1 minute ago, sarumanthewhite said:

I thought for sure they would end OP at some point, but does that mean they won’t have a big even at Gen Con or something? I guess the bigger question is how they support a game that they don’t have OP for.

Note that they didn’t explicitly state that there were no more new figures coming. The notes from the designers were far more ominous. I think Church would be the best one to chime in and let us know if development is truly dead.

That would explain the big sell-off before the holidays as well...

This sounds like the end of all levels of organized play. Part of the world champions prizes is room/board/airfare to come to worlds the following year. I think the more telling point is that they go back two years, for which the first world champion might already have designed a unit card that will no longer be put into circulation. The lag time for Armada was the first WC in 2015 finally got his card into the game in 2018 (Nov to Feb, so about 2 years 4 months from winning), so I think the earlier poster's thought of that is what the contact being about seems reasonable.

Quote

there hasn't been any 'new stuff' for chess for ages and it's still a p  e    rfectly playable and enjoyable game  . 

That's a critical point. Chess has a long critical inertia behind it, whereas miniature games seem much more transient. Ultimately, I can find millions of chess players around the world, but finding Runewars players is a tougher option. And although I might only get out a board game on my shelf once every six months, I also didn't have to invest that much into that board game as I did for Runewars, so I'm much happier if I've got a regular gaming group for Runewars.

Also someone calculated that the number of "original" games of chess is in the vicinity of 10 raised to the sixty-first power. If you exclude the number of games where a move loses absolutely stupidly, there's still 10 raised to the twenty-first original games of chess. As a chess player, I just find that I play chess for quite different reasons than I play Runewars. There's often a kind of scientific art to how I play chess, but theme and setting factor into how I play Runewars. Also, at the highest levels, chess is studied to death, and the possibility of exploring a game that hasn't quite been figured out is one of the biggest joys I find in Armada and Runewars.

As I said earlier, there's still plenty of Runewars to be had. Its just a matter of maintaining any local critical mass you have for as long as you can.

On the positive side, FFG usually has nice Christmas clearance sales.

The more I read the article, the more I feel like it's not completely over for runewars. I think if they were ending total support for the game, they would say it. If it is still happening, I'd expect a very slow release schedule.

1 hour ago, Jukey said:

The more I read the article, the more I feel like it's not completely over for runewars. I think if they were ending total support for the game, they would say it. If it is still happening, I'd expect a very slow release schedule.

Did they ever say they were done with Battlelore?

This is where gets you overpricing stuff.

6 hours ago, Jukey said:

The more I read the article, the more I feel like it's not completely over for runewars. I think if they were ending total support for the game, they would say it. If it is still happening, I'd expect a very slow release schedule.

4 hours ago, xelveki said:

Did they ever say they were done with Battlelore?

I could see this going either way. From what I see, FFG only announces the end to games that have continuous release cycles. I would expect an LCG to have an end-of-game article, but not a board game. Therefore, BattleLore will never have an end-of-game article just like Rune Age never did. I'm not sure how they'll handle miniatures games, though. The Dust line did have an ending announcement, but part of that was acknowledging that the rights were going to a different company. I can't recall seeing any other of their miniatures game get closed down, so I think we're charting new territory. However, given that Terrinoth is their own property, I think will never say it's completely over. They'll just let it die quietly instead.

1 hour ago, Embir82 said:

This is where gets you overpricing stuff.

Maybe? How cheap did you want it to be? There were never going to be enough players for them to price these like X-Wing 1.0, and the market has changed since then. I believe a contributing factor in going to X-Wing 2.0 was that they could reset the pay scale and charge more for each expansion, keeping up with inflation and other things. My point is that it isn't cheap to produce miniatures, and with a game you know won't be as popular as Star Wars, you need to recoup the startup costs for molds, design, etc. I do not believe that $5 off each expansion would have saved the game and I don't believe going lower than that would have been profitable. Again, a single ship in X-Wing costs $20, but each product is produced on a much larger scale.

Built your hope !

This is today 11th birthday of my oldest soon. He invited 5 more friends and they are playing runewars at this moment.

