Got my CKG PDF !

moriarty777 · Post by **moriarty777** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 4:48 am

And now I can finally take an in depth look at this book.

Already, there are things I love about the book and some things that don't quite work for me but nothing terrible at first glance.

However, I do want to thank you for making this available in PDF as soon as the trolls did. I still haven't ordered my physical copy yet but this will hold me over till I do.

Thanks for everything!

M

nightstorm · Post by **nightstorm** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 6:19 am

well I'm glad they put out the pdf. It would have been nice for it to have been lets say $20 as a show of thank you for those that waited over two years for it. And considering the other guy (Paizo) only charges $10.... Just saying it would have been nice.

Seems like I'm not the only one to think so either
http://wondrousimaginings.blogspot.com/ ... -epic.html

gideon_thorne · Post by **gideon_thorne** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 9:21 am

*chuckles* The comments on that blog, directed at me, are hilarious. Course, I don't think too many folks would be all that nice after they've been stalked all over the gaming forums by 'old school' gaming purists and their belittling remarks.

I'm an artist, not a saint.

Treebore · Post by **Treebore** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 10:31 am

I knew the Trolls were going to price their PDF's real high, so I won't be buying it either. I'll do what I normally do, wait the months or years until they decide to put it on sale at a price I am willing to pay. Until then, I have the HC on order, so once I have that I will be happy until the PDF is put on sale cheaply enough that I am willing to buy it.

Besides, why would anyone listen to the opinion of a guy who doesn't even like C&C enough to play it? He clearly says he completely dislikes the SIEGE engine, so therefore completely dislikes C&C. So why he would even be interested in the CKG in the first place is completely beyond me.

Besides, anyone with a brain knows why the Trolls will likely never put the PDF on sale for $10, they don't have the sales volume of Paizo. If they could put up the PDF for $10 and know they will get over 50,000 sales, they might do it then. But they aren't Paizo, they might get a few thousand sales. Two completely different scales of business.

Plus when Paizo did the $10 PDF it was originally going to be a one time thing. Then they got blown away with their 50,000+ downloads, so they did it for the Bestiary, and I assume their GMG. So when you know you can put up a PDF and get a half million dollars of sales within the first few days, your more willing to do such a thing. Especially when your a company who offers up that self same PDF for free if your a subscriber like I was/am.

So if the Trolls ever get C&C to a point where they can get 50,000 + sales within a week, we might start seeing $10 PDF's on a $40+ book they release.

Narl · Post by **Narl** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 3:00 pm

The discount on the PDF if you pre-ordered the hardcover has been upped to 20%.

mgtremaine · Post by **mgtremaine** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 3:28 pm

Bought and sync'd to my iPad. Ready for reading, now if I can just get people to stop asking me to work I can get down to some serious game stuff.

-Mike

Relaxo · Post by **Relaxo** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 4:07 pm

I think the strength of the pdf being available right away is for folks outside the USA where shipping is another 2-3 weeks and $much... I too, find it too costly for me right now with a print copy on the way.
I really am dying to get my hands on it already, but another week or three won't kill me.

Sir Ironside · Post by **Sir Ironside** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 6:25 pm

Treebore wrote:I knew the Trolls were going to price their PDF's real high, so I won't be buying it either. I'll do what I normally do, wait the months or years until they decide to put it on sale at a price I am willing to pay. Until then, I have the HC on order, so once I have that I will be happy until the PDF is put on sale cheaply enough that I am willing to buy it.

Besides, why would anyone listen to the opinion of a guy who doesn't even like C&C enough to play it? He clearly says he completely dislikes the SIEGE engine, so therefore completely dislikes C&C. So why he would even be interested in the CKG in the first place is completely beyond me.

Besides, anyone with a brain knows why the Trolls will likely never put the PDF on sale for $10, they don't have the sales volume of Paizo. If they could put up the PDF for $10 and know they will get over 50,000 sales, they might do it then. But they aren't Paizo, they might get a few thousand sales. Two completely different scales of business.

Plus when Paizo did the $10 PDF it was originally going to be a one time thing. Then they got blown away with their 50,000+ downloads, so they did it for the Bestiary, and I assume their GMG. So when you know you can put up a PDF and get a half million dollars of sales within the first few days, your more willing to do such a thing. Especially when your a company who offers up that self same PDF for free if your a subscriber like I was/am.

So if the Trolls ever get C&C to a point where they can get 50,000 + sales within a week, we might start seeing $10 PDF's on a $40+ book they release.

