Same kind of comments are being said about IA, that's dead now Legion is coming.

FFG would help the community here if they clarified if the scale is different why have they made that decision. Whether you agree with the reasons or not people feel aggrieved that IA and SWL miniatures are differing scales, I don't think posts from either faction will convince anybody of the validity or otherwise of either viewpoint and there's about a dozen plus pages of slagging matches to go read about that, pls don't feel the need to repeat here. Lets leave that for FFG to advise us in so far as they are able.

Given the aggressive release schedule mentioned it might help sooth tempers if we knew what was coming sooner rather than later. Are players going to have to wait another 3 years for an Emperor model for example? I think one of the issues is the primary characters are already available in IA but no idea will they be part of Wave 1 or waiting till this time next year to play Han and Chewie for example?

Reasons for scale difference are fairly apparent when you think about it. If stating them won't convince anyone, FFG stating them won't either.

2 hours ago, gokubb said:

I thought about getting into RuneWars, but decided not too because I've never had the patience to get competent at modeling and painting. 40k and WHFB and RuneWars' settings just don't interest me enough to make me put in the time and effort to learn to paint.

Star Wars does this though. I'll buy into this, watch painting videos and attempt to not ruin my plastic toys. But I can easily see where I might end up enjoying the painting and then, as the inevitable slow release rate of new Legion units happens, I may end up dabbling in RuneWars. So, I may be in the minority, but Legion may influence me to jump on RW.

I thought I would hate painting when I started playing IA. I mean, I have always hated coloring and painting is just coloring with water and stress. I was dreading it.

Now, I think I have more fun painting my IA figures than I do playing with them (and I love playing the game).

I almost bought into runewars just because I wanted to paint the cool rock guys.

Hopefully, you will feel the same.

If you paint something and hate how it looks, you can use Simple Green and a toothbrush to strip the paint off and try again.

8 hours ago, Manchu said:

"RuneWars is selling poorly."

Any non-anecdotal evidence? If not, please stop posting this disinformation.

The actual issue is that RW and SW Legion appear to have similar core target demographics, i.e., people new to miniatures gaming.

I can't give you a source because doing so would be inappropriate, but I can tell you that Runewars is not meeting expectation. Though aside from my source there is obvious "non-anecdotal" evidence that you can always use to find out how a game is doing.

For starters availability of stock. If you find a new game out of stock everywhere, its doing well, or at least at or above expectation, if you find stock available for everything for a game, its doing poorly or below expectation.

Another good liner is re-print plans of the company, something FFG does post. When X-Wing or Armada 1st wave were released the expansions were on the re-print section before the first print was available. Right now the only think being re-printed for Runewars is the core set which originally retailed less then 3 months ago 99 bucks, but can be bought pretty much anywhere at this point for about 65, its almost in the half-price bin at this point and frankly I don't understand why they are re-printing the core set, I searched for half an hour to find a shop that didn't have it.

Finally there is Organized Play participation. This is a bit Anecdotal since you can typically only get information in local areas, though I have access to every event taking place in every shop in all of Sweden. There have been 0 events so far for Runewars in Sweden, compare that to say X-Which 5 years later still has 20-50 men tournaments every weekend in multiple places.

I'm not saying any of these are indicators that the game is dying or failing, all I'm saying is that there are plenty of warning signs and we have seen them before when it comes to FFG products.

Game must be OOS with retailers to perform at publisher expectation? In what timeframe?

Regardless, this would mean many (most?) games underperform and publishers would adjust production to super conservative levels as a result. Maybe that is a better metric for board games? Does not seem to apply in practice to miniatures games (including post-Wave 2 X-Wing).

For reference, most GW plastic kits almost never go OOS including undisputed best sellers, the Space Marines. (Exceptions are usually unusual products: Shadow War, Lake Town Houses, lower priced Spire of Dawn AoS starter.)

I appreciate that naming names is impossible with such rumors. But if we're talking sources, it is either

• retailers - unless large volume (e.g. MM) who cares?
• distributors like Alliance and Golden - better info
• FFG source - best info but unlikely

With four near complete factions announced, FFG has clearly made a huge frontloaded investment in RW. Underperforming would indicate a pretty huge mistake, relative to risk.