They are in another room, and I hear them laughing and crying, I just push the door and they seem having a blast !

Lol, I just find the criticial mass to play runewars ! just need now to talk to the fathers so I can make them discover this game too 🙂

2 hours ago, hakooh said:

Built your hope !

This is today 11th birthday of my oldest soon. He invited 5 more friends and they are playing runewars at this moment.

They are in another room, and I hear them laughing and crying, I just push the door and they seem having a blast !

Lol, I just find the criticial mass to play runewars ! just need now to talk to the fathers so I can make them discover this game too 🙂

I'm just waiting for the day my son can play with me

I want a slow burn on this game. It gives plenty of time to catch up on painting, but I just love seeing new stuff show up.

2 hours ago, Budgernaut said:

Maybe? How cheap did you want it to be? There were never going to be enough players for them to price these like X-Wing 1.0, and the market has changed since then. I believe a contributing factor in going to X-Wing 2.0 was that they could reset the pay scale and charge more for each expansion, keeping up with inflation and other things. My point is that it isn't cheap to produce miniatures, and with a game you know won't be as popular as Star Wars, you need to recoup the startup costs for molds, design, etc. I do not believe that $5 off each expansion would have saved the game and I don't believe going lower than that would have been profitable. Again, a single ship in X-Wing costs $20, but each product is produced on a much larger scale.

FFG's greed knows no bounds. Their products for many years had less and less content for obscenely growing prices. Look at KoW miniatures from Mantic Games - much smaller company, producing on much smaller scale, yet their prices are much lower.
Only FFG's biggest apologist can't see how greedy this company has become.
Runewars was doomed as soon as they introduced pretty average sculpts for a really high prices - especially Starter Set - you didn't even get enough dice and components to comfortably play 1v1 game with starter set. This is pure, unadultered greed. And it backfired on them - for once I am happy, maybe FFG will learn something from this.

Rumors from beta testers... not good.

2 hours ago, Embir82 said:

FFG's greed knows no bounds. Their products for many years had less and less content for obscenely growing prices. Look at KoW miniatures from Mantic Games - much smaller company, producing on much smaller scale, yet their prices are much lower.
Only FFG's biggest apologist can't see how greedy this company has become.
Runewars was doomed as soon as they introduced pretty average sculpts for a really high prices - especially Starter Set - you didn't even get enough dice and components to comfortably play 1v1 game with starter set. This is pure, unadultered greed. And it backfired on them - for once I am happy, maybe FFG will learn something from this.

No, they just are focusing on more profitable lines. All I hope they learned is you cannot half *** a miniature wargame. You need to have enough units and enough variety for it to survive.

They've learned this with X-Wing. We've gone from 2 factions to 3, then to 5, and soon we'll be at 7. Runewars wallowed at 2 factions with too few options for too long, and when it did bump up, it was after an incredibly long drought.

I think I'm most likely going to just start creating my own units for my group to expand on the game. Stuff will be on-line really cheap so trays and dials will be easy to find, and for new dials, you just print on peel and stick paper to turn an old dial into a new one.

3 hours ago, Darth Matthew said:

All  I hope they learned is you cannot half *** a miniature wargame. 

Yup. I feel like I’ve done more promoting for their game than they ever did.

1 hour ago, flightmaster101 said:

Yup. I feel like I’ve done more promoting for their game than the ever did.

Can confirm. Wrote more local posts, weekly game invitations, and impassioned personal sales pitches than they put out articles. Ran more tournaments than FFG did.

A fantastic game, utterly hamstrung by poorly timed marketing, strained release schedules, and more than a little self-sabotage in a headlong rush to suckle at the Disney teat.

I can't say I'm surprised, but I am disappointed.

Just now, Tvayumat said:

Can  confirm. Wrote more local posts, weekly game invitations, and impassioned personal sales pitches than they put out article  s. Ran more tournaments than FFG did. 

I’m genuinely touched.

Everyone in this community has been fantastic. I’m glad to have been a part of it and will treasure the new friends I’ve made through the game. While I’m still a bit salty and disappointed, know that I find the people I’ve met as a bold silver lining to this dark cloud.

