I think that tournament player overstate how important they are to the business of the game... I'm fairly sure that the extra stuff they will sell to accommodate tournament players is just a drop in the bucket in terms of sales. I don't think them having to buy extra stuff is much of a sales strategy at all. If players buy cards online that hardly is money in the pocket of FFG either. Allot of collectors just buy the ship to sit on a shelf and they then sell the cards.

I also think there is a huge difference between using a home made ruler (which I do by the way, made some nice wooden sticks) and a copy of a legal card. If someone cheat and change the text of the card they will be disqualified I guess anyway. I also guess people use old outdated cards in tournaments as well so I fail to see how using a copy of an old card make much of a difference. The cards you use in a tournament is only for reference, there are not more cards in the game that most people already know what they all do anyway, especially people that attend tournaments.

In my opinion not accepting printed cards is just a cheap way to exclude people from official tournaments, having the plastic ships should be a requirement enough. The rulers I can get behind that they need to be an approved model, but lets not get overboard there either. Even the card stock rulers will vary between games as paper will shrink and twist over time and they will not be more exact than most home made stuff anyway, at least if they are done with thought and care.

I would add that... in my opinion... in the digital age then officially printed cards should be an OPTION and not a requirement. This would make the game way more dynamic and balancing the game would be way easier to do as they could pull data from their official list building app as well to some degree.

Using self printed or bought cards should not really matter as cards might anyway change over time, both in function and cost anyway.

If you are against cards changing I don't understand why as change is almost always for the better in the end anyway, even if some change sometimes is bad overall it usually is for the better in these kind of circumstances.

In my opinion FFG should just provide a high resolution PDF of all their cards so people can easily print nice versions of their cards for free, that would be a good service. They could then drop this requirement of official cards for tournament crap... people could print the card in any size they like.

3 hours ago, Revan Reborn said:

The fact that the points are still printed on the upgrade cards, instead of omitted from the card and maintained digitally, like in X-Wing 2E, will undoubtedly cause problems down the road as the META evolves. FFG never did points updates prior to Clone Wars, so there's no reason to believe they will do a points update after Clone Wars factions released.

Legion started doing that. They made no changes to the printed point values and the rules reference explicitly states that casual players are fine to build lists using the printed values, but that tournament play will use points from the latest reference document. Armada designers clearly took note of that, from the GenCon Armada Q&A at 55m: https://youtu.be/m8CAZ3qiZ6Q?t=3295

Quote

Brian: "Do you think there will be any other points updates in the future?"

Michael: "That's definitely something we're hoping to do. Much like with our other products we find it is helpful to support the line to periodically adjust points for competitive play and that's something we think Armada can do too."

Brian: "And you actually brought up competitive play which is really nice because we have a question in chat, will there be dynamic points changes for competitive play?"

Michael: "That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. There could be a competitive play document that will give you updates and adjustments to how ships are pointed out, squadrons are pointed out."

So I expect to be downloading PDFs somewhat regularly.

22 minutes ago, FreakinUnoriginal said:

Legion started doing that. They made no changes to the printed point values and the rules reference explicitly states that casual players are fine to build lists using the printed values, but that tournament play will use points from the latest reference document. Armada designers clearly took note of that, from the GenCon Armada Q&A at 55m: https://youtu.be/m8CAZ3qiZ6Q?t=3295

So I expect to be downloading PDFs somewhat regularly.

I think this is healthy even for casual play if you don't mind using a downloaded document or use online list builders as I think many people actually do that. It is far easier to build your lists in online list builders than browsing your own card collection anyway.

Businesses have to make money.

2 hours ago, geek19 said:

Businesses have to make money.

11 hours ago, Revan Reborn said:

The points that you raised lend credence to the idea that the Upgrade Card Pack was poorly thought-out and motivated by greedy business reasons, rather than the health and natural evolution of Armada.

Or was a decision made based on feedback they received when doing this for X-wing.

