Fantasy Craft is Behind the 8-Ball

[Crafty_Pat]

Of course, I am sure it was a very hard decision for Crafty to essentially delay FC and 10KB by putting them under the MasterCraft umbrella, but I think it will turn out to have been the right decision for both the company and the end-users.

Thank you. We feel the same way.

Alot of the work on the FantasyCraft seems to have been work on the MasterCraft framework as well.  Personally, I am willing to wait for this framework, which will presumably make other MasterCraft releases easier/faster.

Absolutely true.

[Portal]

Thanks for the useful input, everybody, and especially to you, Alex.

Alex,

Our audience didn't start there, and though we'd love to pick up disaffected 3.5/4e players, that was never Fantasy Craft's intent - ours was to serve up a different d20 OGL game that provides a new approach and baseline to fantasy play, with the core principles of our designs (flexibility, balance, tons of options, ability to build and tweak your world) laid on top. People seeking a good game over a compatible game if you will.

No knock to your design philosophy, that's for sure. But in terms of what Crafty expects for overall market success, I think it would be wise to be careful. I think the majority of the OGL-related fantasy RPG market is primarily interested in a "D&D 3.5, but better" and will end up in the lap of Pathfinder (especially if FC doesn't hit market this GenCon). Pathfinder is looking like a good, well-presented, and compatible game. In terms of overall pending sales success, I wouldn't underestimate it. There are lots of us veteran RPGers who don't want to let our 3.5 book collections go to waste when there's a better game system out there that easily allows us to leverage this material we already own. If FC is going to be two design generations away from the 3.5 OGL, I think this will prove to be an overall competitive disadvantage in the broader fantasy RPG market.

Best of luck to you, guys. Crafty delivers excellent d20-based crunch. I just wish you could manage your project schedules and get stuff to market more efficiently. I'll check you guys out again when 10kb is released.

[Krensky]

If FC is going to be two design generations away from the 3.5 OGL, I think this will prove to be an overall competitive disadvantage in the broader fantasy RPG market.

Not an issue, since it's not descended from 3.5 OGL at all.

[Crafty_Alex]

Alex,

Our audience didn't start there, and though we'd love to pick up disaffected 3.5/4e players, that was never Fantasy Craft's intent - ours was to serve up a different d20 OGL game that provides a new approach and baseline to fantasy play, with the core principles of our designs (flexibility, balance, tons of options, ability to build and tweak your world) laid on top. People seeking a good game over a compatible game if you will.

No knock to your design philosophy, that's for sure. But in terms of what Crafty expects for overall market success, I think it would be wise to be careful. I think the majority of the OGL-related fantasy RPG market is primarily interested in a "D&D 3.5, but better" and will end up in the lap of Pathfinder (especially if FC doesn't hit market this GenCon). Pathfinder is looking like a good, well-presented, and compatible game. In terms of overall pending sales success, I wouldn't underestimate it. There are lots of us veteran RPGers who don't want to let our 3.5 book collections go to waste when there's a better game system out there that easily allows us to leverage this material we already own. If FC is going to be two design generations away from the 3.5 OGL, I think this will prove to be an overall competitive disadvantage in the broader fantasy RPG market.

While I appreciate what you're saying, and I *do* mean this will all respect, it's simply not relevant to my point. We NEVER were going to write FC as a 3.5 descended product. Pathfinder popped up months after work on FC had started, and we weren't going to change direction to battle a significantly larger pool of resources and fanbase (honestly, we didn't have Dungeon and Dragon under our care for years anyway...going head to head would have been suicide).

My "good rather than compatible" was not a knock on Pathfinder - I honestly don't know much about Pathfinder at all, having thumbed through The Auld Grump's copy once at Gencon Indy - but rather of a note about who we'd be courting. Pathfinder will do its job admirably, and better than 3.5; we will make a good, Spycraft 2.0 rooted fantasy RPG that will appeal to a different audience. There are plenty of people out there who are maybe done with 3.5, fed up with 4e, are Crafty fans, or looking for another game a bit outside that umbrella - those are the core body of people who will get our game. And I bet, plenty of Pathfinder people who will pick up our book to pull out ideas for their own games. Nature of the market.