4 hours ago, Manchu said:

Reasons for scale difference are fairly apparent when you think about it. If stating them won't convince anyone, FFG stating them won't either.

Your opinion about scale difference is not fact and any thoughts about it are conjecture, maybe your correct maybe your not but as you don't work for FFG as you've stated, you don't actually know what reason they have. Your certainly entitled to your opinion but stop assuming some superior know it all attitude which is why I think some people are responding in what I would say is rather a hostile manner to you. I embrace your entitled to think along different lines to others but what you think and your opinion about it are just that. Your thoughts and your opinion no more or less valid than anyone else.

As FFG endeavour to engage with there community and many are annoyed by what does seem to be a difference its clearly an issue for some that FFG would be doing themselves a favour to respond to with open and clear communication in my opinion.

I don't claim to know what FFG designers and executives think or why they make the decisions they do. That doesn't make the reasons for a scale difference some kind of impossible puzzle. Some of the reasons are evident. There may be others that tie into confidential/non-public business agreements. But those won't be shared regardless.

False topic...

2 hours ago, Manchu said:

Game must be OOS with retailers to perform at publisher expectation? In what timeframe?

Regardless, this would mean many (most?) games underperform and publishers would adjust production to super conservative levels as a result. Maybe that is a better metric for board games? Does not seem to apply in practice to miniatures games (including post-Wave 2 X-Wing).

For reference, most GW plastic kits almost never go OOS including undisputed best sellers, the Space Marines. (Exceptions are usually unusual products: Shadow War, Lake Town Houses, lower priced Spire of Dawn AoS starter.)

I appreciate that naming names is impossible with such rumors. But if we're talking sources, it is either

• retailers - unless large volume (e.g. MM) who cares?
• distributors like Alliance and Golden - better info
• FFG source - best info but unlikely

With four near complete factions announced, FFG has clearly made a huge frontloaded investment in RW. Underperforming would indicate a pretty huge mistake, relative to risk.

Well I think investments take place long before you get results. The Elf and Demon faction were in development before the game was even released, so by the time they would have gotten any results from Runewars they would have already invested and promised far too much to back out. Besides I'm not suggesting the game is "failing" or "dying", nor am I making any predictions about why it might or might not be successful, I'm just saying that their is clear evidence that points more to one side then the other available that is not conjecture.

There may be other reasons for the overstocks and lower participation. One commonality I think many gaming groups, mine included is that we have players waiting on the other factions. Aka we have 6 potential Runewars players in our group and everyone wants to run their own unique faction in the group, hence I took Undead, a friend of mine took humans the rest are waiting for their faction to release. I personally don't see a point in buying anything at this point since we aren't playing but rather waiting for the games releases. If this is happening on a larger scale out there which I suspect it might be, it might explain why stocks aren't being bought up.

There is also the business model itself, for me personally I split three core sets with a friend of mine, I have all the Archers, Foot Soldiers and Siege units I will ever need, I see no logical reason to buy the expansions for those since the only thing we need to do is proxy a few cards. We don't play competitively (since a competitive scene does not exist in Sweden) so proxy is not a problem for anyone.

There are other factors as well, in my group there is a point of miniature game saturation. We have people collecting Armada and X-Wing already, budgets are thinned and so we make calls about what to collect, which is usually whatever is being actively played. Since Runewars is not really an agenda item at the moment in our group, no one is buying anything for it. Again if this is happening on any scale out there, which I suspect it is, that might also explain the overstocks.

There are lots of things that could be impacting the results of Runewars, but one thing I'm certain about is that OOS is a big indicator of how well a game is doing.

OOS with retailers is a big indicator of a publishers expectations vs. results, in general you print as much as you expect to sell, if you are OOS, it means you sold your stock and your doing as expected, if you don't you are not. Publishers do not "overstock", this is simply not a practice in this or any other business, its only a fool that would intentionally stock more then he expects to sell. GW has the same practice and their products do go out of stock, but because they have their own printing capacity optimized over years of trial and effort they are able to very quickly replenish their stocks, its one of the key reasons they are leaders in the industry, they are effectively from the ground up a miniature production company. Its their central focus. FFG functions as a board game company and they treat their miniature lines the same as their board and card games, meaning they predict, print and distribute. Its why at any given point there are always mini's out of stock for their games and on the agenda to re-print, again another thing you can monitor at FFG.