You don't need to be a large company to offer pdf's at a more sane price. Vajra Enterprises are a down right steal. Add the fact that you can get the pdf free if you buy the printed version. Blacksburg Tactical Research Centre has a more industry friendly pricing on their pdf's. I can only think of one company that comes close to insane pdf prices, that being [url=lhttp://www.sjgames.com/]Steve Jackson Games[/url] pricing their GURPS books just a little below that of the printed version, which I think hurts pdf sales if you check-out their top twenty pdf sales. You'd think that the GURPS basic books should be at the top of that list, but doesn't even crack the top twenty. It should be noted that SJgames e23 offers unlimited downloads when you buy the pdf which is handy when the pdf if updated with errata fixed.

Neither Vajra Enterprises, nor BTRC even come close to TLG in sales kind of disputes the logic of only big companies can offer low pdf pricing.

Now, granted I've tried to talk Brian from Vajra to raise their pdf pricing and offer book/pdf bundles rather than a free pdf with a book sale. Vajra has the opposite problem of undervaluing pdf's as a viable revenue stream.

Troll Lord · Post by **Troll Lord** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 6:32 pm

Treebore wrote:I knew the Trolls were going to price their PDF's real high, so I won't be buying it either. I'll do what I normally do, wait the months or years until they decide to put it on sale at a price I am willing to pay. Until then, I have the HC on order, so once I have that I will be happy until the PDF is put on sale cheaply enough that I am willing to buy it.

Besides, why would anyone listen to the opinion of a guy who doesn't even like C&C enough to play it? He clearly says he completely dislikes the SIEGE engine, so therefore completely dislikes C&C. So why he would even be interested in the CKG in the first place is completely beyond me.

Besides, anyone with a brain knows why the Trolls will likely never put the PDF on sale for $10, they don't have the sales volume of Paizo. If they could put up the PDF for $10 and know they will get over 50,000 sales, they might do it then. But they aren't Paizo, they might get a few thousand sales. Two completely different scales of business.

Plus when Paizo did the $10 PDF it was originally going to be a one time thing. Then they got blown away with their 50,000+ downloads, so they did it for the Bestiary, and I assume their GMG. So when you know you can put up a PDF and get a half million dollars of sales within the first few days, your more willing to do such a thing. Especially when your a company who offers up that self same PDF for free if your a subscriber like I was/am.

So if the Trolls ever get C&C to a point where they can get 50,000 + sales within a week, we might start seeing $10 PDF's on a $40+ book they release.

I think I missed part of a discussion here.

But do keep in mind when stacking TLG up against Paizo, there are are a few factors to consider; their PDF store is owned by Paizo. So they are charged no servicing fee for the download and can therefore cut deeper into their prices than TLG or other companies can. We have to pay a percentage of every sale to the vendor... be it RPGNow, Drivethru, and even Paizo. Paizo does not; this gives them a greater freedom in pricing.

Now, we intend to launch our own online PDF store and eventually we will. When this happens the prices for everything will drop.

And how often does anyone charge 10.00 for their core PRINT book.

Steve

Post by **Breakdaddy** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 6:44 pm

I will charge anyone who wants a PDF of my latest core book 10$, SO TAKE THAT TLG!!!

Full disclosure: My "core book" is a one-page document that just says "THANKS FOR PAYING! lub, Breakdaddy"

nightstorm · Post by **nightstorm** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 6:59 pm

I dont want this to be taken as a jab, but if you wait as long to have your own pdf store as you have this book, you might not be here next year. The reality is I'm a nice guy. All of the Troll Lord Pdf's I bought have been liget. I do that because I beleive in supporting.Take for instance paizo. By making the pdfs $10 there is little in way of pirated pdfs. Why? because they have meet the consumer half way. Believe it or not most people will pay if they think the price is fair. Coming on here and justifing the high cost does not help. Being your own boss, you have to see what the other guy is doing and do it only better even if that means you have to think outside of the box.
I plan on using the books and pdf's I've bought from you in the future. And I look forward to buying more. And I like to come on these boards and post and share my gaming experiance.
But please don't be surprised if I dont buy The CKG anytime in the forseeable future, hardback or pdf.
There are other things I would like to address but they are neither what this post is about. I truly wish the staff here luck. I will still be here (if you'll have me ) waiting to see what happens.

