Category Archives: rant

rant

The Death of Genesys ‘Confirmed’!

genesys, news, rant, RPG

It has been reported over the last few days that FFG are killing off their RPG department completely, and that they will no longer be producing RPGs.

The slight silver lining to the cloud is that already announced RPG products like the Keyforge campaign book will be published. But after the current commitments have been met, nada.

That means the Star Wars, L5R and Genesys RPGs will join the ranks of defunct RPGs.

It’s a shame that this is happening.

It kills off any hopes fans of the games had that FFG would be using outside contractors to produce new content for their favourite game.

There are other rumours or conspiracy theories floating around along with this news. These range from FFG are being sold off to Asmodee being sold off. But that’s just internet chatter trying to make 2 + 2 = 5.

I haven’t played the Genesys system but I do like it. Especially that it had the Android source book. The one drawback for me that applies to the whole group of FFG RPGs is the use of custom dice. Naturally these dice had the infamous FFG premium added on. They did produce a mobile app for the dice. Which was considerably cheaper than a physical set.

But we are about to get into the scenario I have for all modern board games that rely on an app for play. Support after the product is no longer published. It gets worse in this situation because the FFG software department went in the cleansing just after Christmas. So unless the Asmodee software team pick up the support and maintenance of the app. As soon as a future release of Android or iOS breaks it, that’s it. It’s a dead app. That’s assuming that FFG don’t pull the app.

The app was the only realistic option for players that want to use any of the RPGs going forward. The dice sets will get rarer and rarer, and more expensive because of this.

I suppose the only option left would be for players in the future to map the relevant custom dice to their regular versions. Not ideal, produces an overhead during play that could slow things down when doing checks. But still a work around.

The future of the licences that FFG have is an interesting one. I think some like the Star Wars one will be picked up. What the actual practicalities of that is I have no idea. Can a third party pick the RPG licence up? Can FFG sub licence those rights to a third party? I’ve no idea. But whatever the specifics we could be a few years off seeing a new Star Wars RPG.

As for seeing a L5R RPG. That’s a harder one to guess. I know it has it’s fans. But enough to warrant a third party approaching FFG about licensing it? I’m not sure.

I love the Android universe. An IP that it seems FFG are mothballing completely, joining Tannhauser.

I know Genesys is a generic system that players are meant to use to create their own worlds and adventures. However I felt it was under supported, especially the two source books they produced. Apart from the sample adventures they produced for conventions there was no other material produced for them. The Android source book was lucky that FFG had produced the Worlds of Android book for Netrunner.

I think Android and Terrinoth would both have benefitted from FFG producing adventures on a regular basis for them. As would the Star Wars and L5R games. They needn’t have been the multi adventure campaigns that WotC put out for D&D. But more single adventures along the likes that the Adventurers League gets, that form part of a season.

Yes FFG introduced the Forge for fan created content. But I’m not sure how popular that was or is. I do feel that was a little too late.

Regular official content helps sell a system. Not all GMs want to home brew. Some want to pick up an adventure and run with it. Being able to cater for both is important. Although you could argue that if that was the case then the Genesys RPG isn’t for them. But it should be.

I still hold onto the hope I can get an Android based campaign up and running. But the likely hood of it being Genesys based has taken a hit.

A response to Jamey Stegmaier on LCGs

rant

Yesterday Jamey Stegmaier posted his weekly Sunday YouTube video (embedded below). This time is was a discussion about living card games (LCG).

It turns out from the video that Jamey is kicking around the idea of designing a LCG. And this video was his spitballing the idea, asking for feedback on certain aspects of the genre.

I think we all know how I feel about Stonemaier Games, and Jamey as a game designer. So I’m pretty excited to see what Jamey’s take on the genre turns out like if it comes to fruitition.

Firstly Jamey is correct in identifying that KeyForge is not a LCG. It is a collectible card game (CCG), but instead of trading cards and building decks you are buying/trading complete decks. However Jamey did miss identify Star Wars: Destiny as a LCG. That too is a CCG that also has dice. And for the record a pretty awesome game.

