I know there have been a lot of posts on Gencon 2011 and many suggestions and negative comments too, but I just wanted to add another that I'm not happy with.....House Cards!

Everyone who played in "Worlds" was supposed to receive a nice set of house cards for attending. I assumed this meant that if you played in Melee, you'de receive a set of House Cards and if you played in Joust, you'd receive an additional set. For those who haven't seen these new cards, they are three cards with the six houses each represented by a major character from each house with the house name. (Though two of the houses have generic looking characters.) The three cards were double-sided and would cover all six houses, just like the House cards that were given out at Regionals.

As many people commented, FFG's lack of support is pretty sad. This was my first Gencon since 2008, and I was very disappointed. In 2007, FFG had three major events.....a Classic Highlander Championship, A Melee Championship and a Joust Championship. I came in first in the Classic Highlander and won about $1000 (retail) worth of product. I came in second in the Joust and won about $1000 worth of product. The first place player (Sam Tham) won twice as much. I know the Melee winner also had a nice haul. There was an official Five Kings release (Draft) tourney. EVERYONE who played in these events received a PROMO card (I believe it was the George Martin promo). If you played in all four events, you came home with four promo cards! There were many "draft-on-demand" tourneys. 2007 rocked! There was a lot of Thrones to play and everyone had a great time and was rewarded for playing and winning.

Cue to 2011.....What did people receive for attending Gencon and playing in Worlds? ONE set of House cards. One of the reasons that I actually decided to play in Melee is that was a Worlds event. I thought that I would receive a set of house cards for Melee and another for Joust. Each player was to receive one set regardless of of which event that was played. Oh...here's the saddest part...I came home with none. There were a few others who didn't receive house cards too. Why? Because FFG ran out! WTF!!! They could even produce 80 sets to cover everyone who played Melee and Joust? Ridiculous! They took our e-mail addresses and were supoosed to contact us and get the cards to us. Ten days later and NO CONTACT!

It's pretty sad that you're happy to just receive a set of house cards when the old days gave away so much more. FFG only ran FOUR Thrones events at Gencon. Again, a ad number compared to the old days. They should've given a set of house cards to EVERYONE! This should've been a Gencon to promote the growth and success of the game. The game is more popular than ever. The release of the new book and the success of the show should've spurred FFG to market this game even more. Some people maybe be happy with prizes of a jewelry box and and over-sized sword, but FFG really dropped the ball this year. There is so much negative talk about the ridiculousness of melee, the lack of prize support, etc. I hope that FFG thinks about this and ENCOURAGES people to attend Gencon and REWARDS them for being there.

I miss the old days....

Well, i know what you mean.

I don´t think that a big prize pool is needed for a big event. But at least players attending should feel to get something special. And the players taking the first palces should at least have some sort of bigger prize. Say, the first place in each tournament could pick up three FFG products for free. It would have been a good prize for the winner and almost no cost at all for FFG.

I also miss the old days. A lot could be said about decipher, but they knew how to draw players to a tournament. I´m talking about special card, alternate art cards, promotional cards, invitational travels (flights), even cash prizes. Like i said it´s not necessary to have big prizes, but i remember that i was very encouraged to get in the "new" Wars tcg very quickly when decipher announced to have some big tournaments. - I placed 3/4th at the Essen game convention and won a cash prize of $ 1000.

If i would be in charge at FFG marketing centre i woudl have tried something like to get the rights to print a lcg card with an alternative image from the HBO movie and hand it out to GenCon attendants e.g. Arya or some other popular charachter.

I sent an email to FFG a couple of days ago about house cards. They promptly replied and asked me for my contact info - they said they'd be arriving soon but that they needed to get them back in stock.

I can understand how 78+ people coming was a lot more than they'd ever seen before. Of course, the popularity of the HBO show should've clued them that there'd be a bigger turnout this year than normal.

As for constructive criticism, I'd like to suggest that FFG focus on deck boxes, promo power and gold counters, house cards, promo cards (alternate art, whatever), play mats and the like. I think those are pretty much the most sought after types of swag for card game players. It's on my wishlist at least. I'm not very interested in pins or uncut card sheets.

I went to Gencon 2011 and all I got was this silly house card.

anavasoothed said:

~Go to Black Friday in NYC and all you'll get is a silly t-shirt.

Stasis said:

This.

Stasis said:

Yes! What can I do with uncut card sheets? At regionals, the winners often gave this stuff away to n00bs. Oh, and a picture printed on cardstock. ~Very nice.

