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 Peregrine wrote:
The simple fact is that you have a really idealized view of how MTG used to be, and your experience is not representative of the player base as a whole.

Now you finally get it!

Or do you?

 Peregrine wrote:

Also, if you think that early cards were less powerful then you just sucked at playing the game. The early sets are full of broken design mistakes that have to be banned or severely restricted in any format that allows the earliest sets, and the designers have openly admitted that they put overpowered stuff in the first sets because they didn't realize anyone would take the game seriously enough to get multiple copies.

Yes, that's right. They began to design balanced expansions, but found out that broken sets sold better. So they began to again put out broken sets and cards.

5th edition was released in 1997. It doesn't matter how well designed a game is, only a small percentage of players are going to stay with it for fifteen years. Measuring the impact of design decisions by that standard is just plain stupid.

I thought you said there were plenty of veterans around? As it is, in local 40k scene I know several 2nd/3rd edition players who began the game in the '90s.

The difference is WOTC continues to maintain that position and expand their player base even with no real competition. GW, on the other hand, decides to completely ignore marketing in the face of declining market share. Take away the advantage of their starting position and the company would be nothing.

You completely fail to provide any actual difference there. I mean, this is almost a parody.

Who cares? My once a month paper magazine was replaced by a website with similar (or better) content and a much higher update frequency.

So when GW closes stuff to cut costs, that's bad. When WotC does same, it's good. We get it.

No marketing is short-sighted. It doesn't take an economic genius to figure out that advertising is a net gain in the long run,

Not necessarily. That's where you need a marketing genius, to figure that out.

Closing stores is short-sighted, in combination with no marketing. GW's biggest asset is their physical retail presence, so making those stores less accessible is throwing away future sales.

This is pretty interesting in the sense that most GW-bashers think GW should get rid of stores completely.

Allowing sales pressure to drive game design choices is short-sighted. For example, making Vendettas overpowered to sell the new Valkyrie kit is a great strategy if you want immediate sales, but you only get that at a high price to the health of the game.

That's also why Pyrovore is so overpowered. It's to promote new miniature.

Of course, WotC would never do anything like that. They'd never put out powerful cards in their new expansions. This is getting funnier by the minute.

And if that's not enough, just look at the reports GW is legally required to release as a publicly owned company. The numbers are not very good: sales volume is fairly flat, and the increase in profits has come from price increases and cost cutting. This is a pretty bad sign of a stagnating game, the player base is constant at best, and there's a limit to how much you can get from cost cutting and price increases before the whole thing collapses.

Once again, how do you know MtG is doing better? It seems to be in pretty much same position it was in 10 years ago, based on my limited observations. Which is not a bad achievment, mind you, for a faddish card game. But are they really growing?

I think it's safe to say GW know what they are doing. They are the multimillion pound business after all.

Same here. We're meeting to play casual magic once a week and often attend limited format events like prereleases or FNM (you know, because those don't cost an arm and a leg like constructed does).
Few magic player can claim to be playing longer than I do, I still remember clear plastic bags with blacked out fronts being available for sale as boosters (Unlimited, 18 years ago). Some of our group started playing when Tempest brought the first pre-constructed decks (15 years ago), and despite the competitive disaster that Mirrodin and Kamigawa were, about half of the players in my area started playing at that time (8 years ago). The rest of the players have started recently, and the total number of players is going up, rather than down.
At college you'd often have groups of magic players playing during free time, prereleases rarely count less than 20 participants. Heck, some even some gas stations here sell magic boosters, which they definitely wouldn't if no one bought them. There is absolutely no evidence of MTG "dying" - despite the fact that the person in charge of the German translation deserves to be taken outside, punched in the kidney, shot, poured gasoline on, set aflame and have his ashes fed to rabid squirrels.

Sure, people come and go, but that's the same for all games, no matter their quality.

Backfire wrote:
Yes, that's right. They began to design balanced expansions, but found out that broken sets sold better. So they began to again put out broken sets and cards.

Err, no, they didn't. The same old broken cards from the first sets are still just as broken and worse than anything designed since then, and they're still just as banned in any format where the earliest sets are legal. The only power level increase that happened was that sets became more consistent, with a wide range of good, playable cards instead of 95% garbage and a small number of absolutely broken cards.

