I'm tired of the doom and gloom posts as much as anyone else. I remember a while ago I posted Armada was O.K., as long as they were still making expansions. Then I saw they kinda had stopped.

I just went through and looked at all the miniatures games FFG has and it really looks like they're back up on receiving or ordering a lot of stuff. Especially the big stuff, even some X-wing stuff and we know X-wing is FFG's golden child. I think a lot of what is happening is FFG either having maxed out their suppliers capacity, or suppliers holding out for more money because they now know the popularity of the games.

I noticed there are a lot of board games scheduled to release recently or in the near future. I gotta think that eats up a lot of production capacity.

On the other hand if I ran a factory and had a contract with FFG that was ending, I'd look at the prices and the demand and my cut would be a lot larger before i signed a new contract.

Like I said this is conjecture based on the amount of stuff that's out of print, but it seems more likely than ending a game as popular as Armada.

FFG is already having issues keeping up with the demand.

I think it's more likely that someone looked at the miniatures from the star wars board game and then wrote some armada rules for them, hoping to to appease, at least in the short term, the rampant desire that people have for more plastic spaceships. pew pew.

My out look. You should be happy with less new ships added. The more new stuff added to the game the faster it will stop getting new players That is right "Less new players." Lets face the you need all or almost all of everything out to have a chance to win Vs a player who has it all. Getting into this game right now and having a chance to win even a one off meeting store game will coast about $400. and that price will go up with each new ship added. Something to think about.

Less new players means less sales and well you know what that means.

My out look. You should be happy with less new ships added. The more new stuff added to the game the faster it will stop getting new players That is right "Less new players." Lets face the you need all or almost all of everything out to have a chance to win Vs a player who has it all. Getting into this game right now and having a chance to win even a one off meeting store game will coast about $400. and that price will go up with each new ship added. Something to think about.

Less new players means less sales and well you know what that means.

I really do not agree with the premise that you need a massive collection to be competitive. Yes, you need the main box and a few other ships. The main box+2 AFII's and maybe a couple of boxes of squadrons (1 box Rogues and Villains, maybe 2 squadron boxes) and you have a solid, balanced Rebel force that is very competitive and has some variational flavor. Imperials need a glad or two, and a few squadron boxes as well. Minimum barrier to entry for Armada is not really that bad, especially considering it's depth of play, and especially compared to 40k (which is still several orders of magnitude more popular, and has a psychotic release schedule). Armada is a different kind of game, targetting a different crowd than X-wing and other fast-play, low cost of entry games. Many of the more dedicated Armada players I have met are also historically Epic/Adeptus Titanicus, Dropzone Commander, 40k, BFG, WFB, etc players.

My out look. You should be happy with less new ships added. The more new stuff added to the game the faster it will stop getting new players That is right "Less new players." Lets face the you need all or almost all of everything out to have a chance to win Vs a player who has it all. Getting into this game right now and having a chance to win even a one off meeting store game will coast about $400. and that price will go up with each new ship added. Something to think about.

Less new players means less sales and well you know what that means.

I really do not agree with the premise that you need a massive collection to be competitive. Yes, you need the main box and a few other ships. The main box+2 AFII's and maybe a couple of boxes of squadrons (1 box Rogues and Villains, maybe 2 squadron boxes) and you have a solid, balanced Rebel force that is very competitive and has some variational flavor. Imperials need a glad or two, and a few squadron boxes as well. Minimum barrier to entry for Armada is not really that bad, especially considering it's depth of play, and especially compared to 40k (which is still several orders of magnitude more popular, and has a psychotic release schedule). Armada is a different kind of game, targetting a different crowd than X-wing and other fast-play, low cost of entry games. Many of the more dedicated Armada players I have met are also historically Epic/Adeptus Titanicus, Dropzone Commander, 40k, BFG, WFB, etc players.

More is not always better. The more stuff you have, the more power creep there is, and the harder the game is to balance.

Armada is very well balanced right now. I'd rather slower, more thoughtful releases.

no sane company in the history of companies ever thought "gee, we have a popular product that ranks in the top 5 in its category, I know, lets release as little as possible because F*** money"

Also, I don't know how many of you have actually dealt with factories in China, but I have. Several in the plasics realm.

