Didn't see a thread for this yet:

http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG

QuotePaizo Publishing® Announces the Pathfinder RPG™
Pathfinder™ to continue under the 3.5 rules.

Tuesday, March 19th, 2008

Paizo Publishing today unveiled the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, a tabletop fantasy roleplaying game that will serve as the anchor for the company's popular line of Pathfinder adventures, sourcebooks, and campaigns. Today marks the beginning of a year-long Open Playtest of the new rules, which are based upon the popular 3.5 rules available under the Open Game License. The Pathfinder RPG is designed with backward compatibility as one of its primary goals, so players will continue to enjoy their lifelong fantasy gaming hobby without invalidating their entire game library. The first Pathfinder RPG Alpha release is available now as a free 65-page PDF download at paizo.com/pathfinderRPG. Until the finished Pathfinder RPG's release as a hardcover rulebook in August 2009, all of Paizo's popular Pathfinder-brand products will continue under the current 3.5 rules set.

"I'm really excited to work with the playtesters to make this the best game possible," said Jason Bulmahn, Paizo's Lead Designer. "In the spirit of the Open Game movement, the Pathfinder RPG is really your roleplaying game. It's a huge thrill to get to lead the design process."

Paizo will issue additional Pathfinder RPG Alpha releases in the coming months, covering new changes and additions to the 3.5 rules. Gamers can download, read, and participate in the free open playtest by setting up a paizo.com account and joining the discussion with Paizo's design staff at paizo.com/pathfinderRPG. The Pathfinder RPG will be backward-compatible with the 3.5 rules, and the staff has kept this goal as a primary focus since design began in 2007.

This coming August, Paizo will release a massive, full-color, softcover Pathfinder RPG Beta release for $24.99. This book will be available on paizo.com, at Gen Con, as well as through hobby distribution at local game stores. Just like the Alpha releases, the Beta release will be available as a free PDF download on paizo.com. As Wizards of the Coast's core 3.5 rulebooks are expected to go out of print with the release of 4th Edition, Paizo will use the Pathfinder RPG as a replacement for the 3.5 core rules. The Pathfinder RPG Beta release will represent Paizo's first published take on an updated 3.5 system, and playtesting will continue through spring 2009, when Paizo will incorporate the open playtest feedback and create a hardcover Pathfinder RPG for release in the hobby trade, bookstores, and paizo.com in August 2009.

Paizo hopes to support 4th Edition with fan-created online conversions of its Pathfinder products and a complete line from its partner company, Necromancer Games, a trend-setter in the original Open Gaming movement. Necromancer has already announced a new 4th Edition version of their award-winning Tome of Horrors monster encyclopedia, and has plans for additional player and GM support products.

Today, Paizo also announced the hiring of Nicolas Logue to run the Pathfinder Society organized play campaign, a massive mega-campaign to launch at this year's Gen Con. The Pathfinder Society will feature events at major conventions, retail stores, and home play as a way to involve thousands of players in a constantly evolving campaign environment fueled by downloadable scenarios released by Paizo. Nicolas Logue is a long-time Paizo contributor to the print versions of Dragon and Dungeon as well as the Pathfinder Adventure Paths and Pathfinder Modules line. He also co-runs an annual competition at Gen Con called Iron DM that will continue to be co-run by Nicolas Logue and his Iron DM compatriots. Nick begins working at Paizo in April.

"Nicolas Logue is one of the most energetic, personable gamers I have ever met," said Erik Mona, Paizo's Publisher and the co-founder during his tenure at Wizards of the Coast of Living Greyhawk, the largest organized play RPG campaign in history. "Running a successful organized play campaign involves a magical combination of cool ideas, organizational skills, and enthusiasm. Nick is absolutely the perfect man for the job, and I'm thrilled that he will be joining us here at Paizo."

Additional information on the Pathfinder Society campaign can be found at paizo.com/pathfindersociety.

Crap, you just beat me to it.

Interesting that 4th will be supported by fan created conversions.

Huh. I'm actually mildly surprised at this. I'm also looking forward to seeing the finished product. Paizo is a class act, and their products are outstanding. A very interesting alternative to 4e.

Quote from: ColonelHardissonHuh. I'm actually mildly surprised at this.

Myself as well.

Quote from: ColonelHardissonPaizo is a class act, and their products are outstanding.

Definitely.

Quote from: ColonelHardissonA very interesting alternative to 4e.

This one I'm on the fence about. I think it'll depend on how different the Pathfinder RPG is from 3.5. If it's very different, folks may have no reason not to switch to 4e.

Seanchai

What little I've been able to glean from the pdf they've posted indicates that their RPG will be a lot closer to 3.5 than 4e looks to be.

Very interesting indeed!

Intriguing.  It's not clear to me from the text whether this will be basically 3.5 OSRIC, "3.75", or some kind of alternate 4th ed that maintains more back-compat.

I am not surprised though, as of the publishers out there, they were one of the biggest out there that was still focusing on D&D3, as opposed to some other game that happened to use the same dice mechanic.

Kinda surprising.  But Paizo has no reason to be supportive of WOTC after having Dungeon and Dragon taken from them.

Yea, and if you read the CEO and others blurbs in the linked news item, it does seem like a kick in the pants.

Is open source taking real hold of 3.5? Are we going to see other 3.75 a likes that keep 3.5 alive for the long term. Could D20 turn into the RPG equivalent of linux? D20 sticking around forever? Ha! This is the real promise of the OGL.

I play RedHat D&D. Well I like Ubuntu D&D, thank you very much.

Ryan Dancy, more of your chickens are hatching.

Quote from: darI play RedHat D&D.

Red Box.  

I've looked through the pdf and - while I like many of the changes - it looks like quite bigger changes than the 3.0-3.5 conversion...

Lots of variant feats, lots of variant spells, skill overhaul, several variant classes, many changes to each race, changes to HPs, and mechanical changes like to wizard specialization and domain class features...  It's pretty substantial.

In other words, "This is not the 3.75 you're looking for."

Apart from changing skills to be more Saga-Like, it's all added complexity, not reduced whatsoever.

-O

I haven't kept up with things at the Paizo message boards lately, yet this development doesn't surprise me in the least. They're smart to do this. D&D is just gonna keep morphing until it eventually becomes something barely recognizable to its core fanbase.

Hasbro is leaving the 3.x fanbase behind, so Paizo wants to dominate the remaining 3.x market (which is sizable), and there'll still be a market for it in the years to come.

Interesting to note that Wayne Reynolds did the cover art for Pathfinder as well as 4e.  I think his work on the Pathfinder cover is much better than the 4e covers...

Quote from: obrynI've looked through the pdf and - while I like many of the changes - it looks like quite bigger changes than the 3.0-3.5 conversion...

Lots of variant feats, lots of variant spells, skill overhaul, several variant classes, many changes to each race, changes to HPs, and mechanical changes like to wizard specialization and domain class features...  It's pretty substantial.

In other words, "This is not the 3.75 you're looking for."

Apart from changing skills to be more Saga-Like, it's all added complexity, not reduced whatsoever.

-O

I do agree that they need to simplify things a bit. That's the only thing that bugs me. They need to trim the fat from the system, not add to it. :pundit: