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Post by: chaos0xomega
Title is hyperbole/a riff off the infamous New York Daily News headline during the 1976 Presidential election.
Atomic Mass posted this:
I have to say I'm devastated.
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Post by: ScarletRose
I feel like this is a bit of an inaccurate headline - they're not saying it's cancelled.
And Armada, perhaps even more so than X-wing, seemed to have a lot of stock issues. There were points of times when the basic fighter packs were going for quite a bit on ebay simply because no more had been made.
On the other hand I know FFG/AMG games live and die on having a stream of shiny new things to buy so maybe this'll be bad. Or maybe having basic products will attract new players, who knows?
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Post by: chaos0xomega
 ScarletRose wrote:I feel like this is a bit of an inaccurate headline - they're not saying it's cancelled.
Did you not read the first sentence in my post, nor read/watch the content in the link I shared elaborating on the reference I was making with it? Its a perfectly accurate headline, the context is essentially the same. Ford never told New York to 'drop dead', nor did him not giving the city additional funding "cancel" the city, in the same way that AMG didn't say the game is cancelled, nor does them not releasing further product prevent people from continuing to purchase and play it.
And Armada, perhaps even more so than X-wing, seemed to have a lot of stock issues. There were points of times when the basic fighter packs were going for quite a bit on ebay simply because no more had been made.
The stock issues are because everything sells out quickly. Everything sells out quickly because the demand for the product exceeds available supply. Demand for the product exceeds available supply because they only manufacture enough product to cover what they expect to sell based on their sales projections. They only manufacture enough product to cover what they expect to sell based on their sales projections because that is what they regard as being maximally profitable with minimal risk.
The fact that everything is constantly sold out proves that the game is/could be very profitable and is worth supporting, so stock issues aren't necessarily a bad thing in this context.
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Post by: Voss
Unprepared small studio under corporate overlords struggles with the backlog of multiple Star Wars product lines dropped in their laps. Goodness me, what a shock.
Armada was the best choice for a new product hiatus, as FFG left it with a legacy of neglect anyway.
--
Got to say, though, I absolute hate AMG's website. Finding anything on it (especially about the SW games) is basically a non-starter.
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Post by: Manchu
Sorry for Armada players as this looks to be the end. But glad I sold all my Armada stuff off years ago.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
Voss wrote:Unprepared small studio under corporate overlords struggles with the backlog of multiple Star Wars product lines dropped in their laps. Goodness me, what a shock.
Armada was the best choice for a new product hiatus, as FFG left it with a legacy of neglect anyway.
I think this is an overly polite read of the situation. It hasn't been publicly stated but the discussion amongst those "in the know" (and I do have direct lines to a few people who worked at FFG and lost their jobs as a result of this) is that AMG was given the option to retain some or all of FFGs design staff and chose not to, and only extended an offer to a couple of people to allow them to interview for their jobs, of which they only hired one, who they fired less than a year later (3 weeks ago in fact). So the unprepared bit is definitely accurate, but I would follow it with "and poorly mis-managed".
Also, FFG left Amada (specifically Armada) with a product development roadmap that Lucasfilm had approved out to 2023, which is far from "neglect". There was a lot of content in various stages of development (scuttlebutt from my contacts says there was at least one more wave of Clone Wars stuff that was basically ready to go in terms of design and development, they only needed to move ahead with production on it). In terms of sales, they literally could not produce product fast enough, the demand for it was clearly there.
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Post by: OrlandotheTechnicoloured
the big question I have is when they got 'given' the starwars line did they get given an appropriate budget to manage them with,
yes they're an internal asmodee studio, but that doesn't necessarily mean they have access to a bottomless pot of cash (or even a pot of cash as big as FFG were playing with)
expecting bits of a business to do more with less is typical venture capital firm behaviour and might explain why so few of the FFG starwars staff were taken across, and why a mapped out release pipeline was dropped, no money to pay for completion and production
not that it really makes a difference to Armada players, as no new releases planned mean an dying game at best, which probably means a canceled game in fairly short order
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Post by: chaos0xomega
Right now I'm thinking its a license issue. Asmodees Star Wars license expires in the 2023-2024 timeframe (if not very early 2025). It takes them 18-24 months to take a product from concept to release. With all the delays and everything its possible that they don't have any optimism to be able to get something out for Armada with enough time on the market to make the investment in time/money/resources worthwhile before the license goes.
It could be that if/when they renew the license things will pick back up and those negotiations are ongoing, but the fact that they felt compelled to post this doesn't leave me with very much hope of that occurring. I think its likely that Disney/Lucasfilm upped the license fee that they were asking for and Asmodee walked. Alternatively, Disney/Lucasfilm want to put it out to bid to see what they can get for it.
Right now, I expect we'll be seeing similar announcements made for X-Wing/Legion within the next 12-18 months.
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Post by: BrianDavion
that's my read too, the SW RPG, which used to be FFG and is now in the Edge has done the same thing, Edge studio has said that they'll continue to print what they currently have, but won't be producing anything else until the lisence gets renewed.
to be brutally honest though that makes me suspect that there's some serious doubt that the lisence WILL be renewed, Disney may be displeased with the fact that they gave the lisence to one company and it's since been bought out and parted out to a number of differant companies.
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Post by: Genoside07
Isn't the woman that was the head of Disney liaison for Fantasy Flight the head of Atomic Mass Games now? You would think she would be the one that knows what is going on.
If feels like they might have a tight overhead, if something doesn't make big money, they could lose their jobs. So they don't want to take any chances and just keep printing stuff
that is already made with active orders for.
I was slow-building my Armada stuff and this will only make it worse on trying to find stuff. Looks like building the new armies need to be taken off the list and focus on getting
the last few models I need for Imperial and Rebels, then call it done.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
Yes, Simone Elliott went from managing the Disney license for FFG to managing all of AMG.
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Post by: BrianDavion
 Genoside07 wrote:Isn't the woman that was the head of Disney liaison for Fantasy Flight the head of Atomic Mass Games now? You would think she would be the one that knows what is going on.
She'll know whats going on on her end but that doesn't mean she'll nesscarily know for sure what disney's planning. Heck, IIRC FFG got the SW lisence before disney even purchased Lucasfilm, there may be the very real chance Disney may not be intreasted in extending the lisence for some reason. not saying it's garenteed, but yeah given the lead time on product development, in AMG's shoes I'd proably be leery of producing anything new.
