Topic: New SW Adventure available

[terefang]

i remember the time that Paizo let you pay for alpha and beta versions of the Pathfinder PDF (at 33-50% the full price).

[Peter R]

@Terry,
You are not stuck with the adventure being PWYW. It is really simple to log in, untick the PWYW box and type in a selling price.

I use PWYW for beta test versions of games. I also make it clear what the money will be spent on. Normally, this is for paying for print proofs to produce final books. A playtest is not about making money and a full set of print proofs if you for a discount B/W, softcover premium colour and a top end hardcover should come in at under $200 even if you need a couple of reprints, which I never have so far. In this model the hundreds of free downloads and the relatively small number of paid copies balance out. You get lots of play testers and your production costs met.

That model works as a one person indie developer. For a brand like ICE that tries to present itself and a premium brand with a long history I don't think that would work. You cannot be a giant of the industry and expect sympathy donations.

[Destyar]

I think that Nicholas and I will confer about how to release the next mini-adventure. I am glad to hear the positive responses here, and I think this is a good way to maintain interest in RM and SW between huge modules (Haalkitaine: almost done except for RMSS stats; many new NPCs and of course many all-new adventures).  PWYW is clearly not the way to go, with a raft of people paying nothing. For 12-18 pages of material, I am thinking $2 -$4. In future adventures, I think I can include suggestions for placing it in other locations than the original setting. Many will include Portals, so get your Jinteni crystals ready!

Good stuff. It's too bad people can be such scumbags. Probably should have saved it for Guild Adventurer #5 (or do those only come along once every 7 years?).

Thanks,
--Desty

Yeah i think that model no longer works, with small pdfs avaiable rather than asking a buyer to pay for a magazine with a lot of materials they have no interest in. Come to think of it, maybe we should release a PDF of just the SW material from those books...?

I think I have brought that up before. You could have a series "Adventures in Emer" or "Adventures in Jaiman", etc. Publish the adventures by themselves at first (and perhaps alter them slightly so that they are linked), and then when you have a certain page count, say 128 pages or so, publish a book "Adventures in Emer, Vol. I". In glorious hardcover, of course.

I think it would work very well.

Just a thought...

Thanks,
--Desty

[Peter R]

I think that Nicholas and I will confer about how to release the next mini-adventure. I am glad to hear the positive responses here, and I think this is a good way to maintain interest in RM and SW between huge modules (Haalkitaine: almost done except for RMSS stats; many new NPCs and of course many all-new adventures).  PWYW is clearly not the way to go, with a raft of people paying nothing. For 12-18 pages of material, I am thinking $2 -$4. In future adventures, I think I can include suggestions for placing it in other locations than the original setting. Many will include Portals, so get your Jinteni crystals ready!

Good stuff. It's too bad people can be such scumbags. Probably should have saved it for Guild Adventurer #5 (or do those only come along once every 7 years?).

Thanks,
--Desty

Yeah i think that model no longer works, with small pdfs avaiable rather than asking a buyer to pay for a magazine with a lot of materials they have no interest in. Come to think of it, maybe we should release a PDF of just the SW material from those books...?

I think I have brought that up before. You could have a series "Adventures in Emer" or "Adventures in Jaiman", etc. Publish the adventures by themselves at first (and perhaps alter them slightly so that they are linked), and then when you have a certain page count, say 128 pages or so, publish a book "Adventures in Emer, Vol. I". In glorious hardcover, of course.

I think it would work very well.

Just a thought...

Thanks,
--Desty

Writing adventures is really hard work and in the grand scheme of things they do not sell very well. Rolemaster is aimed at the more experienced GM and they are the ones who are most likely to home brew everything and take pride in their creations.
Take Tales from the Green Gryphon Inn, it has sold between 250 and 500 copies in 4 years. Taking the upper bounds, ICE is probably making $8 a book after print costs and DTRPGs cut. That is something like $1,000 a year. If the sales are nearer the 250 mark then you are only looking at $500/year and that must be trailing off as the book is far from new. That is revenue, you need to take off the cost of the art from that.

[Jenkyna]

Hi all,

There have been nearly 100 downloads in just a few days, most people paying nothing. One person paid $0.05. That is unfortunate. Also there has only been one rating, and that was 3 out of 5. My products usually get a 4.5-5, so this is disappointing. I don't think we will be doing 'pay what you want' again as there are so many moochers. I imagine that if we will do similar adventures/mini sources of similar size again, we will be asking $2-$4. 

I contributed a bit more to make up for the moochers. I value your work, and the effort you put in. Can't rate it yet, but I will.

I'll pay $3 -$4  for something like this no problem.

