I'm staying 3.5 (and won't buy 4E Pathfinder or anything else made exclusively for 4E), but, though I wish it weren't so, the market will probably be better for Paizo with 4E, so I will certainly understand Paizo going that direction.
I feel the same way about Necromancer & Goodman Games.
Too early to say here; I need to see 4E first. I'd prefer to buy my adventures from Paizo though, so I hope they go whatever direction I do. If I had to say one way or the other right now, I'm leaning slightly towards sticking with 3.5. But new books are shiny...
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Too early to say here; I need to see 4E first. I'd prefer to buy my adventures from Paizo though, so I hope they go whatever direction I do. If I had to say one way or the other right now, I'm leaning slightly towards sticking with 3.5. But new books are shiny...
As I'm leaning toward 4e, I hope Paizo will switch.
If Paizo doesn't switch, the question is whether it will do a 3.75 or not.
If Paizo stays with 3.5, I may still stay with Paizo .. but who knows.
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For reasons cited elsewhere I'll be staying with 3.5.x. I sincerely hope that Paizo also decides that snapping at the scraps of WotC does them a disservice (especially given that WotC has basically tried to become self-sufficient now, with online presence and removing licences for official print publications like Dungeon and Dragon) and they decide to lead the gaming industry in a stand at the 3.5 d20 rules. If they go 4.0 then so be it. If they stay 3.5 I will happily give them my money and support. :)
Paizo's decision one way or the other will not sway my decision, but I will either sadly see them go the way of 4.0 or happily stick with them in the 3.5.x arena.
Seeing the recent uptick in 3.5 sale items makes it very hard not purchase them and play 3.5 forever.
As has been mentioned, its too early for me to make a proper decision regarding whether I'll be playing 3.5 or 4E. That said, based on what I've seen I'll be playing 4E this time next year, and I imagine that if Paizo remained 3.5 I would cancel my Pathfinder subscription.
I want to stress that we don't know what it will be like. Almost every reason people give for wanting to stay with 3.5 is nothing more than rumor and assumption. Don't make that decision until you get a chance to try the game in June.
I expect to be playing 4E by the end of '08. If Pathfinder doesn't go 4E, I'll have to make a decision at that point whether to continue with Pathfinder or not - but it's too soon at this point for me to be sure of any of these decisions.
I will Stay with 3.5
I am a huge fan of Pathfinders, and i will be sad to discontinue my subscription but i will do it
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I am now leaning much more towards sticking with 3.5 than I was a couple of weeks ago.
Thanks to comments DaveMage made about Wizards' marketing strategy, it suddenly hit me: I LIKE 3.5, and it seems, to paraphrase Dave, that Wizards has done nothing to make 4E attractive to people like me who actually like 3.5.
I'm down to very basic considerations: I invested a tremendous amount of money in 3.5. books. I cannot justify putting the same investment all over again in a new edition of the game. I like the game and have very few to none of the issues I see many complain about on message boards. Even if I buy the core books (I'm not even sure I will anymore), I just cannot believe I would just jump right into 4E.
If Pathfinder switches to 4E, I'll be really hard pressed to justify keeping my subscription. I actually hope this does not happen. I know that Paizo has a business to run. I know I'm not its only customer, and I will understand if/when the transition occurs. I just selfishly want them to stick to 3.5.
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I don't have a great deal invested into 3.5, thankfully. Most of my books are adventure material. So if Pathfinder goes 4e, it will be nice to try out a fresh set of rules on an already popular setting. Adventure material is what drives my game, and I will be much more likely to purchase Paizo's developed material, since I expect most of WotC's material at the beginning of 4E will just be more introductory and experimental.
Here's hoping 4E doesn't have to wait 6 years to get its Red Hand of Doom-worthy classic!
Ho pleassseee! Not the WOC 4E products is crap discussion again...!
I understand that peoples are reluctant to change.. it's in human nature but for god sake, even if 4.0 edition is the worst RPG system and even if it take out all the DnD from your beloved DnD, they're is absolutly nothing that force you to buy the new edition... and since they will be probably no more support and new produtcs for 3.5 in a year or two, if you don't buy 4.0 paizo products, you won't buy anything else either... so stop the crap of 'if paizo change to 4th edition I will not buy their products... We.. DnD fans deserve better cause we supported you for the last few years...blablablablabla...'... You support paizo cause they are selling good stuff... no?