I thought you said there were plenty of veterans around? As it is, in local 40k scene I know several 2nd/3rd edition players who began the game in the '90s.

Veterans =/= playing since the game started.

Veterans = playing the game for an extended period of time, long enough to complete decks/armies, learn the game well, build a community, etc.

You completely fail to provide any actual difference there. I mean, this is almost a parody.

The difference is that WOTC's dominance helps, but they're still working hard to continue that dominant position. They don't take shortcuts with their design and marketing that only work when you have no competition, they still keep up the same level of quality that got them into their dominant position in the first place.

GW, on the other hand, ONLY succeeds because of their starting advantage. If the game industry started over again as a blank slate and GW had to compete as an equal against WM, FoW, etc, do you really think they'd be in the position they are now?

So when GW closes stuff to cut costs, that's bad. When WotC does same, it's good. We get it.

Why is this so hard to understand?

GW closing a store is purely negative for the customer. The customers lose playing space, convenient shopping hours, stores within reasonable driving distance, etc, and gain nothing in return. The only "benefit" is that GW claims an increase in profits for that period.

WOTC replacing their print magazine with all digital content was a net win for the customer. We kept the same quality of content, got more frequent updates, and stopped paying a subscription for it. I'd be saying the same thing if GW finally put White Dwarf out of its misery and replaced it with a proper website.

Not necessarily. That's where you need a marketing genius, to figure that out.

I really doubt many marketing geniuses are going to recommend "don't advertise at all".

This is pretty interesting in the sense that most GW-bashers think GW should get rid of stores completely.

There's a strong argument that they should, but only if they replace them with other marketing. In the absence of better marketing elsewhere GW stores are one of their few advantages and it's stupid to close them without anything to replace them.

That's also why Pyrovore is so overpowered. It's to promote new miniature.

Of course, WotC would never do anything like that. They'd never put out powerful cards in their new expansions. This is getting funnier by the minute.

Obviously this doesn't happen every time, but you can see a definite trend of new models and/or codices getting powerful rules. For example, I really can't believe that GW did so little playtesting on the IG codex that the Vendetta was an honest mistake and not a deliberate attempt to sell the expensive new flyer kit.

Oh, and if you think WOTC is selling with power creep, you just don't understand the game. Besides the fact that the average power level really isn't changing there's the tiny little issue that WOTC already have built-in mechanisms to keep the new sets selling: block rotation and limited formats. There's no need to risk using power creep to sell the newest stuff when people have to buy it anyway to keep playing the most popular formats.

Once again, how do you know MtG is doing better? It seems to be in pretty much same position it was in 10 years ago, based on my limited observations. Which is not a bad achievment, mind you, for a faddish card game. But are they really growing?

They claim to be, and the success of their new video game (intended as an intro to the card game) suggests an expanding customer base. Tournament attendance is quite healthy, and still giving away thousands of dollars in cash prizes at each event. And of course there's no real competition for MTG, which is a pretty good sign that WOTC has captured pretty much the entire market for a card game.

GW, on the other hand, is declining. Sales are flat, and only aggressive cost cutting and price increases have kept their profits up. Meanwhile they're losing market share to their competition, closing stores, and generally showing signs of a company with no real ambition beyond "keep share prices up until I retire and sell my shares".

 Peregrine wrote:

Err, no, they didn't. The same old broken cards from the first sets are still just as broken and worse than anything designed since then, and they're still just as banned in any format where the earliest sets are legal. The only power level increase that happened was that sets became more consistent, with a wide range of good, playable cards instead of 95% garbage and a small number of absolutely broken cards.

And what it means is that 95% of the older editions are unusable for being obsolete, and rest are unusable for being broken.

The difference is that WOTC's dominance helps, but they're still working hard to continue that dominant position. They don't take shortcuts with their design...

Really? Because taking shortcuts with the design was one factor which drove me out. "OK, Moxes were too powerful. Lets release much lamer version of them, which are still so powerful they have to be restricted." Wow, so original.

GW, on the other hand, ONLY succeeds because of their starting advantage. If the game industry started over again as a blank slate and GW had to compete as an equal against WM, FoW, etc, do you really think they'd be in the position they are now?

Again, exact same logic applies to WotC.

WOTC replacing their print magazine with all digital content was a net win for the customer.