I’ve played the LCGs Ashes and Android: Netrunner. The co-operative LCGs haven’t appealed to me. I like that competitive element,

I also like the deck building side and all that entails. Which is something that Jamey is not a big fan off. However Ashes shows that it is possible to offer a compromise. That still has all the deck building, and players can happily build their own decks. However they provide deck lists in the core set that players can just throw together and play. Plus when they released more cards they came as playable decks straight out of the pack.

Jamey mentioned a LCG he’d played (can’t remember which) that you take groups of cards and put them together to form a deck. I got the impression that it is similar to how decks are constructed in the game Sorcerer by WWG. As an alternative to full on deck building, I like this. It’s quick to construct a deck at the start of a game. However it has the draw back of taking a bit longer to pack away as you separate the cards in to the respective groups of cards again.

One thing I loved about Android: Netrunner was the theme. The game itself just oozes cyberpunk. The art was amazing, with some great flavour text on the cards. I also liked that with the data packs (this is what FFG called new packs of cards) you also got an A4 page of flavour text. Each cycle of data packs told a story with the data packs advancing that storyline.

One thing I didn’t like about the FFG LCG model as they implemented it was that the core set for which ever game usually required the purchase of multiple copies to get full sets of some cards, or have the ability to build all the decks so they could be played without taking cards from other decks. I believe that Marvel Champions has improved on this. But the cost has gone up also to match.

One issue a LCG has when it comes to the deck building side is in the early days the card pool size. It’s too small. A publisher needs to get expansions out fast to improve the options players have for building decks. If I remember correctly this is why FFG had an aggressive schedule (iirc) weekly for the first few expansions for their printing of L5R.

I like how FFG released expansions for Netrunner. They would release six expansions as part of a cycle on a monthly basis, and in between cycles a deluxe expansion. For me the sweet spot for an expansion would be around $15. For a deluxe expansion $30 is the upper limit I’d pay. A core set if it meant not having to purchase additional copies to get a complete card pool to build with shouldn’t be more than $40.

Also for expansions they need to be kept in print and easily purchasable. There were times with Netrunner when earlier expansions were ‘between printings’ and their price shot up. Particularly those expansions that had cards that went into 99% of decks.

Ashes failed to become as popular as it deserved due to a couple of reasons in my opinion. The first was there was over a year when no new expansions were released. This was mainly due to various corporate buy outs, that saw the publisher change owners a couple of times in that period. Poor communication during this period didn’t help. Also support of the competitive side and the FLGS was also poor compared to the likes of WotC and FFG.

Particularly for a competitive LCG the support for the FLGS has to be there in the form of prize support for tournaments and running weekly events. Not to mention the bigger tournaments such as nationals, regionals and worlds. A competitive LCG needs a player base and supporting the FLGS is a major part of building and maintaining it.

Oh and you have to have cool playmats for the game. Plus all the other accessories that players like such as deck boxes and sleeves. But most importantly token upgrades. I’m also going to assume that any core set by Jamey continues the inclusion of a great insert to storing all the cards sleeved.

So that’s my thoughts on the video Jamey made.

My take on that UKGE Incident

rant, RPG, UKGE

While I was busy showing people how to play Epic the card game on Friday I missed all the drama happening elsewhere at the expo. Now I don’t intend that to seem like I’m making light of what actually happened. I’m not. But I struggled to find a better word to describe what happened. I feel what ever word I use sounds like it is trivialising what happened. And I don’t want to do that.

On Friday during a RPG session that was being run the GM decided to cross the line and do something I think was totally out of order.

Here is a first hand account as told by a person in the game.

(I grabbed the screen shot above off one of the Facebook posts that shared what happened. Unlike the person that shared it I have removed any way to identify the person involved. What happened is more important than who it happened to.)

Naturally this has been a hot topic of debate and even made the BBC News Website.

Firstly the organisers of the expo need to be applauded for their handling of the incident and quick response. They seem to have done everything right as soon as they were made aware of what happened.

I know they have said they will review things and put stuff in place to avoid this sort of thing happening in the future. However I don’t think that the process they had in place for approving the RPG sessions was at fault. It was obvious that the GM had not included in his submission for the game that this would be happening or hinted to the players before hand either.

