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Here we go!

I'm excited to see another hero pack but $157? No thanks. I can wait until April. People are crazy!

ETA: Now it's up to $255!

3 hours ago, maniakmedic said:

I'm excited to see another hero pack but $157? No thanks. I can wait until April. People are crazy!

ETA: Now it's up to $255!

Winner better post the cards!

42 minutes ago, wurms said:

Winner better post the cards!

What he said in that thread is important. Not saying I don’t want to know, but keep in mind that it’s bad for Hype if we know everything 3 months out.

I'm just straight-up excited, whether I know all the things or not, but FFG already has me with this game, so I'm not the one the hype is for. I can definitely see other people getting bored with the whole thing and not paying attention as it gets closer to release because they had the whole thing spoiled months before. And even for my own sanity I hope this isn't an ongoing thing for the future. I'm already both super excited Dr. Strange is confirmed and kinda pissed because I have to wait until May for him to drop. I don't really want to repeat the experience with other heroes that I'm looking forward to.

11 hours ago, wurms said:

Winner better post the cards!

I'd bet $295 myself that the "Winner" is somebody from FFG.

3 hours ago, sverigesson said:

I'd bet $295 myself that the "Winner" is somebody from FFG.

I'm a little surprised FFG did not step in and get the listing pulled. It's not too much of a stretch for them to claim stolen goods since they are not yet for sale and will not be for months.

4 hours ago, sverigesson said:

I'd bet $295 myself that the "Winner" is somebody from FFG.

They aren't. They are a regular dude, he posted on Discord and the FB Group.

1 hour ago, codytx2 said:

I'm a little surprised FFG did not step in and get the listing pulled. It's not too much of a stretch for them to claim stolen goods since they are not yet for sale and will not be for months.

Why would you assume it's stolen? Just because it hasn't been released, doesn't mean it hasn't been given out for testing or other reasons.

56 minutes ago, i_has_a_flavour said:

They aren't. They are a regular dude, he posted on Discord and the FB Group.

I read through all the comments on the relevant posts on FB, and I didn't see anybody claiming to have bought it. Guess this old man will have to find out what's up with this mysterious "Discord" thing all the youngins keep mentioning.

EDIT: Scratch that, saw it. Still, I'll believe it when I see it in the guy's hands.

54 minutes ago, i_has_a_flavour said:

Why would you assume it's stolen? Just because it hasn't been released, doesn't mean it hasn't been given out for testing or other reasons.

They don't give out packaged product for "testing". Playtesters use unfinished product. If something is in packaging, it is fit for release.

They certainly didn't just buy it. We are months from release. A store selling early would have more copies. And they normally wouldn't have 3 unreleased like this.

It was picked up somewhere in the distribution process.

55 minutes ago, i_has_a_flavour said:

Why would you assume it's stolen? Just because it hasn't been released, doesn't mean it hasn't been given out for testing or other reasons.

because most likely it was stolen from the printers or somewhere else down the distribution chain. They don't send test copies of final products. Maybe review copies in advance of the product release, but no one has those for unannounced product and FFG wouldn't just hand advanced copies to people who didn't sign an NDA or something first if they didn't want them to spoil the contents.

1 minute ago, phillos said:

because most likely it was stolen from the printers or somewhere else down the distribution chain. They don't send test copies of final products. Maybe review copies in advance of the product release, but no one has those for unannounced product and FFG wouldn't just hand advanced copies to people who didn't sign an NDA or something first if they didn't want them to spoil the contents.

This seller seems to have a long history of having rare/unreleased Marvel items. Seems likely that he knows a guy, who may or may not be stealing somewhere in the distribution process. I doubt that he himself is doing said stealing, because with the large quantity of merch he seems to be constantly selling, I can only imagine he would have gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar by now.

No I agree. I doubt the people actually sneaking these out of a warehouse would be stupid enough to just list the items themselves. They'd do it through a middleman or a series of middlemen potentially.

51 minutes ago, i_has_a_flavour said:

Why would you assume it's stolen? Just because it hasn't been released, doesn't mean it hasn't been given out for testing or other reasons.

No matter the reason, FFG would have an non disclosure agreement with that person. They wouldn’t just hand out something without protecting themselves legally.
Black Widow is likely to be released around the same time as the film.

6 minutes ago, sverigesson said:

This seller seems to have a long history of having rare/unreleased Marvel items. Seems likely that he knows a guy, who may or may not be stealing somewhere in the distribution process. I doubt that he himself is doing said stealing, because with the large quantity of merch he seems to be constantly selling, I can only imagine he would have gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar by now.

It doesn’t really matter if the guy personally stole it, it’s still a stolen product (either that or counterfeit). Regardless, what the guy is doing is most likely illegal- receiving stolen goods is also a crime, and usually the only defence is if you had good reason to believe they were obtained legitimately (which obviously doesn’t apply here).