If you don't buy paizo stuff, you will probably do your homebrew or stop playing DnD anyway...
But I really don't understand in what the excellent adventures published by the paizo crew will stop to be excellent adventures after/if they convert to the new edition.... I don't even play with DnD 3.5 cause I feel the system is a pain (and prefering True20 simplicity) but I can use any paizo adventures with very few conversion effort.... for the most part the conversion problem come from the campaign I use and trying to find good replacements for specifics locations....Adventures should never be limited to the game mechanics but be story driven... I look forward to innovative ideas, stories, characters, rpg opportunities and I think the paizo folks offer me just that! Don't you think so?
And if the WOC 4.0 Edition sexy Succubus is replaced by the ugly Erynes, is there really something that prevent you or Paizo to use a Succubus in one of their adventure... they are already creating 4-5 new monsters in each relased of pathfinder...
So please... tell me...
Chief Creative Officer, Publisher
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It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Eric, yes that would do the trick for me.
I'm still undecided on 4e, but should be playing 3.5 until at least the end of 2008 and maybe longer. I'd still like to run Red Hand of Doom, Expedition to Castle Greyhawk, Pathfinder, a whole lot of Dungeon adventures sitting on my shelf and a few Green Ronin adv's I just picked up. I just can't keep up with you guys.
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I have no intention of playing 4th edition. I'm also thinking about cancelling if Paizo makes the switch to 4th edition. I personally would like them to say soon whether Pathfinder 3 will be 3rd edition.
If they're going to switch, there doesn't seem to be much incentive to adopt early. Wait a year, have a good sense of how the rules work, have a few expansions, and a stable of writers able to produce 4th material capably.
Regardless of the edition, I'll demand Paizo maintain their unsurpassed quality. More time spent with third makes it more apparent if fourth will allow the stories they want to tell.
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
I'm glad to hear the tone of Pathfinder will not change to match any flavor changes made by WotC. I like Golarion the way it is.
A conversion guide could be a lot of help, but wouldn't that also be a lot of extra work? How would that affect the price of the books? If the price goes up, would you lose subscribers?
I may be on the fence regarding D&D 4e, but I intend to keep my subscription to Pathfinder as long as I can afford it (and being unemployed, it might not be easy). Second Darkness doesn't thrill me, as I'm not an "underdark" fan, but I will at least take a look at it before deciding anything.
Randy
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If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
How is this possible?
Maybe this deserves its own Thread, but, please, can we explore the mechanics of this nebulous "conversion guide"?
-W. E. Ray
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
If it were only electronic, probably not. At the moment a conversion guide would likely need to be part of the physical product to make me consider maintaining my subscription. However, that's not to say I won't change my mind in the future; I'm quickly coming to love the setting.
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Unless my money troubles get worse than they are right now, I will be sticking with PAthfinder for the long haul. However, conversion stats would be VERY nice to have, especially since it will be a while before I switch to 4.0. Especially since I just bought a bunch of stuff for 3.5 due to that sweet, sweet sale you guys (and gals) at Paizo just had.
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Ho pleassseee! Not the WOC 4E products is crap discussion again...!
I agree with almost all of what you say here to at least some degree but I want to comment that your first & second statements yell at two different issues. Sure, I'm vocal about my feelings of WotC's lack of good quality products but that particular "discussion" is quite different from peoples' desire to not change.
It's separate issues:
Some folks are upset because of the fluff changes -- understandibly so.
Some folks are upset at the devoted income in books that will soon be archaic (does not mean useless) -- justifyably so.
Some folks are angry at WotC's pathetic PR job in all this -- well, yeah!
Many folks are furious at the loss of the magazines.
Maybe what you're seeing is that this last issue, the one folks are most upset with, is being "replaced" at such a low quality; the "mags" really do suck. Now the, "how does this bode for the quality of 4E?" question becomes quite valid. And this brings us back to WotC's very poor PR job.
-W. E Ray
Ho pleassseee! Not the WOC 4E products is crap discussion again...!
I agree with almost all of what you say here to at least some degree but I want to comment that your first & second statements yell at two different issues. Sure, I'm vocal about my feelings of WotC's lack of good quality products but that particular "discussion" is quite different from peoples' desire to not change.
It's separate issues:
Some folks are upset because of the fluff changes -- understandibly so.
Some folks are upset at the devoted income in books that will soon be archaic (does not mean useless) -- justifyably so.
