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Back in my day, capslock was how you opened the capsule you were trapped inside to escape to the post-apocalyptic world above.
Dude, Caps Lock is for keeping the mutants out of the capsule.
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Ha, when I was young, if you weren't making your forum thread titles in 133t, you weren't worthy of a response.
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Ha, when I was young, if you weren't making your forum thread titles in 133t, you weren't worthy of a response.at least you had more numerals and letters to work with.
when i was young, we just had to work with 0 and 1s
Well then you were lucky!
We used to dream of using 0s and 1s!
Back in my day we only had 0s, and we liked it.
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Seriously, just make an errata page on your website and update it every week. There's absolutely no good reason to make us wait so long. It's 2019, not 1989.I think it's so people don't say "Did you see the PF2 errata? We'll be using it in the next game!" and the reply is "Which version? I have version 1.0, but I heard the latest is 2.7 already, and 3.0 is coming next week…"
Obviously there's a tension between too often and too seldom. But I don't think saving everything up until you have everything is a good idea. We were still picking at the seams of the PF1 CRB almost a decade after release.
In particular, I don't think postponing all the easy to do clarifications/errata until you've solved all the intractable ones is a good idea.
Something like say, once per month errata with whatever has been solved that month, seems like a decent balance point. Suppose the first Tuesday of every month was FAQ day. That gives plenty of time the rest of the week if something catches fire. It's also something people can rely on ("no sudden changes in the middle of the month").
I like to compare RPGs to software. RPGs are software run on human minds. We hate updating our workstations, and we're not too wild about frequently updating our minds either. But we also want that painful bug to go away and to get that usability improvement.
In software, the Waterfall Model[/ur] of development where you try to do a task all at once, is considered fairly archaic and only suitable for projects with a very high CYA index, like aviation or medicine. In most other fields [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_design]Iterative Design is more common, where you try to finish something usable every spring (2-4 weeks).
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I like to compare RPGs to software. RPGs are software run on human minds. We hate updating our workstations, and we're not too wild about frequently updating our minds either. But we also want that painful bug to go away and to get that usability improvement.
This is an interesting comparison, because literally anyone can apply their own "unofficial patches" to annoying bugs if they want (it's literally open source). Just glance through almost any forum thread discussing the rules and you'll see several alternative approaches for a thing. Even better, these localized homebrew patches won't impact anyone else, so they can be updated right away if they cause problems.
The Paizo devs have also been writing the equivalent of a "dev kit" with the Gamemastery Guide to make it even easier for people to customize the game to their needs.
And, on top of that, no one pays for the patches. There are no support contracts that cover the designers' salaries to issue updates to the rules. Those costs have to be weighed against the value of spending that time on writing new content, and book margins aren't the same as those on software.
It's also worth comparing Paizo's model to hardware manufacturers because no matter what happens, a book that's already been printed doesn't actually incorporate the updates, and it makes sense from a project management standpoint to plan the iterative improvements for those new "hardware" releases. "Agile" hardware development leaves early adopters in the cold.
And then there are Paizo's multiple business partners (licensees) that have to receive and apply the official updates, which have to be incorporated into their actual software release schedules.
TLDR; Paizo is a book publisher, and books aren't actually "software run on human minds." Iterative design requires longer intervals for physical products that have multi-year development cycles, as the 2E core rules did. What do you think the Playtest was?
Seriously, just make an errata page on your website and update it every week. There's absolutely no good reason to make us wait so long. It's 2019, not 1989.Because rpgs are complex and confusing people with rapid errata is a dumb move.
Waiting and catching more is a better option in this case.
Also, it isn't like the people who would be writing it aren't doing other things.
Every six months and placed in a well-known place is not an issue to keep up. The thing is, currently, it's very hard to hear about erratas and find them.
For example, the best place I've found for PF1e erratas was in this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder_RPG/comments/6whkeh/paizo_faq_compendiu m/
Because it's not very intuitive, to say the least, to find errata.I'm pretty sure that if there's enough information circulating about it and the page is well organized and easy to find and search, then it's definitely possible.