9 hours ago, hakooh said:

Built your hope !

This is today 11th birthday of my oldest soon. He invited 5 more friends and they are playing runewars at this moment.

They are in another room, and I hear them laughing and crying, I just push the door and they seem having a blast !

Lol, I just find the criticial mass to play runewars ! just need now to talk to the fathers so I can make them discover this game too 🙂

I hope you succeed! Youll probably be in for a good run since this should precipitate sales and bargains that should be perfect for anyone wanting to start out!

For casual gamers a game never really dies!

So how long will these forums be maintained? And what little corner of the net do we live in when that time comes?

54 minutes ago, Jukey said:

So how long will these forums be maintained? And what little corner of the net do we live in when that time comes?

Rune Age was only removed last year and it had its last expansion in 2012. Considering this is an FFG license, I don't see any reason for them to remove it in the near future.

1 hour ago, Jukey said:

So how long will these forums be maintained? And what little corner of the net do we live in when that time comes?

Worst case we can go to the Descent or Terrinoth RPG forums.

On 1/12/2019 at 1:29 AM, Supertoe said:

And to no ones surprise, a game that FFG set up to fail from the start has failed.

Not sure this is true, it's a quality product that arrived with quite a push from FFG, although maybe it wasn't enough (only FFG know!), it may have helped even though riskier to have the wider range of units from day one rather than now so as to hit the ground running in terms of interest, not sure if the wait for some of the options helped.

We don't know that it's failed- latest news shows one possible real reason could actually be 'we want to switch to plugging KeyForge with OP', so some OP could be a promotional approach to newer lines rather than a permanent thing.

Another thing we don't know for sure is have they stopped development too for certain, and if so is there anything already developed that may yet see the light of day.

Edit: having read some of the above comments maybe the marketing/launch wasn't too great. FFG's IP-tinted specs again? Everything else drowns a little under a sea of IP...

WTF? This is the only game they've ever released that actually had enough dice on the starter set. Not to mention duplicates of all generic upgrades

FFG had plenty of missteps, but there was nothing by wrong with the starter box.

19 minutes ago, DekoPuma said:

WTF? This is the only game they've ever released that actually had enough dice on the starter set. Not to mention duplicates of all generic upgrades

FFG had plenty of missteps, but there was nothing by wrong with the starter box.

I beg to differ. There were no Uthuk Y'llan in the starter box.

I am joking, but there is a little bit of truth there. I do think getting 4 factions out would have been preferred over beefing up the Daqan and Waiqar armies. But then, that would only work if each faction's expansions were ready to come out at a faster pace.

I decided to look up the timeline:

1. Release of core box: April 2017

2. Oathsworn, initial infantry command, Reanimate Archers: May 2017. So this is reasonably close to the release of the core, and especially having infantry command available early allows people to buy two cores, two infantry command, and then fill out another unit contained in the core substantially.

3. Reanimates, Maro, Hawthoren, Spearman: June 2017. Again, not a very long time to wait to put more units on the table. All factions announced at this time.

4. Lancers and Golems: July 2017. So that takes us to the 3 units contained in the starter set.

5. August 2017: Latari elves are finally on sale. I think I had a friend of mine talking up the game a lot at this point, but I had waited for the elves to drop before I bought into Runewars.

6. October 2017: Latari units in the starter are on sale. Late October, Crossbows and Death Knights on sale. So in six months, the game goes from a core box to three factions with all of their core units, and the two starting factions have their first non-starter unit.

7. Nov 2017: Uthuk Starter and Command released. So far, so good. Then the big gap

8. June 2018. Uthuk expansions.

9. August 2018. Finally, Wraiths, Scouts, Darnati, Kethra. I think many of us found the biggest heartbreak here. The Darnati had previewed in July of 2017, with talk of them being available in December, and in my opinion, this was one of the biggest PR failures. We were stuck with a bunch of Latari infantry command units that were basically unusable without the Darnati, yet no Darnati for over a year Compared to the other main core releases, it was also a huge chunk of time from Uthuk starter release to the first set of expansions.