Let me explain something: if a factory in China asks for more money, there are 4 others crawling over its corpse in a week. No one goes to China for excellence in quality or super rapid turnaround (it's across an ocean...) you go to China for price to maximize profit, turnaround is a tossup and quality is a oscillating bar.

FFG probably has a set of manufactorys (keep in mind a plastics factory won't usually print, sometimes it makes more sense to print your cardboard with one supplier and your card stock with another and finally there will be a fullfilment supplier to put all that stuff together and ship it. Very rarerely you can find a supplier that is mostly vertically integrated along a particular industries needs but that depends on the market) they trust that gives them what they need in the Speed/Quality/Price intersect that works for them. Once you find one of these and they prove themselves they are like gold. You pay them a fair price and they do right by you in exchange for your loyalty.

Now the issue is FFGs suppliers have a capacity pipe. Some brain at FFG has to work with these guys to figure out when the big dogs want stuff released and coordinate capacity. At some point I imagine a hard decision had to be made between different product lines/releases and Armada got the short end of the stick. Maybe there were 2 more SKUs (my guess is that originally there were 6 in this wave, 2 medium base ships, 2 fighter packs and the flotillas) but they are on hold while the rebellion stock is built up, Wave 8 demand is met etc etc etc. So they decided to release what they could given the capacity they had available because the choice was release nothing now and have momentum for the game dry up much more quickly OR release 2 SKUs and put up with the misery of upset Prack addicts.

As an Armada addict I hate that they chose our game to get the shaft, as someone who understands the realities of business and manufacturing I grudgingly understand.

Also there is the possibility that they were a good ways along on a 6 SKU wave and LFL pulled permission for 4 of them and all FFG could do is bite their tongue, release what was allowed and just let steam jet out their ears.

no sane company in the history of companies ever thought "gee, we have a popular product that ranks in the top 5 in its category, I know, lets release as little as possible because F*** money"

Also, I don't know how many of you have actually dealt with factories in China, but I have. Several in the plasics realm.

Let me explain something: if a factory in China asks for more money, there are 4 others crawling over its corpse in a week. No one goes to China for excellence in quality or super rapid turnaround (it's across an ocean...) you go to China for price to maximize profit, turnaround is a tossup and quality is a oscillating bar.

FFG probably has a set of manufactorys (keep in mind a plastics factory won't usually print, sometimes it makes more sense to print your cardboard with one supplier and your card stock with another and finally there will be a fullfilment supplier to put all that stuff together and ship it. Very rarerely you can find a supplier that is mostly vertically integrated along a particular industries needs but that depends on the market) they trust that gives them what they need in the Speed/Quality/Price intersect that works for them. Once you find one of these and they prove themselves they are like gold. You pay them a fair price and they do right by you in exchange for your loyalty.

Now the issue is FFGs suppliers have a capacity pipe. Some brain at FFG has to work with these guys to figure out when the big dogs want stuff released and coordinate capacity. At some point I imagine a hard decision had to be made between different product lines/releases and Armada got the short end of the stick. Maybe there were 2 more SKUs (my guess is that originally there were 6 in this wave, 2 medium base ships, 2 fighter packs and the flotillas) but they are on hold while the rebellion stock is built up, Wave 8 demand is met etc etc etc. So they decided to release what they could given the capacity they had available because the choice was release nothing now and have momentum for the game dry up much more quickly OR release 2 SKUs and put up with the misery of upset Prack addicts.

As an Armada addict I hate that they chose our game to get the shaft, as someone who understands the realities of business and manufacturing I grudgingly understand.

Also there is the possibility that they were a good ways along on a 6 SKU wave and LFL pulled permission for 4 of them and all FFG could do is bite their tongue, release what was allowed and just let steam jet out their ears.

Pretty much what I was trying to say. I also secretly hope FFG is looking for more people to produce their products.

Another factor is money. FFG has several new games in production, and I think that probably takes a big bite out of your operating capital. If you have to cut back temporarily the place to do it is with upcoming releases. If the production pipe is full you might be able to pay premium prices to get your stock anyway. If you already have a lot of money tied up in new games that haven't been release then you just have to wait.