Best of luck to you, guys. Crafty delivers excellent d20-based crunch. I just wish you could manage your project schedules and get stuff to market more efficiently. I'll check you guys out again when 10kb is released.

We're getting there - remember we're 3 dudes who work part-time, and who changed the system midstream. Fantasy Craft will be a good product, so I'd hope you'd be willing to at least thumb through the book without dismissing it sight unseen, but that's the salesman in me talking. If not, well, we'll see you when my opus hits

[Valentina]

Yo.
So while I'm a little leery of Mastercraft and it having possible compatibility issues with core SC2, I do wonder if PF's overlooking something.
In my highly anecdotal experience there's a serious difference in the 3.x to 4.0 transition not present in any other D&D system revamp: my players, myself, everybody I know who picks up a die, etc, are GLAD to be making the change. Like, happy. Gleeful. Singing the praises of. The typical complaints of having to repurchase source materials and relearn how to arrange combats are dead already. By comparison we still groan about high level Save or Die, class unbalances, special attack mechanics (Grappling, Tripped, Disarmed), AoO mechanics, builds with gross weaknesses, the constant demand for optimization, horribly unbalanced non-core material and on and on.
There is zero interest in PF. 4.0's what we do when SC's not going on, and really we're content.
4's not Crafty, but it's tight enough and manages ably enough to keep from getting in it's own way -and it's not 3.5.

My current fave is my Elf Barbarian Cham. Yeah, Elf. Non-optimized for stats (+2 Dex, Wis), but remarkably able for secondary abilities. In 3.5 there's a term for a core Elf going Barb: dumbass.

[Morgenstern]

No knock to your design philosophy, that's for sure. But in terms of what Crafty expects for overall market success, I think it would be wise to be careful. I think the majority of the OGL-related fantasy RPG market is primarily interested in a "D&D 3.5, but better" and will end up in the lap of Pathfinder (especially if FC doesn't hit market this GenCon). Pathfinder is looking like a good, well-presented, and compatible game. In terms of overall pending sales success, I wouldn't underestimate it. There are lots of us veteran RPGers who don't want to let our 3.5 book collections go to waste when there's a better game system out there that easily allows us to leverage this material we already own. If FC is going to be two design generations away from the 3.5 OGL, I think this will prove to be an overall competitive disadvantage in the broader fantasy RPG market.

What you're suggesting is that we should have tried to do Pathfinder, but better, and that's just silly for us. If Pathfinder is what you want and you're only buying one game, then we were never in the running for your gaming dollar. They are a vastly bigger company and trying to produce a product with the exact same goals (near-'port of 3.5 with some tweaking) would have put us directly in competition with them and they'd mop the floor with us even if we'd come out last year. But if flexible NPC creation, rich classes, diverse and desirable feats, a powerful contact system, game customizing capaign qualities, and the host of other things we deliver that aren't feasible when 3.5 compatiability is your sworn master, then you'll find some good stuff in our book. Maybe enough to make it a valuable purchase even if Pathfinder directly scratches your most pressing itches. And if you already like Spycraft and just wanted to play in the world's most popular RPG sandbox with the features you already enjoy, I think we have a clear edge over Pathfinder.

Pathfinder IS going to sell more than Fantasy Craft. 'Beating them' in straight sales numbers was never the point - producing a fantasy game with the virtues we've built our reputation on was the point. The folks working on Pathfinder speak pretty highly of Spycraft 2.0. I'm sure they look forward to seeing what we come up with to support fantas-play same as I'm looking forward to their final product and seeingtheir solution to some of D&D's rough patches. I like shiney color art too, but I'm more concerned that the art inspire play or demonstrate a tricky concept and every piece we have serves those purposes, so I'll take affordable and effective B&W over "bet the entire Crafty Games farm on the success of a fantasy product in a saturated market" color pieces/full color printing, thanks. Paizo and Crafty Games are also entirely different enterprises. We only have a handful of mouths to feed compared to them and as a result only need a fraction of their sales for a book to be "a successful product" for us.

