CodenameXXIII said:

 @Avrelivs

Firstly, there's a dark-grey-on-light-grey edit button on the headline of your post, but that disappears after a few minutes. If it's too late, you can still use the heretek way: Click on the Report This Post button, then change the URL of the report screen from "…reportar…" to "…editar…"

(The fact that this actually works reinforces my opinion about the forum software, but then again, I certainly won't turn down a way to remedy shredded posts on a forum that produces them that often…)

H.B.M.C. said:

Proof reading is what is being requested; one of the above forums is asking for people to provide proofread errors.

What we don't have is a guarantee these will be put into the final print and not used as a means to get an errata document out quick. That is what I believe this is about. Only War, imo, is still scheduled ofr the usual gencon release, hence the playtesting credits. As far as FFG is concerned, the work is done. I think they are merely anticipating a few minor issues that will be releated to a pdf and that they are doing us a favour by having that document ready insrtead of having to wait 6 months as with Black Crusade. Certainly no delay is better than 6 months, but paying $20 for the privilege of getting this?

 I'm a very loyal FFG customer (I think I've spent over a thousand dollars on every single DH/RT/DW product - sorry Black Crusade - and assorted  board games), but I will not participate in this so-called "open" beta. I have zero interest in purchasing a PDF of the book down the line, and paying 20 dollars to participate in a "beta" in return for a discount on a future pdf version of the finished book is therefore useless to me. If it was going to be an open beta, it should've been an actual OPEN test, not a clumsily disguised way to get customers to pre-order the pdf version.

peterstepon said:

No.

It's simply, sadly, not that great of an idea. I don't want 100 random people from the forums designing my games, thankyou. Even 100 random people who bought in to a Beta, or whatever, and paid for the priviledge. We've discussed the feasability of the designers listening to the customers ideas on these forums, in another thread.. and, some were more optomistic than others. I wasn't one of them, to be up front about it.

You will get negative feedback over material that is perfectly fine, both "fluff" and "crunch". This was the case of the Sidereal 2nd edition splatbook, in Exalted. There were such tirades against the 1e book, the next writer to come along assumed the voices on the forum were correct, and then they took the nerfbat to it so hard it came out as one of the worst written books of 2e (yeah, yeah, the 1e book wasn't perfect, but most of the problem was because the other splatbooks weren't as well written, as opposed to Sids). That's what going to the players can all to easily result in. Furthermore there's too many conflicting ideas and interpretations about how something should be, even with an already established setting like 40K (or Exalted). AluminiumWolf, for one non-hostile example, and myself both love Space Marines a lot, but you'd never get a game off the ground if the two of us were working together on it.

I'd rather leave the job up to people who do this thing professionally, as a job. They take it a lot more seriously that way. The current group of writers that FFG has working on things have greatly satisfied me with what they've produced, in the overall general (it's not as if I like everything). And will certainly do a better job than some random kid they found on the forums, who really thinks they game needs to include this kewl idea of his.

Blood Pact said:

First, $10 is the PDF price for Pathfinder, not the in-print book price. A full color 576 page hard cover costs more than $10 just to print, and retails for $50.

Second, the OGL allows companies to declare anything they want as "Product Identity", so Paizo didn't have to release their rules as open content. Especially not their expansion content from their other books. But they do. Compare this with the new Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG which is also based on the OGL but only released part of two chapters as open content.

As to someone else's comment that the Wizard's beta isn't the full game: It isn't yet. But before the playtest is complete we will see a near complete game and it will still be for free. So what does Wizard's get out of it? A lot of good feedback (and advertising) about their new line, and an e-mail list directly to a ton of customers that are interested in the new version. That has a ton of value.

So anyway, yes, FFG has the right to conduct their beta as they wish. But when other industry leaders have been doing playtests with great success that are far more customer friendly, I have to conclude that this is a mistake. A pay to Beta will only reach a small number of hardcore fans. A free public beta would get many curious potential customers to check it out which may not have ever looked at a 40k rpg before.

deinol said:

FFG doesn't own 40K, they license it from GW. I would suggest taking up the idea of giving away free content with GW.