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Post by: hotsauceman1
Sounds to me like the switchover and covid ared taking their toll.
I expect new stuf for armada within a year.
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Post by: treslibras
Agree with other sentiments here - this was a likely outcome of a business decision to cut miniature lines out of FFG, just as they did with the PnP rpg before.
And like before, they gave it to a company that fit the product type, without the capabilities to continue development within the next 2-3 years.
And if the licence is up for renewal in 2024, as chaos0xomega wrote, then anything else but reprinting old stuff is indeed most likely off the tables right now, especially seeing how the decision to gut FFG was a corporate one in the first place, i.e. Asmodee will want to further cut costs, not invest in the continuation or even remodelling of a product line, at this point.
What has been pre-planned/put into the production chain by FFG was still being published and then all 3 games are in hibernation. Which should be right about now.
And that effectively means that the games are dead, right now.
Because when a game cannot make the news anymore and product shortages are increasing rather than decreasing, new players do not invest, and old ones will wander off.
(BTW, shops in my area just got the first reprints of some english SW RPG books in 2 years - that is of the latest publications (Allies and adversaries etc.). If that is any indication for the reprinting of miniature lines through Asmodee supply chains, the games are more than dead.)
In the best scenario, we are looking at a Blood Bowl situation, where the community builds something improved and extended from the old, and once corporate world catches up again, they can use that community to start over.
A problem (for AMG or whoever) might be that 3D prints will diminsh demand for official new models, the longer it takes to restart production.
(Unless Disney finally decides to start descending on 3d modellers and - printing services.)
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Post by: Albertorius
BrianDavion wrote:that's my read too, the SW RPG, which used to be FFG and is now in the Edge has done the same thing, Edge studio has said that they'll continue to print what they currently have, but won't be producing anything else until the lisence gets renewed.
to be brutally honest though that makes me suspect that there's some serious doubt that the lisence WILL be renewed, Disney may be displeased with the fact that they gave the lisence to one company and it's since been bought out and parted out to a number of differant companies.
It might be easier than all that: they might just not want a repeat of the GW renewal debacle, where they had to just toss into the trash a lot of developments for something that was supposed to be a "done deal".
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Post by: The_Real_Chris
 Albertorius wrote:
It might be easier than all that: they might just not want a repeat of the GW renewal debacle, where they had to just toss into the trash a lot of developments for something that was supposed to be a "done deal".
What happened with that licence?
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Post by: Albertorius
The_Real_Chris wrote: Albertorius wrote:
It might be easier than all that: they might just not want a repeat of the GW renewal debacle, where they had to just toss into the trash a lot of developments for something that was supposed to be a "done deal".
What happened with that licence?
It got to the end, and FFG and GW didn't reach an agreement for renewal (internal scuttlebutt points to FFG being very, very surprised by that). But FFG had continued developing and releasing stuff until the end (and even after in some cases), so they had to toss a lot of things and abruptly end some others.
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Post by: MarkNorfolk
The_Real_Chris wrote: Albertorius wrote:
It might be easier than all that: they might just not want a repeat of the GW renewal debacle, where they had to just toss into the trash a lot of developments for something that was supposed to be a "done deal".
What happened with that licence?
We'll never know for sure. As with licenses, somebody somewhere thinks they could charge a certain amount and somebody somewhere else looks at the cashflow model and decides the best thing is to drop it. Some people that FFG moving into miniature wargames with Runewars (but they needed of worried as FFG mishandled the whole thing).
Of more concern would be to avoid the Android: Netrunner debacle.
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Post by: caladancid
Albertorius wrote:The_Real_Chris wrote: Albertorius wrote:
It might be easier than all that: they might just not want a repeat of the GW renewal debacle, where they had to just toss into the trash a lot of developments for something that was supposed to be a "done deal".
What happened with that licence?
It got to the end, and FFG and GW didn't reach an agreement for renewal (internal scuttlebutt points to FFG being very, very surprised by that). But FFG had continued developing and releasing stuff until the end (and even after in some cases), so they had to toss a lot of things and abruptly end some others.
What happened with the GW license is that FFG began making a direct competitor to Warhammer for some unknown reason (Rune Wars I think?). One of the worst business decisions made by any company in the last decade. Of course GW didn't want to give their license to a company that would bring people to their store using GW and then sell them a different game.
That decision led to a lot of things- I think ultimately it weakened FFG to the point where it got sold to Asmodee.
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Post by: Albertorius
caladancid wrote:That decision led to a lot of things- I think ultimately it weakened FFG to the point where it got sold to Asmodee.
...what? No. Not in the slightest. FFG has been part of Asmodee since 2014. That was years after that.
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Post by: caladancid
Albertorius wrote:caladancid wrote:That decision led to a lot of things- I think ultimately it weakened FFG to the point where it got sold to Asmodee.
...what? No. Not in the slightest. FFG has been part of Asmodee since 2014. That was years after that.
Which part are you saying not in the slightest? It is absolutely true that FFG violated their agreement with GW and that is why they lost the license. If it was a surprise to FFG, it was because they didn't read the contract.
edit-
Oh, only the sold part. I was referring to the ultimate breaking up of the company that has been happening.
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Post by: Arbitrator
Wasn't the contract that FFG couldn't make models depicting Warhammer, which is why Relic had the busts instead? People cite RuneWars, but getting the Star Wars license and X-Wing taking off (heh) feel like a more probable reason than because they were making a rank and file wargame with their own IP at a time when GW were dragging Fantasy behind the shed. Tome of Decay spending years in limbo (everyone thought Black Crusade was dead when it was suddenly announced out of nowhere) and the Specialist book for Only War never materialising do make me wonder if things were happening behind the scenes for longer than the rug suddenly being pulled out though. caladancid wrote:That decision led to a lot of things- I think ultimately it weakened FFG to the point where it got sold to Asmodee.
They'd had the Star Wars license for a years at that point. 40k products were barely a blip on the radar compared to that.
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Post by: Albertorius
caladancid wrote: Albertorius wrote:caladancid wrote:That decision led to a lot of things- I think ultimately it weakened FFG to the point where it got sold to Asmodee.
...what? No. Not in the slightest. FFG has been part of Asmodee since 2014. That was years after that.
Which part are you saying not in the slightest? It is absolutely true that FFG violated their agreement with GW and that is why they lost the license. If it was a surprise to FFG, it was because they didn't read the contract.
edit-
Oh, only the sold part. I was referring to the ultimate breaking up of the company that has been happening.
