Pathfinder MMO

[Bunk]

It's a well developed world, though it does suffer a bit of potatosaladness in that every concievable "setting" has been jammed in to it. The adventure paths each really focus on developing the chunk of the world they happen to be set in.

[HaemishM]

Its the smartest (simplified) business model for a niche MMO I've seen yet.

Yeah, back when Savant and a bunch of us were talking about developing Cyberpunk Online, one of the ideas I argued for was a staggered "limited" release to alleviate the YAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGG launch day server shit. Not only would the exclusivity work in our favor for marketing purposes (everyone loves the club they can't get into), but it would help with infrastructure build out. Nice to see someone actually trying that strategy out.

[shiznitz]

How can it be Pathfinder without levels?

[Ingmar]

How are they going to decide who gets in?

I think the idea is sound, but it seems more fitting for an IP with no brand recognition. I imagine a few gamers know of Pathfinder, and word of mouth among the MMOGers should give this thing a bit of exposure.

I actually have some connections that might be worth a damn for this one, I will definitely be trying to abuse them.

How can it be Pathfinder without levels?

Because it uses the Pathfinder setting. They *cannot* develop computer games with the d20 system, the OGL specifically limits that.

[Fordel]

Do Halflings ride Dinosaurs in Pathfinder?

[Ingmar]

No but there is a kingdom of demon-worshipping monkeys ruled over by a super-gorilla. I call it a wash.

[Ratman_tf]

How can it be Pathfinder without levels?

Because it uses the Pathfinder setting. They *cannot* develop computer games with the d20 system, the OGL specifically limits that.

Game mechanics cannot be copyrighted, the expression of them can. That's how the OSR came about.

http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl108.html

Hell, look at WoW (or every other CRPG system under the sun). They could have levels if they wanted. They couldn't lift the d20 system whole and plop it into a MMOG, but I dont' think they'd want to.

[Ingmar]

Which has nothing to do with making electronic games using the d20 OGL stuff:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=d20/oglfaq/20040123i

I admit though it isn't as restrictive as I remember, but they're still going to be treading on shaky legal ground and I expect they don't want the risk.

(EDIT: And to be clear my answer earlier wasn't really meant to answer "no they can't have levels." I sort of misread shiznitz's intent, possibly.)

[shiznitz]

Because it uses the Pathfinder setting. They *cannot* develop computer games with the d20 system, the OGL specifically limits that.

Well, the Pathfinder setting doesn't mean shit to me.  So the mechanics are completely unknown then.

[UnSub]

Doing such things saves time on the lore development and concept art. It also means the gaming press, desperate for content, has something to put up under both the "MMO" and "P'n'P" tags.

[Modern Angel]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Pathfinder runs neck and neck with D&D in terms of market share now. Some quarters it actually beats them. I don't play it or have any desire to but there's absolutely a big market for the pen and paper game. Will it translate over to broader sales? Probably not.... which is why they're doing what they're doing.

[Fordel]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Pathfinder runs neck and neck with D&D in terms of market share now. Some quarters it actually beats them. I don't play it or have any desire to but there's absolutely a big market for the pen and paper game. Will it translate over to broader sales? Probably not.... which is why they're doing what they're doing.

That still doesn't make it main stream though. Like, I don't think they are making Pathfinder jokes on Futurama.


DDO was fucking bizarre in that it has fuckloads of 3e in it, but they went with clickspam combat. Plus my Warforged drowned, it fucking drowned, I will never forgive them for that.

[Evildrider]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Pathfinder runs neck and neck with D&D in terms of market share now. Some quarters it actually beats them. I don't play it or have any desire to but there's absolutely a big market for the pen and paper game. Will it translate over to broader sales? Probably not.... which is why they're doing what they're doing.

I had never heard of Pathfinder before til the D&D thread here. 

[UnSub]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Pathfinder runs neck and neck with D&D in terms of market share now. Some quarters it actually beats them. I don't play it or have any desire to but there's absolutely a big market for the pen and paper game. Will it translate over to broader sales? Probably not.... which is why they're doing what they're doing.

Buying the IP gets you the lore, the concept art and the existing fanbase... who generally leave when it turns out you aren't making the RPG they have in their heads.

