned and/or repetitive, both things which good DMs strive to avoid but can be tough to accomplish with space combat.

A good example is Fantasy Flight's Star Wars rpgs. Everyone in a party has different roles and skills, but when it comes to space combat some of those talents don't transfer in a useful manner, resulting in something that can feel forced. If space combat is a reoccurring thing in your campaign, it can wear a DM out trying to find ways to make everyone feel useful without forcing the same situations over and over. Seeing Starfinder testing titles like "Captain, pilot, and engineer" can go either way with the mechanics, I just hope they remember to focus on the roleplaying aspects, because not every player character is going to fit neatly into one of those roles.