Where are Descent avatars? Has FFG erased them? Anyone knows?

it does look as though they have disappeared. Conspiracy theorists might suggest that this is another nail in the coffin of Descent's future. Having said that, I have had this happen before, so perhaps it's just a feature of the system and they will return in due course.

I was wondering what the deal was with that also, it seems like they've all been removed and I can't find them again to chose one. I have a really hard time believing they are done with this game, but it does seem like they are giving it the cold shoulder at times (like how long they are taking with the FAQ after all the hard work people in the community have done to put 95% of it together for them).

The thing that we would all like to see is some news regarding the future of Descent. But it's almost 18 months since the last expansion (Sea of Blood) release.. A commonly held viewpoint amongst players is that both the Quest Compendium and Sea of Blood showed signs of poor quality control. The quest compendium required a 10 page errata document - not an FAQ, an Errata! Sea of Blood received some fixes and clarifications in the FAQ of March 2010 but left as many problems and difficulties as it resolved - Yes, tentacles and ieutenant fights I'm looking at you.

Where does this leave us. It could be that FFG have realised that mistakes were made and that they need to avoid repeats of this nature in any future releases. This alone could be sufficient to slow up the whole development cycle. We also know that Kevin W spent significant chunks of last year working on the Civilization game.Maybe he is now engaged on some new Descent material.

Another thing that cannot be ignored is the cost of our beloved plastic models. Whist being no expert on the subject I understand that the production costs of the plastic game components has increased significantly. FFG is a business and cannot simply asorb the whole of this cost increase. I believe that it is also significant that FFG have been focussing heavily on its card game products recently - I am assuming that the production costs for these games are lower than the plastic heavy Descent. If costs can be kept down and the end product sold profitably then of course FFG are going to take this road.

All of the above is speculation on my part. It would be interesting to do some analysis of the plastic content in games that FFG have released over the past couple of years. In fact, as I am currently recovering from a major operation I may have the time to do some analysis. If I do then I will post again to give you some figures.

As to the disappearance of the Avatars that is harder to explain, unless it is indeed part of a plan to remove Descent from FFGs catalog on the quiet. The only slightly positive thing I have noticed recently is that AoD, RtL and the Base game are all showig up as being reprinted. If the game was being killed then I do not think that this would have happened. Note to self, keep an eye on the Upcoming Board Games page and monitor the presence/absence of Descent products.