18 hours ago, Watercolour Dragon said:

The prices don't seem too dissimilar to other products some of which are pretty much the same prices in the UK which suggests this should be the case even in the US, the hardcover core books are sometimes slightly less sometimes slightly more in the US and the RRP of the D and D one is $10 more so I'd disagree on this point...

As I understand it both books contain core rules about how things work ergo people have to buy two $50 books ($100) in order to play in terrinoth or both $20 pdf's ($40). Pathfinder on the other hand has one $50 core rule book which also comes in paperback for $25 or a pdf for $9.99. D&D has a players handbook everybody needs $50 and one person would have to get the dungeon masters guide $50. It's also worth mentioning that the core rules for both pathfinder and D&D are open game license so potential players actually have access to all the core rules for free as long as they are willing to use the internet. The cost to get into D&D/pathfinder is actually as low as a set of dice....

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...although FFG probably do have some problems on economies of scale being the smaller of the fish in the pond- I have noticed rivals have some cheaper options such as starter sets/ paperbacks etc...

Yeah.....yeah...

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...but the lore books and bestiaries can actually add a lot of extra cost (there are different options for different price bands and how much players want to buy in to the game such as expensive luxury items for the most hooked fans.

Absolutely, once you get seriously into the other games there are a ton of things you can get AND that doesn't register as a bad thing. It registers as a supporting your game thing (you know the thing ffg is typically bad at doing). With ffg's game all you can get 2 adversary decks of 20 cards with information that you already have.....right?

On 3/3/2019 at 12:34 PM, DerDelphi said:

This is so true. I really can't understand how FFG can keep up their non-interaction with their customers. If anything will be their downfall (besides declining quality, which is also starting to be noticeable), it's this.

Really hope they find their feet again, one problem with major company mergers can be the company gets a bit overloaded and loses some of its focus as it adjusts to the new growth and more being under one umbrella, think there's been this short-term hit with the Asmodee takeovers - there have been a lot quite close together - but it could improve and be a good thing longer term, if they can ensure all the many games they now have in their care continue to receive due care and attention that they deserve and if the larger business benefits rather than suffers for its size.

We should be hopeful as many of these games are massive, very popular, quality titles such as Ticket To Ride and Descent so they've good product to work with and build on/ continue, and some things have actually improved quality wise (I really like the RWM minis, curiously Descent 2 manages to have both extremes, some really high quality sculpts and some rather unimpressive ones.)

The new LOTR game is looking top quality on many levels- visually and although not much to go on yet sculpt wise, so this actually bodes well for the future (I was actually saying I wouldn't buy it purely due to the Terrinoth items I still have on my wishlist- quite a few RWM minis I hope to get especially- but if the future reveals are as good as those so far I think the LOTR game will be joining the list).

Good points Bucho, another thing I'm thinking FFG really do need to do is.... Look at what other games companies do making the particular type of game that for some reason FFG don't always do and where/why what they're doing really works, especially the open licenses- that encourages and allows people to make things to go with the games... Solve things like everything being very high quality and the same level of quality across the range etc etc, although one aspect of the open licenses is for the other products they can sell a lot of other product through this, so it probably needs to be backed up with quite a comprehensive product range.

More reasons to (still) be cheerful:

Terrinoth is 9th in this Asmodee corporate IP list of 12 game lines, so somebody at Asmodee rates it as in their top twelve: https://corporate.asmodee.com/our-ips/

(Have to admit "Terrinoth is a land of lost legacies." raised a 'just hope the game line doesn't become that' chuckle with things not looking too hopeful for RWM and several of us hoping things are less bleak than they seem for RWM)

Asmodee sold 34 million games in 2016 and FFG has published over 400 games so Terrinoth is just a slice of the pie but it's quite a hearty pie.

On 3/6/2019 at 7:07 AM, Watercolour Dragon said:

Good points Bucho, another thing I'm thinking FFG really do need to do is.... Look at what other games companies do making the particular type of game that for some reason FFG don't always do and where/why what they're doing really works, especially the open licenses- that encourages and allows people to make things to go with the games... Solve things like everything being very high quality and the same level of quality across the range etc etc, although one aspect of the open licenses is for the other products they can sell a lot of other product through this, so it probably needs to be backed up with quite a comprehensive product range.

I doubt it's realistic to expect ffg to change it's culture in order to sell a particular game but at some point hopefully they'll notice that certain markets are already saturated and their halfhearted attempts to break in are bound to be unprofitable and just alienate their fan base...

It's worth pointing out all but one Descent product is available from FFG- some items had sold out again so they are still restocking, also despite RWM players bemoaning its demise, likewise all of the RWM range is still in stock, I don't think the games may be as dead as some people think, after all people probably buy them in waves anyway, they could be doing better sales-wise than we think.

Maybe not competing with their own new game LOTR Journeys In Middle Earth is also a part of the logic, avoiding competing with their own fantasy game, hence the slight lull in Terrinoth.