So I fail to see how the organisers or any other event could avoid this happening in the future. What you can’t stop is a GM being a total dick and just throwing something just as vile and unacceptable out of nowhere in to the game.

If I need to state it, for the record I think what this GM did was disgusting, unacceptable and I can’t imagine any circumstances (even with real good friends) that this would be appropriate.

What I did find odd, was that some were kind of defending the person online, using the freedom of speech etc defence. You can’t defend this. It doesn’t fall under the freedom of speech.

What I find hard to understand is the mentality of this person. Just what thought process did they have that made them think this was a good idea? I’m baffled.

Single handedly this person has not only harmed those involved in the session, they have bought the hobby into disrepute. I’m hoping after the dust has settled that the person has had time to reflect and see that what they have done is wrong, and made an apology to those involved. But something inside me says that they are finding the attention and coverage fun. I don’t know why I think that. But if the person thought the subject was a good idea, and then enjoyed the aftermath of it. Something tells me that they may not be entirely repentant.

Which is a shame. There are so many positives to the hobby. The last thing it needs is dicks like this ruining it, and destroying those positives.

I hope that those involved get the support they need, and that they hopefully will find peace.

Why do you hate them so?

magic, MtG, rant

Start of May sees the next set of MtG released called War of the Spark. Which means the last weekend of April is Prerelease weekend.

That last weekend of April is a busy weekend. We already know it’s Prerelease but in London MtG players are fighting for over priced accommodation with participants in the London Marathon, so they can attend the London MagicFest (more on that in a mo).

Plus two other collectible card games (Pokemon being one) also have releases/events planned that weekend for stores also.

So what is usually a busy weekend for your FLGS on the MtG front, may just not be as busy as usual. Having a Prerelease clash with the MagicFest means the competitive players with dreams of becoming pro will be in London. Plus those that like to go to the big events. So attendance at the Prerelease could be down for the stores.

But WotC heard the complaints of the LGS and the UK stores can now sell the whole product range a week early to compensate them in some way. So Prerelease weekend players can pick up not only booster boxes, but bundles, deck builder kits, (if they are doing one) and Planeswalker decks and whatever else. But the more cynical out there might think this was not done to benefit the LGS in the UK, but to allow Channel Fireball and the other retailers at the London MagicFest to sell everything to those attending the event. Everyone at the MagicFest is basically lost business for the LGS. You can be sure those attending will be buying their War of the Spark product at the MagicFest instead of their LGS.

The LGS hate from WotC doesn’t stop there. In a shake up of the rewards program I can’t see it being anything but negative. But I’m open to be convinced otherwise.

At the moment Standard Showdown on Saturday at my FLGS sees 6 or 7 Showdown packs up for grabs. We get 8-10 players each week. Hey it’s a small store in the middle of nowhere, so that’s pretty good. But it means currently you stand a good chance of getting s Showdown pack. Under the new scheme, Standard Showdown is dead. The promos for FNM are dead. The FLGS will get a weekly allocation of these new promo packs to use as the prize support. Based on current attendances and the new stats that WotC are using, we the players lose out. The reality is the prize support has been drastically cut back. It means the “not standard Showdown” event that my FLGS would run on a Saturday would have less prizes, and a smaller chance to get a prize. I’d assume also that it’s the same for FNM.

What I think this means is that less prize support, and a decreased chance to get a prize will drive down attendance. Who wants to see the same top players week in, week out taking the spoils? Currently at least you stand a chance of getting something extra as a prize. Under the new system that’s gone.

If I was a conspiracy theory fan I’d be suspicious that WotC are trying to drive everyone to Arena. They are definitely trying to make paper MtG more like Arena. They have already tried best of one as a store format with some lucky LGS lab rats. The recent Mythic Invitational was basically a best of one format. No side boards players took two Standard decks and played those. Even WotC have admitted just about it wasn’t a great success as a format. The upcoming London MagicFest will see a new mulligan being tested called the London Mulligan. There is only one reason they want to try this, it’s probably easier to implement in Arena, and more Arena like. They are errata-ing physical cards so they can implement them easier in Arena.

