Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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Apparently I duplicated a thread. Sorry.
To repeat what I said there, however:
I want it. And I want it badly.
I don't think much more needs to be said, but just in case Paizo is on the fence about this:
The singular strength of Pathfinder, and what allows it to keep it's "edge" in the fight against D&D (and it *is* a fight, polite and proper though the two combatants may be), is the presence of a hugely popular, and very well supported, organized play system.
Over two years ago (three?) I started a thread discussing the likely impact of 5e on PFS attendance. That thread grew contentious, so I will not link to it, but ultimately many of my concerns bore fruit. My PFS tables lost a great deal of players to the 5e OrgPlay events. WotC has been able to maintain that momentum by keeping things very loose and simple, which admittedly pushes many players back to PFS in the long run. But the number one thing that D&D's OrgPlay system does better than PFS by a long shot is attract brand new players to their game. By being loose and simple, there is very little for a new player to concern themselves with, beyond showing up. PFS - admit it - is complicated. Core PFS went a little ways toward addressing that, but unfortunately became more a vehicle for veterans to double their playing options than it is a way to attract new players. And because PFS and Pathfinder have had such a difficult time attracting NEW players, my PFS attendance continues to slip.
Starfinder could fix all that, and more. Savage Worlds has a large draw to their OrgPlay system (another one that is very loose and casual) due to the presence of sci-fi options. But many of those guys are often looking for more than the "one shot" experience that Savage Worlds tends to be. Fantasy Flight has completely dropped the ball on its (massively popular) Star Wars RPG by not having ANY OrgPlay system at all. Only Shadowrun offers a consistently good OrgPlay game, but their actual organizational structure (their real-world implementation, in other words) is terrible.
That paragraph contains a LOT of upside for a Starfinder OrgPlay game. And that's not even counting how much Paizo can attract simply due to the power of its own brands.
I truly believe that if Starfinder had been Paizo's response to 5e during that initial year of "D&D Next" then they would never have given up their position as the Top Selling RPG Publisher. Despite that, I think Starfinder (and a Starfinder Society campaign) could dramatically re-position this company.
I am really looking forward to being a part of that effort. I hope those plans are in the works.
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Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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Can this thread be merged with this thread?
If it has less sway in design/errata decisions than it does for Pathfinder, then I'm all for it.
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As for concerns of splitting the player base, I offer the ACG PFS as evidence that this will not happen. Sure, that system has taken some of the players away from the RPG side (most notably among them Painlord, himself). But there are a lot of new players that have come to that system for the play experience, and many of them have branched into PFS, itself.
I think it's funny that you feel the ACG took me away. I feel the ACG is has kept me in. :)
Count me on board with the Starfinder Corps name, as well. I put "Society" up there merely for the fact that it is a recognizable part of what we see as Organized Play.
I'm going to have a ton of thoughts about this later on, but about to fly home...and I'll be posting on this thread, Drogon rather than the other one.
I love this idea and my happiest thought about Starfinder Spaceparty (name is still TBD and that's going to be mine until I hear otherwise) is that it will be much better as a fan run and written project rather than having Paizo do it.
There are advantages and disadvantages to having it be fan run, but I sincerely feel that the project will be better as a fan run and managed thing rather than if Paizo does the campaign. I'm going to chew on those advantages as I fly back to SFO.
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I think that Starfinder Society or Starfinder Corps could work. Sometimes, players like different genres. Starfinder would probably be similar enough to Pathfinder so that players would adjust to a new system fairly easily.
I know that there would have to be a lot of work to support two organized play programs. I am curious how that would work, as there would have to be a balance between supporting an existing organized play program and starting another one.
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Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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As for concerns of splitting the player base, I offer the ACG PFS as evidence that this will not happen. Sure, that system has taken some of the players away from the RPG side (most notably among them Painlord, himself). But there are a lot of new players that have come to that system for the play experience, and many of them have branched into PFS, itself.I think it's funny that you feel the ACG took me away. I feel the ACG is has kept me in. :)
Heh. Fair point. But from my perspective, you're very rarely on the boards. From that point of view, you've certainly "gone away." But, yes, I can see where you continue to play Pathfinder largely by virtue of the ACG's existence.
Count me on board with the Starfinder Corps name, as well. I put "Society" up there merely for the fact that it is a recognizable part of what we see as Organized Play.I'm going to have a ton of thoughts about this later on, but about to fly home...and I'll be posting on this thread, Drogon rather than the other one.
I love this idea and my happiest thought about Starfinder Spaceparty (name is still TBD and that's going to be mine until I hear otherwise) is that it will be much better as a fan run and written project rather than having Paizo do it.
There are advantages and disadvantages to having it be fan run, but I sincerely feel that the project will be better as a fan run and managed thing rather than if Paizo does the campaign. I'm going to chew on those advantages as I fly back to SFO.
You have a lot of experience that I don't have, namely with the Living Greyhawk OrgPlay system. So I certainly understand why you want to see a fan driven system.
However, times have changed. Kickstarter, Amazon, virtual tabletops, gaming bars/cafes, and on-time stock levels are now the lay of the land in the RPG industry. If an OrgPlay system is run by the fan-base, then "loose" will be the name of the game (see D&D's current OrgPlay system, or Savage Worlds', or Shadowrun's, for reference). From the standpoint of a store owner, those two systems are a nightmare to deal with. D&D has no issues attracting new players; they have HUGE issues retaining those new players. Shadowrun is awesome at keeping their existing players involved, but has a massive problem attracting new players. Savage Worlds seems to be pretty good at both, but that game's organizers have an "elitist" mentality that keeps their organized play focused on conventions, rather than being run regularly on a local scale.
