Probably. Or maybe they've just seen reason and decided to slow down and delay the release of the 2024 core books until we can figure out what the hell is going on.
Probably. Or maybe they've just seen reason and decided to slow down and delay the release of the 2024 core books until we can figure out what the hell is going on.
The fact that assuming this is last playtest that is released (we have no way of knowing), wotc is really starting to push the envelope for a 2024 release date for the 1st book. The earliest date analysis starts of this new material is Dec 11th. We are far far past any 12 month window to nail down material, then get that material formatted into book form, then sent to the printers, then drafts copy-checked, then those drafts sent back to the printer with the inevitable corrections, then the printer actually printing books, then getting those books distributed to vendors for the Christmas 2024 buying season. Of course, most of that timeline goes out the door if the intent is to get ONLY a .pdf available for sale by say Nov 1, 2024. Then changes can happen real-time.
Bottom line, the one trigger, that has not happened yet, is that ANY book publisher has to register a new title 9 months before with the entity that oversees book distribution. That has been confirmed by the Roll for Combat guys, who worked for Pazio, and now create and publish their own books. I am very curious when wotc plans on doing that.
Probably. Or maybe they've just seen reason and decided to slow down and delay the release of the 2024 core books until we can figure out what the hell is going on.
The fact that assuming this is last playtest that is released (we have no way of knowing), wotc is really starting to push the envelope for a 2024 release date for the 1st book. The earliest date analysis starts of this new material is Dec 11th. We are far far past any 12 month window to nail down material, then get that material formatted into book form, then sent to the printers, then drafts copy-checked, then those drafts sent back to the printer with the inevitable corrections, then the printer actually printing books, then getting those books distributed to vendors for the Christmas 2024 buying season. Of course, most of that timeline goes out the door if the intent is to get ONLY a .pdf available for sale by say Nov 1, 2024. Then changes can happen real-time.
Bottom line, the one trigger, that has not happened yet, is that ANY book publisher has to register a new title 9 months before with the entity that oversees book distribution. That has been confirmed by the Roll for Combat guys, who worked for Pazio, and now create and publish their own books. I am very curious when wotc plans on doing that.
1 - This is merely the last playtest of this year. There will be additional playtest material through at least the first quarter, according to the previously described timetables. Granted, those timetables were initially set up many months ago (over a year), and things change, but that's what we have so far.
2 - There are 7 companies that are involved in book distribution, and all of them negotiate individual contracts with individual publishers on a distinct basis. For example, Amazon has to work with them, and you can get a book into print format and into the distribution system within a 14 day timeframe. The last book I had out professionally went from Proof to shelf in 38 days. That time frame depends entirely on the nature of the agreement between the publisher and the distributor for that particular line -- and is affected by the market, the size of the market, the size of the product, the size of the initial print order (standard is still 25k to 50k copies for first hardcover, about double that for soft) and so forth.
Now, in fairness, WotC and Random House did just end their distribution arrangement (in part due to internal challenges with RH that are utterly unrelated to WotC), so WotC will likely have to deal with Diamond or Ingram (the top two for this market segment), plus Gardner and CNPeReading. They might even broker a deal with Baker & Taylor. All of them can handle a high engagement product within about 60 days, which is a more standard timeframe for large scale products.
Also in fairness, a self pub situation does fit your described scenario. For example, if I were to try and publish my current Lore Book for distribution to those stores and avoid using Amazon as a service, that's a time frame for a full color, 500 plus page book that is totally in line with what is common and normative.
3 - Do you honestly think that they haven't registered the 2024 rule books to hold space when they started planning this out in 2020? That registration iis for the catalog orders. The actual catalog won't be out until June of next year, by which time they will almost certainly have figured out there cover set ups and other press/pr facing material, and hav ea good idea of product size.
IOW -- they still have time to be able to make the Holiday release cycle as intended. Odds are pretty good they already have the bulk of the digital matter (that is, the manuscripts) set up, including layout and design, they just need to drop in text.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
The fact that assuming this is last playtest that is released (we have no way of knowing), wotc is really starting to push the envelope for a 2024 release date for the 1st book. The earliest date analysis starts of this new material is Dec 11th. We are far far past any 12 month window to nail down material, then get that material formatted into book form, then sent to the printers, then drafts copy-checked, then those drafts sent back to the printer with the inevitable corrections, then the printer actually printing books, then getting those books distributed to vendors for the Christmas 2024 buying season. Of course, most of that timeline goes out the door if the intent is to get ONLY a .pdf available for sale by say Nov 1, 2024. Then changes can happen real-time.
Because they're such a large customer with a large print run, I'd expect WotC to get way more slack from their printers than most publishers do. It's also probably mostly laid out and finalized, and waiting on a relatively small amount of changes, at least in the PHB.
They've also got the resources to push through copy edits at an accelerated pace, which might not be the wisest move, but they can.
