I'm probably in a minority on these boards, but I've got to voice a bit of a concern.

I jumped back in to this game with the Core set and Chapter packs as a way to enjoy an excellent game while not throwing the investment chunk of my past CCG addictions. I picked up all the Chapter Packs that were available before the Core Set and had to say I was very excited with the set card format. I saw the potential of buying more than one Chapter Pack but was happy with the distribution. When the Core Set came out the excitement continued though I thought a few things were dropped, namely not having any Kings or Queens to trigger the fun Armies and other cards from the Chapter Packs. The Core Set is a great way to bring non-CCGers into the game and enjoy it as more of a board game setting. My non-CCG gamer buddies even looked at the Chapter Packs as regular 'expansions' a la Runebound. Things were looking good for me to get a regular 'CCG' kick while enjoying the game with my non-CCG gaming partners.

Well, that isn't looking that great now. I've picked up the latest three Chapter Packs and have to say that the Winter/Summer theme just doesn't seem to mesh with the LCG format. Most of the Summer/Winter cards are only useable when the right season is there and buying one or two chapter packs doesn't provide enough resources to really run the theme engine. Compounded on that is that using the Core Set to run melee games, you need more of those packs to make everything equal amoung the three to four players. Further mixing up the issue is the immediate 'branding' of certain houses as Winter or Summer specific. With the limited amount of cards available in the LCG format, this theme engine just doesn't seem to fit. Instead of developing the Core Set format, these latest expansion packs seem to be hearkening back to the Night's Watch and Wildings block where if you weren't interested in that theme you just skipped those sets and worked from your old strategy. But again, the limited number of cards in the LCG Core format doesn't make that work really well.

My concern is that the LCG format isn't really a new take on how the game is going to be designed and developed. It looks more like just a straight remarketing and repackaging of the existing CCG design. Yes, there's a balance between bringing in new players and keeping the existing base happy, but there's another thing about introducing a new 'jump point' and than things looking all to familiar once you get past the wrapping.

So that's my concern. Probably not as satisfyingly put as I'd like but it's there. I was expecting a bold new take on CCG fun in a structured non-random manner. Instead, too many dregs from the past are being pulled out too quickly for the new audience to enjoy.

I don't have the core set or any of the new chapter packs yet, so I don't know whether to agree or disagree. However, wasn't this new round of chapter packs (as well as the previous round) designed as a ccg set first? I think we've got to wait and see before we know how the LCG will have its own identity.

Also, I imagine it's a really tricky balance for the FFG folks to figure out much of a break to make from the old CCG without upsetting older players who have kept the game alive for so long.

It's important to remember that the only two chapter pack cycles we've seen so far were originally designed to be expansions to the 5KE block, and to work with those cards in the game.

Hopefully, we'll see some cards in the next chapter pack cycle that are designed to exist in the "LCG only" environment, but that might not even be the case since the decision to move to a "LCG only" format was made in what seemed (IMHO) to be a last second decisions by FFG. If that's the case, the design team may, or may not, have had enough time to react to the decision before designing the next cycle of chapter packs.

Eventually, when FFG decides to stop makes changes to the game (and it appears for now at least that they have), the card pool will be designed to fit the current environment and things will flow much more nicely.

I'm willing to bet you're not in the minority with your opinion. Many old timers have left this game because they saw these "card pool" problems coming. At the same time, many of us have stuck around simply because we love the game. It's just going to take some time before the card pool begins to make sense, and things feel normal once again. I, for one, will be very happy when that day arrives.

Until then, I recommend you just make the best of things for now. Have fun getting a feel for the game, even if many of the cards seem out of place. The game is still in an awkward transitional period, but we should be on the other side soon.

trekkermj said:

I'm not sure if I understand your complaint, but if you are syaing that the LCG is CCG in a new wrapper, i'd disagree, especially if you are syaing the chapter packs are a sign of it.