There are other things WotC have done in the past few months that could be interrupted as attacks on the LGS, especially in the US. Such as selling direct via Amazon, no MSRP, special premium edition booster boxes only available direct from WotC/Hasbro and Channel Fireball at MagicFests.

I don’t know how I’m going to finish this rant. It started off with little intention going in the direction it did. It seems to me that the LGS is under attack from a company that should be supporting it more. The changes are presented as being positive and helping to grow the player base. But on closer examination they seem more like a company cutting back and trying to transition into a new future where they don’t have to worry about secondary markets, card quality, poor selling sets, etc.

MtG: Arena – Dead To Me

magic, MtG, rant

Apparently if the rumours are true, then I will never ever, ever, ever play MtG: Arena.

The rumour started over on Reddit via a post from a disgruntled just made jobless customer support person, who spilled the alleged plans WotC have for Arena, and then removed that part of the post minutes after putting up for the world to read.

Naturally 10 minutes is an eternity on the Internet, and that was more than enough time for some folks to read those words, and take copies as evidence.

Any hoo, yesterday MTGLion on YouTube, shared this rumour with the rest of the world, along with his thoughts on it’s implications.

For me I was gobsmacked that WotC would even consider doing this. And it doesn’t make sense.

WotC have been spending lots of money to push Arena to the masses and get Hearthstone players. They have paid Hearthstone streamers to do Arena content on their channels. They are even trying to push it as an esport. WotC are also supporting Arena streamers with stuff like free packs, promoting them via their social media, etc.

All that money spent, which must be in the millions of dollars to get people playing the game and take on the 800 pound gorilla that is Hearthstone.

It doesn’t make sense to restrict yourself to what is basically the smaller market, while your competitor is on all the platforms. You’ll never get the same numbers or better them that way. There is a reason why AAA game developers are prepared to upset their PC owning fans and go for the bigger mobile market with their next releases (I know it’s much more complicated than that, but the simplification supports my point).

According to the rumour, there is a new mobile only product currently being developed instead. Why?

Well I’ve seen it mention by some (like Mike Hatcher on YouTube) that the Arena interface isn’t particularly mobile friendly. And that is the reason why we won’t see it on mobile. I’ve not played it, can’t because it’s not on Apple platforms (iOS and MacOS). However the videos I’ve seen, or the bits of the game looks very Hearthstone like. So I’d imagine or hope that the deck building etc is also similar. Well we know that the Hearthstone interface works across platforms, so, if I was developing a new card game I’d be learning from that.

So because of a poor mobile interface, WotC are handicapping Arena and spending the what will be a lot of time and money to develop a new mobile friendly MtG game? Surely considering that Arena is technically in beta, they should be tweaking the interface, or even redesigning the “broken” bits to work across platform.

It doesn’t seem right to me.

Developing a mobile app isn’t cheap, especially with all the supporting infrastructure that it will need (servers for starters). Then they will have to spend even more money promoting it. And then I feel the mobile app would potentially impact the numbers playing Arena. It all depends on what the mystery app offers.

But we have to remember these are rumours. Until announcements are made, or hard evidence surfaces, we have to take them with a pinch of salt. Naturally WotC haven’t said anything yet, and I don’t think they will until they are good and ready. Why would they want to effect the uptake of Arena and the amount people invest in the game financially and time wise? But if the rumours are not true wouldn’t they just come out and straight deny them?

WotC have announced that they have a solution to the fifth card problem. Which is nice, I still have a problem with the economy and redeeming codes given in boosters and the handicapping of that.

But while Arena is not on iOS, it will remain dead to me. I’ll keep an eye on developments. But my advice even to fans of MtG that own PC’s I’d be advising to hold off. See how this rumour plays out, and then decide where you want to spend your time and money on digital MtG.

So if you are on Hearthstone, I play casual, and you can hit me up for a game on the following id.


I’m also on the Epic the Card Game Beta as the same name. Yes Epic looks uglier, but boy is that dark draft a lot of fun.