Are they on track to make their release date? I don't know enough about the logistics of publishing to say, but I'd expect they can get the book to market for Christmas if they can get the files to their printer by summer.
Bottom line, the one trigger, that has not happened yet, is that ANY book publisher has to register a new title 9 months before with the entity that oversees book distribution. That has been confirmed by the Roll for Combat guys, who worked for Pazio, and now create and publish their own books. I am very curious when wotc plans on doing that.
The who that does what?
If you're talking about the big book and game distributors, who have catalogs that the stores order from, I don't know what the deadlines are on that, but even if it is nine months, that's still only august/september.
Also, after terminating their distribution deal with Random Penguin a while back, they've announced that they're distributing to the bookstore market directly through Hasbro, and I doubt the "Roll for Combat guys" see that catalog.
oooh, I missed the direct through Hasbro -- that means they have access to the toy market as well, and aren't using a standard print publisher. It also means that Hasbro will be handling warehousing, so massive reduction in overhead and the contracts were set long ago, so they likely have a 60 day window.
Niiiiice...
EDIT: Ah, so looking them up, they are an arm of Paizo, which uses Diamond Distribution, the same folks that Marvel and DC had to use for years until they finally threatened to start a new one fresh in the early 2000's -- Diamond is considered the best for Comics and such, but no one likes them, in part because of shitty contracts like was described.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
There have been delays, but they also worked on catching up. It's possible they'll miss 2024...but I wouldn't start setting up expectations just yet. There's just nothing solid to work on that suggests they will miss it and there's no reason to believe that they didn't factor in some breathing space.
In short, expect it in 2024 until there's something solid saying otherwise.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
EDIT: Ah, so looking them up, they are an arm of Paizo, which uses Diamond Distribution, the same folks that Marvel and DC had to use for years until they finally threatened to start a new one fresh in the early 2000's
Marvel, at least, did. (I think they stopped doing their own distribution after they went bankrupt. But that was a long time ago, and has very little relation to how distribution works now.)
-- Diamond is considered the best for Comics and such, but no one likes them, in part because of shitty contracts like was described.
I think Alliance is the big one when it comes to game stores. Diamond's terms for distribution appear to be that they get the product for distribution 6-8 weeks after it appears in the catalog, so probably three months lead all told. I can't be bothered to look up Alliance, but it's likely similar.
And whatever lead time Diamond and Alliance demand from their regular customers, WotC are easily big enough to push them around.
EDIT: Ah, so looking them up, they are an arm of Paizo, which uses Diamond Distribution, the same folks that Marvel and DC had to use for years until they finally threatened to start a new one fresh in the early 2000's
Marvel, at least, did. (I think they stopped doing their own distribution after they went bankrupt. But that was a long time ago, and has very little relation to how distribution works now.)
-- Diamond is considered the best for Comics and such, but no one likes them, in part because of shitty contracts like was described.
I think Alliance is the big one when it comes to game stores. Diamond's terms for distribution appear to be that they get the product for distribution 6-8 weeks after it appears in the catalog, so probably three months lead all told. I can't be bothered to look up Alliance, but it's likely similar.
And whatever lead time Diamond and Alliance demand from their regular customers, WotC are easily big enough to push them around.
Yeah, and I was off a bit on my recall of the events. Penguin RH now has Marvel, DC, and IDW comics (during the covid stuff they all switched), but Alliance is part of Diamond.
Hasbro doing in house is entirely handled internally, though, near as I can tell from the reports -- and with the Wizards & Digital Division driving profits overall, it makes sense they would ramp up to use that space more efficiently. They have about six distro spaces, and since they don't license their own inhouse material aren't limited by licenses like they are with star wars or other outside IP stuff.
To come back to the Topic, it certainly was a typo, lol.
To the drift, it certainly appears as if not only are they still currently on track to deliver by Holiday season 2024, they have the capacity and capability to do so.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
The video in the comments states the new UA is coming October 5th? Maybe that's a typo and they meant December 5th?
Let the Mists surround you...
Probably. Or maybe they've just seen reason and decided to slow down and delay the release of the 2024 core books until we can figure out what the hell is going on.
The fact that assuming this is last playtest that is released (we have no way of knowing), wotc is really starting to push the envelope for a 2024 release date for the 1st book. The earliest date analysis starts of this new material is Dec 11th. We are far far past any 12 month window to nail down material, then get that material formatted into book form, then sent to the printers, then drafts copy-checked, then those drafts sent back to the printer with the inevitable corrections, then the printer actually printing books, then getting those books distributed to vendors for the Christmas 2024 buying season. Of course, most of that timeline goes out the door if the intent is to get ONLY a .pdf available for sale by say Nov 1, 2024. Then changes can happen real-time.