I agree with you that we don't have much information coming out of FFG on the subject, its just not a common business practice to release sales figures, but we do have the ICV2 and Runewars is yet to make an appearance here while noteably Armada and X-Wing have both been on the list pretty much since their release, X-Wing being number one now for quite a while. If Runewars was truely a success, it would be on the list.

Again, its all here say, but I think to discount the evidence that is available as "nothing", is naive. There is no evidence that its successful and there is evidence that its not meeting expectations.

X-Wing was indeed on ICv2 charts in the fall following its summer release. Key point, however, is ICv2 chart recipe is pretty murky/appears partially anecdotal (polling independent retailers). RW was not on Spring '17 charts but it was launched in March right? But sure I would be surprised to see it on the Summer '17 charts, considering third faction just launched at GenCon and we're awaiting fourth. (You nicely explained why RW is facing an uphill battle thanks to factions.) Then again X-Wing disrupted a fairly complacent segment with a AAA brand whereas relatively unknown brand RW enters a much more competitive one five years later, including the intervening rise of Kickstarter.

I am less concerned about RW being in stock with retailers (X-Wing is mostly in stock, as well; I no longer know the meta well enough to say whether exceptions are good sellers or poor sellers) in such a competitive market, with Lateri just releasing and Uthuk still to come. I would be more concerned with clearances. I saw a clearance on select RW items recently (Fun Again? cannot remember) but by the time I looked, the clearance stuff was OOS. In stock clearence items are the real worry spots, which there might well be by Spring '18 if it the anecdotal impressions are accurate.

And yep, I think Legion could contribute to that.

FFG has always said rune wars is doing great and they have lots of things in the works. those discounted core sets are likely the result of overstocking by online retailers and back room distribution shenanigans.

also three rune wars expansions are in the reprint cue.

It will be interesting to see the impact of the other factions. For me personally Runewars is without question one of the best Miniatures games ever made mechanically speaking. I think if they build on that strength, expand with more factions (as they are clearly doing) and fill in the gaps in particular by putting out a solid, FAT, lore/hobby book for the game I think they could establish the franchise and endear itself to a wider audience.

I do have high hopes for Runewars as a game for future en-devours, but right now as I said, its quite dead in my circles and I don't see it picking up anytime soon. Distractions like Legion certainly aren't helping matters. I did write a whole article about Runewars that sums up my take on it as it is today if your interested http://www.gamersdungeon.net/?page_id=944 . In fact I liked the game so much, that I created its own section on the site for it, which I have only ever done for one other game (Lord of the Rings: The Living Card Game). So while I might sound negative here in the discussion, I'm actually all around quite positive about the game, I think its a winner, though objectively I find some concern with some of the outcomes at this point. I would be quite disappointed if it failed as a game.

I pretty much moved into Runewars as it is a bit faster and cheaper than AoS. This Star Wars release does split the hobby gamer community as we can not all invest in both games. I personally am compelled to paint everything before i field it as well so.... I am not sure if I should just pause my Runewars and wait.

Rune Wars is going to be a slow build and I think FFG has the momentum to see it through. rune wars is part of their effort to build their own big cool fantasy IP. they have Legacy of Dragonholt coming out, are currently expanding rune bound and They just put almost all of descent 2.0 on the reprint que so as they are hitting every game category with that setting that they can. building an IP is very important to FFG and Asmodee so I would not be surprised if RuneWars benefits from that push.

it is lacking an LCG and a traditional RPG but I'm guessing they feel that is covered with Legacy of Dragonholt. and the setting did have RuneAge a head to head deck building card game not to long ago.

7 hours ago, Manchu said:

Reasons for scale difference are fairly apparent when you think about it.

I have yet to see anyone suggest a plausible one.

The only 2 reasons I have seen suggested are some sort of legal issue with hasbro and the detail of the figs (which is complete bull, the size difference is no where near large enough to effect the level of detail that can be achieved, any extra detail is due to the type of manufacturing being used, not the size).