The last year of writing on Fantasy Craft has also been building an new engine for us that we can use to drive a lot of other products. I doubt Pathfinder is going to spin off a lot of other games. Not the point for them and not a virtue they were seeking. They didn't need a system that can make sense in a variety of contexts - they needed a system that specifically appealed to 3.5 players who think WotC made a terrible mistake. We'll probably get new customers who think that, but we're defining ourselves much more by what we can do right than by what someone else did wrong.

I'll check you guys out again when 10kb is released.

Works for me .

[Desertpuma]

I'm with Scotty on this one, completely.

I'm also tremendously biased and Pat's Arizona Henchman.

Just sayin'

[Number Three]

I think Fantasy Craft has missed its marketplace success window to capture fantasy RPGers who want a solid post-3.5 d20-based RPG.

I am not here for a horse race.  I am here to have a good time.

You go enjoy your horse race.  I will be over here, having a good time, with whatever horse we're riding this week.  Any horse the locals want to take for a spin.

(I might even be enjoying the 4E horse.  Don't let that fact keep you up at night.)

[Aziraphale]

[delurk][/delurk]
I know it's been said before by others but i have to say I love these forums. In most other forums this would have already devolved into a flaming war. However here its stayed civil and under control. No animosity, just two sides of a discusion.

I must admit it's also nice getting what is almost a "state of the fantasycraft" address aswell. These discussions on the philosophy that underlies the company and the products are not just refreshing they're useful tools. In a nice heavy binding and the right hands it gives us gms a certain weight in the next "discussion"with a whiny player about upcoming proucts and why they're not out yet. 

Time to drift back towards the shadows for a bit...

[TheAuldGrump]

It is also, perhaps, a mistake to think of Fantasy Craft v. Pathfinder as a zero sum game - there are folks who will want both. I am one of them. My homebrew world will be converted to Fantasy Craft (purely because it is a better fit) with E.N. Publishing's Elements of Magic as the spell system. Eberron I will run with Pathfinder (purely because it is a better fit).

I purchased the Pathfinder Beta at Gen Con, and do not regret my choice. I will be getting Fantasy Craft, and very much doubt that I will regret that choice either.

While the games share a core mechanic the feel of the games are quite different. As different as 3.5 and Alternity.

The Auld Grump

[Portal]

Morgenstern,

Just to clarify...

What you're suggesting is that we should have tried to do Pathfinder, but better, and that's just silly for us.

No, not exactly. What I was looking for in 2008 was a 3.5-compatible fantasy RPG that would clean out the bugs in the 3.5 OGL, up the presentation, graphics, and layout level, let me use the existing stuff I own that I like, and bring a good game to the next tier. Whoever produced such a game under whatever moniker was irrelevant. It just turns out Paizo is working on such a project, and so far, is delivering on their timelines.

they'd mop the floor with us even if we'd come out last year.

If FC was released to critical and player success in 2008, why would you say this? Is it because the production aesthetics of the Pathfinder project are at a higher level (i.e. colour graphics)? If so, it's true, that stuff matters when the baseline of a good game is established. Perhaps not to the people on a Crafty Web forum, but for the average RPGer with limited time and money and a weekly game, it does.

But if flexible NPC creation, rich classes, diverse and desirable feats, a powerful contact system, game customizing capaign qualities, and the host of other things we deliver that aren't feasible when 3.5 compatiability is your sworn master

From what I've seen from the Pathfinder Beta and IMHO, Pathfinder is going to deliver on all those things, except the Campaign Qualities and "powerful contact system". I'd prefer colour graphics and a beautiful layout over these latter bits that are unnecessary to me.

[glimmerrat]

Portal, do you have any idea how much it costs to print a book in full colour? It simply isn't an option for a small independant outfit like Crafty. If it makes such a difference then maybe you should go with Pathfinder. I'd rather use the superior rules over the book that looks prettier.

I also have difficulty seeing why colour should make such a big difference for you - all RPGS for many years had colour covers and b&w interiors. People nowadays are spoiled by big press companies like Wizards that can just throw money at things like that.

