Post originally by Larry Lade at 2003-10-24 17:21:27
Converted from Phorums BB System

Really, it's not so much the high price relative to what games cost a few years ago (something I've already learned to swallow) as much as its price relative to OTHER games.

Fantasy HERO, aka Fantasy Phonebook, is something like 3/4 the price of this. Did I miss hearing the part where the latest incarnation of Hero Games got some silly huge amount of venture capital for a massive print run? Or are there WAY more diehard Hero players than I've realized? Last time I checked it's over in the (alarmingly smaller every time I look) non-d20 ghetto at the store.

Nobilis, IMHO the <i>ne plus ultra</i> of RPG book publishing, cost only fifteen bucks more than this. It puts $80 coffee table books to shame. A <i>certain someone</i> insisted his company was still in the black when he bowed out, so its price point was apparently fair enough to not bankrupt the publisher.

Rod Edwards, indie-RPG <i>wunderkind</i>, managed to get Sorcerer published in a slim, attractive hardcover for twenty bucks. It apparently did well enough to warrant an unplanned supplement.

From these points of comparison, I'm still a little genuinely confused about this price on this particular book. Did something change in small-press publishing costs very recently? Or am I fundamentally underestimating the amount of intellectual property that was generated for this new edition? A yes on either of these and I might reconsider, but right now it seems priced to sell to only diehard Gloranthans.

Incidentally, I picked up a new GURPS book instead, i.e. a product from the same publisher. There WAS a moderate price increase, but nothing too startling.