The DnD Next public test is a mea culpa from wizards for 4E. They have lost so much ground to Pathfinder that they are scrambling to get a new system available so they can gain back customer support.

Honestly, I don't mind the $20.  I own both hard copy and PDF versions of each corebook at the very least.  The opportunity to test and make suggestions prior to release is something people have been clamoring for since Dark Heresy was first launched.  And, if you go back through the forums you will see a significant number of threads complaining about poor proofreading of books prior to them going to print.

Fantasy Flight Games has always been good about addressing concerns of their market audience.  This probably seemed the best way to get some of the corrections taken care of.  Also, it gives them the right to say "you all had a chance to proof this before print, so any typos what remain are on your heads."

-=Brother Praetus=-

Let me get in on this.

If you plan on buying the PDF and you do the beta, your total price after you get Only War in a few months is roughly $50 (finale price with rebate). If you plan on buying the hardback and take part in the beta your finale price is $70 (final price plus 20 for the beta).

It seems clear to me that this is wrong. If they were giving the rebate for either one then they may as well do the beta for free because the beta cost and the rebate cancel each other out anyway and they aren’t making any money.

Is it worth it? Only if you are getting the PDF finale version. Otherwise it is the biggest F-you to the hardback buyers out there.

They are saying, “Hey PDF buyers! Join this free beta!! Oh and hardback buyers, pay $20 for the same thing!! Isn’t that great?” No, it is not great.

I’m using a bit of hyperbole, and I WILL buy the core book because I played Only War on the FreeRPG day and it was awesome! But this practice is wrong. It is not entitlement; they CAN charge if they want to, the problem is making some people pay and other get a free ride, for no reason. They are really only backtracking and trying to cover up their mistake without just really fixing it by making it free for everyone.

Making some people pay and other get it for free is wrong.

As has been said already, these are the full rules. Every one of 'em is in there. They're not going to give the full rules away for free. No one is getting it for free.

Secondly, you don't have to buy it, so if you just want the hardback (or were never going to buy the PDF), then not buying the beta PDF changes nothing for you.

BYE

H.B.M.C. said:

Agreed %100.

For those that won't be buying this book…..Buh Bye.

Looking forward to those that did buy it what they like/don't like so far.

After glancing at the book so far…..I gotta say I'm impressed!

As a business model, its not that an uncommon practice in the computer game production sphere, heck, I'm doing one now for another game and forked out over $70 for. As for the P&P RPG, its a comparatively 'new' thing to try as the demographic is slightly different, however its not that different to be a completely reasonable approach.

You get an idea of how many will sell

You (and me) guys are always whinning on about how 'blah and blah' is wrong in final production

You get a say on what the game model will shape up to be and would like to play

You get the really obvious screw-ups fixed that you often miss when your nose is so buried in the coal face from writing 1000's of words

I've been here a while, all the time I see the ad-lib/ad-hoc inputs on games, their directions and things that just don't quite work, put in a few myself and to be honest, some of the things I've said here on forums as a feedback did end up in errata's, so someone's listening if the problem actually exists (Like Deathwatch tearing-bolters for example) and if you as a GM or player end up with a product that's fairly sound to run. Then you don't really have much to complain about as you have your chance to present it out now in a formal review.

On a personal level, I dunno if I want to run it as a game and I know I don't have the time to do a formal play test, so I won't be buying it just yet, but as a GM you can never have enough 'resources' for game ideas.

Here it is in plain math. (If you read it all you cannot help but see my point is valid even if you disagree, the point is true.)

The beta is $20, if you buy the PDF when it is ready you get $20 off, you are getting the full rules right now for free. It's math, it is free for them, it is like a pre-order. Your money is going to "come back" in the form of the rebate.

If I spend $20 for the full rules now I will not get the $20 rebate because I will not be buying it in PDF later but hardback. I'm spending $20 on something another person is getting for free. You cannot say that if you get the PDF later you did not get the beta for free it is simple math. 2+2=4, 20+50-20=50 (PDF), 20+50=70 (Hardback). How is one person not getting it free while the other is paying for it?