GameAnglia 2018 and a rant about stuff

magic, MtG, rant, Uncategorized

Yesterday I had to miss the D&D crossover with MtG at my FLGS, and the chance to get one of those sweet lands. I’d like to say I missed the Keyforge Prerelease weekend also. But there was no such interest for the game at my FLGS. We will come back to this later in the post.

The reason I had to miss the one shot taster scenario of the up and coming Guildmasters of Ravnica was I got asked if I would take some students to a gaming conference at the University of Suffolk called GameAnglia.

Now GameAnglia isn’t a big event, say like Develop. But it’s aimed at education. There was a good range of speakers from industry doing workshops and talks. Plus an impressive range of indie/student developers showing off their creations. There was even a dexterity board game to try. Which I didn’t because well I’m not really into that genre. However my students tried it and enjoyed it.


One talk by the Media Molecule community manager and communications manager made me wonder just what life would be like if WotC hired professionals like these. There was a lot of good advice in their talk, especially about not talking about politics. I would imagine it would also go as far as not pushing a social agenda.

I don’t think anyone would disagree that whatever the community it should be welcoming and accepting irrespective of things like race,religion, gender etc etc. And that discrimination, hate, abuse, etc will not be tolerated.

However when the message that seems to be coming out of a company like WotC is that they “hate” 90% of their player base. And that they turn a blind eye to hate, and abuse if it comes from those that they agree with and it’s against those that they don’t like, then there has to be a problem somewhere at their end.

There is a sketch by the late great Bill Hicks about subliminal messages in music and the whole Judas Priest fans committing suicide court case from the late eighties, and a bit of that routine reminds me of WotC!

WARNING THIS QUOTE HAS SWEAR WORDS IN IT.

“I’m fucking sick of it, I’m fucking sick of it! Sick of it, sick of it!! What are you sick of? The whole fucking thing…; Touring, making $40000 a night, …free drugs, free booze, stretched limos, penthouse suites, …groupies blowing me dawn to dusk. I’m in a rut and I want out. And then we have a little show’s coming up. I know, it sucks… …unless… Ian, Nijo, come in! Oh shit Nijo get in. Ian, come down! I’ve had an idea, let’s kill the fucking audience. Nijo, go get a soccer ball, Ian, come here… …we’re going to kill them, and then we can get back to our day jobs. We can sell shoes again.”

It’s just that at the moment WotC are putting out their version of subliminal messages in records, they are trying to price their player base out of the game! Well banning them, and telling them they are bad people for being the wrong gender isn’t working.

I don’t care what a persons political leanings are. As far as I’m concerned a dick is a dick whether they are on the far right or the far left. Both of those extremes use the same nasty toolset to silence and bully others. Both want to force their political views on others. While the rest of us just want to buy cardboard rectangles, play a game, and the only thing we care about is whether the other person we are playing with is a dick or not.

We shouldn’t be in this mess as a community. But we are, WotC have created a large part of it, they took sides, and started promoting/pushing an agenda.

Diversity is a good thing. It enriches everyone. You can have a product that appeals to a diverse audience without handling it the way that WotC have. Maybe WotC need to look at Plaid Hat Games and learn a lesson or two from them.

In the meantime my advice to WotC, stand back, reassess the situation, employ professionals with expertise in community management and marketing, become apolitical, rebuild and unite the community (well the online side, remember the online stuff is such a minute part of your player base). Simple!

I’m not sure I articulated the above very well, or made a coherent argument. But that was the thoughts, more or less that went through my head after that talk.

So you can see that attending an event like this can be very intellectually stimulating. In the minibus on the way back, there was definitely a buzz from my students. They had really enjoyed the conference, the talks and the demoes.

I did promise at the top of this post I’d talk about Keyforge. Or more specifically the Prerelease and lack of interest at my FLGS.

For me as a player when a game like Keyforge comes out I talk to the owner of my FLGS to assataine if there have been others at the store asking about the game, asking for it to be ordered in. It gives me an idea if there would be anyone to play with if I bought into the game. For Keyforge there was nothing. Apart from me making enquiries.

Now my FLGS is a small store in a small market town in the back of nowhere in the Fens. It’s not one of these stores in a big city like London or Cambridge. A game being popular in a big metropolis or having a community playing it there doesn’t mean the game is a success.