Well, it could as well be to the rest, too. Do you have any actual data about the bolded assertion? Because that's not what I have been told, by some people sort of high profile on FFG. As far as I know, there was no clause at all in the contract preventing FFG from doing anything related with what you've stated: AFAIK, the only thing they were prohibited to do was releasing any miniatures game using the GW IP, and no miniatures for any of their boardgame that could be used as a gaming miniature for GW miniatures games (which is the main reason why the 40k Talisman uses busts).
Logically enough, OTOH.
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Post by: frankelee
People see amazingly complex narratives when looking at nothing at all. Armada doesn't sell very well. Its revenue when compared to the costs doesn't cover its manufacture, development, and share of overhead for the company at large. And so it goes bye bye.
I saw some in other forums delusionally clinging to the idea that this is just a polite announcement that they don't have any stuff planned for awhile, so you don't have to wonder, and then of course things will crank up again in a year.
It's not a real life version of Game of Thrones happening at Asmodee, it's a product line that was holding on by a thread, if that, that was simultaneously moved over to another department along with all other such product lines. That it got the ax is a necessary coincidence.
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Post by: kodos
It was about X-Wing, the agreement was the FFG does not make a Wargame, so they made the X-Wing Boardgame but because it grew in popularity withing the wargaming community, GW saw this a breach of contract and the license was done
hence why it was a surprise at FFG as they never thought about that
Runewars came out after that
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Post by: Albertorius
 kodos wrote:It was about X-Wing, the agreement was the FFG does not make a Wargame, so they made the X-Wing Boardgame but because it grew in popularity withing the wargaming community, GW saw this a breach of contract and the license was done
hence why it was a surprise at FFG as they never thought about that
Runewars came out after that
I can only say that it's not what I've been told (meaning, that I've been told there was no clause about wargames on the contract).
But it can perfectly be that GW simply saw it that way.
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Post by: kodos
I don't know what was in the contract or what GW claimed the breach of contract was
just that it was about X-Wing because GW claimed it is something FFG should not have done (and competes with their main games) while FFG saw it as Boardgame that does not compete at all with the GW games
back to Armada, a game were you have problems with supply, hence no ones buys it, so you need to stop because you are not selling enough
well, also giving 3 additional games to a company that is able to handle 1 might not have been the best idea and that 1 or even 2 of them will be cut was expected
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Post by: hotsauceman1
 frankelee wrote:People see amazingly complex narratives when looking at nothing at all. Armada doesn't sell very well. Its revenue when compared to the costs doesn't cover its manufacture, development, and share of overhead for the company at large. And so it goes bye bye.
I saw some in other forums delusionally clinging to the idea that this is just a polite announcement that they don't have any stuff planned for awhile, so you don't have to wonder, and then of course things will crank up again in a year.
It's not a real life version of Game of Thrones happening at Asmodee, it's a product line that was holding on by a thread, if that, that was simultaneously moved over to another department along with all other such product lines. That it got the ax is a necessary coincidence.
I quite frankly see it as an aqnnouncement of nothing planned for a bit, they wouldnt do orginized play for a game never coming back.
Everything coming out for legion, including the new faction, are all made from FFG. the Armada stuff was the last of it. they had a roadmap but from what i hear not much of what FFG started is being continued.
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Post by: Sarouan
Well, I do remember when Armada first came out and it was mostly the comparison with X-Wing that hurted it - Armada was way more expensive (because bigger battle scale and bigger ships, duh) and at that time, X-Wing was still seen as a good cheap game you can have fun with with just a couple of ships so the investment wasn't that big.
Armada was nothing like that. Also troubles with the scales of fighters / ships that weren't really coherent with Star War's background (for game's sake and visual design, IMHO) and...let's say a more complicated set of rules didn't help for attracting a lot of players.
Asmodée is certainly a worse company than GW towards customers so I'm not surprised to have this announcement. FFG games are all fated to die if they don't bring huge amounts of cash to their corporate overlords, anyway. That's why the Runewars debacle left me indifferent. It was to be expected, it's their business model and their weird release calendar that killed it.
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Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik
The price point is a bugbear of mine.
The bigger ships from what I’ve seen are really nice, and a decent size. I’d happily get some for display, but man…..the price,
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Post by: hotsauceman1
yeah compared to legion, in which they are relatively cheap. a decent 800pt list could cost you 200$.
HQ are like 12-17$ and troops ragnes from 25-30
Granted they are going a bit up being hard plastic, but to me that is worth it
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Post by: frankelee
 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:The price point is a bugbear of mine.
The bigger ships from what I’ve seen are really nice, and a decent size. I’d happily get some for display, but man…..the price,
I remember seeing the new ships at the game store for the first time and thinking they were pretty cool. And then I flipped the box over to see the price tag and put the box back. The funny thing is, I think Armada would have died on the shelves back in 2015 if it had to survive under the same conditions as the new Prequel sets. The new starters are the same price as the old starter, yes, except not really because the old starter was available at 50% off on Amazon every day of the week. And the other ships in Waves 1 and 2 were also frequently or constantly available at steep discounts.
I know when we talk price, fans always say, "Hey I think at that price it's an amazing value!" And I agree with them. I think just one plastic Armada ship is worth all the gold, silver, and precious jewels in the world, and if Asmodee asks that as the price you should totally pay it and be happy with your purchase. Really they should be charging what it would actually cost to build a 1000 meter long space ship in real life for each and every single one of these plastic ships, absolutely, I 110% agree with that. However, it was my experience in the game store that day, that even though I had enough fun money in my wallet to walk out of there with a fleet for each of the two new factions under my arms, I nonetheless did not really want to spend my money that way. And although I usually assume my experience is completely ungeneralizable to the wider public, in this case I think maybe it's the opposite, I think a lot of previous Armada players looked at those prices and thought, "Nah, I'm cool." Because it was priced to sell in a market that doesn't exist anymore.
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Post by: Dysartes
Aye, the sticker shock for the original start stopped me even considering picking up Armada - though I might've considered some of the fighter packs as painting projects.
Same is true of Marvel Crisis Protocol, though.
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Post by: warboss
I had the same sticker shock when the game premiered but didn't stick around to see if it was available cheaper. The mechanics didn't catch me immediately from the gameplay videos (unlike with X-wing). I do regret it a little bit in not picking up a bunch of the ships at that 50% off though just for generic future spacebattles but I didn't know about it.
