> I contend that if I am just one of a hoard producing d20 modules I won't
be
> distinguishable in the marketplace. I might place some faith in it if 3
> days to kill outsells UA.
Well, the first DAY of distributor sales of 3D2K outsold the first printing
of UA, which took about a month to sell, and we were unable to fill all the
orders for Three Days because we hadn't printed enough. Plus we'd sold a
bunch at Gen Con.
The reprinting arrives next week, and I expect that it will fairly quickly
outsell the UA core rulebook's total sales to date. Perhaps on the day we
get the reprinting -- the first shipment of the reprinting may be as many or
more as we shipped of the first printing.
> If d20 liscencing can't get me into the chain stores I don't have an
> incentive to hop aboard.
Three Days to Kill is not in chain stores (yet), unless you count WotC and
Gamekeeper stores. (They buy from one of our distributors, not direct from
us.) I also haven't gotten any to Amazon.com yet, and a number of our
overseas customers didn't have orders in time for the first printing, and so
haven't gotten any yet.
Big Note of Caution: I expect a drop in sales quantities on subsequent
"Penumbra" (our D20 line trademark) titles, particularly in the re-order
department, simply because there will be a lot more competition in the
market. We're hoping that 3D2K is giving us enough of a head start on
name-recognition to hold open the door for future titles, starting with
"Thieves in the Forest" in November. (And there we start looking at "adding
value" -- in the case of Thieves, by including a poster-size map that people
can put miniatures or counters on -- to distinguish our line from other D20
supplements.)
If we *do* get Penumbra into the book chains and whatnot, it will change our
whole model in a number of ways (including having to factor in
returnability), but I'm not rushing to get there right now. I think a small
game publisher does best by relying on the hobby channels, and regarding
anything else as icing on the cake.
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John Nephew voice (651) 638-0077 fax (651) 638-0084
President, Atlas Games www.atlas-games.com
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