[Terry K. Amthor]

Thanks for all the support (and generous purchases)!  As someone pointed out, adventures are hard to write. I'd much rather just write background/sourcebooks. Hence the early Emers and Haalkitaine which had few or no adventures, and why I am struggling to finish the adventures section in Haalkitaine II (but there are a lot of them!)  Anyway, I am already starting a new mini-adventure. which we will not release as PWYW! 

[Jenkyna]

I think I have brought that up before. You could have a series "Adventures in Emer" or "Adventures in Jaiman", etc. Publish the adventures by themselves at first (and perhaps alter them slightly so that they are linked), and then when you have a certain page count, say 128 pages or so, publish a book "Adventures in Emer, Vol. I". In glorious hardcover, of course.

This is an idea I like, but for it to work you would need people to buy both the adventures and the compilation. The problem is people might ignore one or the other.

Writing adventures is really hard work and in the grand scheme of things they do not sell very well. Rolemaster is aimed at the more experienced GM and they are the ones who are most likely to home brew everything and take pride in their creations.
Take Tales from the Green Gryphon Inn, it has sold between 250 and 500 copies in 4 years. Taking the upper bounds, ICE is probably making $8 a book after print costs and DTRPGs cut. That is something like $1,000 a year. If the sales are nearer the 250 mark then you are only looking at $500/year and that must be trailing off as the book is far from new. That is revenue, you need to take off the cost of the art from that.

Even though I tend to write my own adventures, I do find value in pre-written adventures because they are still a gold mine of character concepts, lore, and ideas. They can be useful as drop ins too.

The current thing I am working on is conceptually based on the original Grand Campaign, but incorporating the modern books and my own plot ideas.

@Terry,
You are not stuck with the adventure being PWYW. It is really simple to log in, untick the PWYW box and type in a selling price.

Imho that is something worth thinking about.

[Terry K. Amthor]

The adventure finally made copper. Apparently only when someone actually pats money does it count towards metal ratings, or it would be past silver already. 

[egdcltd]

Yep, you need someone to pay at least 1 cent for a sale to count as a sale!

[Peter R]

It is also paid orders not the number sold. Occasionally someone will buy more than one copy, probably a slip of the mouse. Even if they buy 10 at once it will still count as one for your metal count.

[Terry K. Amthor]

Might be coincidence, but it seems like perhaps the adventure has inspired sales of other SW products. Five are now in the top ten, not including the adventure: Jaiman (2), Emer III (4), Cloudlords (6), Eidolon (, and Xa-ar (9).

Rolemaster Classic rules fill out the top 11 with the exception of HARP.

[egdcltd]

Probably not a coincidence; new products draw attention to older ones in the range and knock on sales are very common. Especially if existing customers are emailed about a new product, and older related products are linked to from the same email ("Related supplements you may have missed.").

[Terry K. Amthor]

Probably not a coincidence; new products draw attention to older ones in the range and knock on sales are very common. Especially if existing customers are emailed about a new product, and older related products are linked to from the same email ("Related supplements you may have missed.").

I don't think we have a shadow world email list, but it might be cool to have one, like the Director's Briefing. I could do a summary of product progress like I do here, and maybe even solicit question to answer in later email releases. Maybe I'll ask Nicholas about that.

[egdcltd]

There's an email feature built into One Book Shelf where you can email everyone down to people who have bought a specific category or product. It's useful.

[Terry K. Amthor]

There's an email feature built into One Book Shelf where you can email everyone down to people who have bought a specific category or product. It's useful.

Sounds lke only Nicholas as the admin can access this. I do not admin RPGNow.

[Terry K. Amthor]

For any relative newcomers, the SW Atlas 3rd edition is still a valuable resource.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/93284/Shadow-World-Master-Atlas-3rd-Edition?manufacturers_id=461

[egdcltd]

And doesn't have giant black borders!

[Jenkyna]

I don't think we have a shadow world email list, but it might be cool to have one, like the Director's Briefing. I could do a summary of product progress like I do here, and maybe even solicit question to answer in later email releases. Maybe I'll ask Nicholas about that.

I would like to see something like this. The director's briefing is fine for hitting the highlights, but it would be nice to have regular status updates on ShadowWorld.

As far as boosting sales, maybe it is worth occasionally releasing something that is PWYW in order to give people a feel for the setting and your work.

[Hurin]

As far as boosting sales, maybe it is worth occasionally releasing something that is PWYW in order to give people a feel for the setting and your work.

I think that is a good way to look at it: not just at the direct sales, but the indirect interest it generates in other publications.

I finally got a chance to pay, download, and skim the adventure. It looks quite fun. I think I will reserve it as a curveball adventure for when the players get too complacent in using fast travel. This will definitely throw them for a loop!

[Siltoneous]

Fantastic!  I bought it sight unseen, simply because I've never been disappointing by anything Mr. Amthor has put his hand to.  Damn well payed more than the $1 for it, but who cares.  If we can't support good efforts, we'll never get any.