I'd love it if the winner at least got usable stuff like sleeves, but the power/gold tokens is what everyone ooohs and aaahs over at tournaments. I definitely envied the Cali players their Kubla tokens when I was at Gencon. That stuff is easy and relatively cheap. Is the marketing department just lazy? Even is they are, it's so easy to give players free FFG product: a full playset of one cycle, 3 cores of another LCG to promote cross-pollination, a signed demo copy of another Gencon release. Seriously, get creative.

Danigral said:

+1 and +1

we need promo cardspowergoldox!

Danigral said:

Might I suggest framing them and hanging in your office. It's by far my favorite decoration.

papalorax said:

I've actually considered laminating them and then using them as curtains over a window (put yarn through holes in the lamination in the top). Only issue is that they're not terribly easy to open, and arguably the sun could damage the paint eventually and such. But it's a similar idea.

You could also get a plexiglass sheet cut to the size of your game table (if you use such a thing) and then put the uncut sheets under it, would be pretty BA.

papalorax said:

Mine are framed and behind plexiglass. I really enjoy them and have them for the different games I've played (Overpower anyone?).

papalorax said:

papalorax said:

If they already came framed, I'd consider this. I'm not spending $ on a frame. Cheap Target/Walmart frames a tacky, and nice ones are too expensive. I'd rather use that money to buy more games. That or invest in my daughter's future. (~Did I get the priority right there?)

Danigral said:

No. And the tilde is uncalled for. Thrones is no laughing matter.

Dobbler said:

Overpower....holy **** that bring back memories. What a generic game, but I loved the Artwork.

There is an idea. I implore FFG to get the rights to the Marvel or DC comics and produce a quality LCG for those properties. When I say quality, I mean 1v1 COMPETITIVE LCG not CO-OP garbage like the travesty that is Star Wars. That change still makes me sick.

It would be nice to be rewarded for coming X miles using X dollars to play your game. *shrug* I agree I got more at Kublacon, and that was from John D (Fieras) who did a great job with those gold tokens.

Unluckily, with a LCG there is only so many things you can do (product is hard). But AEG (L5R) and other companies do a great job. Off the top of my head:

1. Deck backers. If you want to back your whole plot deck, or even your regular deck with cool pictures (put in facing the opposite side, in a sleeve).

2. Card boxes. Neat ones. AEG just made one that was a longer one, and it opened from the side instead of the top (hard to explain). The artwork on the side was a sword in a scabbard (well, a katana, but never mind)...when you open it the sword is 'un-sheathed'. *Mathlete keep your mind out of the gutter* Inside was a scroll with game information, a bunch of cool plastic dividers for organizing cards with art on them, a book of fiction. Seriously...that is out-of-the-box thinking.

3. Deck boxes. The leather ones were nice from a couple of years ago. Think up some new ones, or custom ones!

3. Playmats. Has not been explored enough.

4. Especially with the TV show, different memorabilia. Shirts, mugs, chains, whatever.

5. More power/gold tokens.

6. Bags for holding counters. Ram pulled out his old, wrinkled, yellow pouch (Mathlete...I am serious) that they gave out 3-4 years ago and got all sorts of 'oh-ah's'.

BTW I liked the custom wooden box. Not as well as the CoC box () or WH box, but it was a neat idea in the least. Not especially useful. But neat. The sword was...so-so. I was just glad someone who drove won!

i was also surprised to find the whole Night's Watch tourney system kaput as well. The old gold dragon system was awesome for rewarding the players who support and continue to promote the game. How much money did I put into FFG's pocket over the years is unknown to me but for the few years that we had 30+ players a week and AGOT was outselling Magic was pretty spectacular.

I was saddened to hear about how week the prize support was for the game in general and even more surprised about the World's support. It's a matter of branding at it's core that you do these types of things. Other non'AGOT players see these things and they want to get involved. I've been especially surprised by the lack of it since the show was coming and even more that it was such a hit. The fact that you can barely find a Core set or some of the House expansions is ridiculous. Preparations should have been made. It's called free marketing! It was incredibly wasted! Sad. It shows a lack of care for the game in general. I guess the Gears of War boardgame is more important.

I've only played thrones since LCG. (started very tail end of CCG era) and do not play any other competitive card games, so I thought this was just the norm.

Boy have my eyes been opened :-)

rings said:

+1

Great job of listing all the easy ideas for cool prize support.