Then, the remaining expansions finally came in a rush, concluding with the remaining Uthuk units in November.

And in reviewing articles, it was clear that they were attempting to PR it by writing some articles about four participants playing out some games with each other. They could recognize the lull (and I heard rumors of a warehouse fire). I'm not sure what precisely went wrong, but quite possibly something in the production pipeline. And then the whole thing was just slow in coming out.

Looking back over the entire timeline, I noticed a few other things I've heard:

1. I suspect the entirety of all the current units were designed in close proximity and with an eye to the balance of the whole product. That is to say we heard plenty of complaints about balance, with Latari suddenly taking it to the original core box participants, and then Uthuk running over everyone in the second worlds. Some of this is people just needing to see what the units can do before making adjustments themselves, some of it was probably some intrinsic brokenness, but some of it was probably also needing to the full scope of units and upgrades. I feel much better now, for instance, in responding to Uthuk with a "reroll to green" strategy as Latari, and I think there are a few more options for Latari and Waiqar, but speed and maneuverability are usually significant in any tactical game, and there are probably a few small adjustments that could be made, and which we may see in an FAQ.

I think having the final Uthuk units released and then hearing this news is a huge let down. Yeah, one can still play with friends, but trying to get a sense of lists and match-ups, and I think the competitive dimensions of the game are one of the big draws. When it comes to maybe an art of gaming or a social club with friends over a game, there are plenty of other games that can accomplish that. I'd have been much better if we had two years of organized play with a clear announcement of no new expansions, than I really am about no more organized play even if more expansions get released.

I'd expect it at least one more concluding FAQ. At this point, without competitive play, there's much less incentive for an errata, because players can get together on their own and come decide what they are willing to agree to play, and how they might make adjustments to the game. If forum discussion is anything to go by, we might not be able to achieve that as a community, but any 2-5 individuals in their local setting can certainly come up with something.

I also really expect that if they want to sell anything else that is left in the store, they really cannot announce that the game is up this yet. The note about talk from playtesters is probably the most ominous, as I'm inclined to trust that portion of the rumor mill. As I suggested earlier, if there is already a mold down and made, then it isn't much to push that plastic through and get a product. And I'm sure if design on anything new was at place where a mold was done, playtesters would already be working through stuff. The only thing I can think of that might be useful in the absent of plastic is a card upgrade set. The production costs would probably be cheap enough to justify it, and it could expand the game ever so subtly, and especially with an eye to giving each faction the tools to deal with things that feel a bit out of balance without actually having to do an errata. But then, I'm not sure what FFG will do. I know I don't feel good with the lack of clarity posted in the article.

5 hours ago, Vergilius said:

I'm not sure what precisely went wrong, but quite possibly something in the production pipeline. And then the whole thing was just slow in coming out.

I think it is more simple than people would like it to be:

The game never caught on - FFG handed out hundreds of copies during Adepticon, but almost no one was reviewing or writing about it.

Also, initial sales looked to be lacklustre, game was in stock everywhere and soon got deeply discounted in variety of online shops.

Expansions, hmm, they were simply too expensive for what they were. A lot of people talked about buying multiple cores and just proxying cards from expansions.

Small mistakes in productions choices - no color coded minis or bases and no art on upgrade cards, made the game look a bit too bland.

I assume that FFG quite quickly realised it is going nowhere, but didn't want to cancel it outright, especially as they were going to release Legion soon. So they simply spread the release schedule to give an illusion that game was alive for year longer than it actually was.

30 minutes ago, player1329291 said:

I think it is more simple than people would like it to be:

The game never caught on - FFG handed out hundreds of copies during Adepticon, but almost no one was reviewing or writing about it.

Also, initial sales looked to be lacklustre, game was in stock everywhere and soon got deeply discounted in variety of online shops.

Expansions, hmm, they were simply too expensive for what they were. A lot of people talked about buying multiple cores and just proxying cards from expansions.

Small mistakes in productions choices - no color coded minis or bases and no art on upgrade cards, made the game look a bit too bland.

