One day, I was talking on a forum to some fellow X-Wingers and we were joking about names of cards. I then said that in England we have differing cards, for example the Royal Guard Pilot was actually the Royale Guard Pilot. They thought I was joking. I quickly put something together on Photoshop and cut off the main text because I couldn't fit the "e" in it. They were amazed. And I was amazed that they believed me. I thought I'd see how far I could go with it. I told them that in England the Gray Squadron Pilot was actually Grey Squadron pilot and again produced a picture on Photoshop. Again, they absolutely believed me. Feeling naughty, I thought I would try for one more. So I told them that in England Biggs was actually Biggles, named after the fictional World War I flying ace. Again I rushed off a picture. The response was amazing. They were bowled over. I told them that it had been an early print of the game and that US versions flooded the UK market very quickly due to insufficient sets. They almost universally believed every word.

I decided to take it a little further, so I posted on the UK Facebook page asking for help. It became a huge thread. There was a very definitely control of information. If we were to pull off an extraordinary hoax then we had to coordinate. Information was agreed and then released very slowly. On April 29th, I posted on BGG:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/1163833/how-come-no-one-knows-about/page/1

It grew from there. With every reply on BGGand on FFG we planned our response. I spent days on it. We pretended to trade with people in the US - we got them in on it, too. They posted thanks for receiving their Biggles cards. Even people in the UK said that they were looking to trade for some Biggles cards because they had never realised until now. We posted on the FFG forum, on Boardgamegeek, we even tried to change the Wookieepedia entry, although that got changed back extremely quickly.

I insisted that no-one profit from the joke. There would be no trades, no prints of fake cards or anything like that. I didn't want people to lose out financially because of the joke.

We cross-posted, to drop little hints and pictures in here and there, for example,
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/15652358#15652358 . Look really closely at the picture. This had moved way beyond simple Photoshop. Now serious designers and artists were in on the act. We even submitted tournament reports with photos that had someone in the background dressed as Biggles.

We had someone join the UK/IRL Facebook page from America asking if it was real. This was everywhere. When I moved to America, one of the first games I played someone asked me if I had any Biggles cards. I asked FFG if they might pretend that they had created one but got no response. They obviously wanted nothing to do with the gag. I can't blame them but it would have been amazing if they had. All I hoped for was that no-one else would actually ask FFG. And no-one did, until now, posted on the FFG Forum, in response to someone asking how they might get their hands on a Biggles card.

By the end of the original flurry of activity in April and May, the UK/IRL Facebook thread had over 540 posts on it. There were so many people involved. This was the largest joke I have ever pulled in my life. People all around the world have been talking about Biggles for over 6 months. It has been wonderful.

So, it's time to 'fess up. There is no Biggles card. But there has been a lot of laughter and a lot of fun and now that I've admitted it, I hope you all see the funny side, too.

Thanks for 6 months of good humour and, by the way, a lot of people in the UK now genuinely do refer to him as Biggles because of this, and that is actually true. I understand if you don't believe me, though!

Tusken

Nice prank

no offence taken but personally i pretty much saw it as a spoof from the start because of the licensing issues with changing a named ANH character

Kudos for pulling it off to that degree though. I'm stunned no one emailed FFG until then.

If i'd have actually *wanted* an oddly named biggs card its the first thing i would have done.

Ay least you didnt tell them that in Europe its called a Royale Garde with Cheese...

ohgoddamnit

One day, I was talking on a forum to some fellow X-Wingers and we were joking about names of cards. I then said that in England we have differing cards, for example the Royal Guard Pilot was actually the Royale Guard Pilot. They thought I was joking. I quickly put something together on Photoshop and cut off the main text because I couldn't fit the "e" in it. They were amazed. And I was amazed that they believed me. I thought I'd see how far I could go with it. I told them that in England the Gray Squadron Pilot was actually Grey Squadron pilot and again produced a picture on Photoshop. Again, they absolutely believed me. Feeling naughty, I thought I would try for one more. So I told them that in England Biggs was actually Biggles, named after the fictional World War I flying ace. Again I rushed off a picture. The response was amazing. They were bowled over. I told them that it had been an early print of the game and that US versions flooded the UK market very quickly due to insufficient sets. They almost universally believed every word.

Thanks for 6 months of good humour and, by the way, a lot of people in the UK now genuinely do refer to him as Biggles because of this, and that is actually true. I understand if you don't believe me, though!

Tusken

Actually in retrospect i cant like this enough.

