I'm seeing a recurring theme in many of the threads. All having to do with future factions releases and releases for current factions.

Understand that while I am new here and new to this game... I have been around the block a time or two. I have been playing similar games since the mid 80s and have seen games and editions come and go. (glares at GW).

I also have worked in stores and factories, currently at Rubbermaid and we repackage stuff all the time for new releases or for adding stuff in or exchanging stuff in packages and so forth and understand that re releasing is more than just saying repackage but that it is also MUCH less than making from scratch.

I understand the marketing ideal of stringing out releases as much as possible to provide trickle income over a long period of time. i have seen this and have seen that it often breeds discontent and cynicism in players. Enough so that games can and have floundered and gone under as people left to other games.

My idea has different parts....

1. Go ahead and re-release ALL of the 1st edition models packaged as second edition as a single wave. requires a capital investment of the company. Sales spike for a short time as a fast semi return.Draws in new players and makes old players happy. How the players or customers feel about a company goes a LONG way in sales and loyalty. This "back product re-release" would give designers a wave's worth of time to double up for the following wave in amount of stuff to release. And/or give them time to get #2 started...

2. The clone wars movies are out and looks like disney is moving forward instead of back so it is fairly safe to say that all the clone wars stuff infor that we will have for a while is as out as it is going to get. This is where a "living list" would be a good start. Many of the ships overlap time periods. Figure out which ones overlap that we already have. Start a pdf file of these lists of ships that would be the same. Pilot cards and so forth and have it all on pdf for players to download and platest. Making it a living document that is updated every other month or so as the meta is defined or bugs/tweaks that are needed are found and fixed. We all KNOW that players would jump on this even if they know that they are final and that more "new stuff" is coming down the road. This would cause sales of those ships to REALLY spike upward giving a nest egg supply of profit to crank up releases and designs and so forth of new stuff.

it is late and my mind is getting a lil foggy but i'm sure you get where I'm going. I'm looking for greater long term profits, faster stuff for players and players to be more happy with the company selling the game.

FFG don't sit on stock, they release in Waves because they design, play test, manufacture and distribute the ships in waves. In between new waves they reprint ships from older waves that retailers have sold out of and want more of. The 2.0 release saw them put out more ships/products at once than they ever have previously, at 8 different ship miniatures and 15 different products. The full 1.0 re-release you suggest would need over 50 different ship miniatures, all of which would have to be manufactured and distributed (the design and play test work was done for the conversion kits at least). Also, most stores do not have anywhere near the money or shelf space to invest in 50-odd X-Wing SKUs all at once. For some, the 15 that just came out are quite a burden and risk.

Also, as I noted elsewhere, every single X-Wing 2.0 model released that wasn't a new model has had either a new sculpt or a new paint job. A large part of that is from starting at the beginning again and a lot of the six-year-old models were not as good as more recent ones so it may not be the case for every re-release ever, but it probably will for a lot of them.

As for your second point the number of ships that would span the factions of different eras is pretty small, so it's probably not worth worrying about. Sales spikes of already released ships would only give additional profit to the retailers, FFG already got their money when they sold them to stores new.

And don't read too much into some forum grumbles, many people are pretty happy with how FFG is handling X-Wing 2.0.

Most of your game stores aren’t set up to hold that kind of inventory.

I think FFG is always playing the game to find the sweet spot in customers' and game stores' wallets. The exception here is the big 2.0 switch, but I think they did a fairly good job of keeping things affordable and helping current and past players into the new edition. Moving forward, their model of releasing in waves builds anticipation and I think maximizes the sales of a particular ship. I know for myself, I've gone back and completed a wave just because there's nothing new out at the moment, or gone back and bought multiples of a certain ship. I also agree that I'd like to see something new about each re-release (paint scheme, weapons, moveable parts), as without this I'm less likely to purchase.

FFG seemed to reprint a lot of ships before going to 2.0, I think so that the stock would be out there for those who wanted to complete collections or get ships to convert over. I know a few new players who bought collections off eBay because it was cheaper to convert and it gave them access to a lot more ships.

In terms of your #2, maybe I misunderstand, but are you aware FFG has announced they'll be bringing clone wars to X-wing? There will be two new factions (Republic and CIS) and they've already shown off a few of the ships at conventions like the Jedi fighter.

I have said elsewhere that I'm intrigued by the idea of era crossover so that all ships and factions could be viable in some type of RPG. (I hope FFG will do an RPG for X-wing this time around.) The list you're suggesting would be a cool graphic to see all the ships and where they overlap, or at least where they began on the timeline.

The store space actually makes sense. As our family previously ran several of them, I should have thought of that. I'd seen the clone wars leak, thats why I brought it up. Aside fromthe store space being an issue, the rest of the idea holds up pretty well. But that one alone would be enough of an issue to put a hold on it.it would not stop the living lists though as that would allow them to not only get a head start on playtesting, it would give them early feedback, additional good will and cost them nothing more than the webspace to host it.

Getting a moderate amount of new stuff every few months is way better than waiting a year to get a massive amount of new product dumped on us after which we have to wait another year.

12 minutes ago, Tvboy said:

Getting a moderate amount of new stuff every few months is way better than waiting a year to get a massive amount of new product dumped on us after which we have to wait another year.

That is one of the advantages of the manufacturing type being used in the miniatures. FFG's contracted companies don't need to hold onto a huge stock of molds or stamps + dies nor do they need to churn out a massive over production to cover expected sales (something every game system previously had to take into account before the advent of additive manufacturing, A.K.A. 3d printing). The manufacturing companies merely need the requisite schematics and can print up batches without needing to retool between designs being printed. End result is smaller, more frequent production runs that are more easily tailored to demand, without allot of unpaid for stock that needs storage space and may never actually get sold.