Lost my subscription discount

[ashwynfaust]

I have been a longtime subscriber for Adventure path. I recently swapped it over to starfinder adventure path and am now no longer receiving any discounts on my purchases.

[Some random person]

ashwynfaust wrote:

I have been a longtime subscriber for Adventure path. I recently swapped it over to starfinder adventure path and am now no longer receiving any discounts on my purchases.

The Starfinder subscription incentive works differently from the Pathfinder AP incentive. The Paizo advantage isn't available to people with just the Starfinder AP subscription.

The details are here.

You get it for subscribing to the Pathfinder AP or to all four of:

• the Starfinder RPG
  
• the Starfinder AP
  
• Starfinder Accessories
  
• Starfinder Maps

If you subscribe to all of these you will also be granted access to the Starfinder Society Scenarios for free.

[ashwynfaust]

That is fairly ridiculous. So in Pathfinder land you save 30% on the AP cover price AND you get 15% off, but in Starfinder land you pay full price for the AP AND you have to subscribe to three other subscriptions to get the SAME discount? How does that actually incentivize the subscription? Sounds like I will stop the subscription and stop wasting money.

[Some random person]

ashwynfaust wrote:

That is fairly ridiculous. So in Pathfinder land you save 30% on the AP cover price AND you get 15% off, but in Starfinder land you pay full price for the AP AND you have to subscribe to three other subscriptions to get the SAME discount? How does that actually incentivize the subscription? Sounds like I will stop the subscription and stop wasting money.

Bear in mind I'm just speculating and I don't have any inside information. I think there's two points to bear in mind:

First is that a subscription to the Pathfinder AP amounts to $300 pa worth of stock (undiscounted). A subscription to the Starfinder AP amounts to $137.94 pa. It makes sense that they would offer a far greater incentive to the first than to the second just on a cost basis alone.

The second is that the two products aren't analogous from a business perspective.

The PFAPs are a well established line with a large volume of sales each month (meaning low print costs and higher margins). It's the product which keeps the lights on and pays the core staff salaries - they really want to incentivise this product to stay in business.

The SFAPs are a smaller print run selling into what they expected would be a smaller market. Its an experiment for them and has incurred significant risk. They are happy for people to pick and choose bits and bobs, but they can't afford to incentivise it too heavily, or people may switch out of the PF AP (buying $300 pa for a product with high print runs and low margins) for a SF AP (buying $140 pa for a product yielding poorer margins).

We each have to make our own choices, of course (and remember that although the $130 of free SF Scenarios is not valuable to everyone - it is a significant perk to many and is an "extra" compared to the PF offering).

It's not surprising though that the product with a proven track record and well established market is more heavily incentivised than a speculative foray like Starfinder. They don't really want people to switch between PFAP and SFAP subscriptions willy nilly, so they can't reasonably offer the identical benefits.

[Some random person]

I will say that it's been a huge hit for them - clearly bigger than they anticipated. If that holds up for a year or two, there's a better than even chance that they'll rejig things like their release rate, subscription structure and so forth. That'd be a way off though, I'd guess.

[ashwynfaust]

From a business stand point, offering incentives to get players to buy into a new game creates repeat customers. People are already bought into Pathfinder and have shown they will continue to comeback for more and more content. There is a reason why product provides offer new customer discounts and lower cost for newer products. They are trying to create a fan base/customer base.

But at the end of the day, it doesn't make sense to my pocket book to pay full price for the AP to get a book that will collect dust (I run almost exclusively from PDFs). Since Paizo is demonstrating that they don't value their Starfinder customers, might as well rollback my spending on the product.

[captain yesterday]

I still play both games, and while it would've been nice to not have to subscribe to four product lines to keep pathfinder advantage, I'm alright with having to keep my AP sub.

[Diego Valdez]

Hello Ashwynfaust,

The other posters are correct. The Paizo Advantage discount comes from either a subscription to the Pathfinder Adventure Path, or a subscription to all 4 physical Starfinder lines. You mentioned that you may cancel your subscription, did you want me to do that?

[ashwynfaust]

Diego Valdez wrote:

Hello Ashwynfaust,

The other posters are correct. The Paizo Advantage discount comes from either a subscription to the Pathfinder Adventure Path, or a subscription to all 4 physical Starfinder lines. You mentioned that you may cancel your subscription, did you want me to do that?

Yes. It is just not of any benefit for me to be subscribed without any discount attached to it.

[Rysky the Dark Solarion]

The free PDF?

[Diego Valdez]

Hello Ashwynfaust,

Your subscription has been cancelled. You will be receiving an email confirmation.