Troll Lord · Post by **Troll Lord** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:08 pm

nightstorm wrote:I dont want this to be taken as a jab, but if you wait as long to have your own pdf store as you have this book, you might not be here next year. The reality is I'm a nice guy. All of the Troll Lord Pdf's I bought have been liget. I do that because I beleive in supporting.Take for instance paizo. By making the pdfs $10 there is little in way of pirated pdfs. Why? because they have meet the consumer half way. Believe it or not most people will pay if they think the price is fair. Coming on here and justifing the high cost does not help. Being your own boss, you have to see what the other guy is doing and do it only better even if that means you have to think outside of the box.
I plan on using the books and pdf's I've bought from you in the future. And I look forward to buying more. And I like to come on these boards and post and share my gaming experiance.
But please don't be surprised if I dont buy The CKG anytime in the forseeable future, hardback or pdf.
There are other things I would like to address but they are neither what this post is about. I truly wish the staff here luck. I will still be here (if you'll have me ) waiting to see what happens.

I don't take that as a jab at all. Its part of the ever changing market. We of course have to be very careful when the market changes.

I understand your argument, but disagree on the pricing (I'll discuss the pricing scheme a little more in the Tusk when I get to it and cross post here). But that's neither here nor there! Please understand your always welcome on these boards and to espouse your views anytime to boot!

Steve

Omote · Post by **Omote** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:15 pm

nightstorm wrote:Take for instance paizo. By making the pdfs $10 there is little in way of pirated pdfs.

Um, heh. That is simply not true, even a little bit. I know a guy...

~O

nightstorm · Post by **nightstorm** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:33 pm

Omote wrote:
nightstorm wrote:Take for instance paizo. By making the pdfs $10 there is little in way of pirated pdfs.
Um, heh. That is simply not true, even a little bit. I know a guy...

~O

LOL well of course SOMEONE will do it. I can take people to a cliff and tell them not to jump but you know at least one will do it eventully. My point was more people on there just pay the 9-10 dollars than get a pirated one.

Post by **Breakdaddy** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:36 pm

Well, as with most everything else in the business world, folks have a choice to purchase it or spend their money elsewhere. I personally prefer hard copies of RPG products anyhow, so PDF pricing has never been my particular focus. YMMV.

serleran · Post by **serleran** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:40 pm

I agree with the Breakdaddy... *did you hear the rumbles in the heavens? Is it 2012 yet?* the price of the PDF is a non-issue for me simply because I won't get it, even if it was $1. I'd rather hold the book, dog-ear its pages, and run it through the Doritos Pepper challenge than e-flip a page one word at a time.

mgtremaine · Post by **mgtremaine** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:56 pm

I like having both

, one to read one to quote from when I get asked questions.

I'm all for people making wise choices with their spending money, money is a very personal thing after all. I do not think that the price of the PDF is that far out there. Let me put another way, I know what I charge an hour if I could sell 1,000 PDF's at that price and I could write the thing in 38 days then it would make economic sense. The Trolls have spent how long on this, and how many people have worked on it? No one is getting rich off this I assure you, the Cristal and Caviar are not flowing now that it is done. TLG is a small press, guess what happened to most small presses.

The most successful RPG designer in history is probably Gary Gygax, ask Gail how that worked out money wise. It's one thing to want what you want at the price you can pay, but Steve and Crew need to charge what is going to keep them in business even if that means losing your sales.

I'm not sure there is much more to say other then money is a tough thing to talk about.

That's my 2cents ;P

-Mike

Treebore · Post by **Treebore** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 8:39 pm

Ideally I like to have both, mostly because I run or play in so many games on line.

As for pricing, the bottom line is business' are different, they have different costs, even different profit margins. So to expect company "A" to do their pricing the same as companies Y, X and Z is ridiculous.

Troll Lords has proven they are cutting their operation costs and passing such savings on to us when they can (how many have noticed the adventures have dropped about $5?).

So like Steve said above, when they can cut PDF prices even lower they will. When they do, that is probably when I will buy.

Heck, I have noticed Steve makes sure to have extra good sales once to twice per year, and those are the sales I wait for to get PDF's, or additional copies of books or modules.

Omote · Post by **Omote** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 8:49 pm

I can't remember another company in the biz (the size of TLG or larger) that offers the fan so much. Hell, as Treebore mentions TLG DEEP DISCOUNTS their stock once or twice a year to, and excuse the saying, RETARDEDLY LOW DISCOUNT LEVELS! When TLG does stuff like offer up book that just came out for 50% off of cover price (12-days of Christmas Sale), that is doing good stuff for the fans. TLG can, and should charge what they have to on their .pdf's to be sustainable. Plus (and I can't beleive I'm going to say this), but really most of the .pdf's out there are way too cheap as is!