The P'n'P RPG market is one that has been shrinking for a while, at least in part thanks to online RPGs. That a D&D alternative has popped up and been more popular than D&D for a little while is interesting, but doesn't mean much for the MMO version of it (especially when it is capped at 4 500 players per sign-up period).

[Mrbloodworth]

Whats pathfinder?

[Modern Angel]

Correct, it doesn't make it a mainstream game. Which is why they're doing the 4500ish server cap and slowly expanding as need be.

[Goumindong]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Pathfinder runs neck and neck with D&D in terms of market share now.

I cannot find any reliable information to support that. ICv2 seems to have some information, but none about how they do their sampling, and they don't catch any of the major distributors(or each subscription service) which are likely to have significant differences compared to their target market.

[Ingmar]

The main issue with all the speculation about who is or isn't selling more is that I don't think anyone is capturing their in-house revenue, whether that's D&D Insider subscriptions or the Paizo Store. In other words, anyone who tells you one thing or the other probably doesn't actually know anything definitive at all.

[Sheepherder]

Yeah, back when Savant and a bunch of us were talking about developing Cyberpunk Online, one of the ideas I argued for was a staggered "limited" release to alleviate the YAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGG launch day server shit. Not only would the exclusivity work in our favor for marketing purposes (everyone loves the club they can't get into), but it would help with infrastructure build out. Nice to see someone actually trying that strategy out.

Too many people will want to bring their friends to make exclusivity a selling point.

[Khaldun]

A sandbox MMO of this kind needs to emphasize trying to "level up the world", e.g., your gameplay has to be oriented on events, buildings, etc. in the world, not in your character; you have to have an emergent story and procedural content. If you do it right, coming in later in the story is ok. If it's all about being King Asshat of Turd Mountain, coming in later is not ok, e.g., if it's about characters accumulating progressively more and more resources from playing in the world. Then you can never catch up unless there is some kind of play dynamic that puts more and more pressure on the accumulators and makes it hard to keep what they've got.

Most of the devs I've talked to with an interest in sandbox design don't really grok this point. EVE is in some sense just as bad a example for the business model they've sketched as WoW is.

[Modern Angel]

I cannot find any reliable information to support that. ICv2 seems to have some information, but none about how they do their sampling, and they don't catch any of the major distributors(or each subscription service) which are likely to have significant differences compared to their target market.

ICv2 is reliable "enough" to extrapolate outwards, which is what I think they do: take the info that is available and then crunch it to as reliable a number as you're going to find. If it's going to take earnings reports from every company above White Wolf size then nothing's ever going to be reliable.

[lamaros]

A sandbox MMO of this kind needs to emphasize trying to "level up the world", e.g., your gameplay has to be oriented on events, buildings, etc. in the world, not in your character; you have to have an emergent story and procedural content. If you do it right, coming in later in the story is ok. If it's all about being King Asshat of Turd Mountain, coming in later is not ok, e.g., if it's about characters accumulating progressively more and more resources from playing in the world. Then you can never catch up unless there is some kind of play dynamic that puts more and more pressure on the accumulators and makes it hard to keep what they've got.

Most of the devs I've talked to with an interest in sandbox design don't really grok this point. EVE is in some sense just as bad a example for the business model they've sketched as WoW is.

The best games I've played of that variety have still been MUDs. With even simple political systems coded in (cities with ranks and - control of rents, taxes, etc, etc) players were responsible for most of the fun stuff that happened. Give people tools to build world elements and they will. Provided you monitor the game and make sure nothing gets completely out of hand then things will ebb and flow of their own. Focusing this development in player skills and player objects is, as you say, entirely the wrong thing to do.

EG: I logged in to Eve a few years back and the skill system turned me off completely. I loved the ideas involved with much of the game but the interface and the skills were a big barrier. I would have no problem logging in to a established game and seeing a huge city and being told by another player "yeah, we run elections every 6 months, if you want to get involved you can, but it will take a bit of time. Maybe suck up to the quartermaster as an in. Or join our army (PvP skirmishes) and prove a bit of loyalty to build up trust." Being told "yeah, the game is awesome and lots of fun, but you need to get this skill and that skill first, then maybe you can join in with everything else we're doing. Also don't try and do you own thing because that player group has all the big weapons and you can't compete unless you spend a year building your own."

