People assumed (myself included) that it would come out around or after Gen-Con, just like the other books. Of course, that was an assumption, not a fact.

BYE

bladerunner_35 said:

What I am saying is that if I choose to pay for the beta, unless I buy the pdf through the related discoiunt, I lose out because I'm also paying for the book - and the cost of the book includes the cost of playtesting (just as it does with the costs of printing, publishing and writing, etc)

I was sketchy about paying for a beta until, unsurprisingly, my fears were alleviated by being informed of a discount on the final product.

I can help the project, which is cool and get an early look at it, which is also cool :)

I also lose nothing in doing so (as far as I can tell), so I'm quite pleased now having got the Beta and spotted a few mistakes :P

signoftheserpent said:

I see, and indeed you do. You either lose out on the beta or pay for the privilige. I understand now, I do not necessarily agree that it's a big deal but again I do not mind using pdf:s so I am biased.

Thanks for the clarification btw!

 Maybe the best solution should to give a discount not only on the pdf version, also on the printed version. Maybe not 20$ of course, but i am sure that a lot of people would buy the beta if they get a 10 or 15 $ on the printed version.

CodenameXXIII said:

Anyway it would be impossible for them to administer a discount on the book unless they sold it directly which won't happen, not least of all becauise it will upset the retail market.

[ADMIN: Edited for content. Feel free to voice your opinions without the personal attacks.]

FFG isn't performing shady business practices again, or trying to "gouge" the fanbase. The people who will buy the Beta are the people who were going to buy the finished .pdf anyway. 

[ADMIN: More content removed.]

so what are you supposed to do with the Beta (not buy it, maybe?). Noone is forcing you, or anyone else, but you'd think they were. And adults apparently take responsibility for how they spend their money.

[ADMIN: More content removed.]

And your complaints about .pdf's in general are something that should be directed at the entire gaming industry, not just FFG, by a long shot.

And yeah, buying the Beta doesn't obligate FFG to listen to any of the tips and corrections that people send them. Good. I hope they'll listen when they idea is good, or the correction valid. But it's been previously established that these forums aren't exactly the place for constructive criticism (wild accusations and rude overreactions, sure). Like all those times that people say FFG should adopt WW's publishing style (when I know for a fact that few forum posters have any experience at all with WW products). I couldn't imagine the mess of a game we'd have, if they had to listen to everything someone on the forums said.

Now getting back to Pathfinder for a second. Their books should be only about $10 to have in print. Pathfinder still uses 3.5e (still better than 4e, but we're moving on to 5e now). It's not cheap out of the kindness of their heart, but simple business practices. Same reason you wouldn't see someone trying to sell 2nd edition material for full price, even if they went and made a bunch of new expansions and adventures for it. And as for the PRD, that's kinda expected since Open Game License pretty much requires them to slap the hard mechanics up somewhere for people to read for free. Wizards did it with D&D too, I probably still have the 3.x System Reference Document that I downloaded years ago sitting on a harddrive somewhere. It's pretty much something that applied to all of 3.0/3.5, some business strategy to try and get more third party publishers in on the game, more easily. Go read the OGL right quick, you'll see right where it says they have to make the mechanics available for free. I'm not saying it's not nice. I'm saying don't be quick to hand out credit, getting this stuff for free is something that Wizards' lawyers already decided for Paizo, when they wrote up OGL.

bladerunner_35 said:

Well my apoligies then to all those I insulted about the paragraphs earlier. Either option was likely, to be frank. But yeah, Drive Thru does have a habit of minor screwups (like not posting complete text and all right away). The 0.99 cent Exalted April Fool's Day product from WW a few years back generated such a riot on the forums, because people were cheated a WHOLE dollar. When it was really just wasn't uploaded to DriveThru properly. Didn't stop people from setting the boards on fire with their unjustified rage though… so you see where I'm coming from a bit better.

To those of you who just tuned in:

signoftheserpent = FFG's naysmith. Don't take him too seriously. He will still be on this forum long after everyone else has left.

Blood Pact said:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/medical/enabler

 Now that the final PDF discount has been included, I think the offer is absolutely fine. Because that's what it is: An offer. Noone's forcing you to buy it if the conditions are unacceptable to you. Just wait for the finished product then as you would have done before.

The weighing of these conditions will vary for different persons, obviously - if you're going to GenCon (if the book came out at GenCon) the deal won't be as good. If you don't like PDFs, it's obviously not for you. If you're living in another part of the world than the USA, it's better. I know I always get the GenCon 40k books somewhen around… mid-January to February at best here. This beta lets me take a (hopefully) small hit in quality and get the game 3/4 of a year before I could get it otherwise even if I never write a single line of feedback to FFG. And maybe we'll be able to finally get a final version that needs neither an errata nor a large bottle of whisky to make the spelling errors go away. If all that's required for that is that some people pay a little sooner for something they'd pay for anyway, that's ok by me.

As for the question "why pay at all and not get it for free", I think N0-1 has hit the nail on the head: This is a nearly finished product. You can play with it. And since it's a physical game instead of one run on a server somewhere, FFG can't take away your access to it once it's given out. Neither is there the possibility of a bug so huge that your GM can't houserule around it. Think about it: Would Blizzard have done an Open Beta of Diablo III where everyone playing the beta could have continued to play the real game (minus the changes) for free? I do not think so.

[quote]

Damnation, any way to edit a post?

My personal thoughts is that this is a way for FFG to enter the Wiki age.

Since most information these days is open source sharing, the logical thing to do would be to allow all gamers to input their ideas to a final product.  Due to the ease of sharing of information, it would be more efficient and economical to have a wider range of ideas come together to make a better product.  Most games in the past were based on a relatively small group of play testers, and were then honed in from feedback from the wider world of players.   This is a way to make a more hands on and grassroots effort to have all players throw their feedback in at the beginning so that a nicer product can be made by release date.  Sure erratas will come out, but that is just part of the evolution of the game.  Look at how much the warhammer line has evolved from Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, Black Crusade, and now Only War.  By having more feedback and more testing by the players themselves, as well as anyone committed to making a better game, the end product cannot help but be excellent.

The more of a group effort, the better future products from FFG will be. 

 But remember that you are asking to people to do a work for free. There are a lot of professionals that work for a fee: Correctors, editors, etc. Now you are asking to people to pay 20$ for a book and after that to send the erratas that the could find on the book.  A lot of people that work and have a contract could be Unemployment because now you have 100 people that will do your work for free (or after have payed 20$)

$20 is steep for a Beta.

I bought it however. I can play the game with just this .pdf, assuming I don't mind providing the setting myself. So I can kind of see why they don't want to give it away.

It is about as finished/polished a product as many of the already ublished core books from FFG - though whether you think that is good or bad is up to you.

I applaud this move toward more extensive play-testing, because honestly, so far the rules have largely been sub-par in consistency and execution. We play 40k roleplay for the setting, not for the rules, though they are improving.

This beta version is full of bit and peices that need improvement, but the only way I see that happening is via extensive playtesting.