Seems extreme to immediately think it's stolen. Breaking street date isn't stealing, it's probably breach of contract at worst.

you think they give packs to stores months ahead of time? I mean it's possible, but that seems unlikely. This would have to be at least 3 months out since we know the releases through March. I doubt FFG expects a retailer to warehouse a product for them for months without realizing a profit. Also they'd never be able to contain spoilers if that were the case. I doubt they'd ever ship something that was unannounced. I know we joke about the FFG upcoming page, but these things don't even appear there let alone show as shipping. They aren't on the radar so I don't know how a retailer would have ordered them through a distributor. How would the retailer know how to gauge interest if the audience doesn't even know the product is coming?

10 minutes ago, HamHamJ2 said:

Seems extreme to immediately think it's stolen. Breaking street date isn't stealing, it's probably breach of contract at worst.

That would only apply if the person had it legitimately and just sold it early, and as people have pointed out no legitimate seller would have it this early.

It’s not a jump to consider it stolen, it’s just Occam’s razor- the circumstances by which this could have been obtained legitimately are unlikely, and involve lots of implausible assumptions.

9 minutes ago, Schrodinger's Hat said:

It’s not a jump to consider it stolen, it’s just Occam’s razor- the circumstances by which this could have been obtained legitimately are unlikely, and involve lots of implausible assumptions.

Wow, somebody actually used Occam's razor correctly on the internet, that's wild.

19 minutes ago, Schrodinger's Hat said:

That would only apply if the person had it legitimately and just sold it early, and as people have pointed out no legitimate seller would have it this early.

It’s not a jump to consider it stolen, it’s just Occam’s razor- the circumstances by which this could have been obtained legitimately are unlikely, and involve lots of implausible assumptions.

Someone clearly did. Maybe it fell off the back of a truck but anyone in the chain from the print shop to some small distributor could be the source.

2 minutes ago, HamHamJ2 said:

Someone clearly did. Maybe it fell off the back of a truck but anyone in the chain from the print shop to some small distributor could be the source.

it's the most obvious answer, but not guaranteed to be the correct one

59 minutes ago, phillos said:

you think they give packs to stores months ahead of time? I mean it's possible, but that seems unlikely. This would have to be at least 3 months out since we know the releases through March. I doubt FFG expects a retailer to warehouse a product for them for months without realizing a profit. Also they'd never be able to contain spoilers if that were the case. I doubt they'd ever ship something that was unannounced. I know we joke about the FFG upcoming page, but these things don't even appear there let alone show as shipping. They aren't on the radar so I don't know how a retailer would have ordered them through a distributor. How would the retailer know how to gauge interest if the audience doesn't even know the product is coming?

You literally know nothing about distribution then. The Valentines Day candy and items your seeing at Wal-Mart & Target were sitting in a warehouse back in November.

Distributors are literally just warehouse holding space for products. Retailers only order what they feel they can sell. It’s just a guess really.

I can't imagine that FFG don't know about this. In which case, the appropriate people will be pursuing the appropriate channels to do whatever they think ought to be done about this.

8 hours ago, Hyperjayman said:

You literally know nothing about distribution then. The Valentines Day candy and items your seeing at Wal-Mart & Target were sitting in a warehouse back in November.

Distributors are literally just warehouse holding space for products. Retailers only order what they feel they can sell. It’s just a guess really.

Distributors maybe. Certainly not the local retailer. Some one room FLGS with no room to just sit on tons of boxes for months that they can't sell. I don't buy it. Sorry. It makes no sense. I don't need to be savy to understand that. They order something they and their customers don't know about yet. That don't add up. I'd buy it if we were talking about weeks ahead of release or even if the product was already announced but unreleased.

Maybe Walmart and Valentines Day candy work like that but that's hardly apples to apples. People are always gonna buy candy in heart shaped boxes on Valentines Day. There is little risk in that scenario and Walmart works on an economy of scale. Listening to the Team Covenant perspective on game distribution they describe it as a very last minute thing. They are finalizing orders even as late as a week before the product arrives in their store it seems. We saw that happen in real time with this game when they were being candid about the early releases in December.

These things fell off the back of a truck as stated above. It's a supply chain/distribution issue. Not a retailer breaking street date 3 months ahead of time issue.

8 hours ago, Tonbo Karasu said:

I can't imagine that FFG don't know about this. In which case, the appropriate people will be pursuing the appropriate channels to do whatever they think ought to be done about this.

FFG does know they have a problem. Famously it happened with the core set release already. I'm sure they are working it, but clearly they still have a leak somewhere. In that scenario they bought a copy off someone on BGG who got a copy months in advance. I assume to assist in tracking down where it came from and to see if it was a reproduction or from one of their print runs. They also gave the guy another copy and a bunch of signed promo stuff for the game to compensate him for the trouble he went through. The dude just preordered it on Amazon and he was shocked that it came months early. It was a pretty cool thread of BGG.