Of course, that idea would probably involve little physical character development besides clothing and maybe basic gear, which would make it much harder to addict attract players who are used to games being about 'physical' individual rewards.

Also your basic game mechanics have to be really fun, because lots of people won't play otherwise.

While there is a problem of resources no matter what (if you have goods or money - which it very likely will - then new players will probably not be able to compete with some game elements unless they join in with an existing system) that could be strongly managed by having new 'pushes' open up new areas of the world with unique resources, giving new players a place to carve out a niche and quickly establish a presence in the world. That and a high rate of attrition, meaning that you can't just get ahead and rest up.

Maybe of these systems would be really unpopular though. So it will be interesting to see how they try and handle things.

[Ingmar]

A sandbox MMO of this kind needs to emphasize trying to "level up the world", e.g., your gameplay has to be oriented on events, buildings, etc. in the world, not in your character; you have to have an emergent story and procedural content. If you do it right, coming in later in the story is ok. If it's all about being King Asshat of Turd Mountain, coming in later is not ok, e.g., if it's about characters accumulating progressively more and more resources from playing in the world. Then you can never catch up unless there is some kind of play dynamic that puts more and more pressure on the accumulators and makes it hard to keep what they've got.

Most of the devs I've talked to with an interest in sandbox design don't really grok this point. EVE is in some sense just as bad a example for the business model they've sketched as WoW is.

I think they can overcome that fairly easily with a combination of two things:

- When you add more people, you add more territory
- You make it difficult for existing landholders to just blob into the new territory instead of people with no land

There are a number of ways you could do that.

[Goumindong]

ICv2 is reliable "enough" to extrapolate outwards, which is what I think they do: take the info that is available and then crunch it to as reliable a number as you're going to find. If it's going to take earnings reports from every company above White Wolf size then nothing's ever going to be reliable.

They would be, if you expected that the market proportions were the same no matter where things were bought. But that is unlikely to be true. If it is not(and we have a reasonable enough suspicion to think it isn't) then it is not "reliable enough" to extrapolate outwards. Not because they did a bad job, but because they simply cannot catch significant market differences.

I mean, if i believed that non-DnD RPG's had the kind of market presence that DnD did outside of hobby stores then yea it would make sense to believe that sampling hobby stores would work. But i think its fairly ridiculous to assert that non-DnD RPG's have the same proportional market presence that DnD has through the major distributors. Which means that we can suspect that extrapolating hobby data is biased in a particular way which makes the results meaningless.

[Ingmar]

I also think it is a pretty safe bet that direct sales are a significant chunk of both companies revenue aand we have no evidence in particular to speculate as to who makes more on those. FWIW last I looked WotC's forums had way more activity, but I don't think that really proves aanything.

[Modern Angel]

Except that their methodology includes speaking to the manufacturers, themselves.

None of this means that it's foolproof, merely that it's the best that you're going to get because of the way the RPG market works. And I think it's absolutely safe to say that they're running pretty damned close with one another. Any further breakdown is impossible but it's okay to say they're tied for first in market share while recognizing how imperfect the metrics are.

[Goumindong]

Except that their methodology includes speaking to the manufacturers, themselves.

Really, you have their methodology? Because i cant find it.

Also, the manufacturers don't release the information as of current, no reason to suspect they would just because ICv2 decided to ask rather than well, anyone else.

[Ingmar]

Even if it is accurately capturing direct channel sales to hobby stores I'm pretty certain that's less than half the revenue stream for either company, probably significantly less.

[Sheepherder]

Most of the devs I've talked to with an interest in sandbox design don't really grok this point. EVE is in some sense just as bad a example for the business model they've sketched as WoW is.

Or they're just not all that enthused about regular mudflation.

[Bunk]

Whats pathfinder?

www.d20pfsrd.com
paizo.com

Everything you could ever want to know.

[Mrbloodworth]

Was not a question that needed to be answered :)

[Bunk]

Was more for anyone else stumbling across the thread and actually wondering about it.

[Mrbloodworth]

I do have a question. Is it more or less complicated than DnD as far as numbers and math go?

[Ingmar]

More complicated than 4e, pretty much the same as 3e.

[Mrbloodworth]

Bah. Been looking for a quick simple PnP for a while. Anything resembling DnD is out.