Playmats I think is #1! Definitely no explored even close to enough. Very easy to do with today's technology too. CaliCon and Kubla have both offered playmats but thats due to mostly community members taking it under their own initiative to provide such cool custom prizes. It would be soo easy for FFG do some custom playmats for Top 8 or Top 16 or whatever or even just Top 4 or Top 2.

Gold and Power tokens are also very easy to do. Community members have done them before as prizes for local tourneys. Granted they might have used labor from Slaver Bay but still, the cost is really not all that great for a company offering a major tournament at GenCon. If FFG is pinching pennies that bad that they can't afford the prize support of gold/power counters (at most $50 per player for top 16?) then I dont know what to say.

Oh, I dont really think deck backers are a good idea beacuse they are very utility item and never really out on display so having a cool one is kind of pointless IMO. Much rather have custom power/gold counters or playmat since those used far more and would be far cooler to me.

To me deck/card boxes like the wood one are very cool but not even necessary for the Top 16. Just give some cool customized power/gold/playmats that represent some House variation and people will love it.

Sure it might cost them a little bit but it would be a great investment for FFG to do as community outreach. Especially when they are at GenCon with other companies giving away a lot better prize support. The positive word of mouth from good prize support vs. the negative word of mouth from poor prize support is going to cost their company more revenue in the long run than simply ponying up for the better prizes.

LaughingTree said:

FFG is one of the main presences at Gen Con, along with Wizards of the Coast and Mayfair Games. Simply from a gaming community PR standpoint, they should look to make their tournament support as good as possible. Obviously their LCG tournament community is never going to be as big as Magic or Yu-Gi-Oh or these other massive, entrenched CCG franchises, but the community is certainly not going to grow if even the small number of people they CAN get at their biggest gaming event of the year go away grumbling that they felt like they were given short shrift.

Now, before people feel like that means FFG should be handing out fabulous cash prizes and building up a glittering tournament circuit, it is important to remember that they're a small company of only about 80 employees, and they make a product that only a very tiny percentage of the population even knows about. They may look like the slickest corporate marketing operation at Gen Con, with their huge floor space and giant, impressive banners, but then again, that's at GEN CON, a convention that people outside the immediate gaming community don't even know exists. I live in Indianapolis, and trust me, the vast majority of the locals have no idea what that convention is or what goes on there, except that they see people walking around in costumes all weekend, and think the worst.

From a business standpoint, I think Christian Petersen summed it up at the FFG In-Flight Report at Gen Con when talking about mobile apps for their games-- that the app for their top selling game of their entire product line, Arkham Horror, had a total of 3,000 downloads worldwide. That, my friends, is niche, and from a business standpoint, barely worth it, given the cost to develop mobile apps that aren't just garbage. Of course, given the cost-to-benefit ratio done for mobile apps (short answer: they'd need to charge about $7.99 an app to make it at all worthwhile to even bother developing them), it's possible FFG had someone crunch the numbers and determine that dumping $1000 into tournament prize rewards for their small LCG audience has no discernible benefit to the company's bottom line. In which case, I would expect more of the same.

I was contacted by FFG about the house cards, something I was expecting to have to chase down myself, so I am pleasantly surprised.

On a more gripey note, would have been cool to see the 6th chapter pack on sale at Gencon too. I thought I was all cool because I picked up the 5th chapter pack at Gencon. Then, I walk into our game store yesterday to see it stocked on the shelves...

Oh well, I got a pin!

Sluggonics said:

I agree that it does have to do a lot with marketing. The way I like to look at it, is that their (at least the FFG crew that I knew) hearts are in it and they have given tons of prize support in the past, meaning to me that if it was up to them they would. However, I wonder if past marketing decisions in the past that they have made (like giving away tons of schwag) are catching up to them financially. Hence, some of the marketing moves that they have made are unsavory. Yet, I still have faith that in the future, after they are (crossing my fingers) number one in the game creation market, it will give them the comfortable financial buffer to offer better prize support than even Magic.

I still have faith because I still remember, the good old days and the passion of FFG.

rings said:

I think this is the deck box Rings is reffering to, very cool. I also like the idea of some custom sleeves for plot cards.

Sluggonics said:

There are so many things they could have done that wouldn't have involved dumping $1000. The top 16 should all have received something (10 sleeves that said GenCon Finals for a plot deck, a special house card, token, etc). There is a big difference between doing nothing and doing something...and from what I have seen here people have simply asked for something.