Nate recently put up a State of the Game for CoC. The first part talks about CoC and AGoT and the spawning of the LCG format and may interest folks: www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp

(One thing it says that surprised me was that Eric Lang is involved in the design of CoC. Maybe I was just under a misapprehension, but I didn't think Lang did game design work for FFG anymore.)

It concludes basically the same way the AGoT State of the Game does, talking about OP and asking for input about what players want from OP. That's the reason for my post. Have folks been making suggestions? I haven't yet. And perhaps we should be trying to put together our heads and brainstorm on what we'd like to see and try to make some viable suggestions to Nate's questions: "To this end, we’re asking ourselves and our fans what players (and particularly, LCG players) might want out of an organized play program, what it might take to get a gaming group who are into it as a casual “beer & pretzels” endeavor to participate in organized play, and what it might take to get a local group who play once a month at their game store to consider traveling for a Regional or National championship."

I haven't sent anything in to FFG yet either. i'm not sure where to send it.

But I think the two things that would be most important to me would be:

A. a rnaking system of some sort, reflective of your performance in OP, and

B. Interesting and attratcive prize support, preferably linked occasionally to special rules tournies like teh Wildling event and the petals of teh Rose event.

Gods - nothing like the event that broke the already marginal 5K agendas last summer - but thematic events reflecting specific motives or factions from the novels.

I've contacted Nate about some ideas for OP. If you have ideas, Nate says to email him directly (his email address is listed in both articles).

I can't say that any of my ideas will be used, but one thing I really suggested they keep up with was the Storyline leagues, as our group loved the first one, and I think that being able to participate in the design of the game (even if marginally) is a big draw for a game. L5R's been doing it for years, and it seems to work well for them. And those of us who played in our League definitely had agendas for what we wanted to see in the game, and played to obtain those goals. I also suggested keeping with both Storyline League and "Hedge" tournaments, as some people prefer the more competitive head-to-head gaming of weekly events as opposed to league play.

I also think that whatever they come up with, they should stick to it. We've had our share of wishy-washy OP for the better part of 18 months now, and I'd like to see some stability. I miss the continuity of regular events, and sure hope that we get the Martell and Stark pins that are next up in the monthly prize cycle.

I agree about the Storylines League; I felt that was well received in our group and the voting on design direction garnered a lot of interest and stimulated a lot of talk. Just look at these forums to see how game/card design can result in lively discussion and it's no surprise that the Storylines did some of the same. And although some of the players at times grumbled about the strict deck building constraints, I think many warmed up to it and it did allow our newest regular player to jump right in. The League deck building format is great "on ramp" for new players to try OP and pushes us existing players to make some tough deck building decisions. I would heartedly support the Storyline League format coming back pretty much as it was done for season one.

So what can FFG offer to attract people to local OP? Promo cards (not consistent with LCG philosophy) and product (probably cost prohibit) aren't viable. The small swag recently used was hit-or-miss (the pins sound nice from what folks have said; the art prints sent for League, eh, not so much). I think that influencing design is probably the best "prize support" that FFG can realistically offer. The other "prize" that FFG can realistically supply is bragging rights, and that goes back to the rankings Stag mentions and other measures that can be publicly viewed of how people are matching up. Some way to see, for example, people with the highest win% and most wins over the last n months, and to see who they played and how they faired, etc. Link it to each person's forum login name and have it so a Night's Watch enters the results. I'm geeky enough that I'd probably go to the Community page for AGoT here routinely to see the latest reported results to look for familiar names that just played and who beat who. And the website and OP would promote each other. Create a login in here? Part of your profile page is your results in recorded games and, in addition to links to Friends, you could have links to Advisories you played in recorded games which you could then easily send a Friend invite to. Show up at an OP event? The Night's Watch encourages you to create a login here so that your results can be properly recorded.

