Hey guys,

I am writing this out some luck that it this might get through to someone. As we all wait for news and new products, here in Australia it has become a little direr for us.

As stock of armada is limited especially fighter packs and light cruiser all over, here in AUS it’s much worse. Right now, as I’m aware, the distributor has no stock of any armada product apart from loads of VSD…

This might be due to a fall in armada players and stock not being sold thought the last two years and store owners don’t want to risk getting new stock. Now that the armada scene is on the rise, a lot of stock is gone, and the distributor is basically sitting on hands and beings silent about new orders. Because of this it has become harder for stores to compete with online. I had no problem with people buying online but give the player a choice where to buy not an excuse.

Right now, these are the posts making the rounds on Armada Facebook pages with people trying to the right thing but get turned down. It’s crazy that this is being told to the players.

As for me, I will always support my FLGS. I will wait and pay a little extra to get stock from him. For me, he supports with a place to play this great game and a way to get my tournament loot. But for others I can’t, nor I should control how they get their products. A lot will choose the quick and easy way and hurt the FLGS.

Thanks for the read, any suggestions are welcome.

The crazy thing is, There are 5 distributors over there... SOMEONE should be getting SOMETHING...

Sounds like the local stores are lying to avoid ordering more stock, which is not a way to keep a community in your store. If the game is on the rise, you should tell owners that and that you want more stock because you will buy it. Just ask them to order what you need.

3 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

The crazy thing is, There are 5 distributors over there... SOMEONE should be getting SOMETHING...

I don't have any proof but my guess is that they don't want to get stock for the reasons i have given.

Just now, Marzaums said:

I don't have any proof but my guess is that they don't want to get stock for the reasons i have given.

i Had a great personal relationship with Jedko games back when I lived in Victoria / and honestly, them not supporting us patently ridiculous to me given my history, but things can change... t’s disappointing to hear - but I wonder how much is store vs distribution as well...

3 minutes ago, Ling27 said:

Sounds like the local stores are lying to avoid ordering more stock, which is not a way to keep a community in your store. If the game is on the rise, you should tell owners that and that you want more stock because you will buy it. Just ask them to order what you need.

yeah this is what don't get. i ask my store owner but he says the distributor has nothing. I think the same is happening in other stores but they choose online stores as its the quicker way to get it, hence why stores aren't ordering and why maybe the distributor is no bothered wit orders

2 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

i Had a great personal relationship with Jedko games back when I lived in Victoria / and honestly, them not supporting us patently ridiculous to me given my history, but things can change... t’s disappointing to hear - but I wonder how much is store vs distribution as well...

i'm not quite sure about that, i really don't know the relationships between store owner and distribution. i just going on he information i know and what my store owner tells me about product. but when post like that on FB, that is ringing some alarm bells.

Regardless:

There would be a bigger stink kicked up EVERYWHERE if it were being recalled - so you can kinda file that away as a piece of misinformation.

My local store here in Wellington NZ is doing the same thing. Saying that they wont stock anymore because no one buys it. Which is BS because every time on their FB page they post that restocks come in with in a week they are out of stock again. There is one other store that sells and gets stuff in but he is over an hours drive from me. I do make sure with the Armada events ive been running that I point everyone in his direction. As he is a fellow war gamer as well he does as much as he can to help the community.

I'm just going to chime in here as both a player and quasi Armada community leader here in Australia.

Firstly i have seen and have responded to the FB post the OP mentions. There are plenty of responses from players and store owners saying they have stock or where it can be found. In fact i even offered a free unopened core set, that was subsequently turned down.

Secondly there are multiple distributors in Australia that are stocking it, however some of the common main stream shops like Good Games are not restocking it because of lack of sales (some still do, but not all). A lot of the independents are though because most of the Armada players are independent store based (The Games Cube, Rebel Outpost, The Magic Vault, IFF, Jolt, Tezzas Games, Game On Card and Games etc).

Thirdly fighter pack 1 and arquittens cruisers are in short supply globally not just in Australia, core sets im sure are plentiful and stores are even trying to get sell them discounted.

I think there has been some misinformation about Disney recalling product as it's simply not true. I can totally understand though if those stores were confused with an entirely different product that has been discontinued such as Star Wars Miniatures: Spaceship Battles

21 minutes ago, Irokenics said:

I'm just going to chime in here as both a player and quasi Armada community leader here in Australia.

Firstly i have seen and have responded to the FB post the OP mentions. There are plenty of responses from players and store owners saying they have stock or where it can be found. In fact i even offered a free unopened core set, that was subsequently turned down.

Secondly there are multiple distributors in Australia that are stocking it, however some of the common main stream shops like Good Games are not restocking it because of lack of sales (some still do, but not all). A lot of the independents are though because most of the Armada players are independent store based (The Games Cube, Rebel Outpost, The Magic Vault, IFF, Jolt, Tezzas Games, Game On Card and Games etc). 

Thirdly fighter pack 1 and arquittens cruisers are in short supply globally not just in Australia, core sets im sure are plentiful and stores are even trying to get sell them discounted.