Summer/winter is a great mechinic for LCG. It is not needed to make a good deck right now (as there are other deck builds) and if you want to use it you only need buy the chapter pack that contains the raven of you preferred season (which you get 3x of in one chapter pack). You don't have to have every deck be a season deck, nor do you have to have every season card in the deck. I'm not sure why you say things look all to familar past the wrapping. If you want to play with just the core set, the capter packs don't stop you, nor do they creat an unbalance (there is a good mix of cards that are usable without it being a season in all the chapter packs, and there are some that while make mention of a season do not need to be in a season deck). Everyone has access to the seasons if they want (its not like the Eryie, which was a hard to find Rare) and one chapter pack will get you a solid season deck as well as three (because of the 3x v 1x choices in them).

Lars said:

I think the complaint was about the fact that the Core set decks can´t be equally developed if you only purchase one of each chapter pack and one Core set. If you follow that logic there can be maximum 2 decks which run a half decent winter/ summer mechanic. However this houses will still miss some backbones, because cards like Shadow stalker, a time for raven´s are only delivered with 1 copy in the latest chapter pack. So you´ll have to buy every chapter pack and the Core set x3 (or more) to develop the decks equally and end up with a lot of not so often used cards. That´s of course not a problem if there are 2 or 3 people which buy the product and trade the cards they need, but it´s somehow harder if you want to treat the game as a classic board game like Runebound or the Cuthulu boardgame with only one person purchasing the cards.

Old Ben said:

Thanks for clarifying my major concern Lars. I'll have you as an editor any time!

On top of the need to buy multiple sets and packs still, from a design issue the Winter/Summer engine still bugs me. Most of the cards are just fluff if you don't have the right season out. Nice and thematic but not that great when you are looking at a card pull of less than 400 cards in LCG format. It might just be me, but I like the mechanic we saw with the Knights rather than the mechanic we see with Winter/Summer and the Night's Watch/Wildlings.

I agree that in such small card pool such mechanic not gonna work at all... It requires really big design set with lots of support, instead we will get 6 chapter packs in which there will be 10 cards for each house with a small bonus for season... it's good for fun but it will not see a competitive play until it will be really solid design with much more support and better season synenergy... Even in season support effects are avarage and get rid of season will be very easy with another cookie cutter Carrion Bird. It will be played as well as dan in 3 copies in every deck as well as raven plot which wreck whole season strategy making fool fo our opp.

trekkermj said:

that was old ben who clarified. I'm still a bit confused, actually.

So, the complaint is that you need to spend $30 a month and not $10 to be 'competitive'?

If so i'm not seeing how that is the same as a CCG (where some people spent $30 on 1 card). Also, i'm not sure if that is true. With the awesomeness of Tzumain's site ( http://www.tzumainn.com/agot/ ) you can tell what is in the Chapter pack (not in the quantity, thouhg. ~tzu isn't perfect after all!!!!!!) and you can decide before hand which CPs you want to buy or how many you want. Also, you can build a pretty good deck for any house right now ignoring the season decks (with a few 1x CP purchases, especially of the older CPs). I do not think you need to have a season deck to beat another season deck (opponets get a benifit out your summer, and winter will slow both players down. All characters that have summer/winter tech have that costed into their cost and are generally not udercosted even during the season. finally, there are power cards outside of the season as well [i.e. lannister can handle a season deck wiht 0 season cards]) So, i think the promise of an LCG holds up, its a fun casual game right out of the box that can be easiliy turned into a competitive deck without too much $$ spent (i mean you have to spend some money to make it competitive, why else would there be CPs in the first place if you didn't?).

If the complaint is that the Seasons are not a good (or too strong) mechinic, then i'm not sure what that has to do with the LCG format.

The LCG format is saying here, now you have the option of paying a set amount of $, know what you are going to get up front for it and for a minimum of $40 you will be able to play this with 4 friends over and over. Now if you want to expand on you purchase you can do so how ever you want. You do not need to build a season deck, you do not need to build a deck with 8 STR characters, nor do you need to add different plots to your pool. Yes, there are some advantages to doing so, but in the LCG format you do not have to if you do not wish to.

Lars said:

Actually, I took it differently. It isn't about deck construction and gearing up for competition. It's about maintaining a balance between the Core Decks for casual play while keeping things interesting by adding in new cards. You cannot upgrade all the decks evenly and maintain a balance between them with a single Chapter Pack each month. You need multiples, and even then, you are unlikely to get balanced representation so that each House gets something new and spiffy, particularly since mechanics are usually not designed to be relatively even across the Houses.