Nobody is asking for a online game level of patches, but a regular errata (if they're necessary) can be very welcome, specially regarding the developers' words on some controversial rules that need to be taken as intended rather than written.
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Yeah, I was trying to say more like having one place where all of this fixes could be searched and seen.
Basically, patch notes you can see in any regularly updated game. With games it often covers balancing changes and bug fixes, for a tabletop it would be FAQ and Errata, with "balance" being covered in both.
I just want to have all classes, feats and items in a good spot to be used, I just think it's lame to not be able to play a concept simply because it will not perform well or, worse, simple doesn't work in some cases.
If there's any actual change purely based on balance (some buffs or changes to make something more appealing), I would be beyond pleased. It's better than having a lot of house rules, it's not every GM that's willing to allow stuff like that and having an official word certainly opens up possibilities.
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Also, it's worth calling out that they specifically have talked about wanting to improve the way FAQs/errata are handled with this edition. Obviously we don't know what that means, yet, but it's not like they aren't aware that there's a vocal contingent who wants more/faster updates, and clear rulings for Society play.
I'm going to wait until Friday's stream before being disappointed that they haven't found a way to clone Mark and make him spend all day on the forums or livestreams answering rules questions and telling fun playtest anecdotes.
The real question is how long would it take for clone Mark to be so out of the loop that his answers stopped being as informed? It seems like you'd have to clone another one, and probably should get all the other designers too, and some developers as needed.
Hm. That's a lot of cloning.
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If paizo could offer up a product that was either a Mark clone or Mark AI (i’m Imagining something like a Max Headrone, or in this case Mark Headrone), that could sit at the table with you, answer questions and offer witty banter, it would be even more the most incredible RPG company of all time.
PS: is the Mark Headrone Halloween costume available for purchase?
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Those of you asking for frequent errata need to understand there is indirect tension with those asking for error free books.
Software is released buggy because the bar for updates is low; the bar for updates needs to be low because software is released so buggy - it's a vicious cycle.
Either Paizo is going to have to move to some godawful horrifically annoying online subscription model (where you don't own the book but own the rights to view it) so they can patch on the fly, or people are going to have to understand that books cannot be errataed as quickly as online software can be patched and are going to have to accept longer timelines for books coming out because they have to double- and triple-check them for errors.
I don't know which group is bigger, the crowd that wishes Paizo would be more careful, or the crowd Paizo would be more quick. But this is definitely a case of "faster, better, cheaper - choose two."
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Those of you asking for frequent errata need to understand there is indirect tension with those asking for error free books.
Software is released buggy because the bar for updates is low; the bar for updates needs to be low because software is released so buggy - it's a vicious cycle.
Either Paizo is going to have to move to some godawful horrifically annoying online subscription model (where you don't own the book but own the rights to view it) so they can patch on the fly, or people are going to have to understand that books cannot be errataed as quickly as online software can be patched and are going to have to accept longer timelines for books coming out because they have to double- and triple-check them for errors.
I don't know which group is bigger, the crowd that wishes Paizo would be more careful, or the crowd Paizo would be more quick. But this is definitely a case of "faster, better, cheaper - choose two."
Why can't it be like it is currently, with fixes and changes coming in at a reasonable pace?
It's their game now, not just a different version of 3.5. They have the power and opportunity to make the changes without worrying about years of material and janky design. Better start keeping things on tracks now than wait years and only book reprints to fix stuff. It's healthier for organized play as well, because the rules are way more important there than for home groups.
Nobody is expecting the same pace of a computer game, at least no reasonable person would, but it would be nice to know that once in a while you can expect some changes and fixes that would otherwise take years and patchwork house rules to make it work or to clarify.
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I feel like a significant amount of the wait time to get the first set of corrections or clarifications is just due to the designers trying to figure out how to best disseminate this information.