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Post by: Dysartes
I will say that I should've gotten a demo of Armada at some point, but the stars never really aligned for that.
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Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik
Wonder if we might see BFG return.
Of late, GW have had a pretty decent run of luck zigging when competitors have just zagged right off a cliff edge. So I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s shown off at the next Con thing.
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Post by: AndrewGPaul
I'm in a minority round my way, but Armada simply didn't feel like a Star Wars game, unlike X-Wing. And they burned through all the ships anyone had ever heard about in the first year of release, reduced to Star Destroyer repaints and trying to convince people that Rebel Transports are combat units rather than objective tokens.
It was ... OK, I suppose, but it shovelled on fiddly mechanics and components that didn't do it any favours.
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Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik
So, to court criticism for writing it off?
If it is the first step to the system being dropped….what do people think it might do to the prices?
I really wouldn’t mind picking some Capital Ships up for display, so kinda hoping I might get some at sale prices.
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Post by: totalfailure
Or, is it just possible that capital ship starship combat games just aren’t a license to print money after all? Armada is a game in a niche of a niche genre, saddled by a very expensive license as well. That said, any number of other starship combat games have crashed and burned the last decade, with and without licenses.
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Post by: ScarletRose
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:So, to court criticism for writing it off?
If it is the first step to the system being dropped….what do people think it might do to the prices?
I really wouldn’t mind picking some Capital Ships up for display, so kinda hoping I might get some at sale prices.
Honestly I'd just pick up some Bandai kits instead. You can get a star destroyer or an Executor pretty cheap when they're not part of a wargame.
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Post by: Azreal13
My whole gut feeling around AMG right now is they're barely holding it together.
I assume Crisis Protocol is outselling X Wing and Armada combined, given its the new shiny and also arguably the more popular IP (at this moment.)
But even Crisis Protocol seems to be struggling with a slew of new releases but poor availability of older stuff meaning if you don't grab something there's a good chance you won't find it down the line.
Perhaps it's all related? It's all Disney after all, and perhaps the high frequency of MCP releases is all tied into getting the assets liquid before the licence go boom?
I'd say Asmodee/FFG's historically terrible stock management has just infected the new baby of the family is the most likely explanation, but the relentless waves of stuff have made it really hard to keep up with MCP to the point I've given up, and now I may never be able to revisit stuff I'd have ultimately bought. Or not for a long while at least.
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Post by: hotsauceman1
MCP is facing the same problems every other company is.
Shipping is screwed up
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Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik
Well, GW are in a better position because they’re less dependent on getting their stuff made in China.
Not an attack on China specifically, just that when you’ve outsourced your supply chain anywhere, you’re adding an extra vulnerability.
For GW, it’s (according to my local manager, so salt to taste) that whilst their second factory site is up and running, nothing could be run at capacity due to social distancing and disinfecting between shifts.
Now, assume this is the same issue in Chinese factories, then add needing to get it from there, to you or your preferred distribution hub, and it’s something GW don’t have to deal with in the same way (though is allegedly the issue behind Cursed City’s, well, Curse)
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Post by: ImAGeek
 hotsauceman1 wrote:MCP is facing the same problems every other company is.
Shipping is screwed up
Asmodee have never been good at distribution, even before shipping was an issue.
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Post by: lord_blackfang
So would you say this is an... Atomic Mess?
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Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik
Slightly less messy than their attempt at a product reveal show a few months back, where they couldn’t even get the ship centred on camera?
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Post by: Arbitrator
At least in the UK, Crisis Protocol stock hasn't been too bad. The first run usually sells out pretty quick but sourcing one isn't out of the question if you poke around a bit, with the odd exception like Venom. Punisher/Taskmaster was quite hard to find for a bit, but not impossible.
Legion was pretty dire for most of the FFG run, but after the ARC restocks it's not been too bad and restocks seem to land close enough that people aren't waiting months to get them again.
A Song of Ice and Fire on the other hand, some stuff like Rose Knights haven't seen a restock in over a year. Tully Cavaliers and Bolton Blackguards were the same until recently. I only mention it here because it's another Asmodee distributed game.
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Post by: Aeneades
 Arbitrator wrote:A Song of Ice and Fire on the other hand, some stuff like Rose Knights haven't seen a restock in over a year. Tully Cavaliers and Bolton Blackguards were the same until recently. I only mention it here because it's another Asmodee distributed game.
Rose Knight restock came in July.
If you need some then current cheapest seems to be - https://www.board-game.co.uk/product/a-song-of-ice-and-fire-expansion-rose-knights-expansion/
New releases have dried up for 2 months now though, I think we are either 5 or 6 units releases behind America.
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Post by: ListenToMeWarriors
My favourite with ASOIAF was waiting over a year for the Night's Watch starter to be released. I have found with the UK releases preorder and just wait for the release to avoid disappointment...my record wait thus far was about 14 months for the Targaryen Hrakkars.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
I can offer some insight on the GW licensing aspect. There is/was (in the past) no clauses or stipulations disallowing design, production, and sale of competing miniature and war game products. there were clauses and stipulations which, if you squint, could be interpreted as meaning that under certain circumstances, particularly if you're a hard-ass lawyer with a chip on your shoulder and instructions to find a way to break a contractual agreement.
In FFG's case, there wasn't (to my knowledge) any sort of breach of contract type stuff involved. The contract came up for renewal, W was unhappy about FFG and directly competing with its other product lines, and made certain demands of FFG in order to negotiate the renewal. FFG declined those demands, and both companies parted ways as a result, more or less a mutual decision. In the case of certain other partnerships - see my comment about squinting and disgruntled lawyers.
frankelee wrote:People see amazingly complex narratives when looking at nothing at all. Armada doesn't sell very well. Its revenue when compared to the costs doesn't cover its manufacture, development, and share of overhead for the company at large. And so it goes bye bye.
This is not accurate. The fact that Armada is constantly sold out and being reprinted and restocked indicates quite the opposite about it, that the game actually sells very well and is more than profitable enough to cover its own costs. When a company like AMG/ FFG/Admodee, or really any competent company in this industry, green lights production on a game like this they first analyze expected sales versus the costs to develop and produce the game, inclusive of all overhead and indirect costs. If those costs succeed the revenue generated by the expected sales, then the game doesn't get greenlit. If If the revenue generated only minorly exceeds the costs and it's clear that the ROI on the product line is not as high as what could be generated from investment on a different product, than the game doesn't get greenlit. when the expected sales exceed the costs, and the ROI is acceptable relative to other uses of the investment funds, then the game gets greenlit.