As for getting people to regionals, I am not sure other than FFG supplying some product and trusting the Night's Watch members to dole it out in a fair/reasonable fashion. To help get players to nationals and to help get people interested in local OP and regionals, I think FFG could make it that people get credit for participating in local OP events/regionals. Everyone who shows up and participates in the national tournament that had met some minimum OP participation set by FFG would get some FFG product and then some additional FFG product for a few people with highest amount of OP participation. OF course I'm assuming that FFG has some willingness to give out free merchandise.

I'm sort of thinking as I type, so some of the above is probably not well formed.

I'm not sure promo cards are necessarily against the whole LCG principle. Make sure you advertise them so people know about them, make there is a emchanic for acquiring them if you miss them for some reason - and i think they'll pull casual players right in.

Stag Lord said:

The point about making sure there is a means for acquiring promo cards other than through OP event participation is key. Promo cards in general do not fit with the LCG "all cards available to all players" philosophy very well. Too many of them, without making them available outside of the original event, will actually make it harder to get new, casual and slow-adopting players to join an organized play program for the LCG by creating an exclusive, or nearly so, subset of cards in an environment that is advertised not to have chase, collectible or limited-access cards.

I think the most important thing for a program is a ranking system, even if it has a few flaws. An organized play program is about competition. It doesn't have to be hard-core or cutthroat, but you have to recognize that people participate to be have fun through competition. As such, you have to make a player's participation mean something. A ranking system lets you see whether you're getting better or not. It also gives you a means, flawed or not, to compare yourself to people you don't play against very often. That's one of the reason the storylines are so well received right now - there's a reason to play and your participation has a demonstrable impact on something.

Promos of existing cards with alternate art have always been a favorite of mine. Doesn't affect competitive play directly as far as power goes, but gives you something unique and cool that you can actually use in your decks. There's also always foils of existing cards, but I'm not sure thats a fit in this game.

alt art for me is either hit or miss.

I for one wouldn't play in a tourney for alt art cards. Heck i don't even have the ice and fire art book.

AGOT card sleeves would be nice. Maybe a basic version for participating players and more noble versions for winners of a tournament so you would recognise great players at once. Different card sleeves for the different houses...

What if they gave out a copy of a card that was in the next month or two's chapter pack? Your prize would then be a copy of a card that everyone will have access to shortly, but that you get to use in your decks at the present time.

The pins are very cool, and they generate alot of interest. If they ensured that everyone actually got the pins, that would go a long way.

I also think they could use some of the older promos -- if they still have them, that is -- for Legacy events.

Lars said:

So what you are saying is that you aren't the least bit interested in the Iron Throne Edition Lannister Siblings with the artwork from Valyrian Edition instead? Really?

JerusalemJones said:

Sounds like a good idea. From a business and logistics standpoint, would it be possible, though? I'd guess that the CP cards are printed in batches and wrapped for the packs. So I wonder how easy it would be to pick a card as a "promo" - and what the minimums might be. It might be simple. It might not. Maybe they should go all out and have next month's CP be the prize for monthly hedge tournaments. It might cost us $10-12 a pop for a monthly tourney, but I bet you could get everyone to put in an extra $1-2 as an entry fee.

Although that's a good question. Does a successful OP charge entry fees for the monthly events? (Or does a successful OP not necessarily have monthly events?)

JerusalemJones said:

yup. i also wasnlt really around for valryian so don;t feel like i'm missing anything. ALso, i didn;t really get that worked about about animie jaime.

I think promo cards are viable. They could also do something similar to gold dragons. Then have special prizes available for the dragons. (Not product you can get in a store... )

They could be stone/crystal house cards... deck boxes, alt art cards. He could put promo cards that support minor themes that he can't put in a chapter pack. (Night's watch, house frey, etc.). Imagine getting a House Frey deck from gold dragons (with a frey house card).

As long as either the promos are released for buying later... or are more flavor then breaking gameplay.

I think that's the biggest thing I liked about the old tourneys... gold dragons and being able to get unique items like the stone/crystal house cards.

Card design as a prize is also what makes the national tourney's special. (I wonder if Mainn's champion card will be in KLE).