It should probably be more often than "when the book is reprinted", since hypothetically the initial order for PF2 CRBs was very large, and some later books might never need reprinting. But the FAQ system in PF1 was ultimately not very good at its job either. So they needed to figure out something in between those two things.
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I like to compare RPGs to software. RPGs are software run on human minds. We hate updating our workstations, and we're not too wild about frequently updating our minds either. But we also want that painful bug to go away and to get that usability improvement.This is an interesting comparison, because literally anyone can apply their own "unofficial patches" to annoying bugs if they want (it's literally open source). Just glance through almost any forum thread discussing the rules and you'll see several alternative approaches for a thing. Even better, these localized homebrew patches won't impact anyone else, so they can be updated right away if they cause problems.
Yes, anyone can patch their home game, but I want a bit more than that:
- PFS does need homogenous rules. If I go on holiday to Germany I can bring some characters and play with the locals, because we're using the same rules. But we'll also need the same rule patches.
- New books are written based on the existing ones, especially the CRB. If the CRB has a bug in it, any books written later that use that part of the rules will also be hindered by it.
The Paizo devs have also been writing the equivalent of a "dev kit" with the Gamemastery Guide to make it even easier for people to customize the game to their needs.
And, on top of that, no one pays for the patches. There are no support contracts that cover the designers' salaries to issue updates to the rules. Those costs have to be weighed against the value of spending that time on writing new content, and book margins aren't the same as those on software.
Nobody pays for them directly, but people are more likely to buy expansions to a good game than to a flawed game.
Are you more likely to buy a game with good reviews or one with bad reviews because it's got painful bugs that could have been easily fixed?
It's also worth comparing Paizo's model to hardware manufacturers because no matter what happens, a book that's already been printed doesn't actually incorporate the updates, and it makes sense from a project management standpoint to plan the iterative improvements for those new "hardware" releases. "Agile" hardware development leaves early adopters in the cold.
Yeah, there's a tension between physical books which are harder to update, and the PDF sales channel. But even for physical books, for years Paizo has used the stock phrase in FAQs "change X to Y. This will be reflected in the next printing".
Also, given how insanely high shipping and import costs are on stuff you order overseas from Paizo, and how unreliable import firms are, I think Paizo should investigate the Print on Demand methods of for example DriveThruRPG. Maybe massive print runs are not the best way to do things anymore.
And then there are Paizo's multiple business partners (licensees) that have to receive and apply the official updates, which have to be incorporated into their actual software release schedules.
TLDR; Paizo is a book publisher, and books aren't actually "software run on human minds." Iterative design requires longer intervals for physical products that have multi-year development cycles, as the 2E core rules did. What do you think the Playtest was?
The playtest was a beautiful display of how not to test in production. A module designed to inform designers, not to be pleasant for users; massive upheavals every two weeks. That's absolutely not what I'm proposing.
I'm proposing regular small amounts of change, instead of packages so big they never get done.
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I think it's important to remember that it's not so simple for a publisher as "just set aside x time to look for errors." It's not always things as straightforward as "we meant this power to do X thing, not Y thing." Some of that stuff has to come through multiple pipelines, like the forums and product reviews, for them to even be aware of it. They can't sit and continue playtesting the rules all day to make sure they got everything.
Secondly, as someone mentioned earlier, setting aside time to dig for errors means pulling those people away from other projects. Paizo isn't just working on the stuff you know about; development starts a year or more before the product is even announced. They have a lot of irons in a lot of fires to get things ready. I bet dollars to doughnuts they were already developing the APG by the time the playtest started. If they want to meet the deadlines to keep putting out products in a timely fashion, they have to be very careful how they distribute workloads, and what they prioritize.
Finally, the CRB is a ridiculously large book. It's 70 pages bigger than the 1E CRB, and a new system as opposed to an alteration of an older, established system. That's going to take even more time to scour for errors.
All things considered, I'd say a three-month turnover on errata for the CRB is pretty darn impressive.
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I think it's important to remember that it's not so simple for a publisher as "just set aside x time to look for errors."