They are giving the FULL RULES out FOR FREE to anyone who plans to buy a PDF. Nothing you or anyone says will change that. I'm not dogging the fact they are charging. I do not care if they make people pay, I know it's how a lot of PC games work, pay to play the beta, but you always get a rebate for the game and since it is a computer game you have to buy it on computer and get to use the rebate.

To be clear. The problem is not that they are charging 20 dollars. The problem is that they are charging some people 20 dollars and "giving" it to other people for free with a rebate. I plan to go to my game store the day it comes out and get it in hardback. This action wont change my plan. Nor will my little rant change what FFG had made up its mind to do.

They are back tracking, as has been pointed out the rebate was added, it was not there when they first posted this. Everyone should pay, or everyone should get it free. They could give a rebate for the hardback too if you order it from the two websites but they are not doing that. They made the choice to only give it to one group. That is the problem.

I know FFG cares about it's players and that is why they added the rebate later, but it was the wrong thing to do.

My two cents:

Bought it - I love using PDF's at the game table as they can be quickly searched. Less books on the table equals more room for beers!

So far I really like it too. In fact I am liking the streamlined version without all the extra art and thing that perhaps FFG should consider offering versions like this for all their books in the future (at a discounted rate of course). The art is nice and it is often quite inspiring but speed is more important when you are at the table. 

What I really want to know is how to integrate this into my DH game. I have some players that are Guardsmen and I would like to recreate their characters in OW, add the benefits of comrades and see how all that works in DH. 

Anyways, thats my opinion. I'll be glad to use the $20 off when the complete book comes out. 

deinol said:

I stand corrected. Legalese always confused me, but yeah, I was taking too much liberty with "mechanics" being listed under open content. Forgot that that didn't necessarily include the stats for monsters, magic items, etc.

And $10 is great for the .pdf, but I'm not going to take that as grounds to bitch about FFG. They can set their prices how they like, and when you take a look around, pretty much everyone else is charging more than most people think .pdf's should cost, myself included. And while Paizo is an industry leader, so is FFG, and Wizards being the richest company of them all by far, can do whatever the damn well it wants if it thinks it will bring them success in the long term, because they have more than enough money to take a loss (hell, WW might even make a comeback in the next few years). They neither get to dictate how the others do business, nor suffer from any stigma for not following the others along.

And since things are touching on .pdf's vs. hardcopies, for the record I buy both. I usually get the former for reasons of lack of local availability (sadly, some of the FLGS's in my area over the last decade, have only been LGS's), sometimes price because .pdf's are still cheaper. Hardcopy's tend to be core books (Exalted, D20 Modern, L5R), or game lines that I'm really in to (DH and DW right now), and the occasional release that really piques my interest (Soul Reaver).

TCBC Freak said:

Well first, I don't remember any of the .pdf core books being $50. But more importantly, your complaints are a lot of crap. Someone who buys Only War in 2 years, having just discovered the game, doesn't get the Beta for free. In fact, the only people who get the Beta for free ARE THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY GET THE BETA (..and still want the full .pdf).

And the only perk of getting the Beta is that you get to play Only War a few months before everyone else. That's it. Though I'll admit, that's a pretty damn good perk. But once Only War is actually released, anyone who subsequently buys it is not "getting the Beta for free", because the 'only' thing you got was early access to the game (and you don't need that anymore). Yeah, it sucks that people who want to buy the hardcopy, and not the .pdf, do not get to apply the rebate to that book. But you, like Signs, keep acting like this is a surprise, or something you're being forced to do. If you're adult enough to have $70 to spend on the beta and book, you should be adult enough to take responsibility for seeing that yes, you are essentially throwing money away, that it was your choice to do so, and accept noone else is to blame.

Is not being able to have Only War a little earlier than otherwise such a travesty? Such an outrage to your sensibilities, and all decency, that people are really ranting about it as much as they have?

Oh yeah, and the implication that FFG added the $20 rebate in a panic, as if from the (meagre) feeback in this thread… well that's quaint. It's more likely that DriveThru flubbed the post. I can think of several times in the past where they've made minor screwups (and no surprise at all, the forums of the product publisher in question were blazing with people's outrage). Even posted an anecdote of one of them earlier in this thread.