Rick Meints

WHERE IS IT BEING PRINTED: China (all other rumors are false) WHAT HAPPENED TO PRINTING IN POLAND: All things change. We are The Chaosium. WHEN WILL IT BE FOR SALE: Summer 2021, as recently announced (If I said "August" people will just hound me, so I won't say that) WHAT ABOUT A PDF: Really? People think that we won't sell a PDF? Can you name any other RQG product we haven't sold as a PDF? CAN I GET A PUPPY: YGWV. BONUS ANSWER: Updated quickstart (rules alignment) is in the works.

Ideally it would be great to have everything we have ever published available as PDF and POD. Unfortunately, that takes time and money and we seldom can justify delaying new projects to focus on old ones. Back in the early 2000s Chaosium did take the RQ3 rulebook, chopped it up into a series of 4 books, and had them on DTRPG in a generic format, but it was a crude effort. Most people today want something far nicer than crude scans that are not searchable, and also want a nice POD version, not a poor photocopy. I wish we had more volunteers to help with such PDF/POD projects, but we seldom find them. It's very rare that someone has a good enough scanner, good OCR software, a good copy of the original to scan, the time, and the skills to use those things to get these sorts of "nice to have" projects done.

It is one of the sturdiest out there, especially compared to other starter sets. It is made from 2mm stock.

The problem with Dragonewts as Player Characters is that they are supposed to be unpredictable, unfathomable, and so foreign to Humans that we simply don't understand them. The only way to make them playable would be to wipe away all of that mystery and most or all of their secrets. Without trying to sound glib, it's hard to have it both ways. I totally get that their mysterious nature makes them sound way cool to play, but I'd rather they just be a mystery. I suppose you could play a mortal dragonewet with total and permanent amnesia, but I doubt that's what you would want.

The second ed. was in a 1" (2.5 cm) thick box. First ed. was in a 2" (5cm) thick box.

At Gen Con 2011 you could buy a preview edition of Mythic Iceland, which was for the 1e version of the book. They sold out quickly and it was not reprinted. The 1e regular version of the book is also out of print.

Thank you for creating this unboxing. We're vary gratified that you liked it so much.

Chaosium's sales have had double digit increases every year since 2015. Would they be higher if we had error free, or nearly error free products, of course. How much higher, I don't know. As I said, we don't like errors, and we are happy for all sources of feedback. When I thank people for it, it is sincere. As an example of trying to sincerely reach out for assistance, I'd like to know what you and Runeblade see as a fair rate of pay (per word, per page, etc.) for the services of an editor that would get us to an acceptable level of "nearly no typos". I can then compare that to what we have in the budget, and potentially make adjustments. Thank you in advance.

I want to clarify something. We don't rely on crowd-sourced editing. It's not about saving money, or because we don't care, or any other similar reason. The situation is simple: We don't want to ignore people who point out errors. Obviously, it would be ideal if there were no errors to report, but that doesn't change any of what I just said. Until there are no errors to report, we aren't going to ignore those who choose to point them out, regardless of their motivation for doing so. It doesn't matter if someone wants to help us, criticize us, lecture us, or any other motivation you can think of. We listen. So why do we create threads for it? To keep it all in one place, or at least probably in fewer places. Also, because if we didn't somebody else probably would. That's it. It's not because it is step 19 of our production process. I think using the auto industry as some sort of illustrative example is an unfair comparison. Having worked in the auto industry for 26 years I know we are not the US auto industry of the 1970s or 1980s. Since 2015 we have worked hard to improve all aspects of the quality of our products. I can assure we we are not trying to compete based on flash, trendy, or similar while ignoring quality. We have been improving. We plan to keep improving. That includes improving our editing. Improving all aspects of our quality has been one of our core goals since 2015. I apologize if we have ruined RQ for you, or profoundly impacted your enjoyment of any of our games. I'm sorry we motivated you to feel you had to provide a number of lengthy examples to reinforce your opinions. Thank you for the feedback.

please email customerservice@chaosium.com and let them know your account details and what email you want to use for the newsletter.

In 1999 the softcover book was $39.99. Fast forward 20 years and a bit and a hardcover printing of the book is $49.99. My inflation calculator says the book is $13 cheaper now when adjusted for inflation. That's kind of cool.

Here is my unvarnished answer to how we support FLGS: We love Brick & Mortar stores. I have fond memories of going to them that date back to the late 1970s. We very much want to help them get through the tough times and also prosper in the good times too. I go to my two FLGS and try to find something to buy from each of them every month when I visit. In contrast, I'm less of a fan of a FLGS that has one physical location, yet they do most of their business online as a 20-40% discounter. I am not a believer of having it both ways. Undercutting all sellers, including other Brick & Mortar stores that sell at retail is not a business practice I want to support. That's a race to the bottom.

