Why I’m Currently Unhappy With Paizo Publishing.

Too much, too fast, too much like Wizards of the Coast.

I’m seeing something of an unsettling trend with the two largest TTRPGs on the market, but maybe it’s just me. I find it somewhat disgusting that WotC and Paizo swap employees back and forth like ping pong balls. If Jason Tondro is hanging with Wizards of the Coast, why don’t they have a union?

I’m somewhat annoyed that this guy is a “Senior Designer” at WotC these days. It’s like he can’t seem to make up his mind which company he wants to represent. For those who don’t know, Tondro did an interview about the 50^th Anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons where he and Todd Kenreck proudly revealed Gygax and company would never have stood up to today’s inclusivity reviews. I’m once again reminded of the famous Kyle Brink quote about how guys “like me” can’t leave the hobby fast enough.

It’s pretty well known that WotC and Paizo swap employees back and forth with smaller companies such as Darrington Press and Kobold Press catching a few of the high flyers. Other freelancers end up hanging out with Michael Shea and his Sly Flourish imprint. (*And people wonder why I say the TTRPG industry has a hiring system built on nepotism.)

Disclaimer: Statements expressed in this article are strictly my opinion. If you disagree or have a different opinion, that’s okay. I’m not an expert on everything. I’m not always right. I’m just writing from my experience as I know it. Your mileage may vary.

Tinfoil Hat moment incoming.

I keep going back to the Great D&D Open Gaming License Debacle of 2023. I can’t decide if it’s an intricate Machiavellian genius scheme or the foolish bumbling of the likes of Cobra Commander and Gargamel. Of course, a truly evil genius would make the plan only appear to be bumbling, so it’s incredibly hard to say.

Think about what the month of January 2023 did for the rest of the TTRPG industry. Everyone scrambled to get out from under the OGL 1.0 that had been propping things up for so long. It’s a win-win for Hasbro/WotC because they can feel free to do whatever they want without affecting Third Party Publishers outside of a select few that they’re already in bed with. (Ghostfire Gaming, Dungeon Dudes, Kobold Press and so on.)

Then, the rest of the industry gets an amazing chance to “remaster” or revise all of their products under new licenses. Paizo  profited the most from the whole thing, having sold out entire warehouses of Pathfinder 2E Core rulebooks only to turn around a couple of short months later and announce the Remastered Core Set. They got to follow up a pile of money with another pile of money.

I noticed something else while composing this article. Paizo’s biggest Pathfinder releases in 2023-2024 are all pretty much landing prior to June. WotC’s biggest releases are starting in June and going through November. Meanwhile, Kobold Press seems to have gone silent about Tales of the Valiant as far as I can tell. MCDM RPG and Daggerheart aren’t even dropping until 2025, probably long after the February release of the D&D Monster Manual. It’s all starting to add up to me.

The price point of the Pathfinder Core Remastered edition is a big turnoff for me.

I was excited to see the Pathfinder 2E Remaster originally. I was already jazzed for Tian Xia when it was announced for late 2023, but sad when it got moved to 2024. Yes, the Remaster efforts took up all their resources and blah, blah, blah.

GM Core and Player Core 1 hit late 2023 when I didn’t have any holiday money to spare. Monster Core is hitting this week, I believe. Just in time for tax refund season, I guess. I heard Player Core 2 is coming in July 2024, originally scheduled to come out with Monster Core. Don’t get me started on Starfinder Enhanced and Starfinder 2E. The polite version of that rant involves a lot of NSFW word salad.

But Jeff, what about the Pocket Editions and Archives of Nethys?

Yes, the Pocket Editions are cute and save money, unless you want the PDF, too. I’m old and wearing trifocals now. Maybe not?  Archives of Nethys are cool once they’re updated, but then one ends up hunting and pecking around for the rules changes one at a time. It’s a tedious affair that makes me cringe.

The Remastered Core books are going to total up to $240 give or take. If I buy into everyone else’s core sets that dropped last year and this year, my wallet would be incredibly empty. WotC’s new/not-new D&D would have to wait even if I wasn’t already broke. (*New/not-new D&D had no chance anyway, but the price point is another “nope” from me.)

Food, medicine, and heat or a new D&D book?

I’m trying to save money for a new computer and a much needed website upgrade. That’s to say nothing for the thousands if not hundreds of thousands of tabletop gamers that are facing unemployment, housing crises, or medical issues this year. The US economy appears to be in a bit of a nose dive currently, and luxury items such as TTRPGs are usually the first things to be scratched off the list.

You can spread peanut butter between two Magic: the Gathering rares but trust me when I say it still tastes like cheap cardstock. The price of TTRPGs is steadily rising. I respect that as I know people like to eat and whatnot. I’m speculating the price of the D&D Core rulebooks (Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master’s Guide, and Monster Manual) are probably going to be around $70-80 each.

WotC will likely jack the price of the physical books in order to make the digital subscription to D&D Beyond look far more appealing. Once players are under that umbrella, I’m sure CEO Cynthia Williams will no longer be crying about D&D players being “undermonetized.”

Shoddy advertising practices all around.

Remember when YouTube TTRPG reviews maybe meant something? I understand it’s a common practice to send review copies to potential reviewers, but lately it seems to be getting out of control. WotC and Paizo are both sending their big bucks review product to the YouTube shills in exchange for good publicity.