Really? Then why did they bother with printed magazine at all? MtG has had a website almost from the start.

There's a strong argument that they should, but only if they replace them with other marketing. In the absence of better marketing elsewhere GW stores are one of their few advantages and it's stupid to close them without anything to replace them.

I utterly fail to see what GW could gain with "marketing". What kind of marketing? TV ads? Ads in gaming magazines? Magic does have latter, but only to inform existing players what's coming up. MtG gains new players the same way GW does - demoing the game in real-life. People aren't going to pick up a miniature wargame because they see ad in TV.

Oh, and if you think WOTC is selling with power creep, you just don't understand the game.

I don't "think" that, I state it as a fact. A fact which is obvious to anyone.

Besides the fact that the average power level really isn't changing there's the tiny little issue that WOTC already have built-in mechanisms to keep the new sets selling: block rotation and limited formats.

Oh right, people are forced to buy new set of cards every year since earlier ones are obsoleted. Can you imagine what an outrage it would cause if GW did that?



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Lansirill wrote:
Apple uses a similar strategy, or at least used to, and based on their success there must be something to it.

As I see it, it's all about building a brand. Apple and GW marketing has, as stated, lots of common. Both companies insist doing their own thing, often ignoring estabilished market practices (much of the cellphone market is operator driven, but Apple doesn't care about that). Both have big emphasis on self-sufficient "wholesale/community" aspect of their product line. Both tend to be viewed as "premium" brands (which is sometimes seen as euphemism for "overpriced"). Both keep their products secret, until suddenly released in massive publicity event.

This in contrast to Apple's competitors like Nokia and Samsung who do things more like "by the book" and have lost signifant market share to upstart Apple. So as said, there must be something to it. Obvious advantage for secretive development process is that when final product is revealed, everyone who wants to know about it must attend or follow the release to get information about it. This makes them huge events which ripple through entire industry. By contrast, releasing information piecemeal over extended time obviously informs customers better, but also leaves final release as sort of everyday "meh" event.

Backfire wrote:
And what it means is that 95% of the older editions are unusable for being obsolete, and rest are unusable for being broken.

So the better alternative is to leave balance in a completely broken state so that you don't ever have to buy new cards again?

And in any case, you said that WOTC is allowing power creep, I pointed out that it isn't. The fact that bad cards from the oldest sets continue to be bad has nothing to do with this.

Really? Because taking shortcuts with the design was one factor which drove me out. "OK, Moxes were too powerful. Lets release much lamer version of them, which are still so powerful they have to be restricted." Wow, so original.

That's your personal opinion. My opinion, which is shared by a lot of very happy players, is that MTG's design quality is as good as it's ever been, if not better.

Again, exact same logic applies to WotC.

Except it doesn't. GW is taking a lot more shortcuts with marketing, game design, etc. If WotC had to start over in a blank slate world they'd have a solid base of marketing experience to work with, continue their current policies, and quickly rebuild. GW would be completely lost, their product isn't all that much better than the competition (to be generous), and their lack of marketing means they're quickly going to fall behind their competition. Once WM/H, FoW, etc become popular GW is left to be that niche game that nobody really hears anything about.

Really? Then why did they bother with printed magazine at all? MtG has had a website almost from the start.

Because in 1993 print magazines were a bigger part of the gaming world, and the internet was much less universal. Things changed, print media declined in general in the face of superior competition from digital media, and WOTC made the sensible decision to move their magazine online and create a superior product.

I utterly fail to see what GW could gain with "marketing". What kind of marketing? TV ads? Ads in gaming magazines? Magic does have latter, but only to inform existing players what's coming up. MtG gains new players the same way GW does - demoing the game in real-life. People aren't going to pick up a miniature wargame because they see ad in TV.

Err, lol? I guess this is where I congratulate you on discovering that advertising doesn't work, and proving everyone else wrong?

Of course MTG gains new players from advertising. If you're reading gaming magazines you're probably open to the possibility of trying new games, and seeing an ad for MTG might interest you enough to stop by your local store and see what it's all about. Or research it online. Or try the video game and eventually move on to the card game. Or maybe they just file it away for later, and when your friend shows up with this awesome new game you remember all the cool ads and decide that it's a good time to give it a try.