Letsgored and i were discussing teh same thing JJ brings up - and we feel its a great idea. Make some CP cards or expansion cards available way ahead of time for those who attend OP events. The guys who sit in their basementwill get them eventually.

Lars--

PM me your address, and I'll send you a copy of each of the demo decks. Not that I think you'll be swayed away from your feelings about alternate artwork, but I think you'll at least understand why other people like (and value) them as prizes. I don't care what anyone says -- those versions of the Lannister siblings were beautiful, and I love seeing them in the new format of cards, which brings out so much more of the artwork.

In regards to "promo cards," I would think Nate/FFG would have to decide before a print run of the cards is run to pick the 6 or 12 cards that would be chosen as prize cards and run a separate sheet of these cards. Now, I don't know how many they'd have to run, so it might not be cost effective. The other option would have been to take the next's months CP, break them open and randomly send out cards to each To hosting an event, or now drop them into the prize kit. The downside of this is that ALL of the cards from the next CP would be in the public domain before the next CP is realeased, making spoilers from FFG worthless because -- and let's face it -- every one of us who received the prize cards would them post what we got in these forums, so we'd be able to put together the entire CP makeup. That's why I though icking two cards fro each CP (and "rare" and a "Common") and giving them to everybody would, in effect, be a mini spoiler.

Excited to see the flexibility the seem to be showing in supporting the game. I think we have to respect the difficulty in coming up with an OP that supports a variety of play groups in this brave new world of LCG. Especially being able to do it at a reasonable cost.

I like the idea of the early product, but that runs into it's own issues... JJ covered the production/distribution issues.

I'd really like to see if we can get uncut sheets back as prizes... those were always really cool, though sadly not quite as regularly useable. Had an interesting conversation with Erick (finitesquarewell) and I do think a ratings system would be nice too. Even if it were like the Westeros/I&F days... how cool (and likely impossible) would it be to have your house shield next to your posting avatar based on what house you'd played most.

More to come.

JerusalemJones said:

Thanks for the offer, but I actually own a set of both. They are nice...but for me, like i said, art isn't even a concern when i look at a card. Untill someone pointed out 'animie' Jaime i never really noticed it was much different from the rest of the art. Now if you ask me if i prefer a Dali or a Picasso i might give you a 30 minute converstation...go figure.

Lars said:

~Definitely Dali over Picasso, but we can discuss this for 30 min on Tuesday.

I would like a participation prize, like the old promos. Even if you came in last, you felt like it was worth your time to come out and lose while learning to play competetively.

Why are promos bad if they are accessible? Maybe stick them in the Expansions like the upcoming Greyjoy one. There would be more reason for casual players to buy the expansions and the tournament players would have something to play for monthly.

Back in the CCG days, did AGOT ever include random foil cards? I would value a foil version of a regular-art card more highly than an alternate-art card.

Arma virumque said:

Nope. AGoT never had any "super rare" or chase cards like foils. At least, not on purpose (the legend goes that there was a error with some rare sheets at the printer for the WES version, so about a third of the rares from that set ended up being REALLY rare, and the print run on the Sea of Storms expansion was kind of small, so those cards in general were kind of scarce).

They were apparently planning on having their first "chase" cards in the Clash of Arms expansion, which became the first set of Chapter Packs so the idea was scrapped.

I can't stand foils. Alternate art all the way for me. The only super-rare card I know of is the George R. R. Martin promo which isn't tournament legal. I think it was given out at one of the gencons and nowhere else.

perthius said:

Seconded. Alternate art is awesome, foils are lame, and the cards often bend inwards with foils, making it obvious that you are about to draw your foil card.

perthius said:

Tell that to a certainl CBK knight that was also a GenCon prize...and amazing...and legal! I would put that, along with the Westy Streets, Sam, and Eyrie, high up there on the most collectable cards this game has had (they did have a couple of levels of rarity for the first two sets I believe.

rings said:

Yeah, but the "legend" seems to be that the two levels of rarity in the WES edition were not intentional. I've heard there was some sort of error. I could be wrong, though.