Some folks are angry at WotC's pathetic PR job in all this -- well, yeah!
Many folks are furious at the loss of the magazines.
Maybe what you're seeing is that this last issue, the one folks are most upset with, is being "replaced" at such a low quality; the "mags" really do suck. Now the, "how does this bode for the quality of 4E?" question becomes quite valid. And this brings us back to WotC's very poor PR job.
-W. E Ray
That last one is the one that has me the most upset. Yes, it paved the way for the Pathfinder, GameMastery, and Kobold Quarterly. But it was still a mistake of epic proportion. Pure and simple. I have yet to do anything other than copy the Last Demonicom of Iggwi. So I have yet to do anything with WotC on their online stuff. ~shrugs~ Oh well.
And yes, I will EVENTUALLY get the 4.x rulebooks. When that happenes is anyones guess. If Paizo goes to 4.x, then that will encourage me to invest in the basic books. PHB, DMG, MM I. That is it at first. If it is any good, I might, might, think about buying more.
I also just spent $148 on the sale that Paizo just had. I now have enough 3.5 stuff to keep me busy for a lonnnnngggggg time.
I find the Pathfinders such a fasinating read that I will continue my subsciption no matter which way it goes. The same I think can be said of the Gamemastery adventures.
While I don't plan to convert to 4.0, I won't say I never will. If I do though I will buy the core rule books only. I've learned my lesson and will not invest in a ton of books for what will also ultimately become an obsolete edition.
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Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
It would be nice. I think I would keep the subscription in that case. As mentioned above, I just can't justify the expenditure of the money required to get 4th Edition rulebooks AND Pathfinder/GameMastery every month, so I'm 99% certainly staying 3.5. But if there were a conversion guide, I'd imagine I'd keep getting Pathfinder.
This does seem like it would be a lot of work on the part of Paizo employees, though, especially if the rules end up being vastly different.
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Very Likly
Would you come with rules for all the content or just the adventure|
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It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Most definitely, but you should understand how skeptical we might be over the promise of online supplements...
I fully understand your current situation and I intend no hostility.
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if you don't buy 4.0 paizo products, you won't buy anything else either...
There see, you're dead wrong, because this edition change has nothing in common with previous edition changes, for a few reasons among which:
1/ The OGL. The OGL is irrevocable. Period. If there's just a tiny amount of people producing stuff for 3.5, then there'll still be stuff for it. Look at Dragonsfoot sometimes: you can still find some pretty cool stuff for previous editions of the game. With the OGL, the opportunity is open that much wider.
2/ Amount of stuff already existing. I have TONS of stuff for 3.5, but I sure am far from having everything. If I continue to invest in 3.5, I can purchase printed stuff still for a long, long time, through eBay for instance.
3/ PDFs. These are products that do not go out of print, are always on the virtual shelf, will be 20 years from now. Forever, as long as there are websites to provide them. Right there, this is the assurance to me that there will be 3.5 stuff available for a long, long time, with or without further e-publications in the years to come.
Add to this that my gaming money could go towards different types of products like miniatures, 3D buildings and decors et cetera... and if I want to spend some money on gaming, believe me, I'll still be able to find stuff that appeals to me, whatever choice I end up making as far as D&D is concerned.
It has nothing to do with a supposed aversion towards "change" or a reluctance to spend money. It has everything to do with a reluctance to spend money on stuff I basically already have. Everything to do with the fact I wouldn't buy yet again the same stuff with different mechanics, and everything to do with the fact I like 3.5 and don't see any reason to change to 4E. You know what they say: "if it ain't broken, don't fix it." I have nothing against change itself. But it has to happen for a reason.
I see none valid at the moment beyond the financial interests of a company that needs to sell products to survive. That's the real, concrete bottom-line.
That has nothing to do with my gaming, whatsoever. And what's more, what really irritates me? That the company in question wants to make me believe that it's all about my game being "broken", "unplayable" and "too complicated." I get the feeling of being taken for a moron, sometimes.