And let's not neglect the importance of advertising to existing players. Did you play the game in the past and leave it for whatever reason? Well, here's something cool you should see! Maybe you'll want to get back into it?

I don't "think" that, I state it as a fact. A fact which is obvious to anyone.

It's only obvious if you don't know much about the game. The top of the power level is MUCH lower than in the past, and there's a complete absence of the "like X, but better" design that defines power creep.

Oh right, people are forced to buy new set of cards every year since earlier ones are obsoleted. Can you imagine what an outrage it would cause if GW did that?

You mean like they do now every time a new codex is released and you have to buy the latest tournament army if you want to keep winning?

Now, I'm not saying this is an appropriate concept for wargaming, where creating an army takes much more effort than buying a new deck, I'm just saying that WOTC doesn't need to use power creep to sell the newest set.

Every time somebody compares GW with Apple it just seems wrong to me. Apple is doing very well. Is GW? There not growing there just maintaining. Not to mention if Kirby likes to think of himself as a fater version of Steve Jobs then somebody at HQ needs to wake that guy up.

Is it too late to say stop the fighting?

 Peregrine wrote:

See above. This isn't a problem if you actually run a proper marketing campaign and tell people how awesome it's going to be once the new book arrives.

Except it is. People don't want to have to replace 25% of their army to remain competitive, and as soon as word of a new codex is coming out, sales for models from that army will practically halt. Even the vague rumor of a new codex coming out "soon" generally results in people not buying things, since they know that new models they buy could potentially be made worthless with the new codex.

 MrEconomics wrote:
The best explanation I've heard is that GW tries to keep everything quiet so third-party modelling companies that make knock-offs can't plan ahead. While third-party stuff can't necessarily replace a whole model, conversion-kit type stuff might allow an established customer to adapt what they have and allow him to avoid buying a whole new kit. Given the amount of time it takes to set up production, ensuring a 6-12 month window where nothing similar is on the market could easily explain this part of their marketing strategy.

GW almost killed its Necron codex with this policy. By releasing the codex without the full range of toys available Puppet Wars put out some cyber dudes on jet bikes and some cyber insects, if they'd released the figures and named them as the GW Items as there were no images of them GW would have lost the rights to produce those items.

GW makes a ton of money by making pretty amazing toy soldiers, thats just what they do, some people love them, some people hate them, others tend to swing between the two extremes, I think we all agree that we would like them to be more professional in their approach to marketing and engage with their customer base more, sadly, thats not something that GW has ever been particularly interested in doing and probably don't see any benefit in introducing now.

A couple more points.

1. Games Workshop views selling models as its core business. Language in the annual statement made that very clear. Given that fact, their lack of focus on tournament play could easily be an optimal strategy, especially since people who do the hobby for the modelling probably spend more money and are less sensitive to price.

2. Spending a lot of money on marketing has no guarantee of substantially growing the business. It can also be a major drag on profits. As an example, do you know why the insurance company State Farm doesn't have a massive price advantage over its vastly smaller competitors (most of which you've never heard of)? Because they spend all their cost savings from being huge on marketing. I could easily be convinced that GW's market is sufficiently specialized that most of their likely customers are already buying their models. To become aware of their brand, basically all you ever have to do is walk into any comic book/nerd game store. I started playing about 18 months ago, but I've been aware of the existence of 40k for roughly 15 years, due to having played MTG in my local comic book store for ages.

Finally, my main criticism is that this line of attack is essentially claiming that you could do a better job of running GW than their management team. It's pretty crazy to think that way. Remember, just because a business decision caused you or any other class of people to stop buying, say MTG cards, does not mean it was a bad business decision. It's generally a good bet that you are not a representative agent.

ghpoobah wrote:

GW almost killed its Necron codex with this policy. By releasing the codex without the full range of toys available Puppet Wars put out some cyber dudes on jet bikes and some cyber insects, if they'd released the figures and named them as the GW Items as there were no images of them GW would have lost the rights to produce those items.

No they would have not.

Backfire wrote:
And what it means is that 95% of the older editions are unusable for being obsolete, and rest are unusable for being broken.

I still play dozens of ice age, tempest, mirage and other cards. Eldar Dragon legends still see play in commander to this very day. What exactly are you talking about? Legends, Fallen Empires and Homelands? Isn't it rather an improvement that they no longer do sets like that?