It may certainly have something to do with Lucasfilm.

I don't want to get my hopes up yet again... but it's reasonable to theorize that Rogue One might have some capital ships that make a showing in those missing SKUs, and they are on hold until May 4th when (we expect) the Rogue One Trailer finally shows up.

Or, maybe they just don't like money?

It may certainly have something to do with Lucasfilm.

I don't want to get my hopes up yet again... but it's reasonable to theorize that Rogue One might have some capital ships that make a showing in those missing SKUs, and they are on hold until May 4th when (we expect) the Rogue One Trailer finally shows up.

Or, maybe they just don't like money?

I think a production issue is more likely. We already got talk like that from rebels before the season ended.

Besides what big ships will we see in Rogue One? Pretty sure they didn't have Mon Cals fighting for the Rebels until post Yavin.

no sane company in the history of companies ever thought "gee, we have a popular product that ranks in the top 5 in its category, I know, lets release as little as possible because F*** money"

This is exactly what is happening. Everyone knows that when you start a business, it is with the heartfelt, greed driven desire to strike it "filthy, stinking, just-enough-to-get-by."

The CEO of FFG came downstairs one afternoon and found the design team had flooded the lobby with $100.00 bills and were swimming in it like Scrooge McDuck. After dialing 911 and almost losing many of them to critical blood loss due to paper cuts, the CEO realized this line had to die.

Besides what big ships will we see in Rogue One? Pretty sure they didn't have Mon Cals fighting for the Rebels until post Yavin.

I think you've hit the nail on the head, but maybe not in the way you think. We've seen some "evidence" that FFG wants to aim for more small and medium ships. This would allow larger fleet builds within the current point limits.

The Empire couldn't possibly have flooded all of their territory with Star Destroyers the day Palpatine made his decree. Rebels shows us this to a degree.

I imagine we could see a significant number of new ship designs. Patrol, Interdiction, Espionage, Carriers, Blockade Duty, Blockade Runners, etc. I think it's important to remember that a significant number of the folks that were part of the Rebellion were put down before Endor. Almost the entire span of the Empire is riddled with "pacification" operations.

It's completely reasonable that System Fleets from hundreds of unseen races were destroyed by the Empire before Episode V begins.

Besides what big ships will we see in Rogue One? Pretty sure they didn't have Mon Cals fighting for the Rebels until post Yavin.

Given that rebels which is canon has a wings and bwings before hoth, who knows what happen when they could decided the mon cal are convert over the ships at yavin, we could get Dreadnoughts and such

Good point. With what many of us "know" as canon now turned on its ear, everything is fair game. Perhaps they'll say that the Mon Cal began quietly converting ships in the time of Rebels, threw off the Imperial garrison on their world, and was in open warfare with the Empire to keep their system free for the entire span of the films.

It's a big galaxy, and the Empire was very busy subjugating a lot of worlds. It would be shortsighted to believe they beat them all. Or that they all used the exact same dozen or so ship designs.

no sane company in the history of companies ever thought "gee, we have a popular product that ranks in the top 5 in its category, I know, lets release as little as possible because F*** money"

Also, I don't know how many of you have actually dealt with factories in China, but I have. Several in the plasics realm.

Let me explain something: if a factory in China asks for more money, there are 4 others crawling over its corpse in a week. No one goes to China for excellence in quality or super rapid turnaround (it's across an ocean...) you go to China for price to maximize profit, turnaround is a tossup and quality is a oscillating bar.

FFG probably has a set of manufactorys (keep in mind a plastics factory won't usually print, sometimes it makes more sense to print your cardboard with one supplier and your card stock with another and finally there will be a fullfilment supplier to put all that stuff together and ship it. Very rarerely you can find a supplier that is mostly vertically integrated along a particular industries needs but that depends on the market) they trust that gives them what they need in the Speed/Quality/Price intersect that works for them. Once you find one of these and they prove themselves they are like gold. You pay them a fair price and they do right by you in exchange for your loyalty.