I think there has been some misinformation about Disney recalling product as it's simply not true. I can totally understand though if those stores were confused with an entirely different product that has been discontinued such as Star Wars Miniatures: Spaceship Battles

i figured you would chime in Ken,

I agree with what you say, stock is there if you know where to get it and GG has really stopped stocking the game. The problem with this that some of the independents rely on the GG distribution and that's where the problem is right now.

Hey Maz, good topic. I really like the streaming you guys do.

As another Australian I'm actually pretty optimistic with the state of the game.

The good bits:

- My local Good Games is proving great support including running most (all?) of the tournament kits

- Our scene is still pretty healthy and just as importantly stable. We had strong turnouts for Nationals and even the regionals here in Newcastle was better attended than I expected. The numbers aren't massive in absolute terms but they are strong enough to keep the game going and make every tournament a tough prospect.

- Great local content providers like Irokenics and Maz

The bad bits are relatively less of a concern

- the greatest insult for me was no Massing at Sullust events here. I'm still pssed off about that

- The local distributor (who isn't Good Games) have been pretty sloppy with support , but I take comfort in the fact that they are just as crap supporting legion and even X wing.

More generally

- My guess is that I think a challenge for all FFG game communities is that most players tend to buy in heavily on most of the products - Armada was my first FFG game, but since then Ive seen Imp Assault, Runewars, Destiny, Legion and now even Key Forge come out. In every case, many of the regular players have bought in heavily. People only have limited gaming time and if a strong number of players puts down say Armada to go play Runewars then most will follow for a while anyway. When in absolute terms we have a lot less active players in the entire pool than 40K/Age of Sigmar, this often means a system can look very sick quickly in an area.

- I think the actual sales side of the game is healthy - certainly even if the levels of play may seem down the product certainly moves. As far as FFG and ongoing support go it would seem to be achieving the point

- I've bought plenty of legion myself and I enjoy it but my impression from event numbers is it already seems to have peaked here at a level lower than Armada.

Thanks @Ophion, its awesome when to see people liking our content. It's all good valid points. I didn't jump on board till after the massing at sullust but it wasn't a good look. The issues with wave 7 hitting late was also not great.

The girls in Australia are super gorgeous. To me armada might come in a far distant second.

35 minutes ago, Fuzzywookie said:

The girls in Australia are super gorgeous. To me armada might come in a far distant second.

Remember that thread that got locked about what it was like to be a woman in the Armada community and why it wasn't the most welcoming hobby in the world? Stuff like this, folks.

12 hours ago, Irokenics said:

I think there has been some misinformation about Disney recalling product as it's simply not true. I can totally understand though if those stores were confused with an entirely different product that has been discontinued such as Star Wars Miniatures: Spaceship Battles

Except, that wouldn't make any sense either... since Disney was not involved in that game and all the stock was already recalled and liquidated by WotC when FFG acquired the rights to Star Wars from LFL -- after that stock was liquidated by WotC it's entirely up to the new holders to decide what to do with it (e.g. MiniMarket or CSI can still sell Star Wars Miniatures game stuff). It's not like all that stock had to go back to WotC and then be destroyed--it was just the case that WotC could no longer sell it after the contract runs out so they themselves have to liquidate it before that.

Maybe there is something regionally weird going on with contracting agreements between Disney and Australian companies? Things can certainly be licensed and distributed differently around the globe, even though it's increasingly less common in our modern globalized world (e.g. see how what Netflix offers varies widely between countries and how people use VPNs to be able to access shows not available in their Region).

So where can we get the lates stuff. I do see stock of the older armada stuff here and there, but the latest couple of waves are all out of stock.

I don't have a lot of money and have to save up before i can buy anything and when i finally have some spare coin and go to buy the ship i wanted it is out of stock.

It is very frustrating and its an evil circle. Players Can't get the ships, people can't play. Shops say people don't play, so they don't get the ships in.

It is so bloody frustrating and heart breaking.

Living in nsw a year ago: over 10 stores within a 30min drive stocked armada

Armada gaming groups within a 1hr drive then: 4

Now: not a single one has any stock in, or has for the last 3 months ish.

Armada gaming groups within 1hr now: 1 with 2 players discounting myself.

5 hours ago, DrakonLord said:

Living in nsw a year ago: over 10 stores within a 30min drive stocked armada

Armada gaming groups within a 1hr drive then: 4

Now: not a single one has any stock in, or has for the last 3 months ish.

Armada gaming groups within 1hr now: 1 with 2 players discounting myself.

Here in Vic, we only had myself and another player show up tournaments for period of 6 months. Now scene has taken off and we get a minimum 6 players for tournaments.

Restocks are going out (and most places have received) for everything except for Squad 1 packs. According to "rumor" those should be out either right before the SSD or at the same time as the SSD because they may both be on the same boat.

Here is hoping that FFG gets some stock out soon. Our local Good games (120km away and the local shop isn’t a great supporter of Armada) has been trying to get a hold of stock for the last six months to no avail. The shop still has a couple of guys holding out on orders from six months ago. I am surprised that they are still keen!

The store owner directed us toward it being more of an FFG problem, more so than a distributor issue. It maybe an issue that they’re focus on releasing X wing 2.0 (which has died around here) and Legion to the detriment of other systems.