Tried this once...so excuse me if another thread shows up out of nowhere...

So, did I just not see the thread, or is it news that the HBO pilot is ready to go! They have a location and everything (no casting info though...)

http://grrm.livejournal.com/

Awesome...

Thread is in the off-topic section, thats probably why you over-looked it. :-)

It is awesome news though, and now I'll have to look into getting HBO eventually or... something.

plus there is the orginal thread in the spoiler space too. I rebukked stag so i must rebuke you as well

Its freaking awesome news. My question is: where the heck is the next book? I sold us on the crappy Feast by saying it needed to see print but DwD was like half done becuase he was working on both, it got too big, he had to split in hlaf.....

This was four years ago people. In the late ninties he was publishing TWO books in four years. I've been very patient with the guy, but its getting to the point where I am getting ready to walk away from his series and his products.

Yeah, a little frustrating. I guess I've been tempered a bit, having been a Wheel of Time reader since ~1992. Robert Jordan wrote his series over 20 years, and didn't even live to entirely write the last book himself. Now, that makes the situation we're in with GRRM seem like nothing. :-P

I can understand a creative process being hard to keep on schedule. Especially when you have so much pressure to deliver an amazing product... and one that you truly love yourself as well. But it really does seem that he has become too comfortable with allowing his own delays.

Can you imagine the prospect of fresh new material, and the new audience draw we would get for AGoT LCG when the new book finally releases? That excites me almost as much as reading the book itself!

Well, yeah - if FFG is on top of things and positioned to exploit the interest and attention. Which they weren't last time. Not a lot happened when Feast came out - they did release a promo deck - Circle of Spies and had a very expensive promo kit, with a short registration deadline and a vanilla non unique trait manip. promo card to celebrate the release.

Veterans were underwhelemd and there was no net gain of new players, while the book soared up the best seller charts in 11/05. I am really, really hoping we can run some bang up promotions when the new one hits and attract some newbies.

I hope they are already thinking about it.

Stag Lord said:

Say what you will about that kit, Stags, but that one event -- which I stumbled upon by accident, I have to say -- was what led to Game of Thrones becoming our #3 top selling ccg at our store, and introducing dozens of new players to the game at my store alone. Yeah, FFG could have done more -- and I feel that they are getting better about getting information our to Retailers, or at least those retailers who let FFG know they want their information -- but the Day of the Feast was without a doubt one of the most successful promotions our store has ever done, for any game system. And no one has taken the Circle of Spies deck away from me yet.

Without this event you wouldn't have had me on these boards. Okay, not a good example. You also wouldn't have gotten The Nick-ler either.

Also, IIRC, the kit itself was only $40, but it came with a copy of Feast ($28), the Art Book ($30), the softback version of Thrones ($18?) and a display of Ice and Fire starters ($100), demo decks and promo cards. That's alot of stuff, at less than 25% retail -- and we actually got 2 copies of Feast with our kit.

Trust me. When Dance hits, even if FFG doesn't do a promotion (which would be foolish on their parts), I'm going to do another big promotion.

Hmm If i´m reading GRRMs blog right, he has found himself an assitant to write Dance with Dragons with. That gives us some hope the book will be finished soon. And I really want to know what Tyrion is up to! ( I haven´t read the spoiler chapters, well because i want to read it "unspoiled" )

Moneylender said:

Check the date. That was his April 1st post -- April Fool's Day (at least, on this side of the Pond). So it was a joke. An inside joke as well, since the guy who he picked as his assistant is an even slower writer than he is.

The Tyrion chapter is everything you expect from Tyrion -- lots of drinking and dwarf jokes j/k. But I prefer the Jon spoiler chapter.

JerusalemJones said:

Yeah, the Tyrion chapter is actually pretty good. I recommend reading it--the spoiler does get you excited for the book, but it also sort of hints at the direction that Tyrion will take so that you don't have to wonder about what's going on with that character at least.

~Off-topic? Spoilers? I think not...if that isn't General Discussion, I don't know what is...

I have to agree with Stag on the level of promotion for the books - it wasn't horrible for stores, but this game - more than any I have seen - needed to get its name out to the readers, not people already going to stores. I obviously don't know the agreement between GRRM and FFG, but you think it would be win/win to have a one-page ad in the back about all the products (board game, TCG). *shrug*

I read somewhere that Peter Dinklage was signed up to play Tyrion! I think thats great casting,but ive heard noting about the other roles.Episode 1 should end with Bran seeinng the twins and getting pushed from his perch!