11 hours ago, Revan Reborn said:

The fact that the points are still printed on the upgrade cards, instead of omitted from the card and maintained digitally, like in X-Wing 2E, will undoubtedly cause problems down the road as the META evolves. FFG never did points updates prior to Clone Wars, so there's no reason to believe they will do a points update after Clone Wars factions released.

Since they mentioned that they were moving to a living rules system like Legion, you would have to be willfully obtuse to believe that.

11 hours ago, Revan Reborn said:

I agree that printed cards should be acceptable for competitive play, because the requirement of official cards is just another way the FFG squeezes us for more money by deliberately making certain cards exclusive to one ship expansion. The Liberty expansion was by far the worst culprit for this, with 6 exclusive cards and 2 more that are also only available in the SSD expansion. FFG has been doing this for years and Armada players have just accepted it. It's long overdue that this practice was ended.

You are aware that they're releasing a card pack containing all of these cards, yes? I think it might even have been mentioned in this thread, even. Like maybe even the initial point of the original poster.

11 hours ago, Revan Reborn said:

The best solution would be an official Armada digital companion app that would give players access to every card, keep the cards/points up-to-date, allow us to build and save our fleets (like other Armada fleet builder apps), load saved fleets for matches, and ideally connect to an opponent's Armada app so both players could see both fleet builds and keep track of the game. Instead of having to ask for a reminder what upgrade cards are equipped on your opponent's ships, you could simply check it on your app. An app could also keep track of ship activations, exhausted/discarded tokens, exhausted upgrade cards, squadron activations, damage cards, and rounds. The utility and convenience of such an app would be immeasurable! I can't imagine any Armada player being against it (as long as it was free ).

You might want to ask the X-wing folks about their opinions on an FFG official app. There's a reason it's hardly used at all.


As for having points printed on cards, since you harped on that a lot, you must remember that FFG is primarily a board game company used to making completed products, not a miniatures company. It is a different mindset. Miniatures as a whole aren't even FFG's largest product line.

You don't even have to buy the card pack at all since they announced that all official products would remain legal for Open Play. In essence, you're whining about nothing.

Also, for the love of God, do realize that conciseness is a virtue to be sought after.

8 hours ago, ovinomanc3r said:

They didn't downgrade a product. They made a new one.

Bigger upgrade cards are objectively worse.

1 minute ago, Petersaber said:

Bigger upgrade cards are objectively worse.

🙄

19 minutes ago, geek19 said:

🙄

Don't make that face, Geek; THEY'RE OBJECTIVELY WORSE. The evidence is all there. It's basically science.

10 minutes ago, Irate Pooka said:

Don't make that face, Geek; THEY'RE OBJECTIVELY WORSE. The evidence is all there. It's basically science.

Please remember both of you that Peter has not made any arguments on the basis of FFG profitability, his argument is based on personal preference and table space. Quite frankly it is a reasonable argument. I personally dont agree or care, but I wouldnt put Peter on the same level as others in this thread.

11 hours ago, Petersaber said:

My name is EA/Activision/Ubisoft/Apple/Nestle and I approve of this message.

Sure, businesses have to make money. How about doing it without making your product worse?

Exactly .

(Don't forget about Disney.)

Asmodee might not be as irredeemably deplorable as EA, Activision, Ubisoft, TakeTwo, and most other "AAA" video game publishers (except for CD Projekt Red, of course ), but there's no doubt that they care more about profits than publishing quality games. Whereas the Creatives at FFG are trapped between a rock and a hard place, having to bend the knee to their greedy corporate overlords. But that's what happens when you sell out to a big evil corporation, so I have no sympathy for them.

P.S. @Petersaber It's a genuine pleasure to see that not everyone on this forum is a shameless sycophant who desperately wants to be BFFs with the FFG employees. Respect!

Businesses have to make money @Revan Reborn

Do we seriously have an 8 page complaint thread about an optional product?

31 minutes ago, Revan Reborn said:

P.S. @Petersaber It's a genuine pleasure to see that not everyone on this forum is a shameless sycophant who desperately wants to be BFFs with the FFG employees. Respect!