Now the issue is FFGs suppliers have a capacity pipe. Some brain at FFG has to work with these guys to figure out when the big dogs want stuff released and coordinate capacity. At some point I imagine a hard decision had to be made between different product lines/releases and Armada got the short end of the stick. Maybe there were 2 more SKUs (my guess is that originally there were 6 in this wave, 2 medium base ships, 2 fighter packs and the flotillas) but they are on hold while the rebellion stock is built up, Wave 8 demand is met etc etc etc. So they decided to release what they could given the capacity they had available because the choice was release nothing now and have momentum for the game dry up much more quickly OR release 2 SKUs and put up with the misery of upset Prack addicts.

As an Armada addict I hate that they chose our game to get the shaft, as someone who understands the realities of business and manufacturing I grudgingly understand.

Also there is the possibility that they were a good ways along on a 6 SKU wave and LFL pulled permission for 4 of them and all FFG could do is bite their tongue, release what was allowed and just let steam jet out their ears.

They could also have limitations set on them by Disney.

Another consideration is that FFG is slowing down production on purpose. X-Wing did not start out this popular and only recently started releasing things like crazy. It makes sense for Armada to follow that track.

For silly people out thee that believes that X-Wing is great because of its variety, they need to recall that it as well did not start off with off of the ships it had. In fact, Armada has more variety in it than X-Wing did at the same point in its life.

A last consideration is that balance is key here. If they release too many ships at once they will create bubbles of imbalance that will cause people to leave the came who enjoy its balance.

In the end, no matter how FFG does things, SOMEONE, will be unhappy. That is just the way things work

I really like having a positive conversation about this instead of running around screaming, "the sky is falling!"

I really do not agree with the premise that you need a massive collection to be competitive. Yes, you need the main box and a few other ships. The main box+2 AFII's and maybe a couple of boxes of squadrons (1 box Rogues and Villains, maybe 2 squadron boxes) and you have a solid, balanced Rebel force that is very competitive and has some variational flavor. Imperials need a glad or two, and a few squadron boxes as well. Minimum barrier to entry for Armada is not really that bad, especially considering it's depth of play, and especially compared to 40k (which is still several orders of magnitude more popular, and has a psychotic release schedule). Armada is a different kind of game, targetting a different crowd than X-wing and other fast-play, low cost of entry games. Many of the more dedicated Armada players I have met are also historically Epic/Adeptus Titanicus, Dropzone Commander, 40k, BFG, WFB, etc players.

But where are your Nebs for x17s or mc30s for trcs? Its not the ship themselves that a player needs lots of, but the cards.

Besides what big ships will we see in Rogue One? Pretty sure they didn't have Mon Cals fighting for the Rebels until post Yavin.

Well to be honest we have no idea. Might be Mon Cals, Might be EU stuff, might be something totally new.

I keep seeing people suggest a production issue and I've got to ask if you are simply speculating or is there some real evidence for this? In my area I see everything on the shelves. Virtually nothing is out of stock. Sometimes an old expansion runs out but that's typical. The only stuff I can even remember being out of stock was a few X-Wing things over the past few years. (Most Wanted and Starviper packs last year, and Millenium Falcon / Slave-1s in 2014 IIRC), but those weren't new things, that was a case of older ships that simply had to be re-ordered/re-printed.

Has FFG said something related to them not being able to get things printed?

no sane company in the history of companies ever thought "gee, we have a popular product that ranks in the top 5 in its category, I know, lets release as little as possible because F*** money"

Also, I don't know how many of you have actually dealt with factories in China, but I have. Several in the plasics realm.

Let me explain something: if a factory in China asks for more money, there are 4 others crawling over its corpse in a week. No one goes to China for excellence in quality or super rapid turnaround (it's across an ocean...) you go to China for price to maximize profit, turnaround is a tossup and quality is a oscillating bar.

FFG probably has a set of manufactorys (keep in mind a plastics factory won't usually print, sometimes it makes more sense to print your cardboard with one supplier and your card stock with another and finally there will be a fullfilment supplier to put all that stuff together and ship it. Very rarerely you can find a supplier that is mostly vertically integrated along a particular industries needs but that depends on the market) they trust that gives them what they need in the Speed/Quality/Price intersect that works for them. Once you find one of these and they prove themselves they are like gold. You pay them a fair price and they do right by you in exchange for your loyalty.