/rant
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A conversion guide would be helpful, but ultimately, from what we've been told by WotC so far, the rules will be so incompatible that they suggested we actually end any ongoing campaigns and start something new with 4e. From the sound of it some of the mechanics will be so different as to make it extremely difficult to do. It would basically mean doing an equal amount of work for the 4e info and the 3.5 info, with potentially a lot of explanatory information to describe why this NPC can't do this in 4e, but can do it in 3.5, and figuring out what prestige classes higher level NPCs have that don't exist yet in 4e (if they even have prestige classes)... etc etc etc. I guess I'm just not convinced that a conversion guide would be possible. If it *is* possible, I would certainly want to take a look at it before committing to paying the Pathfinder subscription fee to see how much work it is and what effect it has on the campaign.
I personally have no problem with downloadable content - as long as it's not an additional subscription cost.
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That has nothing to do with my gaming, whatsoever. And what's more, what really irritates me? That the company in question wants to make me believe that it's all about my game being "broken", "unplayable" and "too complicated." I get the feeling of being taken for a moron, sometimes.
Yep. And we're also expected to believe that the same group of designers who came up with the "broken, unplayable, too complicated" rules figured out how to fix them and are going to save us with 4e. ;)
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It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
As I have shelves of 3.5 material and like the current system, a conversion guide IF Pathfinder chances to 4.0 would be enough to keep my subscription if it could be expanded to the Gamemastery subscriptions then I'd keep that subscription to.
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Erik, pretty sure I would stay with Pathfinder even if it moves to 4E, but this is an ironclad lifeline. Maybe that's not the best metaphor. You know what I mean; I'd definitely stick with Paizo with a conversion option.
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It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Yup.
I'm quite on the fence about sticking with Pathfinder after the apparently inevitable switch, but the downloadable retrofit would do the trick.|
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Missed the post while I was posting last.
If Pathfinder went to 4th edition but had a guide for converting to third edition as a free downloadable PDF, I would keep my subscription.
I want to keep spending my money on Pathfinder regardless of whether I will use it or not. I like the product and I like getting gaming product. But at some point I do have to face the practical aspects of a fairly expensive product that I find useless.
In 2011 I'll still be playing 3rd edition. About that time I think I might be willing to switch. If I finish sorting through the things I like most about 3rd edition and getting together a 3.D(eadDMwalking) I'll play a lot longer, me thinks.
I just don't see a concrete reason to upgrade. I have yet to see anything about 4th edition that really says 'This makes it better'. I think with the release of 3rd edition and 3.5 they were really able to focus on the advantages of the new product. I have yet to hear about anything that works 'better' in the new system. I hear about a lot of things that don't work well in 3.x, but without a solution it isn't convincing, and since none of the things that are 'broken' are causing a problem in my games, I don't see it as something worth changing editions for.
Combined with a poor PR, I'd feel really bad if I spent any money with WotC. And assuming that I would need core books to run Pathfinder, or perhaps even to figure out how to convert it myself, that is why I'd consider dropping the subscription if it does go 4th edition.
But I would stay if it had a conversion guide done for me. I also share some doubts about whether it is practical, but maybe when you see the rules for 4th you'll be able to tell us whether it is or not.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Honestly, I'd have to see it in practice before I committed long-term. In theory, yes. If Pathfinder went 4E, but had a *complete* 3.5 stats download (rules, DCs, monsters, tactics, etc.) I'd have to see how cumbersome it would be to use the 3.5 ruleset in game.
If it was not cumbersome and/or confusing, then I would continue to be a subscriber.
Of course, should you decide to do this, my recommendation is to keep pathfinder 3.5 and have the 4E stats be the downloaded version. ;)
That has nothing to do with my gaming, whatsoever. And what's more, what really irritates me? That the company in question wants to make me believe that it's all about my game being "broken", "unplayable" and "too complicated." I get the feeling of being taken for a moron, sometimes.Yep. And we're also expected to believe that the same group of designers who came up with the "broken, unplayable, too complicated" rules figured out how to fix them and are going to save us with 4e. ;)
Ditto both!
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Here's the gist of it as I see it (take it for all its worth): how many "v.3.5 or nothing" guys will you really, truly lose from the subscription rolls if Pathfinder goes 4E? If it's a minority of a minority, a conversion guide, while a very nice gesture to them and further evidence of Paizo's superior customer service and commitment to its fans, is probably more effort than it's worth. If it's really a sizable number of people who'll go, maybe you shouldn't go 4E at all. Maybe you should make a bid for being the new home for disaffected 3.5 guys and run with it.