Did one of the FFG employees ignore you at an event or something? You seem very against them having friends. FFG Devs. are people too.

This thread is STILL GOING?! Goodness people, it's a simple cost saving measure. Oh no, cards are bigger! The world is ending! Seriously, find something actually useful to care about. Seeing as most game companies not named Games Workshop routinely struggle, I think saving some production cost is forgivable. I for one would rather have games than, you know...not. I'll never have sympathy for customers of luxury game. It is the whitest of entitlement. I will care about their employees being abused all day long, which I very much hold against Asmodee after the lay offs. Where was this outrage over the lay offs? But card size? Really? Get over it.

2 hours ago, Petersaber said:

Bigger upgrade cards are objectively worse.

'Worse' is a value judgement, so they can't be 'objectively' worse.

11 minutes ago, Truthiness said:

= It is the whitest of entitlement. I will care about their employees being abused all day long, which I very much hold against Asmodee after the lay offs. Where was this outrage over the lay offs? But card size? Really? Get over it.

Same Team.

Like actually, why is this the thing people choose to be mad about?

9 minutes ago, flatpackhamster said:

'Worse' is a value judgement, so they can't be 'objectively' worse.

Bigger upgrade cards are objectively worse .

Objectively:

in a way that is not influenced by personal feelings or opinions.

LAWWWWWWWWWLS

Are objectives upgrade cards? They are bigger

13 minutes ago, Truthiness said:

This thread is STILL GOING?! Goodness people, it's a simple cost saving measure. Oh no, cards are bigger! The world is ending! Seriously, find something actually useful to care about. Seeing as most game companies not named Games Workshop routinely struggle, I think saving some production cost is forgivable. I for one would rather have games than, you know...not. I'll never have sympathy for customers of luxury game. It is the whitest of entitlement. I will care about their employees being abused all day long, which I very much hold against Asmodee after the lay offs. Where was this outrage over the lay offs? But card size? Really? Get over it.

It's not a cost-saving measure. I already debunked the baseless assumption that resizing all the cards to Standard size somehow saves money. Mini-American size cards require less cardboard and less ink. Therefore the production cost per card has to be less expensive than Standard size cards. It's as simple as that.

IF FFG/Asmodee had decided to change the size of all of Armada's cards to Mini-American size, that definitely would have saved money in production .

As for Asmodee laying off FFG employees, I'm absolutely against that -- it's flagrant corporate greed! Why didn't Asmodee's executives take a pay cut instead laying off the talented Creatives who make their games? After all, the games are just the products that Asmodee sells. Surely the products don't matter as much as ensuring the executives are overpaid.

But I seriously doubt that most other people on this forum would participate in criticizing Asmodee about that, as evidence by all the sheep that posted "Businesses have to make money" in sycophantic defense of Asmodee's greedy business practices.

Sheep! He called us sheep! We got a Bingo! Baaaaaa baaaa baaaaaa!

10 minutes ago, Revan Reborn said:

It's not a cost-saving measure. I already debunked the baseless assumption that resizing all the cards to Standard size somehow saves money.

10 minutes ago, geek19 said:

Sheep! He called us sheep! We got a Bingo! Baaaaaa baaaa baaaaaa!

Baaaaa baaaaaaa!

I'll take the word over people that actually work in the industry over some random person on the internet who is way too in love with the word "sheep." Going from three card sizes to one saves them money. But hey, what do FFG employees know about their own products? I'm sure they just want to randomly antagonize their own fans for no reason instead.

Do I like the change? Nope, I've said so in plenty of places? Do I care to say anything more about this? Nope. It's a waste of my time to even talk about it for this long. Now please go get yourself banned again @Revan Reborn

Wait, another rando insisting on calling people Sheeple? Wasn't that Reevorn's shtick a few months ago? Somebody used that bit, get a new one!

As for card sizes saving money, I suppose that depends on how many card-printers they have at the factories. If they can have one dedicated for small, medium, large/tarot whatever, sure, but if they don't then not having to adjust settings on the cutters would at the very least save time (which I hear equates to money).