The fact that the game has something like 8 years and a dozen waves of product behind it, and tons and tons of sold out restocks behind it as well, would indicate that the game does sell very well and does cover all of the associated developmental, production, overhead, and indirect costs behind it. If it didn't, all of those expansions would not have been green lake. If it didn't all of those reprints would not have been greenlit. An expansion would not be authorized if the ROI on the expansion didn't meet performance standards. a reprint would not be authorized if the ROI on the reprint would not meet performance standards. We don't need to have hard data in front of us to know that the game sales performance is strong enough to have justified all of the support that it's received to date.
The fact that in this post AMG committed to continuing to reprint and restock existing products would corroborate this. If they were suffering losses on those existing products, they would not be continuing to reprint and restock them. this is just pure common sense.
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Post by: frankelee
FFG losing the license also occurred at the start of the Rountree era, and there was much speculation at the time that GW wanted to bring smaller games back in-house. They haven't really made much in the way that would be similar to what FFG would have made for them, but the certainly have entered the world of smaller games with enthusiasm.
As to Armada, I would say, jargon aside, that it quite clearly is not selling well, the prequel era ships were an attempt after a hiatus to jumpstart the product line again, and the revenue they generated was a disappointment that didn't justify the line's continuance.
Selling out is a completely unreliable metric, that doesn't tell us anything without other data points. Data points such as them cancelling the game because it doesn't sell well. Also, if anybody wants the new Armada ships, they're widely available online and at retail stores near you, at least in North America. Which doesn't make them feel very sold out anyway.
There's nothing particularly telling in their "reprint and restock" promise either, FFG has advanced on-going reprint orders with their Chinese factories for their products they haven't cancelled yet, the developmental costs are already paid for, it would actually be quite normal for a dead game that's not generating acceptable revenue to still get stocked for a year after they decide to pull the plug. They did with Runewars. Not to mention they may well have warehouses full of it that they want to get rid of, and the "reprint" is not going to mean what optimistic fans hope it means. The game is cancelled.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
frankelee wrote:
As to Armada, I would say, jargon aside, that it quite clearly is not selling well, the prequel era ships were an attempt after a hiatus to jumpstart the product line again, and the revenue they generated was a disappointment that didn't justify the line's continuance.
An AMG employee(well, technically contractor) in the Armada discord literally said that the game continues to sell really well and product continues to actively sell out well in advance of their projections. So, no - you're wrong.
Selling out is a completely unreliable metric, that doesn't tell us anything without other data points. Data points such as them cancelling the game because it doesn't sell well. Also, if anybody wants the new Armada ships, they're widely available online and at retail stores near you, at least in North America. Which doesn't make them feel very sold out anyway.
One of the two Clone Wars starter sets actually did briefly sell out in both the Asmodee and FFG online stores and in many distributors. It was said that they had an early second wave of product for the Clone Wars releases in anticipation of demand (i.e. a "pre-reprint") which is why it didn't completely disappear from shelves. The Venator is also sold out in many places (including Asmodees online store, Fantasy Flights online store was briefly sold out as well but recently restocked (likely a similar second wave/pre-reprint).As far as Asmodee and AMG are concerned, "selling out" means their own inventory is depleted. They don't particularly care if you can go to your local store and buy them, Asmodee was already paid for that product and they have already extracting whatever profit or revenue they can derive from it.
There's nothing particularly telling in their "reprint and restock" promise either, FFG has advanced on-going reprint orders with their Chinese factories for their products they haven't cancelled yet, the developmental costs are already paid for, it would actually be quite normal for a dead game that's not generating acceptable revenue to still get stocked for a year after they decide to pull the plug. They did with Runewars. Not to mention they may well have warehouses full of it that they want to get rid of, and the "reprint" is not going to mean what optimistic fans hope it means. The game is cancelled.
Have you ever done business in China before? An "advance on-going reprint order" can be pulled at any time essentially at no cost. #1 rule of dealing with a chinese factory is never pay up front or make a deposit, because the factory can and will walk away with your money and you have no recourse to see it or what you paid for again. Likewise, FFG has no real obligation to carry through on a reprint order that hasn't entered into production yet. If it did enter production, the more likely thing for them to do would be to cancel any further reprints, ship and release whatever was already completed, and then drop this announcement.
They also don't necessarily have "warehouses full of product" - the industry as a whole, and Asmodee in particular, operate very lean when it comes to how much inventory they retain in their warehouses. The majority of their product orders are delivered immediately to their distributors and retailers, they only keep a bare minimum of inventory for themselves to cover short-term restocks in between reprints, as well as allocating some product to their own direct online sales channel.
The comparison to Rune Wars is also poor. When Rune Wars was shitcanned they announced it via ending their Organized Play program. They actually never ran a reprint for any of the Rune Wars products. While FFG and AMG might have differences in communication, manufacturing, logistics, supply chain, production quantities, etc are all centralized under Asmodee corporate. There is a stark difference in how Asmodee is handling these two games which should be immediately obvious and has strong implications in terms of their relative strengths as revenue/profit generating product lines.
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Post by: hotsauceman1
Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
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Post by: Stormonu
I'm rather surpised Armada has held on as long as it has. In my area, the FLGS stopped carrying it after their stock sat unsold for about a year (and organized play died about a month after initial release), and output for the game has seemed sluggish. As others have said, getting product has been annoyingly difficult, especially online.
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Post by: BrianDavion
hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
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Post by: kodos
Arkham Horror would come to my mind as original IP that works
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Post by: Albertorius
BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Let's see... anything set on Terrinoth, the Android setting or the Midnight RPG, for example.
Or hell, Twilight Imperium.
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Post by: BrianDavion
fair eneugh, I'm sure there was some stuff, just didn't know any off the top of my head
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Post by: ImAGeek
kodos wrote:Arkham Horror would come to my mind as original IP that works
I’m not sure a game set in the Cthulhu Mythos is an original IP, and I think there was an old version before FFG took it over.
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Post by: Albertorius
 ImAGeek wrote: kodos wrote:Arkham Horror would come to my mind as original IP that works
I’m not sure a game set in the Cthulhu Mythos is an original IP, and I think there was an old version before FFG took it over.
Indeed, the original was published by Chaosium.
