rings said:

I wonder if the ability to solo play has something to do with it as well (if the rumors are even partly true) though it still makes me sad that there isn't a head-to-head game. I guess beggers shouldn't be choosers, since prior to the announcement there were 0 new SW games coming out, now there are 2.

Kennon said:

The same for me. LOTR is in my opinion a very good theme for a cooperative game. The book is all about the fellowship and the evil you wouldn´t want to be par of. Star Wars somehow feels different for me. Like i wrotebefore i want to play The Emperor, Lord Vader, Boba Fett and the like. And i want a 1:1 game here.

rings said:

Unfortunately we cannot verify this, right? But you know, I think George doesn't sell SW licence cheap.

rings said:

I think the same will happen here. People will realize that's simply playing solitaire.

BTW I invented new LCG co-op game. You can play with 2 persons or 4, you can even play with 7! Here's how it works: you throw a dice. If it's 1,2 or 3 then you carry on (I call it "beating a scenario"). If it's 4+ then you lose.

rings said:

Assuming it's true, obviously this decision has nothing to do with popularity of LotR? Obviously it sells so well, because of co-op format, and NOT because of property, right? IF that's true, then I don't understand this world any longer.

I heard (can't remember from whom...Nathan?) that the decision came down from on-high that Star Wars could be co-op, and not from the developers themselves. Maybe it had something to do with the popularity of LotR, or that all the (failed) iterations of Star Wars heretofore have been 1v1.

Are any other companies making co-op CCG's? Or has FFG staked out this territory as their own?

There's something to be said for co-op games. I believe it's one reason that Arkham Horror is their best-selling game. I know that my friends and I all love Arkham Horror because, since it's co-op, it eliminates angry grudge matches, drunken shouting, and storming away from the table. Also, it makes for a great party game, because our wives and girlfriends want to play. So we can get a big group and often have so many people that we run multiple games, and bust out the food and drink for a good time. For some reason, the co-op games appeal to the ladies much more. This is in addition to the fact that you can play the games yourself, although Arkham Horror isn't much fun with 1 person.

I'm looking forward to the co-op Star Wars game. I also doubt that FFG is going to limit their Star Wars licensing to 2 games-- especially since they don't have the board game license. So it seems inevitable that we'll see a head-to-head Star Wars LCG somewhere down the line.

Sluggonics said:

But it's board game, not card game with monthly packs to buy, right?

Sluggonics said:

You are very optimistic person. Another game that needs proper testing?

Rogue30 said:

Well, Arkham Horror is a board game with 8 expansions totalling $350, plus however much you want to spend on investigator figures-- I think there's another $200 worth of those. So it's "collectible" in a similar sense to an LCG-- however many monthly packs $350 gets you... it would have gotten you almost three years' worth back at the $10 price point.

As for the head-to-head Star Wars LCG, Star Wars is FFG's biggest license to date... it's bigger than AGoT, Warhammer, Cthulhu, anything, so I suspect FFG will allocate resources accordingly. But I suppose that is the optimistic view.

Sluggonics said:

It wouldn't surprise me, that licence says about 1 card game. Besides, it's impossible - they already named it as "SW the card game". Another card game would be confusion for customers. So I think it's epic fail and there's no turning back. Time will tell.

Rogue30 said:

I don't know about that.

I'm fairly sure that the target customer base (gamers) would be able to get on board with " Jedi Battles: LCG ", or similar, if FFG decided to do a second (player vs player) LCG somewhere down the line.

While there may be a whole multitude of reasons that they wouldn't do a second SW themed LCG, I don't think that naming issues will be one of them.

Rogue30 said:

I am still a little confused here. I am not sure who we are comparing testing with? I have played (too) many CCG's in my life, and I would put the # of mistakes by FFG probably close to the bottom. As I said, AEG just banned a few, Magic has their share...YGO has millions of them, and a super-duper restricted list (although no rotation) if I remember right.

It is part of the game, and overall I think FFG has done pretty well. Two full rotations have certainly helped that, in total card pool.

I just have never seen any numbers that says that FFG has more erratta/bannings/restrictions than any other game. *shrug*

Sidenote: I heard as well that FFG was not limited to one card game. Anything that brings in revenues with an accurate representation of the universe I am sure they will approve.