In my ignorance I will assume that the way most of the .pdf publishers on RPGNOW/Drivethru are hobbiests who really don't make a living on their work anyway. That's why they can charge such low prices. As someone pointed out in an earlier post, I know what I have to charge for an hour's work just make my house payments! There is no way in this industry that you can charge a couple of bucks for hours/days/months of your work and be expected to turn profit.

Sure, we all love a deal but .pdf pricing is too out of whack these days in my opinion.

~O

Treebore · Post by **Treebore** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 9:26 pm

BTW, getting your own PDF store front up and going is the smart way to go, it isn't that friggin hard, and you already have a good idea of how well your efforts will pay off.

Troll Lord · Post by **Troll Lord** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 10:05 pm

Treebore wrote:BTW, getting your own PDF store front up and going is the smart way to go, it isn't that friggin hard, and you already have a good idea of how well your efforts will pay off.

Yeah, you probably remember but last year we had it all set to go but the guy that was managing it for me got caught up in doing other things and we never went live on it. I can't even recall the name of it.

But it will be revisited in the next few months. Basically I've been sucked into the print shop these past 8 weeks, Tim too. Those weeks were supposed to be Mark/Davis printing, Tim promoting, Peter/Dreamie/Megan desiging, all the writers writing and me writing AND working on growing the business into the book market, and into new venues. So presumably we have this handled and I can get out of that *#&*@ shop...though in truth I like working the binder, its pretty cool.

It also occurs to me that many people look at the PDF as a bonus to a print purchase and that is really not the way we view the PDF. We see it as a viable market even as the direct to consumer and the direct to retail as well as game and book trade markets are; hell even the convention market is a viable market. When we released the PDF last night it was to allow people to get a copy in that format if they so desired, not really as a bonus to the pre-order folks (I don't mean that harshly). The same thought process went into releasing the perfect bound edition. The thinking being "the book is ready to go, people want it, so those who want it in format X or Y or Z can get it. For those who want it hardback, we can offer this discount for the electronic version IF they want that too. The real bonus for those who have waited so long will come in a print version...probably some added something to the package when we ship that SOB, an adventure, coupon for another book, or some such.

The problems come in the pricing in that market place. And I think treebore, you pointed out the way any business has to establish its prices. If we price it at 10.00 bucks we actually don't earn any profit. Companies that do that are doing it to drive business to their print publications where they can make up for 'loss' occurred. I know what works for us, what works for them is entirely different.

And we do offer stuff for sale on the dirn time! hahaah

But really, thank everyone for all the discussion. Its good to hear the other side to things. I balk at paying 1.00 for an app on my kids Iphone, but to hell if I won't lay down 45.00 for an over priced history book without even looking at the price.

Steve

JoetheLawyer · Post by **JoetheLawyer** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 11:57 pm

Being the guy from the blog, I thought I'd chime in. First, just to answer Treebore's point, you don't need to be a fan or player of C&C to get use and enjoyment out of the book. I don't like the siege engine, sure, but I do like the style of the Troll Lords. Like I said, they are some of the coolest guys in gaming. In a DMG type book, I think there might be plenty of useful info for me to steal for my own game. Just because I dislike the SE, doesn't mean I dislike other aspects of the game. I don't think Steve wanted to limit his sales of this book to just people who play C&C and like the Siege Engine.

My thoughts on the 10 dollar pricing are this: I don't have a game store anywhere nearby. I don't know what I'm getting if I plunk down full price for the book---whether it will be useful or not---worth the hardcover price. I can't tell from the table of contents how good the contents are. However, I assume I will be getting something useful out of it, and I can bet I would be willing to pay 10 bucks for that useful info. I'll even pay 10 bucks to take a chance that there is something useful in there, and not be too pissed if there wasn't anything good. It's a gamble I'm willing to take.

Let's say it turns out that there is tons of of useful stuff in the book. If that's the case, the 10 dollar purchase just lead me to buy the hardcover book, which I never would have bought sight unseen. TLG makes even more money off of me. This is what happened with me and Pathfinder. They got a ton of hardcover sales after people first checked it out by looking at the 10 buck pdf which they would never have gotten otherwise.

Some of the posters in the comments on the blog basically said they could just download for free via torrents. Now some would do that anyhow, regardless of price, but many people have a twinge of guilt, and if an affordable pdf were available, they would pay for it rather than steal it.

