Pathfinder Sells Out
Is it just me, or does that wizard look like the same one who's on the 4e PHB cover, aside from the hair color?
According to Paizo, as of Monday, their Pathfinder game’s core rulebook has sold out its first printing. Now, this is mostly distributor orders — not actual sales — and there’s no indication of how large the first print run is. Still, it’s a pretty impressive accomplishment. I suspected that the initial sales would be very strong, and I hope it’ll bring people to the hobby, and not be confined to the existing 3.5 audience.
I have my doubts, though.
I haven’t seen the final revision of the rules, obviously, but the beta was not promising. While the stated intent of the developers was to address some of the problems of 3.5e, and in particular to make melee characters a more viable choice, I found that the beta did the exact opposite — spellcasters were given a variety of bonuses. Some problem spells were addressed, like Glitterdust and death spells, but there remained a wide variety of “I remove the enemy from combat” spells — including some new ones added by Paizo. Fighters, on the other hand, were given more bonus feats… but they also need to spend more feats in order to achieve the same effect they used to get from a single one. For instance, the +4 from Improved Disarm? That takes two feats in Pathfinder.
In addressing 3.5′s class utility problems, it would seem the obvious solution would be to make spellcasters weaker, or to make non-spellcasters stronger. Pathfinder made spellcasters stronger and non-spellcasters weaker. Combat maneuvers in general are weaker, thanks to the way the maneuver bonuses work as if the defender had rolled a 15. (To give credit where credit’s due, though, grappling is clarified a bit. It would’ve been hard to make it worse, but it’s significantly better.) Melee feats like Power Attack and Cleave are weaker. Rogues’ damage is weaker beyond the low levels. Bards’ songs are weaker. You might have thought bards couldn’t get a whole lot weaker than they were in vanilla 3.5e, but you’d be wrong.
Spellcasters, though, get bonuses. Better hit points, new class features (intended to encourage single-classing rather than prestige classing, but available starting at level 1, so really just free stuff), a +2 to a mental stat, more feats, and specialist wizards can now use wands and scrolls from their banned schools. And even craft them.
On top of all that, there are enough changes to the system that it’s not truly backward-compatible with 3.5 material — un-updated 3.0 or even d20 Modern material is closer to 3.5 than Pathfinder is. Barring significant changes in the final ruleset, of course.
I think Pathfinder will probably appeal to that segment of 3.5 gamers who felt that wizards (and to a lesser extent sorcerers, clerics, and druids) should be the most powerful class. It’s a reasonably-sized segment, with roots reaching back to OD&D, and wizards in Pathfinder will certainly outshine their allies in ways 4e wizards don’t. I think the appeal of Pathfinder will remain relatively limited, though; I expected strong initial sales from the faithful Paizo core, and that support is showing, but I don’t expect the game to draw a lot of new players to it. My main hope is that, while it lasts, it will shake up the market a bit; I think Wizards of the Coast has gotten a bit complacent, and Paizo generally puts out quality stuff, even if Pathfinder isn’t to my tastes. If Paizo can present enough competition to spur Wizards’ creativity, everyone wins. Likewise if Pathfinder does well enough to create a coattail effect for other RPGs.
Also, I like Paizo as a company a good deal more than I like Hasbro.
So here’s wishing Paizo great success with Pathfinder. Hopefully I’m wrong, and the game will be thriving a couple of years down the road.
Related posts:
- What are the Best 4e Ability Score Arrays?
- Review: Player’s Handbook 2
- Fox Magic: Martial Feats
- Gencon in Review
Categories: Industry News, Philosophy and Rants | Comments (7)
Thanks for the commentary, so far I’ve only heard feedback from rabidly pro-Paizo partisans. Even though I’m a huge 4E fan now, I was hoping that Paizo would actually come through on their goal of improving the 3.5 ruleset. Doesn’t sound like they hit that mark, though. I think 3.5 might have just been too fundamentally flawed to work well long-term no matter what, which is why WOTC jettisoned it entirely. Still, anything that keeps gamers playing and brings new people into the hobby is a good thing.
@Matt: Maybe I’m just cynical, but I kind of think part of the reason WotC changed so much in 4e was to try to ensure lots of “turnover” sales from people updating from 3e to 4e. (I’m also of the opinion that this is one of the reasons 3e changed so much from 2e.) Still, I like the 4e ruleset in general.