It's not really a matter of LOOKING for errors. As soon as the material hit the streets, forum users started several threads collecting them, including spelling and grammar issues. Heck, I know one thread collated all the questions into a G-drive document. IMO, it's a matter of sorting through them and finding solutions: The 'grunt' work of finding the errors was already done.
Paizo isn't just working on the stuff you know about; development starts a year or more before the product is even announced.
This makes it MORE important that the core rules are correct as errors will just multiply if those projects are grounded in rules with errors. Doing a fix now can prevent multiple fixes later in multiple books.
I think it's important to remember that it's not so simple for a publisher as "just set aside x time to look for errors."It's not really a matter of LOOKING for errors. As soon as the material hit the streets, forum users started several threads collecting them, including spelling and grammar issues. Heck, I know one thread collated all the questions into a G-drive document. IMO, it's a matter of sorting through them and finding solutions: The 'grunt' work of finding the errors was already done.
I think crowd-sourced material is definitely valuable, but you still need to verify, and obviously there are elements that were missed by the crowd.
My sense is that figuring out all of the consequences of changing something probably takes the majority of time.
Paizo isn't just working on the stuff you know about; development starts a year or more before the product is even announced.This makes it MORE important that the core rules are correct as errors will just multiply if those projects are grounded in rules with errors. Doing a fix now can prevent multiple fixes later in multiple books.
I think you are overstating the value in this case. We are talking about experienced designers and developers. if something seems seriously off, then I would bet the issue would get escalated/discussed. Not saying that folks working on rules text shouldn’t have the most current set of rules, I just don’t think this has much affect on the process of writing these books.
Very weak arguments against a measure that would only improve the health of the game over the years.
PF1e suffered from it over the years, specially because it was an offshoot of D&D3.5. Now Paizo created everything from scratch, they're the ones behind every design intent, so they can balance and change things with more control and safety.
There is nothing wrong in wishing for a more modern system, specially if the place to find the errata, faq and balance changes are in a place well know by the community that is also organized.
It's hard to grasp the utility and good impact it has right now because you can't even find things well in this very website. The worst that can happen is that some people will play without knowing about the changes and those that play PFS will need to keep up to date with the changes.
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Very weak arguments against a measure that would only improve the health of the game over the years.
PF1e suffered from it over the years, specially because it was an offshoot of D&D3.5. Now Paizo created everything from scratch, they're the ones behind every design intent, so they can balance and change things with more control and safety.
There is nothing wrong in wishing for a more modern system, specially if the place to find the errata, faq and balance changes are in a place well know by the community that is also organized.
It's hard to grasp the utility and good impact it has right now because you can't even find things well in this very website. The worst that can happen is that some people will play without knowing about the changes and those that play PFS will need to keep up to date with the changes.
We get it. Errata and FAQs have had problems in the past. It's valid to feel like that needs to be done better. However:
Literally no one has argued against having updates that are communicated clearly and effectively. We're just pointing out that it's not as easy as some might think and that there are opportunity costs to whatever option they pick. The best frequency for updates is also not straightforward - too many updates can be as alienating as too few. There's also diminishing returns - each subsequent editing pass will find fewer and fewer errors to correct, but often still take the same or similar amounts of time.
It's also been pointed out that Paizo has similarly said they wanted to rethink how those are communicated with Pathfinder's 2nd edition, and when they figured out what they were doing there they'd tell us.
Like, they're on it. They're doing what they can. Announcements on their errata plans come in two days on their Twitch channel, and I'm sure they'll be transcribed almost immediately after by the community and followed-up with a blog post when the final errata is ready. Note that the original post was also asking about the APG playtest, which it turns out is another major drain on the same resources' time (to say nothing of the GMG).
Complaining that you can't easily find the rules changes they haven't formally announced just doesn't sit well with me. Calling out people giving "weak arguments" when they're just pointing out the various reasons it's hard and comes at a cost just misses the point.
