HoyaLawya said:

And possibly even made to cry. Anecdotally.

I would pay FFG to be a playtester.

With Bastard coming back in the Lanni box, I don't think we need errata to the collar or the Maester agenda anymore. Bastard should do a good job paring back the Maesters.

Ratatoskr said:

Totally agree. I said many times and loudly how much it woudl be good to have Bastard back. I got smiles in return, so I was hoping!!!

Oh, and there is no requirements for FFG to listen to playtesters. Trust me...

Ratatoskr said:

Of course, that's speculation since there's an NDR, right?

Danigral said:

No, they announced it on the news feed.

Ah, sweet. I didn't read to the end...

Danigral said:

What's NDR mean?

Ratatoskr said:

I meant ND A , which means non-disclosure agreement.

Danigral said:

Ah, I see. That one I would've understood.

Ratatoskr said:

Norddeutscher Rundfunk

Rogue30 said:

I can imagine that with the LCG release cycle and the tons and tons of cards that are in the environment right now that the limited amount of time that the playtesters have it's making it increasingly hard to test the new sets. This is one place where a rotation schedule would benefit AGoT. But we all know that rotating sets out sucks so just disregard that statement.

widowmaker93 said:

Tons? 1000+ cards? Come on. Besides, usually you just need to look at 1 new card and you know something is wrong. The truth is, FFG make poor designing and testing. It's FFG fault, not our playtesters. I'm sure playtesters, just like other players find the best cards/combos quickly, if not immediately. Look at the top of this page - "Leading publisher of board, card, and roleplaying games" - yeah, right. And they don't have money to test properly? They don't have enough people to avoid mistakes, poor wordings (see new Tyrion), and rules confusion or lack of rules? (How many years must I wait to be sure that I can play an action before a challenge during epic phase? BTW If I don't know, then playtesters probably also don't know, and if playtesters don't know the rules, then how can they test anything properly?) But hey, they have money and people to make SW LCG and LotR LCG. Isn't that great? I really hope that Lanni box will be the last. Seems to me that all evil happened when they started to work on deluxe expansions (and Nate on other LCGs) - no wonder that "limited time" is a problem. People compare Magic to AGOT, but the main difference is that Wizards care about their leading game, and AGOT is just one of many FFG games.

Rogue30 said:

OK, so maybe tons is not the right word here? I never blamed the playtesters for the cards coming out and being overpowered or having poor wordings. They can only do so much and it's not their fault if the person over the AGOT testers doesn't want to listen to their input or has preconceived notions on what he wants. Nate jumping ship is most definitely the worst thing that has happened for AGoT. But then again that is a good thing for the LOTR and SW games so cudos to FFG for that. Noone should blame the testers because this is not their game. They can only make due with what is given to them. And for that I feel sorry for them.

Batsard deosn't solve the problem, in my opinion. The Collar can still be set up rigth on teh hsoue card and in play as early as Challebge Phase I. You would ahev to luck into an ealry draw of Batsard for the counter - the efficiency skews to the already stronger Maester build.

It remains way too efficient and easy to set this combo up.

Don't get me wrong though - Bastard coming abck is a very, very good thing. The environment will be much better for it.

And I aslo agree with rogue30 - the maester stuff, - like the Wildling stuff before it - is just way too good. I think design dropped the ball on those two cycles. Brotherhood and Shadows workes - these two didn't.

Stag Lord said:

I agree, although it is always a hard balance between making cards good enough to get people excited, but not too good to make everything else obsolete. Really I think Wildling and Maester were only one very minor change away from being designed very well with that balance in mind (the Wildling could have been -1 only if you had another Wildling in play or somethign, Maester could have said 'printed' or just not had the apprentice collar).

Remember, playtesting a ton doesn't make much money for FFG (law of diminishing returns to be sure). Making a new Star Wars LCG does , however. They are putting their resources where it makes them money, as any for-profit business does.

Does anyone realize that Bastard hardly stops the Maester agenda at all? I don't know if it is getting a direct reprint, but here is how the CCG version of Bastard read.

Condition After you play Bastard from your hand,discard all other attachments on attached character. Attached character gains the Bastard trait,loses a icon and cannot have attachments played on it.

Since the agenda puts attachments into play, it will bypass the restriction on Bastard. I realize Bastard will help remove existing chains, but it does nothing to prevent new chains from the agenda (barring the fact it might have been changed from the CCG version. I haven't seen a picture of the new one yet)

rings said:

What if game becomes irritating enough to be abandoned by players? I may be wrong, but I think selling AGOT is much money for FFG.

rings said:

Well, we will see. Besides, is that mean that SW will not be tested properly too? It's SW after all! It will sell anyway, even with zero playtesting, right?

Dobbler said:

hopefully they use "gains 'no attachments'". not sure if that templating was around in CCG days or not.

Rogue30 said:

Being playtested in a small amount will keep 95% of the competative players, and 100% of the casual players. Being playtested 5X more will then keep 99% of the competative players. In a fairly niche market mind you.

Then, compare that to a brand new Star Wars game. SW hasn't had a game in years. Again, it could have minimum playtesting and still make tons of $$, especially as a co-op where there is no competative environment.

Day 1 of playtesting makes them money. Day 100 doesn't. A 2% decrease in aGoT sales compared to a 100% increase in Star Wars sales? I know where I would put my $$ if I was FFG.

Dobbler: The bastard does, however, take off the 3-8 chains that an uber-character has on them, assuming they don't win the turn they put them on. I still think it helps.

papalorax said:

The character cannot gain a blanket "No attachments" otherwise Bastard would fall off. It would have to gain "No attachments but Bastard". I'm guessing this didn't happen, but I have no idea.

rings said:

Ah, so that's why we have poor playtesting. Now I understand.

As for SW, I guess Wizards version made tons of $$ too?

Dobbler said:

This is when the "played" and "put into play" difference becomes annoying. In order for this attachment to keep all other attachments off, you need add uncommonly used text to the card. This is why the "discard your hand" and "discard cards from your hand" is an annoying difference as well. In order to have the function of a card apply to both conditional sets, you'll need to reference both.

Rogue30 said:

Actually it did to start with (it was the #2 or #3 selling CCG for a year). And then people realized they used dice in a CCG. Which sucks. I would still bet in the two years of operations, they had more revenues than any five year period of aGoT...because it is Star Wars.

Decipher made a crap-load of $$ off it as well, before being stupid and having their CFO embezzle tons of $$, and etc. etc.

Look at LoTR. I guarantee their base set sold 5X the amount that aGoT did. Through the grapevine I heard it was so popular, they had to change Star Wars to co-op 1/2 of the way through (from vs. - again total gossip).

rings said:

Which saddens me greatly. Your comment earlier on the even lower threshold of playtesting necessary for a co-op game worries me because it makes sense. Why bother with head to head LCGs from here on out for the foreseeable future? Co-op sells and requires vastly less effort past the initial design. Ugh.

One Co-op was a fun change of pace. Past that, I don't have any interest.