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Post by: AduroT
BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
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Post by: MarkNorfolk
 AduroT wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
Hence Runewars. They were trying to lever the Terrinoth setting in to a wargame (and an RPG at roughly the same time). Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, it just didn't take.
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Post by: Arbitrator
The Genysis RPG is their own creation which is doing really well in the 'settingless PnP game' market.
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Post by: warboss
AduroT wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
Yup, those were the two I was about to name drop as well. I enjoyed them both when they came out but haven't kept up with either in the editions since though.
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Post by: Polonius
When I was a wee little Polonius, knee high unto a grasshopper, my Pa took my aside one day. As we sipped on cold sasparilla, he told me, “Son, you’re gonna see alll manner of fancy games. But some will only break your heart. Be wary of pre painted miniatures, naval fleet battles, and licensed properties.”
Then my Ma stuck her head out the window and chimed in, “Also remember that undercapitilization, not incompetence, is what sinks more businesses.”
They were simple folk, but they understood the ways of the world.
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Post by: NewTruthNeomaxim
 warboss wrote: AduroT wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
Yup, those were the two I was about to name drop as well. I enjoyed them both when they came out but haven't kept up with either in the editions since though.
Twilight Imperium was a Dune IP game until copyright issues caused them to wholly rebuild it. Technically, even it was born from an unoriginal source.
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Post by: Albertorius
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: warboss wrote: AduroT wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
Yup, those were the two I was about to name drop as well. I enjoyed them both when they came out but haven't kept up with either in the editions since though.
Twilight Imperium was a Dune IP game until copyright issues caused them to wholly rebuild it. Technically, even it was born from an unoriginal source.
I believe you're thinking of Rex, which was indeed a reskin of the Dune boardgame.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
 Polonius wrote:When I was a wee little Polonius, knee high unto a grasshopper, my Pa took my aside one day. As we sipped on cold sasparilla, he told me, “Son, you’re gonna see alll manner of fancy games. But some will only break your heart. Be wary of pre painted miniatures, naval fleet battles, and licensed properties.”
Then my Ma stuck her head out the window and chimed in, “Also remember that undercapitilization, not incompetence, is what sinks more businesses.”
They were simple folk, but they understood the ways of the world.
Truly wise. This is why I buy absurd amounts of XWing/Armada/Legion product, well beyond reasonable levels. These games won't be around forever, and who knows what they might be replaced with when they go.
A large collection means I can continue playing them indefinitely.
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Post by: WUWU
hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
The Runewars rule set was basically an improved X-Wing with a rank and file spin on it. Better than anything GW has ever produced. It failed for a number of reasons, mostly I would say negligence on FFGs part, but the rules were not one of those reasons.
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Post by: ERJAK
WUWU wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
The Runewars rule set was basically an improved X-Wing with a rank and file spin on it. Better than anything GW has ever produced. It failed for a number of reasons, mostly I would say negligence on FFGs part, but the rules were not one of those reasons.
It was a mediocre flank and spank game. I know it's trendy to gak on GW but...no. It's not better than everything GW has ever produced.
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Post by: Dysartes
AduroT wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Twilight Imperium and Decent have done well for them.
I'd say Descent has done decently... 
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Post by: WUWU
ERJAK wrote:WUWU wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
The Runewars rule set was basically an improved X-Wing with a rank and file spin on it. Better than anything GW has ever produced. It failed for a number of reasons, mostly I would say negligence on FFGs part, but the rules were not one of those reasons.
It was a mediocre flank and spank game. I know it's trendy to gak on GW but...no. It's not better than everything GW has ever produced.
Runewars took the movement dial from X-Wing and tied variable initiative values to each unique maneuver, for each unique unit. Never been anything else like it, and far from a "flank and spank". You've never played it, fine.
GW has been designing games like they are still in the '80s, since the '80s.
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Post by: MaxT
The quickest way to kill a game is to announce that there will be no new products for it. Everything after that will become self fulfilling.
Not AMGs fault, they clearly got the mother of all hospital passes from Asmodee corporate.
I’d not bother with those reprints. Not many stores will be daft enough to buy meaningful volumes of stock. No one wants to be left holding the baby
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Post by: Slipspace
I'm not sure I buy this idea that Armada was doing fine and this isn't just a purely business-related decision based on poor sales. It may not be completely representative of a game's success, but if you compare the numbers participating in the official world championships for Armada and X-Wing it appears X-Wing was more than 4 times as popular. That agrees fairly well with the local situation pre-Covid where X-Wing tournaments drew around 30 players and Armada tended to be the same group of 6-8 people.
It seems likely AMG have been dumped with these three new games and the reality is they can't cope with them all. Of the three X-Wing is the most historically successful and continues to sell well, though not as well as it once did, Legion seems to have grabbed a good bit of attention and sales (again, judging locally) and Armada looks like the odd one out. I fear for its future.
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Post by: The_Real_Chris
Armada turned me off with the lack of consistent scale and then the up gunning of the rebels. I get why, just didn't like the choices.
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Post by: Coenus Scaldingus
BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Besides the various games+settings mentioned in response to this question already, it seems rather unfair to the games designers to attribute the successes only to the IPs. The various FFG games I've played have typically been very enjoyable, fairly intuitive, certainly interesting and largely characterful to the setting they were part of. The settings don't have to be original for the games to be. Let's face it, it's not like Star Wars fans will automatically like something just because it's called "Star Wars".  Not that the IPs won't help get people interested to begin with, but it's not the whole story of ongoing popularity and commercial success.
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Post by: BrianDavion
 Coenus Scaldingus wrote:BrianDavion wrote: hotsauceman1 wrote:Runewars was a failure for a multitude of reasons, sculpts, no advertizing, poor rules, generic lore.
which raises the question....... has FFG ever produced anything good that was ORIGINAL? seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
Besides the various games+settings mentioned in response to this question already, it seems rather unfair to the games designers to attribute the successes only to the IPs. The various FFG games I've played have typically been very enjoyable, fairly intuitive, certainly interesting and largely characterful to the setting they were part of. The settings don't have to be original for the games to be. Let's face it, it's not like Star Wars fans will automatically like something just because it's called "Star Wars". Not that the IPs won't help get people interested to begin with, but it's not the whole story of ongoing popularity and commercial success.
not at all, but if a gaming company is dependant on a lisence for all of it's sucess that can make them HUUUGELY vunerable to a lisence loss. losing the SW lisence would have crippled them, for example. that said even FFG seemed to reckongize this, hence their adopting the SWRPG system they developed to the more generic genysis system
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Post by: Midnightdeathblade
I have a feeling after this wave of Star Wars Legion releases we wont be seeing much of that in a while either.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
Slipspace wrote:I'm not sure I buy this idea that Armada was doing fine and this isn't just a purely business-related decision based on poor sales. It may not be completely representative of a game's success, but if you compare the numbers participating in the official world championships for Armada and X-Wing it appears X-Wing was more than 4 times as popular. That agrees fairly well with the local situation pre-Covid where X-Wing tournaments drew around 30 players and Armada tended to be the same group of 6-8 people.