The real question is how long would it take for clone Mark to be so out of the loop that his answers stopped being as informed? It seems like you'd have to clone another one, and probably should get all the other designers too, and some developers as needed.Hm. That's a lot of cloning.
Nah, the way you address this is to have Mark prime and Mark: mark 2 trade off. Don’t let them specialize; make one do the forums for two weeks, then back to designing for two weeks, and trade back.
James Jacobs is another obvious clone candidate. Jason needs three; one shaping PF2, another answering questions, and the third running an actual play podcast. Probably with the other couple of clones as his players.
I think crowd-sourced material is definitely valuable, but you still need to verify, and obviously there are elements that were missed by the crowd.
My sense is that figuring out all of the consequences of changing something probably takes the majority of time.
My point was that there isn't a need to 'set time aside LOOKING for errors': I made NO comment on the time to fix errors.
I think you are overstating the value in this case.
And I think you're understating it: you focus on the " seriously off" but what about the less obvious ones or issues with combining multiple rules? What if one person sees an issue and someone else doesn't but because they haven't gotten together talk about it, it slips through? We're already 3 books in.
experienced designers and developers
If you give experienced accountants the wrong numbers, do you expect the correct tax returns? If they aren't working with the best information/materials, your work will suffer no matter how good you are at your job. A firm/strong base just makes everything done afterward easier and less prone to needing reworking/fixing.
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I think you are overstating the value in this case. We are talking about experienced designers and developers. if something seems seriously off, then I would bet the issue would get escalated/discussed.
As an experienced designer and developer with over 10 years experience, I can say with absolute certainty that even experienced designers and developers will miss things, and frequently too (though our skill is on another level than the general layman, we can get pretty overconfident too).
I can't tell you how many professional projects I've worked on where I would have LOVED to have had an army of passionate editorial volunteers backing me up (but also having ZERO authority over the final product).
We get it. Errata and...
I'm not actually complaining. I'm just explaining why it would be good to have changes, erratas and FAQ in a well known and organized place, the main reason why so many of these are missed by the majority of people.
Also, I completely understand the fact that they're swamped with work right now with a lot of new content in line. The thing is, upkeep is also important and having it once or twice a year would help, rather than only making changes on new prints or even reprinting some changes (Lore Warden archetype, for example, was butchered some time after it was first released).
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I think it's important to remember that it's not so simple for a publisher as "just set aside x time to look for errors." It's not always things as straightforward as "we meant this power to do X thing, not Y thing." Some of that stuff has to come through multiple pipelines, like the forums and product reviews, for them to even be aware of it. They can't sit and continue playtesting the rules all day to make sure they got everything.
Secondly, as someone mentioned earlier, setting aside time to dig for errors means pulling those people away from other projects. Paizo isn't just working on the stuff you know about; development starts a year or more before the product is even announced. They have a lot of irons in a lot of fires to get things ready. I bet dollars to doughnuts they were already developing the APG by the time the playtest started. If they want to meet the deadlines to keep putting out products in a timely fashion, they have to be very careful how they distribute workloads, and what they prioritize.
Finally, the CRB is a ridiculously large book. It's 70 pages bigger than the 1E CRB, and a new system as opposed to an alteration of an older, established system. That's going to take even more time to scour for errors.
All things considered, I'd say a three-month turnover on errata for the CRB is pretty darn impressive.
Every company ever has had to juggle multiple tasks. Time spent putting products in the store so people can buy them also takes time away that could be spent writing books, but obviously it has to be done anyway. Time spent complying with IRS tax reporting rules takes away time that could be spent on customer service, but you still have to.
Fixing bugs in the rules contributes to overall quality of the product. It prevents technical debt from accumulating. Every rule you don't fix is something you have to deal with in every splatbook you have a freelancer write, in every adventure you have a freelancer write.
I don't think it's reasonable to have to wait three months for first errata. Anyone launching a wholly new product should expect there to be zero day bug discoveries. It's completely normal and a responsible business plans for it.