As much as I'd like to think there's this vast horde of D&D gamers who won't convert to 4E, big enough for you to base a business on, I'm not sure that's the case -- not sure. The rabid 4E supporters will tell you nothing stands in the way of 4E's total victory but without any real evidence except past experience, which I think is largely invalid because of the existence of the OGL. But I also have no evidence that all the guys like me who will have nothing to do with 4E, no matter how much effort you put into preserving the flavor of past editions, will sign up and keep your business afloat. I will do that, but I'm just one guy. How many others will follow suit and is that enough for you to run a profitable business?
So, my feeling is you should just go with one edition and make it your own. Either decision is fraught with peril and I don't envy your position. All I would ask if that, if/when you do go 4E, you plan for the future and make a serious, well-considered effort, to prevent this situation from arising again when 5E is released in a few years. Paizo is a great company with talented people, but, by being effectively a support company for WotC, you are beholden to their whims and you dance to their tune, not your own. That's not a good place to be. For the good of your company and the good of the guys who buy your theoretical 4E products, don't let this situation happen again in the future. Break free from WotC's apron strings and forge your own path.
I'm not planning on giving up my subscription either way. But, I believe this is the best way to go.
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Eric, yes that would do the trick for me.
I'm still undecided on 4e, but should be playing 3.5 until at least the end of 2008 and maybe longer. I'd still like to run Red Hand of Doom, Expedition to Castle Greyhawk, Pathfinder, a whole lot of Dungeon adventures sitting on my shelf and a few Green Ronin adv's I just picked up. I just can't keep up with you guys.
I'm sorry Eric, but you can't have it both ways unless you plan on printing two versions of your material in both 3.5 and 4.0 versions. Me and my friends plan on sticking with 3.5 and hopefully Paizo. If the 3.5 material is not printed in the book I purchase and I am inconvenienced by having to cross reference the fluff with an online document that I either have to print myself or warm up my laptop, I'll pass.
I suspect that most 3.5 players won't tolerate the inconvenience either. I think 3.5 players are more likely to desire a print version of the books as we are older gamers who are more comfortable with the print format. The 4.0 material should be offered as a pdf supplement as 4.0 players be more accustomed to the reference natue of the new 4.0 encounter format. You could also save money on page counts because the 4.0 encounter format takes up more space then 5.0.
The digital initiative and electronic document formats are for 4.0. Print is for 3.5.
Well, I understand that peoples could feel cheated and upset by the loss of the Dungeon magazine... They are losing scenarios support for the core WOC campaign world DnD(Greyhawk, FR and Eberron)...
This is indeed pretty bad... And I think that we can agree that almost all the adventures produced by WOC over the last 5 years have been a pale imitation of the great stories done by the Paizo Staff (even Paizo superstar Nicolas Logue's Voyage of the Golden Dragon adventure is less interesting than most of his Eberron's adventure in the Dungeon magazines)... so the adventures for 4e by WOC risk to reflect badly on 4E without the support of the Paizo crew... But Paizo no longer have the right to publish core DnD campaign scenarios... and nobody can’t do anything about it… so instead of complaining on the Paizo Board, write your disagreement to WOC and tell them that you won’t buy they products instead of telling exactly the same thing to Paizo like a lot are doing right now…
Even if you all recognize the quality of Paizo materials (writing, editing, mapping, creativity), almost half of you are telling/menacing them that you will stop buying their products if they follow the market with the 4e... For what reason exactly? I don't get it... Eric Mona is even proposing to add a conversion guide to all the folks who don't wish to convert to the new edition... You won't even have to do the conversion yourself...! Wonderful.. no? Are you telling Paizo to publish adventures for a game system that will no longer be supported?
My point is: The game system is irrelevant to a good adventure... Paizo publish adventures... not game system... Paizo crew could write DnD 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 3.5, 4.0, 4.8E or for True20 or Warhammer Fantasy RPG (and if you take a good look at the tone of the pathfinder adventures you will see more WFRPG elements than traditional DnD stuff) and I will buy their products anyway... And seriously I don't think you will find better DnD (don't care the system) adventures on the market for a couple of years, so your choices are simple: Stop buying WOC DnD Stuff cause you don't like 4e for whatever reason but keep buying excellent Paizo adventures in whatever game system they choose to follow (but frankly do they really have a marketing choice?) or don't buy Paizo adventures and do your homebrew or open your 100 dungeons magazine that you didn't had the time to read/play or simply stop playing DnD... And am I the only DM who still convert old 2nd adventures for my 3.5E campaign?