Bottom line, the one trigger, that has not happened yet, is that ANY book publisher has to register a new title 9 months before with the entity that oversees book distribution. That has been confirmed by the Roll for Combat guys, who worked for Pazio, and now create and publish their own books. I am very curious when wotc plans on doing that.
1 - This is merely the last playtest of this year. There will be additional playtest material through at least the first quarter, according to the previously described timetables. Granted, those timetables were initially set up many months ago (over a year), and things change, but that's what we have so far.
2 - There are 7 companies that are involved in book distribution, and all of them negotiate individual contracts with individual publishers on a distinct basis. For example, Amazon has to work with them, and you can get a book into print format and into the distribution system within a 14 day timeframe. The last book I had out professionally went from Proof to shelf in 38 days. That time frame depends entirely on the nature of the agreement between the publisher and the distributor for that particular line -- and is affected by the market, the size of the market, the size of the product, the size of the initial print order (standard is still 25k to 50k copies for first hardcover, about double that for soft) and so forth.
Now, in fairness, WotC and Random House did just end their distribution arrangement (in part due to internal challenges with RH that are utterly unrelated to WotC), so WotC will likely have to deal with Diamond or Ingram (the top two for this market segment), plus Gardner and CNPeReading. They might even broker a deal with Baker & Taylor. All of them can handle a high engagement product within about 60 days, which is a more standard timeframe for large scale products.
Also in fairness, a self pub situation does fit your described scenario. For example, if I were to try and publish my current Lore Book for distribution to those stores and avoid using Amazon as a service, that's a time frame for a full color, 500 plus page book that is totally in line with what is common and normative.
3 - Do you honestly think that they haven't registered the 2024 rule books to hold space when they started planning this out in 2020? That registration iis for the catalog orders. The actual catalog won't be out until June of next year, by which time they will almost certainly have figured out there cover set ups and other press/pr facing material, and hav ea good idea of product size.
IOW -- they still have time to be able to make the Holiday release cycle as intended. Odds are pretty good they already have the bulk of the digital matter (that is, the manuscripts) set up, including layout and design, they just need to drop in text.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Because they're such a large customer with a large print run, I'd expect WotC to get way more slack from their printers than most publishers do. It's also probably mostly laid out and finalized, and waiting on a relatively small amount of changes, at least in the PHB.
They've also got the resources to push through copy edits at an accelerated pace, which might not be the wisest move, but they can.
Are they on track to make their release date? I don't know enough about the logistics of publishing to say, but I'd expect they can get the book to market for Christmas if they can get the files to their printer by summer.
The who that does what?
If you're talking about the big book and game distributors, who have catalogs that the stores order from, I don't know what the deadlines are on that, but even if it is nine months, that's still only august/september.
Also, after terminating their distribution deal with Random Penguin a while back, they've announced that they're distributing to the bookstore market directly through Hasbro, and I doubt the "Roll for Combat guys" see that catalog.
oooh, I missed the direct through Hasbro -- that means they have access to the toy market as well, and aren't using a standard print publisher. It also means that Hasbro will be handling warehousing, so massive reduction in overhead and the contracts were set long ago, so they likely have a 60 day window.
Niiiiice...
EDIT: Ah, so looking them up, they are an arm of Paizo, which uses Diamond Distribution, the same folks that Marvel and DC had to use for years until they finally threatened to start a new one fresh in the early 2000's -- Diamond is considered the best for Comics and such, but no one likes them, in part because of shitty contracts like was described.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
There have been delays, but they also worked on catching up. It's possible they'll miss 2024...but I wouldn't start setting up expectations just yet. There's just nothing solid to work on that suggests they will miss it and there's no reason to believe that they didn't factor in some breathing space.
In short, expect it in 2024 until there's something solid saying otherwise.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Marvel, at least, did. (I think they stopped doing their own distribution after they went bankrupt. But that was a long time ago, and has very little relation to how distribution works now.)
I think Alliance is the big one when it comes to game stores. Diamond's terms for distribution appear to be that they get the product for distribution 6-8 weeks after it appears in the catalog, so probably three months lead all told. I can't be bothered to look up Alliance, but it's likely similar.
And whatever lead time Diamond and Alliance demand from their regular customers, WotC are easily big enough to push them around.
Yeah, and I was off a bit on my recall of the events. Penguin RH now has Marvel, DC, and IDW comics (during the covid stuff they all switched), but Alliance is part of Diamond.
Hasbro doing in house is entirely handled internally, though, near as I can tell from the reports -- and with the Wizards & Digital Division driving profits overall, it makes sense they would ramp up to use that space more efficiently. They have about six distro spaces, and since they don't license their own inhouse material aren't limited by licenses like they are with star wars or other outside IP stuff.
To come back to the Topic, it certainly was a typo, lol.
To the drift, it certainly appears as if not only are they still currently on track to deliver by Holiday season 2024, they have the capacity and capability to do so.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds