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No doubt with the launch of PF2 you took the opportunity to discuss the policy/approach you've taken in PF1's life. Are you able to share any news as to how you will approach the issuing of FAQ/Errata? Will the approach be the same as PF1? Completely new? Different in some ways?
I'm specifically interested in the policy as it applies to printed books, but this has proved a semi-controversial topic over the years, so I daresay it would be interesting in a broader context for those who use PDFs or the various online resources.
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The elimination of the Player Companion line and the apparent dedication of more adult supervision to the campaign setting replacement line should reduce the frequency of "are you kidding me with this" nonsense published as well as making everything eligible for whatever error correction process they deign to engage in at infrequent intervals.
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The elimination of the Player Companion line and the apparent dedication of more adult supervision to the campaign setting replacement line should reduce the frequency of "are you kidding me with this" nonsense published as well as making everything eligible for whatever error correction process they deign to engage in at infrequent intervals.
Yeah, that's one reason I'm glad that campaign setting & player companion will be folded into the larger, less frequent world guides.
Both more focus to get the product right, and easier to actually follow up with FAQ/errata as needed.
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It is obvious that Paizo had this merger of the Player Companion and Campaign Setting lines planned for a long time, at least since they reduced their publication frequencies to alternating months and started blurring the contents a bit between them.
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No doubt with the launch of PF2 you took the opportunity to discuss the policy/approach you've taken in PF1's life. Are you able to share any news as to how you will approach the issuing of FAQ/Errata? Will the approach be the same as PF1? Completely new? Different in some ways?
Honestly I'd be surprised if they'd formulated a clear policy yet. From everything they've been saying, it sounds like a mad scramble to finish the products for launch. I imagine policy work like this is probably on-hold at least until the books are off to the printer.
But yes, definitely interested to hear if there will be a more stable FAQ/errata policy than the unreliable ad hoccery we've seen in the past.
Chief Creative Officer, Publisher
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The elimination of the Player Companion line and the apparent dedication of more adult supervision to the campaign setting replacement line should reduce the frequency of "are you kidding me with this" nonsense published as well as making everything eligible for whatever error correction process they deign to engage in at infrequent intervals.
A less mean version of this.
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A less mean version of this.
Cheers. I should’ve thought through this thread a little more before posting I think.
To be clear about my reason for asking - I’m going to get at least three books at launch, but maybe up to half a dozen. I note that the PF1 CRB hasn’t been updated in a long time and the Core Rulebook line in general has noticeably slowed the rate of updated printings.
I’m curious if that’s the new normal or if it’s a sign of diminishing returns at the end of an edition’s life. (I meant no disrespect and was making no comment on the need for FAQs).
It’ll probably impact on how many books I get at launch, but not make any difference in the long run.
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The elimination of the Player Companion line and the apparent dedication of more adult supervision to the campaign setting replacement line should reduce the frequency of "are you kidding me with this" nonsense published as well as making everything eligible for whatever error correction process they deign to engage in at infrequent intervals.A less mean version of this.
That would be a less mean version of your current policy! Thanks.
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Speaking as someone who has to rely on OFFICIAL ERRATA and FAQs for answers professionally every day please let me say...
The system that exists works well enough in terms of navigating to and finding the Errata but the rate and frequency of things being added to the Errata and FAQ listings has been SEVERELY lacking in the last two years.
I hope for your own sake as well as my own that some newer, unified FAQ system and scheduled review period to evaluate problematic Content/RAW/RAI would be awesomely and immensely appreciated.
The death of the smaller more granular companions is a welcome decision that I'm for some reason just now finding out about here that I applaud, and a great first step.
IMO Paizo would do itself a big favor if they just hired 1 person FT for 50k~ a year salary to JUST review FAQs and Errata and take transit those questions and answers between the upper dev team and the customers as their own task.
The metric system is right - both post above and the actual metric system. Handling of FAQ/Errata is important. :D
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IMO Paizo would do itself a big favor if they just hired 1 person FT for 50k~ a year salary to JUST review FAQs and Errata and take transit those questions and answers between the upper dev team and the customers as their own task.
A full time position for ensuring that a bunch of opinionated forum-going nerds are maybe, perhaps, possibly, a bit less problematic while 80% of your customers aren't even aware that there are any errata/FAQs being issued?
Poor ROI.
Also, 50k annually for an entry-level job in tabletop gaming industry. Oh, I laughed.
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Yeah, pride in their work is the only realistic motivation they should have to issue FAQ/errata.
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Yeah, pride in their work is the only realistic motivation they should have to issue FAQ/errata.Not really. Customer service/player engagement, especially in light of the organized play campaign, provides an excellent reason to want a steady FAQ process.
A tiny percentage of players are even aware of FAQs and a small percentage of those will actually reduce future purchases based on this.
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Combining the two splatbook lines seems like a good decision.
Really, I just want whatever FAQ system exists to be searchable without having to click on every individual book and then use CTRL-F. I just want to be able to type into a search box something like “spell combat” and then see all the FAQs that mention spell combat, regardless of what book they are for.
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I'm hoping that we're just done with relying on FAQs/Errata to fix stuff, just because everything is supposed to be a lot clearer in the new system.
So FAQs are going to be things like "Do I apply the MAP to the second attack in a flurry of blows?" not "If I combine these six feats, what is my Magus doing with his hands?"
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No, the tone was correct. Paizo has earned it.The elimination of the Player Companion line and the apparent dedication of more adult supervision to the campaign setting replacement line should reduce the frequency of "are you kidding me with this" nonsense published as well as making everything eligible for whatever error correction process they deign to engage in at infrequent intervals.A less mean version of this.
Thanks for making my point.
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Is it just me that personally does not care for the Eratta's? I like that sometimes things are not very well balanced. For example the summoner Eidolon was really buff (compared to unchained)but it was rarely played by my players. I never saw a problem with it. Same thing with stuff like the trait ancestral weapon. I always found that erratta's were excessive and took the shine off stuff and almost always made it less then useful. In other words I liked that there was the random really strong stuff. It's not like every character took ancestral weapon because of it.
I know this is off topic, and there should always be Errattas and Faqs to fix problems and clarify subjects. I just wish there was not so much heavy handed balancing.
Is it just me that personally does not care for the Eratta's? I like that sometimes things are not very well balanced. For example the summoner Eidolon was really buff (compared to unchained)but it was rarely played by my players. I never saw a problem with it. Same thing with stuff like the trait ancestral weapon. I always found that erratta's were excessive and took the shine off stuff and almost always made it less then useful. In other words I liked that there was the random really strong stuff. It's not like every character took ancestral weapon because of it.
I know this is off topic, and there should always be Errattas and Faqs to fix problems and clarify subjects. I just wish there was not so much heavy handed balancing.
I agree with you in theory, but in practice, it can be a problem if the imbalance is too great. What has ended up happening in my games with an imbalanced PC (let's call him "Bob"), is an imbalance that is too great tends to feature the PC the imbalance favors and diminishes the enjoyment of the game for those who play PCs that are less powerful. It's one thing if the power curve shifts over time (whereas, say, a spellcaster is weak for part of the campaign, but dominates at the end), but if a PC is overly powerful from start to finish, other PCs may feel like they are not needed. "Why bother engaging if every encounter becomes the Bob show?"
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Perhaps naming a price point was not exactly wise but the position itself I TRULY believe would be an important and valuable one.
Someone who has the tact to discuss, document, and organize reported issues with their products POST-RELEASE and work to communicate with the authors and "math people" who should be in charge of balance, exploits, and even minor typos should be something that is valued. Sure, it would be a tough job ferrying all of this information between the customers and the developers but there NEEDS to be someone dedicated to that role full-time if they want to really take it seriously... instead of treating the FAQs and Errata as a "gimme" pickup job for folks who ran out of stuff to do at their office which... I'm not saying is ACTUALLY the case right now... but it sure FEELS that way sometimes.
I also don't think 50k FT with benefits is out of the scope for an appropriate salary given how expensive it is to live in Redmont, in fact 50k is almost EXACTLY the median individual income for residents of said locality soo.... yeah, they need to be paid well enough to pay rent, insurance, transportation, other taxes, other insurance, etc for the area.
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RPG jobs are underpaid because RPG fans won’t pay sufficient prices to support creators and other staff appropriately.
Our hobby exists and thrives to the level it does thanks to the charity of those willing to sustain it in their spare time - both 3PPs and those who work for major publishers. Many need to pick up freelance work on top of their regular 9-5.
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I also don't think 50k FT with benefits is out of the scope for an appropriate salary given how expensive it is to live in Redmont, in fact 50k is almost EXACTLY the median individual income for residents of said locality soo.... yeah, they need to be paid well enough to pay rent, insurance, transportation, other taxes, other insurance, etc for the area.
A game developer at Paizo is 30-40k. And that's a creative position with some experience required. You're talking video game industry money.
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RPG jobs are underpaid because RPG fans won’t pay sufficient prices to support creators and other staff appropriately.
Our hobby exists and thrives to the level it does thanks to the charity of those willing to sustain it in their spare time - both 3PPs and those who work for major publishers. Many need to pick up freelance work on top of their regular 9-5.
That and it's a really, really, REALLY niche business compared to board games, let alone CCGs. Video games exist on another planet.
You want those people to earn 50k? Pucker up, buy the stuff instead of relying on open content/pirated PDFs and get new people into the hobby, because the only way to make the industry more lucrative is to increase its size.
Bringing in new players is a great way to help support the industry if you don’t have the budget to buy lots of books.
It’s still a good thing for you to do - growing the community will unavoidably bring in people with antisocial traits. It’s nonetheless better than not growing the community. If possible, it’s also good to do what you can to convert the antisocial converts to positive members of the community. Their behaviour isn’t your responsibility but you may well have some ability to educate them as to the harm they’re causing.
