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While there are other threads asking what people want to see in the Chronicles or Companion lines, with the recent change to the Council of Thieves Player's Guide, a question that has been nagging at me has become more relevant.
Looking at the products, there seems to be some focus issues.
Companion
Player's Guides (ended, 2 products, 4 if you count the first two which are placed with their adventure paths)
Race Guides (1 released, 1 pending)
Nation Guides (1 released, 4 pending)
Chronicles
Setting Books (1 big, 1 little)
Monsters Revisited (1 released, 3 pending)
More Monsters (1 pending - Princes of Darkness)
Map Folios (3 released, 2 pending)
City Guides (2 released, 1 pending)
Regional Guides (2 released)
Nations Guides (2 pending)
Organization Guide (1 pending)
Other (1 released, 1 pending - D&M, The Great Beyond)
Obviously already released books cannot have their type changed, but there seems to be a bit of crossover with the nation and region guides, as well as some changing naming conventions.
All of that makes me wonder what line, what size, and what name I can expect to see on various products.
Would it be fair to encapsulate your main issue thus: What is (now) the difference between a Chronicle and a Companion?
The main concern being content expectations?
Chief Technical Officer
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All of that makes me wonder what line, what size, and what name I can expect to see on various products.
It might help you to think of the Pathfinder Companion as an analog of a themed, player-centric issue of Dragon magazine. The main message is: "Here's 32 pages of cool stuff about [dwarves, Cheliax, or whatever] that players can use."
The Pathfinder Chronicles line includes sourcebooks and other accessories that provide a more thorough overview of their topic, and they may contain sections that players shouldn't see. Most often, books will be 64 pages, but when they need to be bigger, they'll be bigger.
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It might help you to think of the Pathfinder Companion as an analog of a themed, player-centric issue of Dragon magazine. The main message is: "Here's 32 pages of cool stuff about [dwarves, Cheliax, or whatever] that players can use."
I know the basic ad copy, but it is not helping.
What I keep seeing are some nation guides are "complete" with DM and player information and some are not.Or, more directly to the way I look at it, some just have a bunch of rules options and light background material, and others are more comprehensive sourcebooks, making me question the value of the ones that are less than comprehensive.
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CEO
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It might help you to think of the Pathfinder Companion as an analog of a themed, player-centric issue of Dragon magazine. The main message is: "Here's 32 pages of cool stuff about [dwarves, Cheliax, or whatever] that players can use."I know the basic ad copy, but it is not helping.
What I keep seeing are some nation guides are "complete" with DM and player information and some are not.
Or, more directly to the way I look at it, some just have a bunch of rules options and light background material, and others are more comprehensive sourcebooks, making me question the value of the ones that are less than comprehensive.
Hey Sam:
I think the editorial department would agree that we haven't been the most consistent to date with the distinction between the two lines. About a month ago, we had a meeting where we hashed the differences out, so I think you will start seeing a better distinction starting at the end of 2009 going forward.
-Lisa
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It might help you to think of the Pathfinder Companion as an analog of a themed, player-centric issue of Dragon magazine. The main message is: "Here's 32 pages of cool stuff about [dwarves, Cheliax, or whatever] that players can use." The Pathfinder Chronicles line includes sourcebooks and other accessories that provide a more thorough overview of their topic, and they may contain sections that players shouldn't see. Most often, books will be 64 pages, but when they need to be bigger, they'll be bigger.
This is pretty much how I viewed them.
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Creative Director
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We want to get regional guides out for all five Pathfinder Society regions. We'll hit that goal this year with Andoran's release.
As for the actual contents, that's something that we're still refining. Osirion had too much GM content and no character trait stuff, for example. That doesn't make the Osirion book bad, of course... it's pretty much exactly what we asked the authors to provide and they did a great job, I think.
The Legacy of Fire Pathfinder Companion is a lot closer to where we want to be going with these books.
Here's how I would break down our four lines of Golarion products:
Pathfinder Adventure Path: A canned campaign for you, complete with detailed adventures from 1st to 15th level and all the support material you need to run the campaign.
Pathfinder Module: A one-shot canned adventure. Sometimes part of a loosely-connected series of adventures.
Pathfinder Chronicle: A book that expands upon the world, aimed primarily at GMs but with lots of information that players can check out too.
Pathfinder Companion; A book that explores one subject in Golarion, be that a race, a location, a religion, an organization, a type of magic, or whatever. So far, we've only done race and location companions, but once we cover the five Pathfinder Society regions and now that we're moving away from double-dutying them as AP Player's Guides, come 2010 we should be able to start diversifying a bit more. I could see a "Swashbuckler's Companion" or a "Gnome Companion" or a "Nex Companion" or a "Survivalist's Companion" or a "Hellknight Companion." (NOTE: None of those are announced or in the works yet; they're just idle examples.) In any case, these will focus on material that players AND GMs can use to expand their Golarion experience—I'd like to keep GM secrets in them to a minimum, but that might take us a few more to reach.
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now that we're moving away from double-dutying them as AP Player's Guides, come 2010 we should be able to start diversifying a bit more. I could see a "Swashbuckler's Companion" or a "Gnome Companion" or a "Nex Companion" or a "Survivalist's Companion" or a "Hellknight Companion." (NOTE: None of those are announced or in the works yet; they're just idle examples.) In any case, these will focus on material that players AND GMs can use to expand their Golarion experience—I'd like to keep GM secrets in them to a minimum, but that might take us a few more to reach.
Well then, let me be the first to suggest a companion...
The Seoni Companion...
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Ok.. I was joking.. a companion that focuses on the Iconics would be cool though. At a 32 page count, that's 2.5 pages per Iconic.. backstory and such would really be well.. awesome. Could call it the Hero's Companion or something like that. The two supplements that TSR did for AD&D back in the day for the Realms that focused on all the Heroes and then all the Villains were really popular; the Heroes' Lorebook and the Villains' Lorebook.
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Chief Technical Officer
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I could see a "Swashbuckler's Companion" or a "Gnome Companion" or a "Nex Companion" or a "Survivalist's Companion" or a "Hellknight Companion." (NOTE: None of those are announced or in the works yet; they're just idle examples.)
I'd like to clarify that a Gnome Companion should never appeal *solely* to players of gnome PCs. Every volume should have something useful for PCs of any race or class, in much the same way that Elves of Golarion wasn't exclusively written for elf PCs.
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I'd like to clarify that a Gnome Companion should never appeal *solely* to players of gnome PCs. Every volume should have something useful for PCs of any race or class, in much the same way that Elves of Golarion wasn't exclusively written for elf PCs.
Right.. it was written for all the Dwarves that want to wear elf ear necklaces. :P