Of course, I also liked 3e when it came out; it was the years of playing it, and dealing with the problems, that led to the jaundice. In a couple of years I might feel the same about 4e.
I don’t know that I’d say Pathfinder did a bad job. I think from Paizo’s perspective it accomplished some of what it set out to do. (Not the making melee characters more equal to spellcasters, though. I don’t know how they could possibly claim that.) It’s just that I’m not very interested in what it does. I’d sooner just play 3.5, or perhaps one of the spinoffs like True20 or Microlite 20.
I do kind of feel that Pathfinder is borderline plagiaristic, but hey. Open license. And clearly there’s some kind of a market for it.
Little bit conflicted, I guess. :p But I wish them well with it, because I think a success, even a temporary one, will be good for the industry.
Man i think you guys really need to look at the rules again. The non spellcasters definately got a kick up in playability, flavor, feats and overall improving them. Spell casters did get some powers that made them much more interesting than just another wizard with really different specialization powers from school to school. It is a much more customizable system than 4th edition. You can really create balanced and completely unique characters.
Anyway just look over the final printing and after giving it a fair shake then make an actual review rather than “I think D&D 5th edition is going to suck even theough we have NO information about it yet.
I’m still going to check out Pathfinder, but I can never see myself going back to any “spells per day” system, or one in which melee is totally eclipsed by spellcasters. Since I have spent the vast majority of my gaming time as a GM, and 3.5 was enormously demanding for a GM (both in prep time and execution), I can’t imagine anything in Pathfinder being so appealing that I would consider switching back or even running a parallel game.
@Darren: What I’ve said is based on the beta rules, which have been available for over a year now. I think that’s plenty of time to comment on them, and far from “we have NO information.”
I acknowledge that the final rules may have changed matters (and I hope they have), but the degree of change necessary to meet the developers’ stated goal of making melee classes comparable to spellcasters is not a small one. As of beta, Pathfinder rules went in the other direction, and wizards were still king.
I’ll see whether I can flip through a copy at Gencon, or borrow one from a friend. I’d love to review the final product, but I’m not about to pay upwards of $50 for a game that, based on the beta version, isn’t for me.
@Matt: Pathfinder was a little bit easier on the preparation front than 3.5, but still a lot heavier than 4e, 1e, or Cyclopedia D&D.
@Darren
PFPRG design assumptions are well known. There’s been enough preview material released on the Web to fill a 180 page splatbook. Beta has been out for a year.
It’s incredibly reasonable to say, based on available evidence, that the PFRPG playtesters (and by extension the designers) didn’t see Scott’s issues with the 3.5 system as problematic – the fan base saw them as features, so the designers designed as such.
That’s perfectly fine – I want people to have fun playing the games they want to play.
But when you answer Scott’s reasonable critiques with:
“The non spellcasters definately got a kick up in playability, flavor, feats and overall improving them. Spell casters did get some powers that made them much more interesting than just another wizard with really different specialization powers from school to school.”
I’m left wondering if you actually understand Scott’s point.
Non-spellcasters getting “a kick up” in playability is insufficient to redress the power differential between spellcasters and everyone else – and that’s before we add in things that make them more powerful. As best as I can tell, spellcasters have access to abilities that allow them to “break” the rules of the game in a controlled way – it’s part of retaining Vancian magic and keeping a distinction between spellcasters (who get to break the rules) and non-spellcasters (who can, at most, tweak the rules through situational feats).
If you enjoy that, great! Play it! But pointing out that non-spellcasters got a “kick up” as a defense against Scott’s critique that nonspellcasters needed to be significantly reworked is a virtual non sequiter.
Like Scott, I play 4e. Like Scott, I want Pathfinder to be really successful because they employ a lot of great people and do great work. But I’d also have liked a reinvention of 3e that made all classes contribute equally to the adventure on a mechanical level. PFRPG won’t do that – though I’m optimistic Trailblazer might!
Just wanted to let you guys know that in addition to the “official” PRD that Paizo has published for Pathfinder, there are a number of SRD’s out for Pathfinder. I am the creator and primary maintainer of http://www.d20pfsrd.com and I think we are the first SRD to be basically fully updated to the final rules. There are a couple other SRD sites out there but none anywhere near as complete or up-to-date as this one. Check it out and let me know what you think!