7 hours ago, Cusm said:

I found it interesting that the Worlds winner in Runewars bought all his stuff at the venue, and iirc spent less than $150. At least FFG is learning from their history. Unfortunately it does little for IA, Armada or X-Wing new players.

Considering the limited number of SKU's to put it all together, that tends to keep the costs down. The top tier cards can't be spread over a bunch of products if there aren't a bunch of products to spread it over.

Also, and this can't be stressed enough when comparing IA to ANY OTHER SKIRMISH GAME;

IA is a campaign product with a competitive skirmish mode tacked on to it. Runewars, X-Wing, Armada, Legion, Warhammer 40k, etc are all just head to head conflict games meant to be fought in a vacuum, with no real narrative or consequence to your actions. If you're lucky, you get something like IA or Armada where there's at least battlefield objectives to make it interesting.

I can't think of many head to head conflict games that also come with elaborate narrative campaigns right out of the box. It's a unique product that way, and thus hard to compare apples to apples to anything else, other than to paraphrase Homer Simpson and say "if you don't like it, go to Runewars"

5 hours ago, cleardave said:

... a unique product that way, and thus hard to compare apples to apples to anything else, other than to paraphrase Homer Simpson and say "if you don't like it, go to Runewars"

I said it I found it interesting, no complaint. The first World's winner of IA or Armada, how much product did the winning list require? I have seen FFG improve on their required purchasing on many games; Netrunner required 3 core sets, Star Wars LCG required 2, newer LCG require just one. Runewars is their first miniature game that allows you to buy one faction only. I do not care to play Runewars and have no interest atm for Legion, but as someone that has several FFG franchises (IA, Armada, SW:LCG, X-Wing, Netrunner, Descent) it is encouraging that they are making better buy in options for their players.

rune wars is also very conservative with how they put out upgrade cards. there should be very few "buy for the cards" situations in rune wars. they have even gone so far as to put unique cards in multiple expansions.

but thats getting a bit off topic.

Crazy idea, but what if IA's had it backward all this time? Box sets should include all the typical goodies (new tokens, map tiles, etc) but as far as units go, we should be given only the uniques- heroes, and unique allies/villains. Boxed sets could cost roughly 30 bucks (15-20 for smallboxes) and blisters could be their typical roughly $10 price (roughly $20 for big stuff like the Rancor or an AT-ST).

Blisters should be for the generics. Boxed sets could have placeholder tokens.

I'm still waiting for a confirmation of FFG that the game will keep going strong.
From their articles, recently, it seems that Legion will take major time for them as well as dedicatio, almost saying that this is the SW game people will have for some time.

9 hours ago, cleardave said:

Considering the limited number of SKU's to put it all together, that tends to keep the costs down. The top tier cards can't be spread over a bunch of products if there aren't a bunch of products to spread it over.

Also, and this can't be stressed enough when comparing IA to ANY OTHER SKIRMISH GAME;

IA is a campaign product with a competitive skirmish mode tacked on to it. Runewars, X-Wing, Armada, Legion, Warhammer 40k, etc are all just head to head conflict games meant to be fought in a vacuum, with no real narrative or consequence to your actions. If you're lucky, you get something like IA or Armada where there's at least battlefield objectives to make it interesting.

I can't think of many head to head conflict games that also come with elaborate narrative campaigns right out of the box. It's a unique product that way, and thus hard to compare apples to apples to anything else, other than to paraphrase Homer Simpson and say "if you don't like it, go to Runewars"

1st edition 40k was very role-play heavy. While it was dropped pretty much completely for 2nd, things like objectives and overarching campaigns and even leagues got added back in. 40k also doesn't exist in a vacuum with things like Shadowwar Armageddon, Necromunda, Space Hulk, Kill Team etc. adding various degrees of campaign play for your miniatures. Meanwhile you can't even use Imperial Assault miniatures in Legion.