If a game hasn’t broken through to my FLGS it tells me that despite the initial flurry of hype (and there has been to some extent online from those that attended the Prerelease this weekend) that maybe this game doesn’t have legs.

A game for me is a success if it can break into these smaller stores where they are probably more likely to only carry games they know they can sell, and have demand for. These stores have more to lose, so if they invest in it then it means there is a market for it.

Now there may indeed be a “community” for Keyforge in the area. But they are not making themselves known to their FLGS and creating a location they can play and get easy access to OP kits. Having to travel long distances to attend events, or to play tells me the game isn’t popular.

Was that worth waiting for? Probably not. But there you have my continuing thoughts on Keyforge. And in the middle why WotC will never consider me a MtG content creator.

A bad online store experience

rant


A few weeks ago I ordered some miniatures from an online web store who are also an actual real life store as well I believe.

One of the miniatures was a pre-order. But after a long wait and a single email from them telling me they were going to ask for an update from their distributor. Nothing. Any communication otherwise about the order was instigated by me.

Finally I got fed up waiting and not hearing anything from them, I emailed them at the start of the week. Turned out that they were out of stock of most of my order and had no idea about when the pre-order would arrive.

I can’t believe they sold stock they had already sold. Maybe they thought they would get more in before they had to complete my order. But this really is poor. The stock for my order should have been put to one side, not sold.

Anyway it was agreed they would send what was left of my order to me and refund the rest. The store also gave me some store credit to compensate me for the situation of the long wait, and stock blunder.

I have to admit, I wasn’t happy. But the store credit was a nice touch, which might have tempted me back to the store at a future date. But…

Yesterday the order turned up having been given next day delivery (nice touch). However…


As you can see one of the bugbears is broken inside the pack. How did this get past their quality control?

Yes I know it can be fixed with a little glue. But that’s not the point. This is a damaged product they have charged me full price for.

I’ve emailed them this morning about this. I wasn’t going to write anything about it on here. But now as you can see I’ve changed my mind. This whole experience has made me not to want to spend money with them again. What good is store credit if you have no intention of using it? Yes store credit costs them, but they hope it gets you back and spending more with them than they actually have given you. To me now it seems like a hollow gesture. There is no way I will use them again. I certainly won’t recommend the store to anyone. This whole experience has totally soured my opinion of the store.

I await to see what they have to say about the bugbear. Who knows I may name and shame.

Watching the train wreck

rant

I think the following really does sum up the current situation for WotC and Hasbro over #magicgate as it’s become known.

I know it’s the holidays and all, but the deafening silence from said companies over the continued harassment going on in the community on both sides of the argument is worrying. There really should be some high profile bans going on. But at the moment WotC seem to be copying the three wise monkeys when it comes to people they like. They get away with murder, but god forbid if you are not in the approved list of abusers and harassers, then you can expect them to come down on you with the ban hammer. If evidence provided by the recently life time banned person is accurate, WotC are hypercrits, and actually view what that person did worse than actual physical abuse and harassment. Why do I say that? Well the evidence presented shows that a person can admit to saying “I hope you burn to death” and admit to harassing a magic judge at an organised event and not get banned. Apparently a person can threatened to, and I can’t believe I’m writing this, rape a WotC employee, and have a ban for making the threat revoked. Or get this this you can actually sexually harass a player at an event as a judge and get a temp ban, and then shown a route back to the community!!!!! Then there are new allegations that WotC, their judges program and now their event partner Channel Fireball don’t vet magic judges for being sexual offenders, despite young vulnerable people attending their organised events. What’s worse is that they are now trying to cover up (again I have to say allegedly) the fact that these convicted sex offenders were still judges at events after being convicted.

So if these allegations are true why are there not more lifetime bans going on? It’s also worrying that the so called “pillars of the magic community” are silent on all this, burying their heads in the sand. Mind you one or two of them should be getting lifetime bans too. Just because they don’t like the messenger doesn’t invalidate the message. So you have to ask why are they silent on this? Are they hoping if they bury their heads deep enough in the sand that the issue will go away? If these “pillars of the community” are all about the community then they should be speaking out on this. But sadly I don’t think they have the publics best interest at heart. Watch the “right” YouTube videos and you might come to that conclusion also (but for other reasons).