I assume that FFG quite quickly realised it is going nowhere, but didn't want to cancel it outright, especially as they were going to release Legion soon. So they simply spread the release schedule to give an illusion that game was alive for year longer than it actually was.

1. I wasn't at Adepticon, so I can't speak to this, and since I only bought in with the Latari, I missed a lot of the opening excitement.

2. I really can't speak for opening sales. I know in my local community, a big rush of people caught on. It gave the impression of reasonably strong out the gate, reasonably good excitement for the first six months, and that's about the time the nosedive started.

3. Opinion, but fair enough point, and I'm inclined to agree with you. I know I didn't personally like buying 5 of the Darnati warriors just to ensure that I could run a 3x3, when for the most part, I had the upgrade cards that I needed after about two. I suspect they went with two trays to an expansion to keep the price per unit low, but four would have been significantly better. Probably would have nosedived it faster because people then would have complained about the cost of the expansions. Some of the multiple cores and proxying was with the Uthuk core, because we only had the core for the longest time, and then months between announcements of some cards and the unit releases.

4. I'm really not too worried about these, and I suspect they are just peanuts in the end. Some of the more artsy people might have been bothered, but I bought in because it was a fun game to play and offered strategic depth and richness.

5. Too many of the facts on the ground are just inconsistent with this, and especially of what we know from other FFG products from the past 18 months.

Anyone, what is, is, and we can't change anything of it.

+1 to @Vergilius for his analysis a couple of posts up. I wasn’t there for the launch in 2017- I was in too many other games at the time and couldn’t spare the bandwidth. My friends talked me into playing this summer and I was hooked (albeit a bit late).

I think there are a couple of underlying issues that folks have hit on in this thread:

1) Non-licensed product - In this day and age with so much stuff coming out, it’s hard to get mindshare and shelf space. That’s where the licensed products shine. Look at Fire & Ice from CMON.

2) Committment to building a community - The amount of events CMON is running at Adepticon (most of which are filled) for Fire & Ice shows a strategic committment on the part of the company to get people into the game beyond just releasing stuff. FFG never did anything on that scale.

3) Competing interests within FFG - This is clearly speculation, but as someone who works in a corporate environment, I can certainly say that when you’re acquired, one of the possible outcomes is to increase sales and profitability. Reading their actions, it would appear that they’re focusing on the big licenses (Star Wars, LOTR) on a more global scale - makes sense. That means those same development resources have to work on things that have larger outcomes ignoring “the love of the game (at some level)”

Having said all of that, I’ve re-read the posts and looked through FFG’s actions in the past. When then cut OP support for a game, it’s dead to them. In this case, they have the license to their own IP, so it’s not truly dead forever, but I would humbly advise folks to make their peace and move forward as I did over the past couple of days.

More importantly, I would submit that there’s still a couple of avenues to move forward here. A card based expansion, similar to The Corellian Campaign (for Armada) but without the printed map sheets and counters is entirely within FFG’s realm to put out at a very marginal cost with their Print on Demand capabilities that they’ve used for other games. Think of the store kits for the Runewars OP and you’re pretty close. I have to admit, I was inspired by @Viktus106 ‘s impromptu storyline which would connect people to Terrinoth and provide a bunch of ideas for cards.

If we could come up with 50-60 variant (perhaps unique) unit and upgrade cards as well as a 3-4 page campaign insert with some new missions and setups. This would give the game another couple of years- easy. When I think of Armada, most of the upgrade cards aren’t used because they’re worthless and there’s about the same amount of ships in each faction and unit types within a single Runewars faction. I know there’s a few regular groups here on the forums that play regularly, so if we could get a couple of reps from those groups, plus anyone else that wants to help out, we could probably get this done pretty quickly. From there, we would need to sell it to FFG. I’ve got a buddy who works there as a designer, so I would hope we could at least get an introduction to the right person. If anyone else has a better contact, we shoudl definitely use it!

In any case, my point it, “Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? It’s not over until we say it’s over!” (OK, watch the movie Animal House from the 70’s for that clip, just trying to insert some humor on a Sunday AM!)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q7vtWB4owdE

Thanks everyone for reading and I hope we can find a way to work together to keep the game alive...