Thats not really saying anything, the size of worlds is fixed by FFG (and I guess now FFG if they continue doing it) and requires an invitation to play (though in some years they have done last chance qualifiers for various games). Also keep in mind that a game of Armada occupies 2x the footprint of a game of X-Wing.
The_Real_Chris wrote:Armada turned me off with the lack of consistent scale and then the up gunning of the rebels. I get why, just didn't like the choices.
Yeah, agreed. Having seen what many of the ships would look like in scale proportional to an Armada Star Destroyer, I understand why they opted to go for the sliding scale, but it would be cool if they had scaled everything down so that the game actually lived up to its namesake and you were playing fleet scale engagements more along the lines of the Battle of Endor or the Siege of Coruscant as opposed to the small task force skirmishes that the game is actually focused on.
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Post by: Togusa
Slipspace wrote:I'm not sure I buy this idea that Armada was doing fine and this isn't just a purely business-related decision based on poor sales. It may not be completely representative of a game's success, but if you compare the numbers participating in the official world championships for Armada and X-Wing it appears X-Wing was more than 4 times as popular. That agrees fairly well with the local situation pre-Covid where X-Wing tournaments drew around 30 players and Armada tended to be the same group of 6-8 people.
It seems likely AMG have been dumped with these three new games and the reality is they can't cope with them all. Of the three X-Wing is the most historically successful and continues to sell well, though not as well as it once did, Legion seems to have grabbed a good bit of attention and sales (again, judging locally) and Armada looks like the odd one out. I fear for its future.
How could there be "poor sales" when 70% of the line was nearly constantly sold out for the last three years, while at the same time people were actually selling ships on Ebay for 150$ or more dependent on rarity?
Every time the game has a release all of my area stores sell out of their stock in less than a week. One store STILL has Venators on backorder for 9 different people. I'm just not sure I buy that line of thinking.
I think it's more likely that Asmodee did what all Has-bros do and made willy-nilly changes on a whim because "MaH PrOfiTs" and AMG is a small company now responsible for four different games.
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Post by: Aeneades
Ignore! Wrong Atomic Mass thread!
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Post by: chaos0xomega
AMG is a small company responsible for 4 different games that apparently elected not to retain the majority of the original design staff and fired most/all of those that they did. Lets not pretend that the blame is all on Asmodees shoulders, it may have been Asmodees decision to transfer the projects, but its AMGs responsibility to manage the transition and continued development of those products.
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Post by: AduroT
chaos0xomega wrote:AMG is a small company responsible for 4 different games that apparently elected not to retain the majority of the original design staff and fired most/all of those that they did. Lets not pretend that the blame is all on Asmodees shoulders, it may have been Asmodees decision to transfer the projects, but its AMGs responsibility to manage the transition and continued development of those products.
Did Asmodee give them the budget to retain that many extra staff members? Like you said, it’s a smaller company.
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Post by: Polonius
Coenus Scaldingus wrote: Let's face it, it's not like Star Wars fans will automatically like something just because it's called "Star Wars".
Pretty sure the sign of a true Star Wars fan is hating Star Wars.
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Post by: deano2099
I know AMG are not FFG, but if the idea is to just kill it off, they're doing it very differently to how FFG have killed off game lines. Ending OP is always the first thing they do.
This news piece on the end of L5R reads very different, for example: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2021/2/17/future-of-legend/
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Post by: Slipspace
Togusa wrote:Slipspace wrote:I'm not sure I buy this idea that Armada was doing fine and this isn't just a purely business-related decision based on poor sales. It may not be completely representative of a game's success, but if you compare the numbers participating in the official world championships for Armada and X-Wing it appears X-Wing was more than 4 times as popular. That agrees fairly well with the local situation pre-Covid where X-Wing tournaments drew around 30 players and Armada tended to be the same group of 6-8 people.
It seems likely AMG have been dumped with these three new games and the reality is they can't cope with them all. Of the three X-Wing is the most historically successful and continues to sell well, though not as well as it once did, Legion seems to have grabbed a good bit of attention and sales (again, judging locally) and Armada looks like the odd one out. I fear for its future.
How could there be "poor sales" when 70% of the line was nearly constantly sold out for the last three years, while at the same time people were actually selling ships on Ebay for 150$ or more dependent on rarity?
FFG/Asmodee have had distribution problems for as long as I can remember. Selling out of a tiny number of ships is not the same as selling out of a huge number of the same. All I can go off is my experience, since nobody has the actual numbers to hand, and it's been my experience across multiple different stores, clubs and other communities that Armada was just not doing as well as either Legion or X-Wing. Hell, you just needed to look at the activity in the official FFG forums before they disappeared to see that.
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Post by: MaxT
chaos0xomega wrote:AMG is a small company responsible for 4 different games that apparently elected not to retain the majority of the original design staff and fired most/all of those that they did. Lets not pretend that the blame is all on Asmodees shoulders, it may have been Asmodees decision to transfer the projects, but its AMGs responsibility to manage the transition and continued development of those products.
We ofc do not know the intricacies whether AMG fumbled the handover or Asmodee gave them a huge hospital pass without support, but ultimately the parent company is responsible. They made the decision, they need to get it executed correctly.
Saying that, quintrupling the number of games to manage by a company only a few years old smells like a terrible idea without a REALLY good transition plan. Automatically Appended Next Post:
Is a slow death better than a quick one tho?
There’s a few store owners on the site. What’s your thoughts? Would you do a big restock of Armada reprint products knowing there no future development?
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Post by: MarkNorfolk
MaxT wrote:chaos0xomega wrote:
There’s a few store owners on the site. What’s your thoughts? Would you do a big restock of Armada reprint products knowing there no future development?