Paizo's handling of PFS is the only consistently good OrgPlay system I work with, outside Magic and WarMachine/Hordes (both company-run OrgPlay systems, as well).
Unless the direction and leadership are strong and consistent, organized play suffers greatly in this era of constantly shifting expectations. And fan-run systems like Living Greyhawk will have a hard time putting out that kind of direction and leadership, as is being proven with both D&D and Shadowrun.
Savage Worlds is actually an excellent example of what I *don't* want to see in OrgPlay. Kickstarters everywhere, free PDFs for all, design-your-own-game-setting-be-damned sessions abound (sometimes with wretchedly bad GMs inflicting their stories on unsuspecting players). It is all fan-driven, and while I sell a ton of the core rules (the "big five" are Explorer's Edition Rules, Fantasy Companion, Sci-Fi Companion, Horror Companion, and Super Powers Companion), it is unbelievably frustrating to deal with organizers, late-to-the-party publications everyone already has because they backed the Kickstarter, and regularly out-of-stock Core books.
PS: Have a good flight. I look forward to seeing your thoughts.
I have to say though, name Starfinder confuses me
I mean, stars are kinda easy to find in the "Look at the sky in the night" way. Name sounds kinda redundant in that way xD And searching for far away star is less exploring and more telescopes and satellites
The main purpose is to have marketing resonance with "Pathfinder".
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Im inclined to agree with a few previous posters. Paizo probably spends a lot on Pathfinder Society. Its a good marketing tool for everything they sell from the Core book down. But again its probably a hefty load of money and they might be at the point in regards to Starfinder that while they see there is a market for Science Fantasy it is a NOTORIOUSLY hard market to crack and hold.
The sad fact of the matter is that the core genre of gaming is Fantasy, Swords and Dragons et al. (and Im saying that as a fan of gaming that prefers scifi). Paizo would have to think there is a big enough market for Starfinder to get taken to production to begin with, but its unknown if the market will be there for anything remotely resembling PFS.
Again it's stateted above for marketing resonance with Pathfinder.
People picking up Starfinder would be
A) Those devoted people who buy everything Paizo puts out
B) People who try and get every rpg out there
C) People looking for something new to try.
D) People who like Science Fantasy settings (Which generally arnt the Hard Scifi Traveller type people). Its a niche within a niche
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RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
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I would like a Starfinder organized play, but only if it's structured different. I lost interest in PFS around season 3 or 4, and haven't played since. The focus on boons and character advancement is a turn off for casual (i.e. convention only) play. I certainly know many, many people love it and that's great.
Having a differently working OP option for Starfinder would still allow PFS to work as it does. I'd love to see a Starfinder OP focus on more interesting scenarios that have pre-gens with intertwined histories, possibly with competitive goals for some characters, or even the occasional PC who's a double agent and not always working with the rest of the party. Essentially a return to the style of con games that the RPGA used to have prior to Living City, with opens that were challenging dungeon crawls, and specials that were often something you'd never do for a non-one shot (playing insects, playing siblings trying to help a small village while proving worth to their father the King, an all wizard party, an all rogue party on a heist, etc.)
You could still integrate continuing stories by having the more standard adventures feature at least a sub-set of the same pre-gens, and have them level up ever 3 adventures, and use the one shots to tell different POVs that surround the main plot, and things like that.
Something like this would make me very interested in being involved, while a PFS clone set in Starfinder would likely not get me playing at all.
I'd like to see an organized play system for Starfinder, it be a hit in my area. It's a bit hard to predict what it should look like because that should be based on how the game turns out.
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Im inclined to agree with a few previous posters. Paizo probably spends a lot on Pathfinder Society. Its a good marketing tool for everything they sell from the Core book down. But again its probably a hefty load of money and they might be at the point in regards to Starfinder that while they see there is a market for Science Fantasy it is a NOTORIOUSLY hard market to crack and hold.
The sad fact of the matter is that the core genre of gaming is Fantasy, Swords and Dragons et al. (and Im saying that as a fan of gaming that prefers scifi). Paizo would have to think there is a big enough market for Starfinder to get taken to production to begin with, but its unknown if the market will be there for anything remotely resembling PFS.
RPGA ran at least two scifi Living Campaigns in it's day...Living Force, which was of course Star Wars d20 based, and there was one using the Alternity setting. Neither acheived anything close to the popularity of Living City, but Living Force, at least was more popular than the other fantasy network campaigns.
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I would like a Starfinder organized play, but only if it's structured different. I lost interest in PFS around season 3 or 4, and haven't played since. The focus on boons and character advancement is a turn off for casual (i.e. convention only) play. I certainly know many, many people love it and that's great.
Interestingly, I see very little focus on boons at the local level. People do get excited if there is a neat boon on a chronicle, or if they get to play a boon race, but most of the focus that I see locally is enjoying playing with your friends, or making new friends.
I'd love to see a Starfinder Corps, or SFS, but not because PFS is having trouble maintaining itself. In my area at least, just about every location is booming. We have a pretty vibrant PFS gaming community with lots of new people.
I want it because I'd like to do a bunch of space adventures with my wonderful crazy PFS community. I think that SFS would be a huge hit locally, and I could see us opening up another gaming day to accomodate it.
The biggest issue is the cost. There is staff time -- approving or disapproving material for the organized campaign, and creating a vibrant set of adventures that everyone can play.
Hmm
Names are rather superfluous but I have seen a few good ones. Maybe something like Exploration League or Seeker Corps. Right now I am just hoping and praying for it to be announced and I can sign up.
There still hasn't been a word on this officially right? I would like to reiterate what everyone said above, I would love to see SFS! As this system launches those quick scenarios would be a great way to try out several classes in a short amount of time. I know it's true for me, whenever I see the "what class do you want to play most" question a greedy voice in my head says 'all of them!