Now the issue is FFGs suppliers have a capacity pipe. Some brain at FFG has to work with these guys to figure out when the big dogs want stuff released and coordinate capacity. At some point I imagine a hard decision had to be made between different product lines/releases and Armada got the short end of the stick. Maybe there were 2 more SKUs (my guess is that originally there were 6 in this wave, 2 medium base ships, 2 fighter packs and the flotillas) but they are on hold while the rebellion stock is built up, Wave 8 demand is met etc etc etc. So they decided to release what they could given the capacity they had available because the choice was release nothing now and have momentum for the game dry up much more quickly OR release 2 SKUs and put up with the misery of upset Prack addicts.

As an Armada addict I hate that they chose our game to get the shaft, as someone who understands the realities of business and manufacturing I grudgingly understand.

Also there is the possibility that they were a good ways along on a 6 SKU wave and LFL pulled permission for 4 of them and all FFG could do is bite their tongue, release what was allowed and just let steam jet out their ears.

Yay. Someone with some real world experience and logical conclusions weighing in on why we "only" got 2 ships. YOU MUST BE AN FFG MOLE!!!!

For many of us who don't have multiple ISDs and MC80s, a Wave 4 of flotillas will help us save up for more big shapes while keeping us busy with something new and shiny.

Has FFG said something related to them not being able to get things printed?

FFG went out of their way at GAMA to show to the (mostly X-Wing Retailer) Crowd that they had solved the stock and production issues of the past, and got a general agreement applause that indeed it had shown.

Has FFG said something related to them not being able to get things printed?

FFG went out of their way at GAMA to show to the (mostly X-Wing Retailer) Crowd that they had solved the stock and production issues of the past, and got a general agreement applause that indeed it had shown.

Interesting.

So part of me thinks that this would be justification for having a larger wave. If Wave 3 truly is this small (no hidden surprises), it's likely not due to production at all. Otherwise why claim to have solved existing production issues?

Has FFG said something related to them not being able to get things printed?

FFG went out of their way at GAMA to show to the (mostly X-Wing Retailer) Crowd that they had solved the stock and production issues of the past, and got a general agreement applause that indeed it had shown.

Interesting.

So part of me thinks that this would be justification for having a larger wave. If Wave 3 truly is this small (no hidden surprises), it's likely not due to production at all. Otherwise why claim to have solved existing production issues?

Because the Wave 3 Flotilla wave actually has a potentially massive effect on gameplay, and they are willing to wait and see how that goes before announcing more? Taking their time and making sure Rules and Upgrades issues are done and dusted beforehand?

Y'know.

Being careful and giving us an awesome game?

Has FFG said something related to them not being able to get things printed?

FFG went out of their way at GAMA to show to the (mostly X-Wing Retailer) Crowd that they had solved the stock and production issues of the past, and got a general agreement applause that indeed it had shown.

Interesting.

So part of me thinks that this would be justification for having a larger wave. If Wave 3 truly is this small (no hidden surprises), it's likely not due to production at all. Otherwise why claim to have solved existing production issues?

Because the Wave 3 Flotilla wave actually has a potentially massive effect on gameplay, and they are willing to wait and see how that goes before announcing more? Taking their time and making sure Rules and Upgrades issues are done and dusted beforehand?

Y'know.

Being careful and giving us an awesome game?

I'll grant you, it's possible the potential impact of Flotillas have caused them to do nothing else.

I doubt it though. I think the impact will be significant, but still small. CR-90s and Raiders still give us the ability to have a lot of ships on the board. Granted flotillas will allows us to have even more activations, but this isn't a new concept... they are just expanding upon an existing concept. This is cool, but I don't see it as being that huge.

The bigger change is the new Fleet Support upgrade. But even that might not be that big of a change. The few cards we've seen aren't exactly game breaking. Plus they do playtest this stuff, so I'm sure they have a realistic idea of how this will impact things.