That said, 40k always has been and is still a completely terrible game mechanically, but it's the big boy on the block. Runewars is basically fantasy X-Wing and mechanically is a good game, but the miniatures are poop, the limited army options, company "support" being making stores pay for OP kits, and the fact that you can't even reliably get the core set have basically killed it.

Mechanically Legion is garbage compared to Runewars, but is still much better than 40k. But the minis are premium price, not painted but also not hobby quality, and you'll have FF's typical "we'll only print in China, we'd rather have game-killing shortages than give a job to an America pig."

It's sad they've bungled Runewars as badly as they have because it is a good game, basically a much cheaper X-Wing, and I'd far far prefer to have game tables running it rather than Sigmar/40k, but that's what people are playing.

5 minutes ago, gmcc said:

I'm still waiting for a confirmation of FFG that the game will keep going strong.
From their articles, recently, it seems that Legion will take major time for them as well as dedicatio, almost saying that this is the SW game people will have for some time.

I suppose it depends on what we mean by "going strong." They're just building for Legion's release, which they obviously hope will be a cash cow (and maybe it will be). IA will play backseat to Legion and Destiny (and Xwing and ...), but I think we'll still get content as long as it brings in that $$$.

-ryanjamal

52 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

Crazy idea, but what if IA's had it backward all this time? Box sets should include all the typical goodies (new tokens, map tiles, etc) but as far as units go, we should be given only the uniques- heroes, and unique allies/villains. Boxed sets could cost roughly 30 bucks (15-20 for smallboxes) and blisters could be their typical roughly $10 price (roughly $20 for big stuff like the Rancor or an AT-ST).

Blisters should be for the generics. Boxed sets could have placeholder tokens.

Only problem with that is that it would be a bit of a hard sell for the campaign players. The unique allies/villains are very rarely on the board, whereas the generic groups are there constantly. Sure it would be fun to see IG-88 when he (maybe?) shows up in the core campaign, but who wants to go through ten missions of fighting cardboard cutouts of stormtroopers?

1 hour ago, ManateeX said:

Only problem with that is that it would be a bit of a hard sell for the campaign players. The unique allies/villains are very rarely on the board, whereas the generic groups are there constantly. Sure it would be fun to see IG-88 when he (maybe?) shows up in the core campaign, but who wants to go through ten missions of fighting cardboard cutouts of stormtroopers?

I guess this is contradictory to what I originally posted, but ideally the total cost of all components wouldn't change. So yeah, it's gonna cost roughly $30 for all the stormtroopers for the campaign.

I don't know, maybe that's flawed, too.

The idea was to make it so that multiple copies of boxes wouldn't be required, but I could see how that could still be an issue. Maybe campaign and skirmish are just so different that there is no perfect compromise? Maybe skirmish lists should face the same unit limitations that campaign does (that would potentially break some stuff like Ugs lists, which wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing). I don't know- at this point, any big change is bound to make people mad. Hate to say it, but maybe Legion really is the answer to the skirmish side of things, at least for skirmish players unwilling or unable to keep up with IA. This game is just so big and diverse (two drastically different game modes- which again, certainly not a bad thing) that I suppose it was inevitable that there'd eventually be a big rift between the players who were exclusive to only one side.

a local store owner tells me the unit packs sell poorly and the unique characters sell very well.

3 hours ago, TylerTT said:

a local store owner tells me the unit packs sell poorly and the unique characters sell very well.

Yes, no doubt about it. Most of the unit packs released so far just s*ck: Rebel Troopers (Tier 3 to 4), Rebel Saboteurs (were Tier 1 but are Tier 2 to 3 now), Stormtroopers (came out, when everyone already had to cores / Stormtroopers are not Tier 1 anymore), Wookies (Tier 3 to 4), Hired Guns (Tier 2 to 3?), Echo Base Troopers (Tier 3), ISBs (Tier 4), ...

I like the Rangers, got 2 sets.