Either every person needs to take one deck out of the box and maintain/upgrade it on their own with their own money as they see fit, or the one person who owns the box must buy a lot of cards to maintain all the decks so that any person can play any deck without feeling outclassed by the other person's cards. In either case, it's a lot more like a "repackaged CCG" than something new and more "board-game-like." If you were expecting something more "board-game-like" than "CCG-like" when you got the box, I can see where it would be disappointing.

To be fair to the LCG format, it is a compromise between a CCG and expansions to board games. A Runebound expansion doesn't satisfy one's "CCG fix" if that fix is deck customization. The LCG format doesn't satisfy that "pulling a rare" rushif you enjoyed that about blind booster pack purchases. The LCG format lets you decide how much you want to spend on a highly customizable game with no uncertainty and, for someone who wants a complete playset, a lower absolute cost in all likelihood then when one had to chase rares under the CCG format.

If you are trying to build out all four decks in the core set because only you'll own the game and your friends will completely rely on you to supply the cards, the LCG format allows you to do that without guesswork on what you'll get when you make a purchase since you know (with the help of spoilers posted by the community) exactly what is in each pack. Buy one a chapter pack a month, sprinkle a few of the cards into each core set deck while potentially removing others and do it in a way so that you're trying to keep decks somewhat in balance. Switch cards between core set decks to further mix things up. Will you're decks be brutally efficient? No. Will the game still be fun? I think it should be if you like the underlying rule set. If you want more efficient/"tight" decks, then buy more copies of the chapter packs to get exactly what you want. With the winter and summer themes, you could buy one each of the chapter packs and build a deck that is summer oriented, one that is winter oriented, and two that prefer neither and would look to shut the seasons off. Again, they won't likely be tournament quality decks, but that doesn't sound like your goal. If you're not yet sold on the season mechanic, hold off on these chapter packs and see if subsequent ones flesh the mechanic out to your liking. If they don't, skip these chapters.

FFG has set the format and price of the chapter packs so that it will cost someone $30 each release to get a complete playset and thus be able to build any conceivable deck. That's better than any CCG I'm aware of. For casual play, FFG has made it easy to pick and choose both what you add to your collection and how much it'll cost you to get it. Again, that's not something that a CCG readily offers.

It doesn't look so nice. 30 $ monthly plus core set 90$ gives u 270 $ for 6 months plus additional 180$ for 12 month. You have core set and two series of chapter packs. In another games for 450$ I can build 2-4 tier 1 decks and play at the highest possible level. In my eyes it is only marketing becuase you pay a lot of money monthly to have playset. Of course you need to be clever and buy/trade singles plus get tons of C/U for free or for couple of dollars. As an example in L5R I invested about 400 $ and have 3 tier 1 decks lot's of Rares almost all strong cards as a playsets plus tons of C/U. And we are not talking about limited pool of cards which you get for this amount in AGOT. Samurai set is almost 5-10 times bigger than core + 2 chapters series. So be carefull with estimation that it's the chepest TCG/CCG on the market.

I dont get it.

I use one unaltered core-set to show the game to interested players. Another i use for deck-building in "advanced" games with other agot-players.

And if i get someone hooked, i play with some of my "advanced" decks (they should be competitive, because i use them against others) to show the possiblities. And here you have to make the "transition" from board to card game.

If they are still interested they have to buy there own sets and expand these.

berto said:

and there is where your math fails as you just cut out time effort and cards that have $$ value.

lets just look at old AGot vs new AGoT prices:

to be able to play the game with 1 deck - New = $40 Trading not needed, Old = minimum $120 (retail value on a box) trading optional

to be able to play the game with 2-4 decks - New = $40 Trading not needed, Old = minimum $120 (more likely $240+) Trading optional

Price to be competative - New = $40-$80 plus $10-30 a month Trading optional, Old = Minimum $120, add in secondary boxes $120x (x = number of extra boxes), $3.50y (y equals number of packs), add chase rares which a lot of people spent more then $10 for on ebay on a montly basis, and trading required.

if you want to classify it as a CCG it is a fairly cheap CCG (its a CCG on an MMO payment plan to really mix and match terms)

Lars said:

Wrong. To be able to play game in new format - $40, to be able to play AGOT in old format 0 (zero!!!) dollars. You can get all commons/Uncommons for free.