Maybe they wanted the Figures to be the focal point of a larger table. Maybe they did you a favour by only going slightly larger than IA and not massively bigger

I think that's because people have been approaching the issue from the perspective of why the miniatures are bigger, as opposed to asking why they are a different size. Subtle difference, I know. But before entirely moving on from the "why bigger?" question, it might pay to consider that not all companies are equally proficient at achieving detail in any scale. FFG itself, according to Jonathan Ying, was unsatisfied with what it was able to get in the way of detail out of the Battlelore 2e figs. From FFG's perspective. therefore, figs smaller than 28-32mm were out of the question. But okay let's put aside the question of why Legion figs are bigger for a moment. Let's just ask, why did Legion figs have to be different from IA figs?

Simply put, they could not be the same because they are a different product line. So far we have read a lot of complaints that IA figs and Legion figs are different sizes. But it seems like no one has paused to imagine that there would also be complaints, almost the same complaints, if they were the same size. Currently, people are complaining that they don't want to buy models of the same character again just because one is a slightly different size. But that isn't the actual reason they would have to buy another model of the same character, assuming it was the same size. The real reason is, unlike with many other miniatures games, FFG isn't just selling you a figure. FFG sells you a game expansion, of which the figs are only a part. Fundamentally, people are really complaining that FFG won't change its MO to bifurcate miniatures on the one hand and games on the other. And FFG is just not going to do this; it is contrary to their fundamental business model.

So again, imagine if the fig in the Legion expansion was indeed the same one as the one you got in an IA expansion and the only thing that was different between them was the tokens, cards, and rules packaged along with it. In this case, customers would complain about paying a "figure tax" to get the rest of the stuff. Okay, so what if FFG were to sell you a different sculpt of the same character but in the same size? Well, first this presumes that "same size" actually means something to begin with, and there are complaints that scale of IA figures is inconsistent. That kind of inconsistency is probably okay for board game pieces; it needs improvement in a miniatures game context. But, again for the sake of argument, let's assume we can establish something close enough to a consistent IA scale. What if FFG sells you, in an expansion for Legion, a fig in that same scale with adifferent pose? Well, basically the same argument arises: I'm not gonna buy that mini again, just changed ever so slightly, just to get the cards! And in fact, isn't that the exact complaint we are actually hearing about Legion?

Okay, so changing the size did not head off the complaints anymore than not changing the size and just changing the sculpt would have. Again, this is fundamentally because the real issue is not the fig at all but rather the game at large, the cards and rules and tokens and also the figures, in the context of all that other stuff, which is why the people complaining say they want some kind of conversion kit. So then, why change the figures at all, if it doesn't head off the complaints of certain customers (but not all, or even demonstrably, the majority) who bought IA? For starters, it is pretty unlikely that decision hinged on that demographic. Instead, the issue is very simple: IA and Legion are different product lines. They are not meant to be cross-compatible. They are not meant to sell one another. They are not meant to be confused for one another. That is true of the rules and the cards and the tokens and the figures, too.

Now, if that is the actual issue, then why not make Legion figs smaller than IA? So finally, after establishing that Legion and IA game components are meant to be different from one another, the figs no less so than the cards and tokens, we can return to the question of why Legion figs had to bigger than IA figs. Well, it's already answered in the opening paragraph: FFG does not want to make figures smaller than RW size, and in fact abandoned Battlelore 2e in favor of RW for that reason, among others. Therefore we are left with figs bigger, if only in mm terms, ever so slightly bigger, than IA figs.

11 hours ago, Guest AdmiralAndy said:

Given the aggressive release schedule mentioned it might help sooth tempers if we knew what was coming sooner rather than later.

It's at least 4 months until this game is released maybe even 6... Given FFG's track record it could be a year.

The last thing they want to do right now is get the hype train going too soon. So they'll wait until 2-3 months before the game is released to start talking about wave 1 stuff.

2 hours ago, Forgottenlore said:

I have yet to see anyone suggest a plausible one.

The only 2 reasons I have seen suggested are some sort of legal issue with hasbro and the detail of the figs (which is complete bull, the size difference is no where near large enough to effect the level of detail that can be achieved, any extra detail is due to the type of manufacturing being used, not the size).