I’m just sitting on the sidelines, watching just how messy this train wreck will get. If you like high body counts, lots of collateral damage, gore, and being deafened by the sound of silence, then you really have to follow this. Both sides of the argument are committing atrocities against each other, the fallout is going to be messy. It’s hypnotic, and I can’t turn away from the carnage.

Modiphius Suck It

news, rant

Like buses it seems Fallout games are coming along in pairs. 

Today FFG announced they will be releasing in the last quarter of 2017 a 1 – 4 player game based on the popular video game franchise Fallout.


Wait a game I won’t have to spend hours or even days assembling, one that I can buy and play straight away? Wow that’s ground breaking.

Modiphius can as the once WWE superstars Degeneration X said “Suck it!”

This is how you handle a popular IP that will appeal to non-gamers. This audience isn’t interested in spending hours cutting and gluing. They want to buy and play. Oh one or two might enjoy it but not the majority who this would appeal to. Let’s face it you don’t splash money out to buy an IP like this to appeal to your core market. You are trying to appeal to that wider audience that wouldn’t normally buy your stuff. How else are you going to make your money back on that expensive IP licence?

Let’s face it we have had a few popular IP licensed in recent years for miniature skirmish like games. Predator and Aliens, Terminator, and Walking Dead naming a few. How many do you see being played at your local FLGS or game club?

Look I can rant about this all night. At the end of the day I’ll vote like many others with my wallet. Which means my vote will be going to FFG, as I imagine the great majority of people’s votes. You can be certain of the fact the FFG game will outsell the Modiphius one by a big margin.

You can read the FFG announcement HERE

Egg meet face

rant

I’ve had to cancel this evenings kickoff event for a Magic the Gathering League at our gaming group due to lack of interest.

I’m kind of feeling a little disappointed.

A while back I tried to get something going for Ashes at my FLGS. I bought an OP Kit from Plaid Hat (two actually) out of my own pocket. Tried to get a tournament going, and attract interest locally for the game. It was myself and one other. I wasn’t looking to make money out of it, that wasn’t the reason I was doing it. At best I was hoping to break even and kickstart a local meta for the game. That day for the one kit cost me £40. I eventually sold the second kit on at a loss for me. Happy to get something back.

That experience didn’t put me off. After seeing the Magic the Gathering league format. I thought that’s a great format for new and seasoned players. It doesn’t rely on having lots of cards. Decks are 30 cards built from the cards you get from purchasing 3 booster packs, and adding in any extra lands that you need. Then strengthening your deck once a week by purchasing an additional booster pack. If you got three loses in a row I think it was, you could also buy an additional booster pack to strengthen your deck with. This kind of put everyone on an even playing ground. Plus not going to break the bank. I think at my FLGS prices the initial 3 packs would cost £10, and £2.95 (?) a booster after that.

So I sounded out the group for interest in playing Magic the Gathering using these rules. I think there were five or six that showed interest. Enough to warrant setting up an event and getting in booster box.

Which I did. Sadly, at best tonight there would have been 3 of us. So it looks like I’ve taken another hit in the wallet.

If I run something like this again, I’m going to ask for money up front. But at the moment, I’m not feeling like I want to put the effort in. Feeling a bit bruised.

But feeling that way about organising stuff for the club for other games too. Maybe disheartened is a better word to use. maybe it’s me! I know, you find that hard to believe. But I am an acquired taste.

Oh well maybe I’ll feel better tomorrow after spending an evening watching videos about games I won’t get to the table soon. Oh wait no I won’t because an event to find people to play Xia, has 1 possible, and that’s it. So I might find myself going to see the new Spider-Man movie again.

Yep that’s right, again! I saw it Wednesday evening. Bloody brilliant movie. Easily the best Spider-Man movie so far. Refreshing to have a reboot that doesn’t cover the origins of Spider-Man again. I think as a superhero movie it’s in the top 25% I would say.

Right later folks