Paizo announced yesterday that they will be sticking with their own re-branded version of Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 for their popular (and well made) Pathfinder series. The Pathfinder RPG will serve as the core book, which will update the 3.5 D&D Rules. You can even download the nice-looking Alpha document from Paizo’s site now. After looking through the rules, they incorporate what I consider some “no brainer” updates to 3.5, and nothing that struck me as brilliant game design. It’s also not nearly complete, since they just offer a selection of updated classes and such, still having the expectation that it’s an add on to the PHB.
I personally am not happy about this because I loved the first Pathfinder series, but I’m definitely moving to fourth edition, which means I won’t have a Pathfinder in the new edition. (I am glad to see that Necromancer Games, a Paizo partner, will be publishing an adventure path for 4e. I just hope it’s up to the same standards.)
Looking at it from a business perspective, however, this makes a lot of sense. WotC is behind in offering the big third party publishers the new license and rules to use 4e. Paizo is uniquely positioned with the existing 3.5 market. Judging from the divisive reaction to 4e (and those who just don’t want to pay money to switch rules) there will be a market for 3.5 for at least the near future. I’m not sure they had a choice.
Still, I hope they produce high quality accessories and adventures for 4e, even if they don’t switch for Pathfinder. The truth of the matter for me is that no one else is making products up to their level except Wizards.
While I am going to buy the 4E books, I have quite a bit invested in 3.X, and so I’m not terribly disappointed in having more options here. I’ve got a few things that will probably determine what I end up doing.
I’m really wondering about the GSL. If it ends up being as restrictive as early indications show, then I don’t think we’re not going to see the same type of third party options that we had with 3E. The OGL can’t be revoked, so people can use the existing rules and contribute OGL materials…
I agree, more options are good. Heck, just on a graphic design level, the Pathfinder Alpha is better than the 3x PHB.
The GSL is the big question, and it’s already had some flat out disappointing (for consumers) statements. We’ll see how it shakes out, and if they can sell it to the public and other third party companies.
Wow, this is big, folks. Will be interesting to see how it all pans out!
Well now that Paizo has released the Beta edition in both a print(which was sold out at GenCon, but I got one) and a free PDF. I really and truly love this. They added fixes to exsiting rules and fleshed out classes. I personally will be using PathFinder with a few house rules as opposed to 4E, which I was in the process of nearly re-writing. There are a few things I’ll be adding from 4E,but that is about it.