And we have had some "t++~ta", where designers answer on Twitch streams and confirm there are bugs and what they should have been. But that makes for extremely hard to consult documentation.
If at least they'd just put all those off-forum rulings on a page that we could easily refer to, that would have been an improvement already.
Waiting three months because Paizo wants to do it perfectly all at once is IMO not a good approach. Putting off anything because you keep increasing the scope is not a way to get anything done.
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I don't think it's reasonable to have to wait three months for first errata.
Curious, what would be reasonable?
Anyone launching a wholly new product should expect there to be zero day bug discoveries. It's completely normal and a responsible business plans for it.
No, actually. Bugs are found pretty fast. Especially in games both video and tabletop where there's lots of moving and connecting and playing around with pieces.
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There is already a case of issue from Core Rulebook messing up followup book:
https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=1063
Every class is supposed to get Unarmed Expertise. So unless there is a class infuture that won't get it, this feat is useless.
Was it every class is trained and advanced in Unarmed Proficiency, or Classes with Simple Weapons Proficiency? Pretty sure it was the latter.
I'm pretty sure it was every class. They said they did it correctly on the official class-specific character sheets and forgot to include it in the rulebook.
So, there is a fairly simple solution: someone who has the official character sheets with class-specific sheets, please check for us and let us know. Specifically for Wizard and Cleric how it looks.
You need to read the thread on that:
https://paizo.com/threads/rzs42t4p?Problems-with-Iruxi-unarmed-attack-featsBy doing so you will learn your claim is false. Cheers!
Nothing in that thread convinces me that my claim is "false".
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I don't think it's reasonable to have to wait three months for first errata.Curious, what would be reasonable?
Anyone launching a wholly new product should expect there to be zero day bug discoveries. It's completely normal and a responsible business plans for it.No, actually. Bugs are found pretty fast. Especially in games both video and tabletop where there's lots of moving and connecting and playing around with pieces.
I would say, put up a page with fixes for urgent stuff after at most one week.
After that, once a month, try to tackle at least one hard issue and clear out most of the easy issues. Publish on say, the first Tuesday of the month so that if there's a problem people are still in the office.
Thanks. So I think we can expect everyone to have Expert Unarmed proficiency.
I have a follow-up to this: Should putting up a page of urgent fixes one week after publishing, then putting out further fixes on the first Tuesday of each month, delay the release dates of future books?
No, simply because this work should be planned and release dates of future books should reflect that this has to be done in addition to work on the new books.
Otherwise you get Iruxi Unarmed Expertise issues.
All of them? What do I care. They should also make sure to include the delay for handling errata on those books into releases after them as well.
And realistically, I doubt they need more than a week of delay to handle the errata.
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I have a follow-up to this: Should putting up a page of urgent fixes one week after publishing, then putting out further fixes on the first Tuesday of each month, delay the release dates of future books?
Depends on how you view delay.
Delay as in "something suddenly came up and we have to drop what we're doing" - no. The need to do some day one support on a major new product is completely foreseeable.
Delay as in "we decided we're going to do errata after all", also no. They already decided they'd do errata.
Delay as in "we decided to change our policy and shift from one big heap to periodic updates", then initially slight delay. Takes a few days now because you're going to release what you currently have, saves a few days later because you've already done part of the job. In the long run, you have a bit extra overhead from multiple releases, but you'll also get happier customers because you're providing timely support.
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I have a follow-up to this: Should putting up a page of urgent fixes one week after publishing, then putting out further fixes on the first Tuesday of each month, delay the release dates of future books?Depends on how you view delay.
Delay as in "something suddenly came up and we have to drop what we're doing" - no. The need to do some day one support on a major new product is completely foreseeable.
Delay as in "we decided we're going to do errata after all", also no. They already decided they'd do errata.
Delay as in "we decided to change our policy and shift from one big heap to periodic updates", then initially slight delay. Takes a few days now because you're going to release what you currently have, saves a few days later because you've already done part of the job. In the long run, you have a bit extra overhead from multiple releases, but you'll also get happier customers because you're providing timely support.