I doubt your sincerity, sir.
Allow me to FAQ that for you - I am entirely sincere.
Someone who has the tact to discuss, document, and organize reported issues with their products POST-RELEASE and work to communicate with the authors and "math people" who should be in charge of balance, exploits, and even minor typos should be something that is valued. Sure, it would be a tough job ferrying all of this information between the customers and the developers but there NEEDS to be someone dedicated to that role full-time if they want to really take it seriously... instead of treating the FAQs and Errata as a "gimme" pickup job for folks who ran out of stuff to do at their office which... I'm not saying is ACTUALLY the case right now... but it sure FEELS that way sometimes.
It wouldn't work. The bottleneck isn't collection of information and delivering it to decision makers, it's the time of those decision makers, the inability of the decision making process (requiring unanimity among the design team) to resolve many questions, and especially the costs involved in actually implementing FAQs/errata. Those costs include customer backlash from the FAQ resolution (which may be greater than the pain caused by just ignoring the issue in many cases), layout for errata in a book receiving a new printing, and morale inside Paizo.
The morale issue arises as we move from a world where those with sufficient pattern recognition can spot the weak and strong Paizo employees/freelancers from the frequency of issues in books they developed or rules that they've acknowledged writing, to a world where Paizo is explicitly overruling those issues enough to have impartially generated statistics on which developers/writers are poor enough to have their work fixed with the highest frequency. It's like how I'd know which were the particularly bad US federal court of appeals judges and circuits even without statistics, but being able to point at their rate of being overturned by the Supreme Court is helpful when discussing them with those in denial.
So Paizo has absolutely been doing the right thing in not doing much about the FAQ/errata issues. With the new rigid keyword system in PF2 a lot of issues should go away and be much easier to fix when they get dropped out by accident. And by having a much blander and simpler rules set with explicit limits, the problematic Player Companions with their creative and out there options (for both good and ill) don't make as much sense.
The future is looking like the best of both worlds, a PF2 FAQ/errata problem that is low enough to make me happy, and a comical Starfinder FAQ/errata problem that will still entertain me.
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Frankly a full-time job dealing with people acting like you would need more than 50k a year.A tiny percentage of players are even aware of FAQs and a small percentage of those will actually reduce future purchases based on this.Yeah, pride in their work is the only realistic motivation they should have to issue FAQ/errata.Not really. Customer service/player engagement, especially in light of the organized play campaign, provides an excellent reason to want a steady FAQ process.The difficulty in being the FAQ/Errata guy wouldn't be in dealing with customers, but in dealing with inside egos who have to face up to the fact that they were responsible for publishing stuff like Sacred Geometry feat, the Shifter class, the (HH) Pact Wizard, Glimpse of the Akashic spell, and too many duplicate/reused names to count that demonstrate either an inability to use google competently or to care about their work sufficiently.
It's no wonder that management decided to severely limit their employees' ability to go rogue or live down to the lowest common denominator by canceling the softcover companion line rather than deal with cleaning it up afterwards. It's also no surprise it took this long. Sure, it earned them lots of frustration and a fair share of derision and mockery, but I doubt it cost them very much money. Excellence just costs too much money to be worth it in many fields.
But I come not to bury Paizo, but to praise them. Don't regret 10 years of missed opportunities and frequent uncorrected embarrassments, get hype about a much greater degree of minimal competence in the future!
We liked and used Sacred Geometry and the Pact Wizard, and we, in our group find the shifter a well-balanced class. In a game when you can do whatever you want, someone choosing to exploit the rules its such a pointless thing, and I might add, a thing that only happens in the message boards or by the most avid rule abusers. FAQ and Erratas are good to help in confusing wording and typos, but balance is a complex thing, that varies from group to group, are you that arrogant to think that you can be the judge of that?. At this point, I can do pretty much whatever I like with the rules, finding exploits is easy, finding overpowered stuff is easy, break the system is easy... doing it is pointless. I don't find sincere your last statement as well.
Just for the record, Sacred Geometry is not broken in the sense of "it's overpowered" (although it is), it is rather broken in the sense of "it does not do what the designer intended it to do" - past a certain level, the chance of it working actually becomes 100%.
In cases like that, I would think errata would be absolutely warranted.
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I think the biggest problem with sacred geometry is not that it is outrageously powerful, but that it encourages slow play.
I think the biggest problem with sacred geometry is not that it is outrageously powerful, but that it encourages slow play.
That, also. It is just... arguably the worst feat in all of 1e.
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Just for the record, Sacred Geometry is not broken in the sense of "it's overpowered" (although it is), it is rather broken in the sense of "it does not do what the designer intended it to do" - past a certain level, the chance of it working actually becomes 100%.
In cases like that, I would think errata would be absolutely warranted.
8 ranks is all it takes