Last note: Decipher's 1v1 Star Wars game was an unmitigated success, and even still probably has more competative players than many games after being 'dead' for - what - five years? More? The company itself disinegrated though bad decisions and an employee stealing a TON of money. I knew some people over there, and even after paying Lucas they were pulling good $$ out of that game all the way until they lost the licence to a company that could keep its house in order (but unluckily, put out a crap game).

About a second card game:

Talking to several FFG employees at GenCon I head the response that "We can always make a second card game" in regards to complaints about the co-op game. FFG will do whatever makes money (rightfully so), and if they decide that a competitive game will do that then they will make a second game.

The Star Wars: The Card Game naming argument is hilarious. As I believe someone else said, they could just name it Star Wars: Jedi Battles or something like that. If they want to make another game then I'm sure that a name wouldn't stop them.

Not to derail the conversation, but could someone please explain to me the problem with Prince's plans and why people think it needs to be changed? I wasn't able to attend gencon, and my meta includes me and 2-3 other people, and no one uses martell. So I'm kind of confused how a card that removes all icons is overpowered, and causes card recursion.

thanks in advance.

http://www.agotcards.org/card/v/4023

That is the card people are talking about, if it were deathbound it would probably be more well balanced. As it stands currently once you turn up two of them (or an Open Market + Summer) you can achieve the recursion being talked about (Orphans, Burning, etc. etc.).

fhornmikey said:

Anyone else having a problem getting to this website? I cannot seem to get it to open up for me.

Winged_Human said:

Hah, looks like they're having bandwidth issues again (the price of popularity), here it is on CardGameDB:

http://www.cardgamedb.com/index.php/GoTCards.html/_/secrets-of-oldtown/the-isle-of-ravens/the-princes-plans-tior

Intentionally Anonymous said:

I suggest Star Wars: Goshdarnstud rules. That's kind of catchy. And I agree, a for profit company usually tries to make money.

@Rings I agree that the Decipher game was a success. I still have all the Imp cards I had purchased through what ever expansion I stopped at. (See in HS I was broke and my buddy played Rebels and we split the packs) Next event I'm bringing my cards so I can play (assuming someone else brings a rebel deck!)

goshdarnstud said:

I wouldn't buy that. Sounds fishy and broken already.

Intentionally Anonymous said:

Personally, I fail to see how a multiplayer SW LCG could possibly fail to make FF a stack of money any smaller than, based on a few basic calculations which I did in a spreadsheet, Detroit.

They've already sunk a load of money into SW art with the co-op game (and possibly there's additional arts purchased for X-Wing that aren't being used in LCG yet), so one of the major costs of making any new card game is completely absent. As such, all that they really need to do is lock a couple of designers in a room for a month or two, flog a graphic designer until they produce some eyecatching new cardframes/backs, then procure a Bothan to ferry the outcomes to the factory in China. Relatively speaking, it'd be a complete bargain to produce.

I know that FFG reuse artwork in different games, and I have no problem with that - but a Co-op LCG and a different, contemporary PvP LCG sharing the same artwork? I don't think that'd be a good idea.

Ratatoskr said:

Well, as they'd be two seperate gaming systems that you wouldn't be mingling together, there's no practical reason it wouldn't work. Once you get past the initial realisation that they'd both be card games, it's no more weird than having the AGOT Board Game and Battles of Westeros sharing a whole heap of artwork.

Either way, the point that '2nd SW Game would be cheaper to make, and would probably sell like hotcakes' stands. Even if FFG only had the two (theoretical) games share 30% of their artwork (say, generic ships/locations/worlds) that's still a massive saving on the development costs of the 2nd LCG.

The main argument against a 2nd SW LCG that I can see is that it might be viewed as a competitor to the co-op that wouldn't justify itself financially (as it'd have to pick up enough new players to justify the chunk of sales that it would be taking out of the co-op). Though, it's a fair argument that FFG has a fairly long track-record of producing LCGs that, to some degree at least, act as direct competitors to their other existing LCGs.

Alternatively, there is the depressing: 'players are stupid and we should try to avoid confusing them' line of thinking, which I could totally see putting the kibosh on a second SW LCG (i.e. a pvp one that I would actually buy).