Lars said:

Wrong look higher...

Lars said:

To be competitive now:

3x core set 100 $

3x each chapter pack 30 * 9 = 270 $

We have 370 $

In old format you can build 2-3 decks easily for this amount of money. You can invest maybe 100-200 $ if u're interested in 1-3 houses here you have no choice you must buy any chapter pack because there is no trades for LCG due to this limitation.

Lars said:

It's still very expensive and maybe a little bit cheaper if you want to have all cards (very rare). If you gather some houses LCG is much more expensive.

LCG has four potential problems, (I don't mention very poor and not interesting not syn-energed card pool)

1. Cost is still very expensive for competitive playing and even on casual one.

2. There is no 2nd market in new format and it's very difficult trade even one particular card. Usually players buy 1-3 and don;t have not needed card

3. Jump in is still very expensive in contrary what they wanted to do... New player need to pay for the beginning almost 400 $ to start playing, there are no C/U for free. I remember my first tournament in L5R when we got tons of C/U from older players for free... This is not the case in LCG where you don;t get even singular LCG card

4. No draft format which gives a lot of fun and shows some hidden card possibilities and limited synenergies... additiionally enables company to sell couple of boxes per shop which gives quite a lot in whole world.

We will see but two the best arguments which FFG gives for LCG are fake: it is still expensive with much worse jump in as before

i've given away lots of cards, i've never given away a full set of uncommons or comons (i don't have disposable sets) so i'm a little confused on your assertion that as a CCG it was free to play (you say you got those Cs/Ucs at a tounrey so obviously you had already bought into the game when you got them...that doesn;t sound free to play to me). Also, if you want to use that logic i could say its free to play in the new format just by knowing someone who owns the core set and playing core set only games.

Re 4 problems:

1) you do not need 3x core sets to be competitive, even if you did it is still cheaper as there are NO CHASE RARES (an argument you've yet to counter so far) which a lot of people spent a lot of money on and which is why a lot of other people do not like playing CCGs. If you think the summer mechinic is really strong, go pick up a summer CP, you get the mechinic, a lot of good cards that work with the mechinic in mulitple houses and only have to pay $10 once if you want. Your notion that $40 to play casual is more expanisive is crazy (its at least $10 cheaper then most FFG boardgames).

2) to a lot of people this is a good thing. Nothing to chase, no need to have to know other people who want to trade. No need to have to put in the time and effort to trade, but if you want to you still can (on a less broad scale, but it is there and people can split 3 CPs and trade out houses)

3) to start playing, again is only $40 and you get 4 decks, split it with four people and you have an instant game group for $10 a head. To be competitive you do not need any rares (imagine being able to win a tourney with those free Cs/Ucs you got from the older players (i'm almost positive they were not giving away the power UCs. Also, the reason they have them is becuase they bought so many f'ing packs trying to get the rares that the Cs/Ucs have little value.) A new player does not need to pay $400 to start playing, and does not need to pay $400 to be competitive. There is no need to buy 3x of every CP (i think Clash of Arms proves that point) and even if every CP was good you could drefray the cost as mentioned above by splitting houses with someone and splitting that $30 a month

4) draft is a style that not everyone likes. Those that like it are working on a way to have it continue in AGoT instead of just lamenting about its demise. Also, if you play casually and not enough to memorize the cards the Core Set is draft-esq (especially if you pick houses at random).

Lars said:

I didn't say a full C/U set. We were at the first tournament draft. We payed 12 e for 5 boosters and then we get those cards from other players. It wa enough to build 9-12 decks easily (80 cards each). It was our first tournament and I spend next 3 nights to sort those cards out. So there is no easiest way to jump in the game as CCG/TCG. From older players you get lots C/U for free. I alone gave 4000 AGOT cards for free to my collegues. This is not a way in LCG you must pay for starter and you can't get almost anything for free. Fix pack cards cost alwayes much more than C/U from boosters

Lars said:

Unfortunately yes, to start any booster game you don;t need any money. Old players will give you for free a lot of cards to start playing. To start LCG you must invest money. And yes for competitive deck unfortunately you need 3x every chapter plus core set. Add to this 450 $ cost of shipping which gives you something around 500 $. Imagaine noe that someone wants to jump in this game in one year, then investment will be at the 1000-1200 $ which was standard competitive investment in booster area. Regarding chasing rares, I have never such problem, ebay, shops and trades.