Secretly FFG hates IA and they are trying to destroy the community by launching Legion.

Ok, I bought the Runewars core set and painted it all, including the two primary infantry expansions. I also joined our local Facebook forum for the game. Several shops in our area in kansas city are working hard to support it. However, so far, it has clearly struggled to find a robust fan base. Literally, there are only a handful of people in our entire metro that regularly play it competitively or for fun in stores. Obviously, people can play it at home and no one would know about that. This is, in fact, how i play it, with my kids. But, my local shop doesn't even carry it at all because not enough people are interested. Yes, this is anecdotal and doesn't necessarily mean it won't eventually catch on. But, in my mind, it does make it harder to commit to Runewars when Legion seems so obviously appealing with an obviously bright future.

24 minutes ago, davepaulstanley said:

Ok, I bought the Runewars core set and painted it all, including the two primary infantry expansions. I also joined our local Facebook forum for the game. Several shops in our area in kansas city are working hard to support it. However, so far, it has clearly struggled to find a robust fan base. Literally, there are only a handful of people in our entire metro that regularly play it competitively or for fun in stores. Obviously, people can play it at home and no one would know about that. This is, in fact, how i play it, with my kids. But, my local shop doesn't even carry it at all because not enough people are interested. Yes, this is anecdotal and doesn't necessarily mean it won't eventually catch on. But, in my mind, it does make it harder to commit to Runewars when Legion seems so obviously appealing with an obviously bright future.

Using the term "its anecdotal" is one of my greatest pet peeves. Its like this zingger that basically says, hey anything you say we can assume is false because any information that didn't come from Christian T. Petersen on video, means it's speculation not evidence. But I think what you just told us here is information that is clear cut evidence thats not l that hard to digest..

Consider for a second that Kansas City has a population of 480,000 people. If .01% of the people living there are gamers and .01% of them are Runewars players and just 10% are interested in playing at a game shop in your neighborhood and only half of them show up on the same day as you, you would have at least 2-3 opponents to play with every time you go there.

Now let me ask you, if you wanted to play X-Wing or Armada this weekend at your shop, would you have trouble finding an opponent?

I only highlighted the anecdotal nature of my comments in light of other posts saying they were frustrated with anecdotal evidence versus more empirical evidence. But, I agree that anecdotal evidence can be annoying.

And, yes, to your point, I probably could easily find an X-Wing opponent and most especially a Star Wars Destiny or Magic The Gathering opponent at our local store. Or for that matter, a 40k or Warhammer opponent. Sheesh... This is getting depressing now. I'm gonna have to drop Runewars. :-)

9 hours ago, Manchu said:

I don't claim to know what FFG designers and executives think or why they make the decisions they do. That doesn't make the reasons for a scale difference some kind of impossible puzzle. Some of the reasons are evident. There may be others that tie into confidential/non-public business agreements. But those won't be shared regardless.

It may also be as simple a reason as they made a mistake, didn't FFG just recently appoint someone to ensure all there lines were tied in perhaps having realize the mistake, after all its not like large retail companies make mistakes with product lines that get past Q&A and then still need to get recalled? It maybe no more considered a business decision than a mistake without any real strategy behind it. Hands up anyone who never met a manager calling the shots short on common sense, it happens.

You pretty much stated that what you said concerning the reason for difference and what FFG said would be the same, that's an arrogant assumption. Until FFG do elaborate if they do, your neither more right or wrong than anybody else. There are some interesting points on both sides and reasons and viewpoints put forward by both sides including some of yours Manchu, I personally dislike the way some people resort to personal insults and unfounded accusations in response to some of your posts. However that doesn't stop you coming across as arrogant and dismissive of what maybe valid points being raised and infact you seem to refuse to even consider your wrong given you have no more information than the rest of us.

On 8/20/2017 at 11:52 PM, Dr Zoidberg said:

I think he feels RuneWars will be neglected because of Legion.

Well seeing as the North American RuneWars Championship at Gencon only had an embarrassing turnout of 16 People, I think it's safe to say RuneWars was already being neglected well before Legion came along.