Buy the Starter set when it comes out and find out... Who says a new one didn't get added and two from the core rulebook were omitted... We are The Chaosium after all.

Also, please note that we have no current plans to sell BtMoM through distribution.

Ok, I'll bite, who is selling it at such a discount?

We had a simple data error in the inventory system. The warehouse had the wrong SKU assigned to the product. They have now assigned the correct SKU and the book will be up for sale asap.

Let's start with a look at the ToC for the 64 page rulebook and for the 64 page Glorantha book: The Homelands info in the starter set is in the Glorantha book. All of them are there, but they are 2 pages of info in total. The core book has 21 cults described over 22 pages. The starter set has 20 cults described with 3 pages of overview. The starter set has 37 spirit magic and 94 rune spells documented. Sorcery is briefly covered, and one of the pre-gens has 3 sorcery spells detailed.

Unfortunately, we have almost no control over when or how much any distributor will order from us, especially our overseas distributors. We also have almost no control over when those distributors offer the books to stores, let alone when the stores will actually order. Distributors don't even like us to know which specific stores they sell to. NOTE: Because the BtMoM book is from 1999, it is for the 5th edition of the rules. Thus, we do not currently have plans to sell the book to distribution.

The books should be on sale later today. We will be sending out coupons to some of the PDF purchasers of the books later today, shortly before the books go on sale.

Most RPG people I know love boxed sets. Unfortunately, there are a variety of reasons they are not more common. The single biggest factor is that they cost more to make. Printing 4 booklets, some handouts, and a box to put them in costs more than producing a single bound book with all of the same contents. Boxed items also are more prone to damage, both during shipping and during use, especially for flimsy/thin boxes. A well made book, not nearly as much. Boxes often contain a lot of extra empty space. That means they cost more to store, take up more precious shelf space in a game store, and cost more to ship. Large shipments have their costs calculated by weight AND by dimensions. I also want to echo what has been said about sales tax in a number of countries. Books are not taxed as much in many countries as boxed "games" are. So why are boxed starter sets an exception to all of the above "negatives". While I cannot speak for other companies, I believe in the following logic. When you are trying to attract NEW customers you want to entice them with as cool and inexpensive a product as you reasonably can. In our case we feel $29.99 isn't too big an investment for the "RQ curious". There's lots of enticing art, including the box cover art. We've had lots of positive first reactions from people who come to our convention booth, see the CoC starter set, browse through its contents, and find its price very enticing. Many come back at subsequent conventions, or sometimes a day or two later at the same convention and happily switch to buying our RPG books from us. It's a little like the printer and ink cartridge situation. Most of the income we get from customers are the repeat customers who become long term customers. The hardest part is getting them to take the initial plunge. There are a lot of other RPGs vying for their $$$. That's probably the final factor worth mentioning. We are competing with a number of other RPG companies that have cool boxed starter sets on the market. Not doing likewise is somewhat of a disadvantage.

What isn't in the Book 1 rules: about 350 pages of the RQG rulebook. Book 1 is more than the Quickstart, though. Book 1 is designed to get you playing without having to absorb everything. Thus, most things are simplified. You get what we feel are the best parts of the rules to give you a taste of the full system. How to expand to the larger rules set? There are no intermediate points we have set up for future releases. We don't have a "medium" rules set that is 160 pages, followed by a 240 page "advanced" set of rules that lead you to the full 440 page rulebook. It's not some sort of BECMI progression. If you like what you are playing in the Starter set you will most likely buy the full rulebook, maybe the slipcase set, and then start buying adventures (if you are the GM). As for the advantages of either set of rules, that all very much depends on what sort of game you want to play. We could say that the starter set doesn't cover X, but if that's something you love you will only fault us for saying it's a good thing. You could probably play a lot of RQ with just the starter set, including many other adventures found in other books. The most important thing about the starter set is that it provides new players with a chance to start playing the game more quickly, and with a lower investment point. We have lots of material they can move on to after they have exhausted all of what they can play in the starter set. As for what would you be missing out on? Without sounding trite, that's once again a VERY subjective question. If you told me EXACTLY what you like about role-playing in Glorantha I MIGHT be able to answer your question more specifically. Otherwise, it's more likely to be a situation of me saying you miss out on X and then you replying with "I don't care about that, I care about Y". With all politeness and respect, you are asking questions newcomers might ask, when you aren't a newcomer. If you are trying to help your newcomer friends, encourage them to ask their questions here themselves. I wouldn't want to be the middleman in that conversation.

Ask Jason about the ongoing debate of the quote in the book...

Same as the old boss...

yes.

Two things: 1. HotOE and BtMoM had no content changes or additions. We just redid the layout and fixed obvious typos. These are new printings, not new editions. 2. They both go on sale next week.