Or unhappier ones because you're not providing new product fast enough. It's a matter of what matters to the consumer and not all consumers have the same desires. Pleasing you may well annoy more consumers than not pleasing you does. Or vice versa. We have no way to know from the outside. I doubt Paizo know for sure but probably have a better idea based on sales/errata downloads.
Of course, this ignores two important caveats to the policy in general.
1) It assumes errata is both easy to find and easy to fix, i.e. will not take a significant period of time. I find this unlikely, especially on something as large as the CRB. An error every ten pages, which would be a superb error rate, produces 60 errors. If you think that's a few day's work, you're seriously efficient or naïve.
1a) Finding errata is also easier than fixing it. For instance, I would not expect changing the rules on the accuracy of unarmed strikes to effectively neutralise one career path of Alchemists. Even if finding the error is easy, fixing it without creating further errors and imbalances would often be a time-consuming and difficult process.
2) It assumes the designers will notice the errata is necessary beforehand. They've looked at this stuff for months already. From personal experience, I know it's easy to miss "how is this written to work" if you already know "how it should work". No one wants to put out a book with errors in, so the book's already gone through multiple passes by both development and editorial. I'm not sure how you think it's possible to pre-prepare errata in the manner you're suggesting.
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I mean, on the one hand it is funny that they took the time to update the Character Sheet Pack to already include some Errata they found between the CRB going to the printer and the Sheet Pack going to the printer.
On the other hand, if they already knew some things need Errata on day one, why not go all the way and put out that bit of Errata somewhere?
Yes, in the Legacy system, errata was only issued with reprints, but they put some thought into changing that for 2nd edition, so things could have been worked out in time.
For me, I welcome the Errata / FAQ as soon as it's ready. Most likely, I'm the only one of my group that will know it exists though.
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Emphasis mine to ask this question: Is it completely forseeable?I have a follow-up to this: Should putting up a page of urgent fixes one week after publishing, then putting out further fixes on the first Tuesday of each month, delay the release dates of future books?Depends on how you view delay.
Delay as in "something suddenly came up and we have to drop what we're doing" - no. The need to do some day one support on a major new product is completely foreseeable.
Delay as in "we decided we're going to do errata after all", also no. They already decided they'd do errata.
Delay as in "we decided to change our policy and shift from one big heap to periodic updates", then initially slight delay. Takes a few days now because you're going to release what you currently have, saves a few days later because you've already done part of the job. In the long run, you have a bit extra overhead from multiple releases, but you'll also get happier customers because you're providing timely support.
Yes, because it happens to every company that introduces a major new product.
The devs spent months going over the PF2 rules before the playtest, then a few more months during and after the playtest before finally sending it to the printer, and there were still things they missed.
Yes, and they also missed things in every book published before, so it's unreasonable that this time it'll be perfect.
Organizations where mistakes are far more costly - NASA for example - still make mistakes, no matter how hard they try not to. Trying not to make mistakes is a good thing, but thinking that's ever going to prevent all mistakes is hubris. It's far healthier to also have a good business process for handling mistakes that do get made.
Your stance seems to be that they should assume they will miss things and be ready to create errata for major issues within one week of release based on what gets reported to them through the forums. That's a good stance for programming, but I don't think it's a good stance for pen and paper RPG design.
First of all, this means at least one person has to devote time to going through posts on the forums within one week of release, cataloging all of the errors that the users find. Then, they have to go back to the design team with their list, and figure how to fix those errors. The next step is to test the fixes, to make sure the fix doesn't break something else. Finally, they can publish the errata.
They have to look at the forums anyway, and really it's not so hard to find the top 10 bugs/rules that really confuse people just by checking the longest active threads in the rules forum.