It is possible for colour art to be inferior to b&w art y'know.

[Desertpuma]

they'd mop the floor with us even if we'd come out last year.

If FC was released to critical and player success in 2008, why would you say this? Is it because the production aesthetics of the Pathfinder project are at a higher level (i.e. colour graphics)? If so, it's true, that stuff matters when the baseline of a good game is established. Perhaps not to the people on a Crafty Web forum, but for the average RPGer with limited time and money and a weekly game, it does.

That is just shortsightedness on your part, Portal. ... First, Paizo has a much bigger advertising budget than Crafty. Second, Crafty is not going to release a half-finished product. Plus your inference that those of us on the Crafty forums do not believe "that stuff matters when the baseline of a good game is established" is idiotic. Of course it matters. However, we would rather sacrifice aesthetics for great crunch and not the other way around. A beautiful artfully done picture book with very little crunch is not what we want. Even the average RPGer would agree with us. The only ones who won't are those who are so blindly set on buying anything by only one gaming company which is not the 75+% of those of us on this board. We're here because we trust the Crafty crew and their crunch of anything else on the D20 market.

But if flexible NPC creation, rich classes, diverse and desirable feats, a powerful contact system, game customizing capaign qualities, and the host of other things we deliver that aren't feasible when 3.5 compatiability is your sworn master

From what I've seen from the Pathfinder Beta and IMHO, Pathfinder is going to deliver on all those things, except the Campaign Qualities and "powerful contact system". I'd prefer colour graphics and a beautiful layout over these latter bits that are unnecessary to me.

Obviously you have yet to explore the Campaign Qualities thoroughly. How flexible is their NPC creation system? If it is like WOTC's, then you are just adding templates until you hit the hit CR for the party. Crafty's NPC system is more flexible where you can stat up a NPC once and then the NPC will naturally fluctuate with based on the TL of the party. Also, how balanced are all the classes and feats you see in Pathfinder? Is it a solidly balanced system all the way around? Even for the GM? What about Origins or the Dramatic Conflict system (of which there will be new iterations on in future MC material?

I'll tell you what... when FC comes out, you make two of the most badass fighters you can, one from Pathfinder and one from FC. Look them over and I bet that the FC fighter will win over 50% of the time for more of its completeness, stronger skills, class abilities, and teamwork capabilities.

[Portal]

Sure, glimmerrat, I recognize a full-colour print is more expensive. I'm willing to pay more for it, however. And it seems broader macro-trends support this, as Wizards could have made the choice to go B&W at lower cost and a lower book price point for years now. Obviously, there is data showing it's worthwhile to go colour.

It's true older RPGs have traditionally had B&W interiors. But it's 2009, let's evolve.

I'd rather use the superior rules over the book that looks prettier.

Pathfinder is offering better rules than 3.5 OGL and compatibility with 3.5 stuff I own I like. For my situation and interests, I'm getting superior rules with Pathfinder (they're offering what I'm looking for) as well as better graphics. I'm also getting a product line that seems to be hitting market close to its project timelines.

[Portal]

Desertpuma,

Plus your inference that those of us on the Crafty forums do not believe "that stuff matters when the baseline of a good game is established" is idiotic. Of course it matters. However, we would rather sacrifice aesthetics for great crunch and not the other way around.

If you're willing to emphasize a higher level of crunch beyond a solid core baseline over aesthetics and presentation, at the end of the day, the graphics don't matter that much to you. It's inherent to what you're saying and your decision-making.

I've long learned that the most important aspects of good RPGing are (IMHO, in order):

1) Inspired, creative, organized GM / DM
2) Inspired, engaged players with a solid relationship between each other
3) A game that inspires one to be creative and imaginative
4) A decent rule system behind the game

I find atmosphere, presentation, and aesthetics more inspiring than ultra-well designed rules. Yes, the rules can't be crap. But once you have a decent game engine behind you, it's time to move on to the other 3 things. I could care less which game system makes a 5th-level fighter more mean. YMMV.

Now if we're talking tactical wargaming, ultra-well designed rules are essential....