Lars said:

To be honest it really doesn;t cost so much time. You can buy set of cards very cheap or from one seller. I had never problem with this, and trading is very fun at the tournament you can really get a lot of cards you need without spending a lot of money. in LCG you must as well find good store with good shipping cost.

Lars said:

I told you before after our first tournament we could create easily 12 decks, we got 20 rares in boosters and 3 sets for free. This was for 12 e per head, but we could only go there and say we want to start and we will get those for free. I repaet you can start playing in booster game easily for free. Of course you don;t win tournament but you don;t do this with 1 core set as well. Competitive is similar in both you must spend 500 $ and you can play competitive in both ideas. BTW I know players which get tier 1 deck paying only draft cost every 1-3 months (10 e) and trade rares they got.

Lars said:

Draft is good format for experienced players to show how really good they are and players love this format. On agot drafts in germany/Austrai there were always almost all players from tournmament. Additionally draft gives producer possibility to sell large amount of displayes. Imagain that during new set preview you do draft from 2 displayes. Now multiply this by number of stores which do this event. Did you get the point? And this is only preview...

I always buy as much as I need and want [so far 2 Core Sets, one or two CP's, happend I have 3 Sacred Bonds; I don't plan on buying more stuff]; the same players I play with. Some of those posts above just do not make sense to me. Some people try to make their subjective point of view some kind of official policy...

That's true... I'm hardcore players so I have to had all stuff... but we were talkin in general... in CCG you are choosing which rares you trade or buy... here you have less choice... you must buy whole pack even if you need only one card...

Deathjester26 said:

The next cycle will be designed with the Core set in mind or there wouldn´t be the Greyjoy/Martell treaties in them.

berto said:

Actually those x3 cards from the CPs make great give aways to newbies, actually one of my friends is planning to do exactly that to hook another friend of ours. Also a lot of the staples from the Core Set are reprints, so you can just give out the old cards. Now if you say that those are not lcg fine, but if you count the lcg as an entire new game: You can´t get a lot of commons/uncommons from a new tcg either if everyone just started out.

CATS said:

The question isn't whether the next set of CPs was planned with the CORE set in mind (it obviously was), but whether it was designed with the "LCG only" card pool in mind. Two VERY different things.

GJ and Martell could have used those agendas even before the "LCG only" anouncement was made, just because of the cards all the other house received from the core set. I'll admit, however, from the chatter on the boards about the agendas before Nate's R&D article, it did sound like they were being worked on after the "LCG only" anouncement. That gives me hope. But, the question still remains, was the next cycle of CPs designed from the ground up to exist in the current card pool (minus ITE and 5KE), or was is designed, and then tweaked where possible to fit it? We'll know when it hits the shelves.

My guess, judging by where certain announcements came in regards to what should hypothetically have been FFG's point in the development cycle (assuming that they were still roughly on schedule with developement, even though product getting to us was hella slow) my guess is that the next cycle probably weren't designed from an LCG only standpoint either. I think it won't be until next fall's cycle that we start seeing everything catch up.

D you guys know when we can expect The Raven's Song CP? Is there any schedule for A TIme of Ravens [as there was a nice pdf file for A Clash of Arms ]? Can FFG do anything that is predictable?

I have been clicking on the Buy Now button under The Raven's Song in the FFG store for over a week now, and all that comes up is error: page cannot be found!

Hope FFG will put their s*it together in 2009!

Potomoc has it for dec 31st, so tomorrow it either will have it, or they will have a new date set for it. If the new date isn't the 31st, that's the closest to an actual date unless FFG posts something official.

I did notice they pulled Refugees and scattered armies off thier pre order section (potomoc),

Potomac removed all other Chapter Packs from their distribution, besides Raven's Song The release date for Raven's Song is Jan 31st. As usual FFG does not help their customers.