I'd say, the unit packs sell poorly, because FFG put the wrong units in those packs.

I'd imagine, if the following units would have been figure packs coming out at the same time as the corresponding box, they would have been sold well: Royal Guards, Officers, Probe Droids, Stormtroopers, HKs, Snow Troopers, Ugnaughts, Weequays, Jet Troopers, ...

As a campaign player I'd agree with a lot on this thread...

Minis are probably the most expensive part of the game and cardboard is cheap in comparison.

Bring out a medium sized box with just new map tiles and campaign book. Most people by now have at least Return to Hoth if not other expansions. However, only have Imperial deployments from the core set as closed sets per mission, maybe add in a couple of deployment cards for scout troopers (for example) and give cardboard tokens only - the minis available elsewhere. No new heroes either. Also throw in a mechanism for chaining campaigns together.

This might mean a whole new campaign, cards and new map tiles for sub £20 (not sure US price). This would work 'if' the campaign box was cheap enough and satisfy new players with only the core set plus players with loads of expansions and skirimish only players that don't want to pay for campaign hero stuff just to have new maps.

6 hours ago, DerBaer said:

I like the Rangers, got 2 sets.

You're the only one that did. Boba outsold everything despite sucking and being hard to use as a unique, because he's Boba. People were buying the things that were cool on screen.

Nothing is really selling right now though. Hera/Chopper didn't really sell as far as I can tell despite being good and well known.

They really need to get the app out and have the box available in their own store.

54 minutes ago, Union said:

Boba outsold everything despite sucking and being hard to use as a unique, because he's Boba. People were buying the things that were cool on screen.

Nothing is really selling right now though. Hera/Chopper didn't really sell as far as I can tell despite being good and well known.

I'm curious to know how Obi-Wan/Greedo/Grand Inquisitor sold.

I bought the Grand Inquisitor (I needed him for free shipping ) only for the Electrostaff item. He was delivered last week with HotE. I may get Obi-Wan someday and paint him like a ghost (his item card is also pretty good). But I don't ever see getting Greedo unless he's on super sale. I also did not pick up Hera & Chopper, although if they release more "Rebels" characters I might get the whole set. I have purchased everything else up to this point, and I have 2 of most generics, fwiw.

1 hour ago, Union said:

You're the only one that did. Boba outsold everything despite sucking and being hard to use as a unique, because he's Boba. People were buying the things that were cool on screen.

Cool on screen right?

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/weeklyplanet/images/2/25/Courage.gif/revision/latest?cb=20160423105822

16 minutes ago, thestag said:

I'm curious to know how Obi-Wan/Greedo/Grand Inquisitor sold.

I bought the Grand Inquisitor (I needed him for free shipping ) only for the Electrostaff item. He was delivered last week with HotE. I may get Obi-Wan someday and paint him like a ghost (his item card is also pretty good). But I don't ever see getting Greedo unless he's on super sale. I also did not pick up Hera & Chopper, although if they release more "Rebels" characters I might get the whole set. I have purchased everything else up to this point, and I have 2 of most generics, fwiw.

IA being a 2-game-in-1, I feel it a bit misleading. I understand that not everyone who plays campaign are into skirmish and not everyone playing skirmish are into campaign mode. Technically IA players that are fine with tokens can play the core and box expansions campaigns without actually buying blister packs while I assume a typical skirmish player who wants to remain competitive will tend to buy most of the stuff that comes out. But there are others like me, that will buy anything that came out (only Greedo missing) even though I only play campaigns and have yet to jump into skirmish. So technically, it should make sales look better than if the game was campaign only or skirmish only.

I'm afraid that if a great percentage of IA skirmish players jump to Legion, it will inevitably affect IA sales and we may not see stuff coming out at the same pace as before. But in the meantime, from a campaign point of view, there are so many side missions, agenda missions, even story missions that I have yet to play that this game could go a long way without releasing new stuff (hope not though) before I actually panic or lose interest in the game.