JerusalemJones said:

Outch!

JJ: I'm glad the Day of the Feast worked out for you (and yes, your personal presence is an important component of the community) - but you are about the only play group i heard of who were happy with the promotion. If the kit was only $ 40 - I am surprised. I rember many NW complaining about the cost of the kit. NAd there was generally a feeling fo helplessness and anger about teh time frame given to register for the event and the lack of hype on the website etc to commemorate the event. There should have been dozens more JJ's posting and playing during the mid point of Winter block.

Many veteran posters will recall how poorly it was handled - granted, they were going through a transition at the lead designer spot at the time, but the timing just couldn't have been worse.

In FFG's defense though - if they knew when they acquired the license and released the agme in 2002 that there would eb exaclty one new bookk (and a sub par one at that) in the ensuing eight years, no one could have blamed them if they had had lower expectations for the game and its popularity.

Stag Lord said:

This is a pretty valid point. (Feast was by far my least favorite of the novels as well.) And the long gap in new material and a possible cross-promotion only goes to increasing the importance of doing something huge for the game when Dance finally drops.

What is really sad is that there is actually the possibility of the next Dunk and Egg short story coming out before Dance. And its not like FFG can cross-promote the game with those stories.

Also, I could see FFG having come up with some special promo cards to coincide with the release of Dance. Now, those promo cards won't see the light of day because of the new format for the game.

Also, who knows what Bantam (it is Bantam that publishes the novels, right) would charge FFG to advertise the games in the back of the novel. I know that FFG and SciFi did a cross promotion on the BSG game (adverts for the DVDs in the board game, adverts for the board game in Season 4 DVDs), but does Bantam really need to cross promote the books in the game? I bet the licensing already allows for that, since every Core product mentions the books somewhere in the rules of on the packaging (in most cases, on the booster boxes themselves). And the percentage of players going to the books is smaller than the readers going to the game. And there are way more readers than gamers.

But I think that may also have been part of FFG's thinking when coming up with the LCG format. I seem to recall Christian talking abuot how the new format allwos the game to be displayed in bookstores (like B&N, Borders, etc) next to the books themselves. Now, when Dance comes out you might be able to go to the local big box bookstore and see Dance next to a dozens copies of hte board game and think "Wow! I can play a game based on these books." So that might work in the game's favor. And some stores -- like ours -- sell books and games, so we have the built in ability to cross-promote the lines. But most book store don't sell games, and most game stores don't sell mass-market books, or books at all.

The cross-promotion between the books and the game can be a difficult one. Perhaps that can be what we as a community can try and come up with -- ways to promote the game when the next book releases.

JerusalemJones said:

Well, unless something has changed since 2005... they already have the rights to advertise for the card and board games in the back of the novels. I have an August 05 mass issue paperback of Clash of Kings in front of me, and it has full page ads on the last page of the novel for both the CCG and another for the board game.

Don't know where my copy of Feast is, so can't check to see if it was still in there at that point as well but I'd be surprised if it wasn't.

i found out about the game via such an ad in thrones

GRRM has an update on his site and a link to this article: www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/television/news/e3i30b29365238b3652295a5a9e328518de

i am starting to not care about the show.

Where's the freaking book?

i'm afraid the next book is going to be very very bad. I think he lost the story. He has an ending he wants but somwhere (probably when he was having brienne wonder up the coast ad nasuem) he lost the way to get to it...

If this is half of feast plus some more writing that has taken this long i think we are in for a lot of X character is wondering through the woods contemplating the meaning of life...blah blah blah

Excellent casting decision for Tyrion. He's a great actor and his publicity shot isn't a million miles from the more flattering depictions of Tyrion in AGOT CCG art.

Lars said:

Well if it´s Tyrion wandering through the woods contemplating who to backstab next, it´s fine by me.

But you do have a good point. I myself can´t see the book coming to a satisfying conclusion in less then 3 volumes, wich at the current pace seems too much to hope for.

I'm really excited to see the book series come to life on HBO. I enjoyed Rome and if HBO can do half as well on AGOT its going to be awesome. HBO is able to do things most networks aren't allowed to since they aren't cable or they feel what is portrayed goes against the vaues of their station. That said I am excited to see the pilot and hope that it is a decent production.

Anybody take a look at GRRM's page lately? He put up a re-re-re-updated version of the Daeny and a dead Unsullied chapter... and made another Not-a-Blog joke about a South-Park-ification of the HBO show... anything to keep him in good spirits and writing at this point.