They’re no longer potential reviewers if their loyalty is being bought with free copies of $60-$90 books or book sets. How can I trust them? I think reviews lose all sense of authenticity when I hear, “This copy was sent to me for free by…”

What? Paizo or WotC couldn’t send a PDF? WotC couldn’t send a link to D&D Beyond for reviewers?

I never review a book on this blog if I don’t 100% believe in it. Sometimes it’s a free review copy of the electronic version (which is awesome, btw.) Most of the time it’s a book that I’ve paid money for, and I truly think it’s a good value for the money. I don’t know if you, my audience, would trust me if I did a big unboxing video of all my free swag from WotC/Hasbro. I don’t trust reviews from the YouTubers who do that. As always, use your own discernment.

The TTRPG hobby is getting to the point of pushing a lot of customers out.

2024 is The Year of the Flattened Wallet when it comes to TTRPGs. (*I’m claiming that name.) There are so many new products and crowdfunding projects coming out every day now. I am up to my eyeballs in TTRPG news on a daily basis and even I’m struggling to keep up with the releases.

Pathfinder 2E’s Tian Xia comes out in April much to my chagrin. I was truly looking forward to it. They had a team dedicated to making sure everything was proper in terms of culture and inclusion. It was literally going to be the next iteration of the controversial AD&D Oriental Adventures without all the cultural appropriation.

Things have gotten to a point where gamers are going to have to become very fickle with where we spend our dollars. Those reviews I mentioned earlier? They are going to become more crucial than ever to avoid getting burned on some of these high dollar pieces of fluff masquerading as core rulebooks.

We’re at a crucial juncture that’s never been seen before in the TTRPG hobby. D&D is poised to make or break the industry in September with their next PHB. There are so many alternatives becoming more and more apparent every week.

I love Shadowdark, Old School Essentials, and Dungeon Crawl Classics. They’ve done their thing and are just chugging along at a nice, steady pace with supplements and mostly adventure modules. Meanwhile, Paizo is already trying to milk another $240+ out of players that spent a ton of money on their core product last year. It’s painful to watch.

Wizards of the Coast/D&D Studios is still dropping the ball at least once per month or more. There’s a new scandal or old issue (safety tools, combat wheelchairs, etc) about every other week that involves WotC or D&D. Every time they release a new book something stupid happens to draw attention away from it. But that’s okay, we still have all the YouTube shills shouting about their awesome new free product.

Then there’s that BS line about everything being “retro compatible.”

Let me be honest with all of you younger folks out there. I’ve been in this hobby for 40+ years, and rarely have I seen an edition change or remastered edition that was truly compatible with the prior material. Yes, it looks good on a press release or an ad to say it’s all compatible. Within a few short months, some games become unrecognizable between editions because designers like to add stats, change the names of things, create new categories, or whatever else they can think of to encourage everyone to stay current.

The idea of the “new” D&D 5E Forever Edition (or whatever it is this week) will be incompatible with AD&D because WotC seems to think the game didn’t exist prior to 2000 unless they’re datamining it for a new adventure compilation. D&D 4E, for all of its flaws and advantages, may as well never come up in conversation. It’s a separate animal. All the old modules, supplements, etc will require conversion work before they can be run with the shiniest, newest edition.

Make no mistake, game companies want you to buy the newest edition of their games. FoMO aside, there’s no point printing an all new book if no one wants to give up their old ones. Why do you think some of us old codgers are still playing Moldvay B/X D&D? Because we’re stubborn and refuse to learn a new game.  

My final question for TTRPG YouTubers is would you feel the same way if you paid for it?

My guess is that Dawn from Roll 4 Initiative, whom I respect a great deal, wouldn’t have picked up PF2E Monster Core if Paizo hadn’t sent it for free? I think they have one youngin and I thought someone said another on the way. Trust me, kids ain’t cheap.

Without support from Patreon, whatever little YouTube pays, and free product what do you have? Not much of a TTRPG YouTube channel, to be sure. I get that Content Creators all around have their own bills to pay. So do consumers. That’s where we have a concern about the price of luxury goods such as TTRPGs.

Do the people in charge of WotC and Paizo understand how much it makes their new books look cheap when they’re just handing them out like candy to the shills? WotC especially needs to be careful with the free giveaways because many products are ending up at some second hand joint such as Ollie’s. I think it shows a serious lack of respect for the product and the consumer. Most if not all TTRPG YouTubers seem to forget that Third Party Publishers almost lost their product lines last year during the OGL Debacle.

The bottom line is these large TTRPG companies need to respect our time, money, and overall love for the game- their games. Otherwise, they’re going to hamstring themselves in terms of demand, and that’s not good for business. I think it’s time to go back to the business model for TTRPGs that says make a good product at an affordable price. I think they should focus on having passion for the game and love for the product.

I feel as if WotC and Paizo are seriously lacking that in the current day and age. I think it’s just a cash grab for them and the passion is kinda dead if there was much to begin with. Hint, hint. I hear Chaosium follows my model of a good company pretty well with Call of Cthulhu and Basic RolePlaying: Universal Game Engine.

Thank you for being here today with me. I appreciate you. Please embrace the things that bring you the most joy.