And with all the creative minds around on this forum, I'm sure some could write new missions, or even just new campaign by shuffling existing missions one after the other with new and interesting narratives to tie them together. So even after this game is "dead" (from a skirmish point of view), it could still live (from a campaign point of view)

Just a thought about new ideas for campaigns...

Random events - the imperials can generally read ahead and prepare, but if there was a mechansim for random events that could occur in a mission then that might spice things up a bit (based on an event deck or something).

Linked Campaigns - official rules to keep characters, allies and certain upgrades between missions. Imps could start at a higher theat level and keep unlocked villains?

A very small box expansion adding in only more side missions and reward cards for core and expansion sets in a single box - could drive sales of the expansion sets as well. Maybe missions to add Heroes not used by the players as allies instead?

Still holding out for a DS2 plan retrieval campaign set partially on Endor and elsewhere.

On 11/13/2017 at 9:21 AM, Cusm said:

I said it I found it interesting, no complaint. The first World's winner of IA or Armada, how much product did the winning list require? I have seen FFG improve on their required purchasing on many games; Netrunner required 3 core sets, Star Wars LCG required 2, newer LCG require just one. Runewars is their first miniature game that allows you to buy one faction only. I do not care to play Runewars and have no interest atm for Legion, but as someone that has several FFG franchises (IA, Armada, SW:LCG, X-Wing, Netrunner, Descent) it is encouraging that they are making better buy in options for their players.

I'm gonna fix a couple of things there. Netrunner requires 1-2 core sets, Star Wars needs 2, Conquest (RIP), GoT 2nd ed, and L5R need 3. (If you're playing Tyrell you can get away with 2 cores of GoT)

Armada list was probably $200 or less. IA......

1 hour ago, qwertyuiop said:

I'm gonna fix a couple of things there. Netrunner requires 1-2 core sets, Star Wars needs 2, Conquest (RIP), GoT 2nd ed, and L5R need 3. (If you're playing Tyrell you can get away with 2 cores of GoT)

Armada list was probably $200 or less. IA......

Netrunner required 3 if you wanted a full set of everything. There were 16 cards that were 1 of in the core and needed 3. People on ebay were selling the 2x and 1x cards from the core for $50-75, so buying 2 more core was actually cheaper with discounts. Wasn't sure about L5R. Armada new was expensive like IA at release because of the limited number of released items.

1 hour ago, Cusm said:

Netrunner required 3 if you wanted a full set of everything. There were 16 cards that were 1 of in the core and needed 3. People on ebay were selling the 2x and 1x cards from the core for $50-75, so buying 2 more core was actually cheaper with discounts. Wasn't sure about L5R. Armada new was expensive like IA at release because of the limited number of released items.

I should have clarified. To be competitive you only needed 2x max of Netrunner. Sorry.

10 minutes ago, qwertyuiop said:

I should have clarified. To be competitive you only needed 2x max of Netrunner. Sorry.

I have not checked out the new reworked Core+ set, do you know if they include 3 of everything in that?

1 hour ago, Cusm said:

I have not checked out the new reworked Core+ set, do you know if they include 3 of everything in that?

This is FFG we're talking about. (no)

On 11/15/2017 at 9:04 AM, Cusm said:

I have not checked out the new reworked Core+ set, do you know if they include 3 of everything in that?

Of course you need 3 core sets to have one of everything. I hear L5R is the same way. Just a huge rip off and stupid of them for doing things this way.

I don't expect any new IA stuff for a good while. Their efforts will go towards Legion for now. If they are ever able to release the app, that should give a boost to IA sales which may at some point get them to make another expansion.

I can't find not even one product of imperial assault in the upcoming page.Am I the only one?

9 minutes ago, Blacktorn said:

I can't find not even one product of imperial assault in the upcoming page.Am I the only one?

Follow the rabbit hole in that thread.