Disclaimer : I'm not a Paizo fan boy or staff member... and I'm not necessarily happy with the pathfinder actual format or their marketing model (I just don't see why they can't do 3-4 short adventures by magazines like the old Dungeons mag or why I must wait 3 weeks before the release of the pdf format for non-subscriber)... But this is for another discussion... :-)
I suspect that most 3.5 players won't tolerate the inconvenience either. I think 3.5 players are more likely to desire a print version of the books as we are older gamers who are more comfortable with the print format
What? Please don't presume that you represent the majority of older gamers and that we can't tolerate the inconvenience... Seriously, I can't understand you guys... We are in 2007, you are currently sending message on an Internet Board and you are telling me those old timers are more conformable with print format...? You really prefer to pay 5-7$ more for a printed adventure instead of a PDF that you can annotate/cut/paste as you wish? Well... this is not my case and I considered myself an old gamer having played a lot of RPG in the last 20 years...
What I am understanding is that instead of asking nicely Paizo to be the only support for your preferred game, you are using negative arguments and telling them that they will loose you as a customer and that you will cancel you subscription if they choose to change edition and support the majority their current and future customer...
If this is the case, and that the vast majority of 3.5E will stick to it like most seem to pretend on this board, why don't you all send a letter to paizo and tell them that you will all renew your subscription for another year if they publish 3.5E DnD adventures... I think that if they received enough subscription they could probably do something for you... But please stop using negative argumentation...
But I stick to my point... I think that game system is irrelevant to the quality/tone of the adventure that will be published by Paizo... You can do whatever you want with a game system... the tone of the pathfinder chronicles as, until now, nothing to do with Eberron, FR or even Greyhawk campaign setting and none of this campaign world are included in the Core DnD rule system... game mechanic != great storytelling... Paizo will include their own universe in their adventure whatever game system they are using... give them a little credit there...
I love converting stuff. It's part of the fun of the game for me. Playing RotRL with an all-goblin trollkin party is requiring a tonne of conversion work and I'm enjoying every minute. It looks I'm running Curse of the Crimson Throne using some sort of on-line diceless system, and I'm expecting to have a blast doing that.
I plan to buy 4.0, just like I've bought lots of other RPG systems. I expect the main group I'm with will keep playing 3.5, but we'll probably dabble in 4.0. If we decide to use D&D rules for a particular AP then we'll probably use whichever version of the rules Paizo used to write it. Otherwise I'll just convert it to Ars Magica or Bunnies & Burrows or whatever.
Presuming that 4e turns out to be as mechanically innovative and robust as it looks:
If Pathfinder goes 4e, I might as well just send Paizo my bank PIN.
If Pathfinder stays 3e but has 4e stats available in non-print, I'll stick with Pathfinder; god knows I tweak stat blocks often enough that I'm rarely ever running monsters out of the book anyways.
If Pathfinder stays 3e, then my continued use of Pathfinder hinges on exactly how complicated conversions (or, rather, recreations) would be.
Doesn't matter what they do with fluff, because not an ounce of the PHB fluff will have any bearing on the fluff in a game set in any campaign setting. (Also, I don't care about Forgotten Realms.)
Regarding the magazines, I'm at least as livid as anybody else (although rather less so now that I've got Pathfinder), but I'll be damned if I'm going to deny myself a game from a brilliant development team on account of an incompetent marketing team. Anybody who can say that PHBII was a bad book is certifiably insane, and I'd be giving funny looks to anybody who considered it less than excellent.
Finally, my favorite RPG supplement of all time is Shadowrun's "The Neo-Anarchist's Guide to Real Life". It's a gold standard of good design in a dozen ways; one of these is that the first 80% of the book is entirely in-setting (printouts of various catalogs and articles and Shadowrunner BBS commentary on them), and the last ten pages or so are just statblocks for all the stuff discussed earlier in the book. What's relevant at hand here is that all the stats were presented twice - once with 1e stats, and once in 2e.
Of course, that was equipment and not creatures...
It's a given that no matter what we won't be going along with some of the flavor changes coming out of WotC. The "tone" of Pathfinder is not going to change no matter what edition we go with.
That said, I'm curious about one thing.
Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?
Without a doubt, yes. As much as I love Pathfinder and Gamemastery so far, I simply don't have the time to devote to converting the information myself and find the time to DM the game.