In our music subculture scene (goth industrial techno bobbins) we had one lad who was holier than thou about bands.. if you didnt know who produced covenants 3rd album or who the studio engineer on ministrys pslam 69 was you were a 'noob' etc.

We invented a band called 'Der Putsch' (the bloke was a closet bit of a nazi tbh and i thought that would hook him) and pretended they did a single of 'all the kids in america' by Kim Wylde but in german... we all put it on our livejournal, got the local goth record shop in on it to say it had all sold out etc.

We had that one going for a few weeks , nothing like the work you put in but ours was more to take some one down a pg or two as a 'muso know it all' so i cant be as 'innocent' about it as you.

But like i say excellently executed prank there.

You know at *one* point i was beginning to doubt myself about my insistence that card had never existed and was on the verge of mailing Britty myself but couldnt be bothered... apathy in the uk!

lol nice. ya got me.

It was great to be a small part of Tusken's Army, especially as he wanted the whole thing to be in good taste; there are real examples of fraud, such as Sherlock Holmes Bee Keeping book, sold to credulous collectors, when in fact it just had a forged frontispiece. Part of what makes the UK group so special, was us rallying behind Biggles, and Tusken, his resurrector. We were sad to see him leave.

On British humour, I feel I must explain that spoofs of this kind are in the blood, never condescending, and always expected (at some point) to be discovered. Pulling the leg is a Blighty way of making us all question what is presented to us, even by so-called friends. It is (almost) always affectionate, so I hope that others join us in having a chuckle. It was never at anyone's expense and Tusken always planned to confess if it ever arose; we worked hard to bury the thread like an undiscovered treasure; again under the excellent direction of Mr Raider. He'd make an excellent propagandist…

The English are like wolves we constantly seek weakness and when we find it we attack weeding out the runts, this comes in many forms such as jokes designed to expose gullibility or slow witted people so we can mock them mercilessly.

As they say keep your enemies close.

I love my country

"It was a fiction! and I its author!"

I never heard about this until now, but I probably would have fell for it. Pretty sly.

I dont belive you this sounds more like a conspiracy. you just want all the Biggles cards for your self

Bloody brilliant!

I dont belive you this sounds more like a conspiracy. you just want all the Biggles cards for your self

Yes, yes, that's it!

Fell for it, still laughing about it . Magnificient, well played, and extremely well organized!

Well done sir, well done.

*bows*

Admittedly, I was of the mind.. show me and I'll believe it, but no official cards came forth. After all, his name is Biggs, and I can see the fun in calling him Biggles, but even with the novelty I couldn't imagine FFG changing a named character.

I will say, well played though. I was a fence sitter, so in that I was partially gotten on it..

Being a Wings of Glory player I know a few Brits who were quick to throw out the Biggles name and chuckle of old stories about the famous pilot. I can see why you are all so fond of him. He's kind of.. an every man.. we all want to be like him, or be him..

Play on lads.. pip pip and all that.. cherrie O

I take my hat off to you Tusker - what a terrific wheeze!

Dude Kyla is going to kill you.

I must say I believed the rumour, despite my better judgement. I should have gone with my gut - I didn't understand why the S in Biggles was cut off in every picture, I didn't know why they would be so stupid as to potentially let people use two Biggles in one list, and I didn't understand the use of such an obscure reference. "I" know who Biggles is, but he's hardly a household name with most people - would be like me going to the states and expecting everyone to have heard of Gasoline Alley.

I absolutely loved this prank all the way through.

Also when Bigg(le)s gets destroyed I usually say '****. I pranged my kite!'

Well done sir.

A prank?!?!?! Are you still mad about that whole independance thing we did? Can we call it even now?

A prank?!?!?! Are you still mad about that whole independance thing we did? Can we call it even now?

Nope - you are /still/ nothing but a bunch of rebellious colonials who will eventually beg to be let back in to our lovely country.

A prank?!?!?! Are you still mad about that whole independance thing we did? Can we call it even now?

Nope - you are /still/ nothing but a bunch of rebellious colonials who will eventually beg to be let back in to our lovely country.

Considering that I now live in the US, I'll decline comment here...

Well done, Tusken, well done.

Hi-larious!

But ... It was so artistically done.

Great prank Tusken, I can't believe you had so many of us (including me) fooled.

Well done

But to be honest I never bought into it. The card never looked quite right so unless someone could of produced a card sitting on a table or something, I didn't buy it.