This process must then be repeated each month for each product. One year from now (October 2020), that means potential errata for the following: Core Rulebook, Lost Omens World Guide, Lost Omens Character Guide, Bestiary, Gamemastery Guide, Bestiary 2, Lost Omens Gods & Magic, and the Advanced Player's Guide. That's monthly errata updates to potentially 8 books as needed, and the number only increases as more content is published. Eventually, the number of books requiring monthly errata will reach a point where all the design team has time to do is compile, create, and test the errata for the next monthly update. This means they don't have time to work on new releases, which are the core of Paizo's business model.
You're presenting it as if new bugs will continue to appear at the same speed from books that have been published for a while already. That doesn't make sense.
Also, you're presenting it as if designers are sitting behind their desk with a looking glass looking through their books to try to find novel bugs. Also ridiculous.
I think the only way they could handle the monthly model would be to focus on a limited number of issues per month, based on a priority system that takes into account the brokenness of the issue, the customer outcry over the issue, and the recentness of the issue. The problem with this option is there are some issues that may never get addressed, as they continue to release new material, which would get higher priority due to its "recentness."
This is what I've been saying all along.
None of that takes into account that there's no way to apply the errata update to the books until the next printing, so any that are already published and bought or sitting on store shelves or warehouses waiting to be bought will still have the original issues in them. Those of us on this site are only a small subset of PF players - many may not even know that an errata is released, or download it if it is.
Those mechanisms exist and have been used in the past. PF1 FAQs have had entries saying "yeah, this is bad, change X to Y, and we'll do that in the next printing too".
That's actually how almost every gaming company does it, both board games and RPGs.
Other companies actually go farther; I get quite a few emails from DriveThruRPG saying "your PDF for game X has been updated, you can download the new version here". It's okay that Paizo puts things in an FAQ and carries out actual changes to the text on a print run, but it's unreal to say that you can't do more. Because others do.
My point was that there isn't a need to 'set time aside LOOKING for errors': I made NO comment on the time to fix errors.I think crowd-sourced material is definitely valuable, but you still need to verify, and obviously there are elements that were missed by the crowd.
My sense is that figuring out all of the consequences of changing something probably takes the majority of time.
As I pointed out, there most certainly is, though there is value in crowd-sourcing.
Aye, I wasn't ascribing that comment to you, I was just adding a thought, which is why I started with "my sense".
I think you are overstating the value in this case.And I think you're understating it: you focus on the " seriously off" but what about the less obvious ones or issues with combining multiple rules? What if one person sees an issue and someone else doesn't but because they haven't gotten together talk about it, it slips through? We're already 3 books in.
What you are describing happens anyway, whether its the correct rules or not. That's just reality.
I assume communication and editorial passes occur as part of the process.
Just as an example, I assume that an aldori sword incorrectly priced as 20 gp is not going to create some major logjam for future authors. If someone, not on the immediate team, is asked to write specifically about Aldori Swordlords. I imagine Mark would let them know if it was relevant.
experienced designers and developersIf you give experienced accountants the wrong numbers, do you expect the correct tax returns? If they aren't working with the best information/materials, your work will suffer no matter how good you are at your job. A firm/strong base just makes everything done afterward easier and less prone to needing reworking/fixing.
I do not think accountants and RPG designers/developers are in the same category. Moreover, accounting numbers, and RPG rulesets are not equivalent. I But I get what you are trying to say.
I do agree that a firm base is definitely going to make everything afterward less prone to needing reworking/fixing.
I think you are overstating the value in this case. We are talking about experienced designers and developers. if something seems seriously off, then I would bet the issue would get escalated/discussed.As an experienced designer and developer with over 10 years experience, I can say with absolute certainty that even experienced designers and developers will miss things, and frequently too (though our skill is on another level than the general layman, we can get pretty overconfident too).
I can't tell you how many professional projects I've worked on where I would have LOVED to have had an army of passionate editorial volunteers backing me up (but also having ZERO authority over the final product).
Yeah, same here.
Naturally people miss things, but that isn't really what I was saying, and that is going to happen no matter what.
There are parts of projects where I find this useful, and other parts I do not. As I mentioned above, there is value to crowd-sourcing.