I think TLG is passing up a good opportunity here to get potentially more sales, and garner some goodwill after the long wait for the book. I don't feel that pdf sales at a low price would substantially cut into book sales. In fact, it may help it, as in Paizo's case. Every pdf sale is essentially free money, on top of book sales. You may not get as much as if you sold it from your own pdf store, but still every penny of what you do get is free money. If you think based on your data that pdf sales would cut into book sales, then so be it. It's your business decision. I just know that Erik Mona had to work really hard to convince Lisa Stevens CEO of Paizo to do the cheap pdf. She was skeptical as hell, but it ultimately paid off really well for them. She was very happy with the result. She later made all their hardcover book pdf prices 9.99, when she initially hadn't planned to. If it cut into the sales of hardcover books to do so, I doubt she would have done it. And I know that she is the type that makes hardcore number crunching-based business decisions.

Anyway, my 2 cents. I figured I ought to come over here and make myself available for an ass-kickin', rather than hide behind a blog.

Oh, and Gideon, I don't know who slammed you in the comments or why. I don't know who you are man, so I have nothing bad to say about you.

Joe

Treebore · Post by **Treebore** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 12:05 am

A very good point brought to my attention, you do realize you are selling the PDF for more than the digest sized or the Perfect Bound can be bought for, right?

Shouldn't the PDF be cheaper than any of the print versions?

dadiceguy · Post by **dadiceguy** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 12:08 am

There is no way I can spend that kind cash on a PDF OneBookShelf cant be charging that much.

gideon_thorne · Post by **gideon_thorne** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 12:39 am

JoetheLawyer wrote:
Oh, and Gideon, I don't know who slammed you in the comments or why. I don't know who you are man, so I have nothing bad to say about you.

Joe

That would be Akrasia, when my name, Peter B, got mentioned.

Not that I personally give a damn. I just think its amusing that people can divert from commentary on the price of a book, to something that has absolutely nothing to do with the subject at hand. Its no wonder I can't take some folks serious in the face of that.

As for the pricing, as Steve mentioned earlier, there are all manner of costs that go into it. I don't really know what rpgnow, or the other places, take as a cut. Probably wont ever come up in my case, since, if I ever do a project of my own, it wont be released in pdf. So its not really 'free' money. All sorts of people have to be paid out of that money. The lower the price, the less money left over. Now, I don't really operate on that end of the spectrum, so I don't really know what the costs are? But in the end, some money does have to be made.

Paizo can get away with many things because they have a certain amount of volume, and their own store. Other companies not so much.

And, as far as I understand, to comment on Treebore's point, the price of the e-book, after the various discounts are applied, is actually less than the perfect bound.

I might suggest to Steve that he put up a page or two of a chapter here and there, something like Amazon.com does with their 'search inside this book' option. Thats a good thought.

Lord Dynel · Post by **Lord Dynel** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 3:43 am

pdfs are for wussies...get the dead tree model or gtfo!!

Rigon · Post by **Rigon** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 3:58 am

Lord Dynel wrote:pdfs are for wussies...get the dead tree model or gtfo!!

Hellz yeah!

That's why I ordered a perfect bound copy this morning and it shipped this afternoon.

R-

Lord Dynel · Post by **Lord Dynel** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 4:04 am

Rigon wrote:Hellz yeah! That's why I ordered a perfect bound copy this morning and it shipped this afternoon.

R-

Right there with ya, bossman. Same thing, too - shipped this afternoon. Thing is, I'll probably buy a HB also. I'll keep the HB for myself and ship the perfect bound to a friend of mine.

Rigon · Post by **Rigon** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 4:19 am

Lord Dynel wrote:
Rigon wrote:Hellz yeah! That's why I ordered a perfect bound copy this morning and it shipped this afternoon.

R-
Right there with ya, bossman. Same thing, too - shipped this afternoon. Thing is, I'll probably buy a HB also. I'll keep the HB for myself and ship the perfect bound to a friend of mine.

I preordered my HB when the preorders hit the street back in Nov/Dec. I just got tired of waiting.

R-

ArgoForg · Post by **ArgoForg** » Fri Feb 18, 2011 1:32 pm

I would be sorely tempted to buy a perfect bound (or possibly a PDF) copy while waiting for the hardcover. But I have a move and a new house careening toward me at breakneck speed, so I better wait.

Troll Lord Games

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