All we 'know' for certain is that the "no development" thing is for the near future. Once the reprints started coming through the distribution network, then yes, I would restock ISDs, and Mon Calamari stuff, fighter packs and so on. I'm hardly a big store though, but we do have a local Armada scene.
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Post by: ced1106
> seems like all their sucesses are stuff that rides on the coat tails of an eistablished IP but I could be missing something
As someone who lived back in the days of the CCG glut, one of the signs of a mature market is that you can't release a new CCG without an IP.
CCGs are "lifestyle" games. In a "lifestyle game", the customer is expected to make multiple purchases of different products in the game line, often spending hundreds of dollars on a single game system. This, of course, costs a lot of money, so a customer typically will purchase, beyond casual purchases, only one "lifestyle" game at a time, particularly if it involves painting. Game companies usually only end up continuing making product for one or two "lifestyle" games, while sometimes releasing new ones which may or may not continue to have product released. It's a fuzzy definition to at least separate it from boardgames, which tend to be either single-purchase or some expansion sets (and typically don't have a culture of painting or collecting). Other traits of "lifestyle" games are: that they often face the challenge of continuing to release more product as their games mature; that, if they're based on an IP, they often end up releasing product based on obscure aspects of the IP; that a customer is often expected to only buy products of their faction, rather than buying the entire game line (again, referring to how boardgamers typically buy their boardgames); and that a company will have in production only a few "lifestyle" games; and that a customer is expected to keep up with new product releases (rather than expect older releases to be available, which is how the boardgame market usually works).
Games Workshop and Wizards of the Coast have the most well-known "lifestyle" games: Warhammer 40K and Magic the Gathering. While Games Workshop even had the popular Warhammer Fantasy, it now has Warhammer 40K and Age of Sigma as its "lifestyle" games. In the past, it also had its Space Marine Epic, Man O War, and other "lifestyle" games I forgot. Wizards of the Coast has Magic the Gathering and D&D, with HeroScape, D&D Miniatures, Chainmail, Netrunner, and Star Wars as discontinued "lifestyle" games. (Warhammer Fantasy and HeroScape had different situations than the other games for their discontinuation, though.) ( BTW, WizKids had MageKnight, MechWarriors, and HeroClix, with HeroClix still remaining. CMON dropped Kings of War and Dark Ages, and their "lifestyle" game is A Song of Ice and Fire. Mantic Games... okay, I lost track of them. ) In any case, GW and WotC, and other companis typically only have two or so "lifestyle" games in current production.
So back to FFG. Off the top of my head, FFG released a number of "lifestyle" games: Battlelore, Call of Cthulhu CCG, Netrunner, Call of Cthulhu LCG, Runewars, SW Destiny Dice Game, SW X-Wings, SW Armada, SW Legion, Arkham Horror LCG, Legend of the Five Rings LCG, Marvel Crisis Protocol, etc. etc. That's a lot of "lifestyle" games. All had (or should have) a lot of product to buy, and only a few still remain. As for Armada, like GW, I suppose, it's not a matter of if a game sells well, it's a matter of how well it sells compared to other game lines, and maybe even FFG thought Armada customers would buy X-Wing if Armada was discontinued. In any case, when a company is releasing more than one "lifestyle' game, I think it's best to determine which of them are the most popular, since they're the most likely to have continued products released. (You may also want to look at how a company keeps new product being purchased, as it often boils down to "sorry, you can't play the older stuff you bought".)
I guess, as a footnote, it's unfortunate that Armada is unlikely to be picked up by another company: AEG's Doomtown, Wizard of the Coast's Netrunner, and Hasbro's HeroScape, as examples.
EDIT: Just to be clear, the examples Doomtown, Netrunner and HeroScape were picked up by other companies, Pinnacle Entertainment Group, FFG, and WotC, though not all of them are still currently printed. I also just remembered that Vampire the Masquerade (?) card game was KS'ed by a new company. Glad to see Netrunner coming back and back the Deadlands card game KS so they can unlock new counters! 
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Post by: Ancient Otter
 ced1106 wrote:
I guess, as a footnote, it's unfortunate that Armada is unlikely to be picked up by another company: AEG's Doomtown, Wizard of the Coast's Netrunner, and Hasbro's HeroScape, as examples.
For the record, Doomtown Reloaded was picked up by Pine Box Entertainment after AEG ended it. They kept it going and are currently running a successful KS for a new starter set.
WOTC recently made trademark applications for Netrunner, possibly for digital versions.
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Post by: LunarSol
Humorously, Heroscape got remade into that Magic the Gathering minis game that kind of went nowhere a while back.
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Post by: chaos0xomega
Ancient Otter wrote: ced1106 wrote:
I guess, as a footnote, it's unfortunate that Armada is unlikely to be picked up by another company: AEG's Doomtown, Wizard of the Coast's Netrunner, and Hasbro's HeroScape, as examples.
For the record, Doomtown Reloaded was picked up by Pine Box Entertainment after AEG ended it. They kept it going and are currently running a successful KS for a new starter set.
WOTC recently made trademark applications for Netrunner, possibly for digital versions.
Kind of a different situation, these are all tabletop IPs owned by other tabletop companies.
Star Wars Armada is a non-tabletop IP owned by a non-tabletop company. Unless Asmodee has the ability to sub-license the IP on behalf of Lucasfilm and allow a non-Asmodee publisher to produce the game for them under license, etc. - something which I very much doubt they can do - it will not and cannot happen. The fact that the license is itself coming up for expiry within the next couple years makes this a non-starter as well, no publisher is going to cut a deal to do this when the expiration window is this close and they have no control over whether or not Asmodee will have an extension/renewal of the license. Theres essentially no opportunity to see a return on investment here as they are racing the clock to develop, manufacture, and release product before its too late. Any sub-lease like this (assuming its possible under the terms of Asmodees license) will not happen until Asmodee's license is first extended/renewed - something that might still well be a couple years away from happening.
And that assumes that the extension/renewal is something Asmodee intends to pursue. The revelation that theres some licensing SNAFU involving Hasbro ( iirc Hasbro has exclusive Star Wars board game distribution rights in North America, which means that Asmodee can design Star Wars board games but can't sell them in the US/Canada unless it goes through Hasbro) leads me to believe that Asmodee might not want to renew the license as the ROI without the board game piece of it might not be there. In other words they are going to continue to push out the Legion and X-Wing content that they have ready to go until the license expires and then they pack it in.
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