Late to the party here but I have to say abandoning your own IP in favor of producing games with third party licenses is about dumb as it gets. When those licenses are canceled, there goes your customer base. It’s fine to slow down what you’re doing as you pick up more license options, but stopping completely is pure foolishness.

On 10/10/2019 at 9:34 PM, Boris_the_Dwarf said:

Late to the party here but I have to say abandoning your own IP in favor of producing games with third party licenses is about dumb as it gets. When those licenses are canceled, there goes your customer base. It’s fine to slow down what you’re doing as you pick up more license options, but stopping completely is pure foolishness.

I also want to note that the LoTR game was pure garbage in every sense. It had 0 redeeming qualities besides, maybe, "very non intrusive app." Enemies had no personality, map had no personality. And everything was done with a recycled Runebound 3 side-mechanic which wasn't even that well received. First game my group ever sold. When we lost a mission because we failed a check to eat soup and it gave Aragorn schizophrenia, that's when we knew the game was a flop.

On 10/11/2019 at 2:34 AM, Boris_the_Dwarf said:

Late to the party here but I have to say abandoning your own IP in favor of producing games with third party licenses is about dumb as it gets. When those licenses are canceled, there goes your customer base. It’s fine to slow down what you’re doing as you pick up more license options, but stopping completely is pure foolishness.

True - I've said before lots of companies have suffered from losing IP rights- someone else can pull the plug, if you own it it's yours to do with as you wish. The other point is these 'famous name' IP's can also be killer IP's in the bad way as well as the beneficial way- a. you're making THEIR brands even bigger not your own, piggybacking on their popularity and b. as a result of this you may kill off your customer base for your own brands, which could be fatal for your business if you lose those IP's (especially if another business gets the rights to pick up where you had to leave off)- there is some evidence this has happened with Star Wars product versus Terrinoth product such as there even being people who it seems follow both but are all starry eyed for Star Wars so forget about Terrinoth as soon as they get a SW itch (almost warrants that dating meme where someone's eyes are where they shouldn't be ) but the more obvious one that if you've got similar games made as both a SW game and a Terrinoth game then for SW fan gamers you've maybe lost them as a potential buyer of the Terrinoth game, a company competing with itself does seem a bit illogical Jim (oops wrong sci fi, Journeys aboard The Enterprise coming soon, nooo, don't give them ideas like that!)

What worries me also is there's maybe some confirmation bias at play- another risk of these big IP's - oh, people are more interested in the big IP stuff, they don't want the non-IP stuff so much, hence FFG giving up on some Terrinoth lines very easily, almost as if the decision was made, perhaps partly subconsciously even, way before - I think it can skew company's faith in products, and if you don't believe so much in a line it could be in trouble before anything's even released. Conversely if you're over-hyped for a big IP line you could end up churning out so much for it and focusing so much on it that your own creations have no room left to breathe.

Finally there's the monopoly factor (and a lot of gamers don't like...... ) - I can't dislike Disney as I've loved loads of their movies and still do and I'm a bit of a coaster fan (never been to a Disney park but they played a big role in coasters becoming as big as they are) BUT they are a really really big company, so every IP feeding trough they add to their gargantuan web is chucking more money at them, so even though I can't fully diss Disney, it does seem a bit 'does Disney really have to be everywhere/ is Disney maybe TOO big?'

Disney revenue: US$59.434 billion (2018) (Source: Wikipedia)

I guess the flipsides are:

These IP's can be big money (some people will buy stuff just because it's their fave movie series or whatever)

It - if the company's smart - is a way to fund other projects which may not be based on these IP's, more development funds is no bad thing (Unless the IP becomes an obsession and eclipses all the in-house stuff, which FFG MAY be a little guilty of, and it could eat into human dev resources even if it brings in more financial ones)

It's still a business choice- if there's a cash cow it's probably gonna get milked dry, this could of course be countered with the view it's also a little lazy- if you're under-utilizing your own strong IP and as I mentioned above maybe even weakening it's market positioning.

Plus, as I found out in the AMA, Andrew Navaro’s a big SW fan so we have to allow for there being 'a few' SW games

But on the LOTR Journeys side of things I did enjoy the demo game at this year's UK Games Expo but it was only a short demo- I did get the impression I'd enjoy it though, the map has its good and bad points (I have to say visually I still like Descent's tiles better), the figures are awesome and actually quite sturdy (break-ability was a failing of a few of the earlier Terrinoth games' figures). I think the checks mechanic comes down to the choices you make and strategies you go for and how well they fit how you subsequently play and your objective, everything made sense in the demo. So I'm still curious to see how it plays (maybe I should try it with someone else's copy just in case before I consider buying my own!)

For people considering LOTRJ it may be a bit of a case of either it's your type of game or it isn't- this review and the responses are quite useful to help you decide (I'm still up for giving it a go): https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2273644/fantasy-flights-best-adventure-game-yet