[UA] Release schedule stuff

[Will]

Greg Stolze <holycrow at mindspring.com> a écrit :
> 
> Not to be snide, but let's take a historical perspective.
> 
> Or, to give another example, check out Hunter: the Reckoning.  NOBODY loved
> this game before it came out.  EVERYBODY expected it to suck.
[...]
> Yet it has handily outsold UA at every single turn.

I think the big difference here is marketing. It sucks, it's lame, whatever,
but in the end it means $$$ and sometimes they don't even have to sell out.
Which other company on the market could afford to publish 2 books dedicated
to a clan and one "sidebook" and then kill them all? (I'm referring to Ravnos).
And still they sold quite a lot of these books...

About UA, since we are in a different "environment" (I'd say the goal is not
100% $$$), I'd like to have 3 supplements a year, and here are the reasons
why:

- Timing: more than 1 supplement every 3 months for a game line that is not
a pure marketing whore is just waste. Besides, it's then very hard for fans to
catch up with everything (nothing more annoying than the Trinity/Aberrant
strategy). And you don't have a "storyline/timeline" to support that. UA has
been designed along "old" lines, basically a core book and then supplements in
order to describe the UAverse, not supplements to describe what's going on.
The only good mix I've seen at the moment for this is Shadowrun. On the other
hand, one book every 6 months and everybody thinks the game is dead, retailers
first. People who spend a lot of money on RPG books tend to live in big cities,
w/ good, well-supplied stores and go there every other week (if not more).
As of now, the timing is too slow, definitely. I can tell that because I'm
currently _waiting_. I'd say one book every 4 months is a good deal for UA.

Side note: Delta Green is NOT a game line. It's an impressive cherry on top of
the big cake. But it's not an alternative to good, dedicated support for the
game line.

- Focus: more books obviously means dilution. With 3 books a year, you can do
a scenario book (a la One Shots, around 80pp), a corebook (TNI, IC, bigger,
say 128 pages) and a "side" book (say, Max attax ?, around 96pp). Everybody's
happy and you can sell 2 books out of 3 to the average fan. (I remember the
Trinity line quite heavily focused on scenarios and people repeatedly saying
they never bought adventure books, and other people saying they buy only
for their favourite clans/organizations and others saying...).

- Price: I'd rather buy 3 or 4 books even if it's more expensive than 2. First
of all, I guess it means Atlas gets more money out of people, and let's not
forget -G.'s mortgage :) It also means I have to get less money out of my
pocket more often, and psychologically it's better. For ex. I only bought
Delta Green recently. Why? I was obviously interested, everybody said it was
great, every review said it was great, and then some other people would come
out of the blue and say it was great. Yes, but I had an answer to that: it was
also expensive. The idea here is to decrease the "Let's try it"-cap. Who tells
me it's gonna be worth the cash? Some "I'm the writer's best friend" reviewer?
The layout or illos? Word-of-mouth? Nothing. I want to try it by myself, and
therefore I'm risking some of my money for... what? So, ok, I'll buy this
comparatively cheap WW splatbook instead, it's bound to be good (then I can
cry on forums that it's lame, they already have my money...)(for those
interested, not anymore :).

One last thing, if you really want some exposure, get this Naked Goddess book
out DAMN QUICK! :)

Just my .02$
Will

PS: Greg, if you think H:tR and UA have the same potential audience (in size,
I mean), just one thing: which one has madness meters, and which one has big
flame-throwers-mwahahahaha? And if you want a real blockbuster, just imagine
one with both (Chtulhu, Vampire, ...) 


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