Really? Because taking shortcuts with the design was one factor which drove me out. "OK, Moxes were too powerful. Lets release much lamer version of them, which are still so powerful they have to be restricted." Wow, so original.

Mox Diamond and Chrome Mox were actually interesting and clever cards in there respective extended and standard environments. The latest one is a failure imo, but oh well. Legacy always has been borked and will stay that way as long as magic exists - and that's not the fault of new cards, but rather the fault of very old cards - Moxes, Black Lotus, Time Walk, Time Twister, Ancestra Recall and Force of Will. However, a "mox" is actually something that is a part of magic with recognition value, just like you expect anything with "lotus" in its name to produce mutli-colored mana. Just like bolters are for GW. So you're actually right here, but WotC designs 120+ game pieces at a time, while GW only designs a maximum of about 40 at once, with about the same or higher percentage of recycled parts.

GW, on the other hand, ONLY succeeds because of their starting advantage. If the game industry started over again as a blank slate and GW had to compete as an equal against WM, FoW, etc, do you really think they'd be in the position they are now?

Again, exact same logic applies to WotC.

Oh, I wouldn't count on that. Kids at a certain age already start dropping their Yu-Gi-Oh, Duelmasters and Pokemon cards regularly to join the magic crowd. Their product is high quality, access to the game is as easy as never before (PC game, MTGO, Pre-Constructed tournament ready decks, access to old and rare cards via premium decks, officially supported casual formats, starter sets for new players, Prereleases and FNM with prices for just participating at almost every game store).

WOTC replacing their print magazine with all digital content was a net win for the customer.

Really? Then why did they bother with printed magazine at all? MtG has had a website almost from the start.

Oh, really? How much time did you spend online in 1994? When every person could pick up an AOL cd with free minutes on it, WotC dropped The Duelist in favor of an easier maintainable and cheaper web page, where they could answer rules question every Friday instead of once a month, post art, new cards and event infos or just have the lead designer talk about how he met his wife without wasting expensive paper. Don't care about that? No problem, you didn't pay for it, unlike for those 75% of the White Dwarf you don't give a damn about because you only play 40k.
Oh, and the designers actually used to talk to people on the forums, rather than being a mythical beings sometimes seen at conventions like Ward, Cruddance or Kelly.

I utterly fail to see what GW could gain with "marketing". What kind of marketing? TV ads? Ads in gaming magazines? Magic does have latter, but only to inform existing players what's coming up. MtG gains new players the same way GW does - demoing the game in real-life. People aren't going to pick up a miniature wargame because they see ad in TV.

The difference is that WotC supports the game being demoed. Promo Cards, tshirts, and promotional material for all events instead of power-point fliers, official and organized Judges in form of the DCI rather than incompetent Redshirts and house-ruling TOs, easy entry into all playing stiles, rather than a single starter box with only two Factions, ready available rules instead of hunting down that one issue of White Dwarf, and actual and timely reactions to game play and rule problems instead of "Forge a Narrative". Well, at least the last part seems to be getting better.
It would be naive to think they do all this because they really like Richard Garfield's awesome game so much. It's all marketing.

Instead of echoing "But WotC is the same" name one thing that GW does for their customers, which WotC doesn't? I'm really curious of the answer.

Oh, and if you think WOTC is selling with power creep, you just don't understand the game.

I don't "think" that, I state it as a fact. A fact which is obvious to anyone.

Agree, power creep in Magic does exist. It's lot more subtle than in WH40k, but you'd surprised how many top-tier tournament cards from the past are just average nowadays. The re-introduction of lightning bolt into standard which was considered too good for decades is a pretty good indicator of this.

Besides the fact that the average power level really isn't changing there's the tiny little issue that WOTC already have built-in mechanisms to keep the new sets selling: block rotation and limited formats.

Oh right, people are forced to buy new set of cards every year since earlier ones are obsoleted. Can you imagine what an outrage it would cause if GW did that?

You don't need to change the models to change the rules. And it does happen, every edition and every codex release. Just ask all the kanz now gathering dust on shelves about their glory days in 5th.
Besides, MTG has limited formats, where you pretty much don't give a damn about you cards after the event is over. Or you play vintage or casual magic, where your cards never get old. No one forces you to attend tourneys or play by tournament formats.

 Peregrine wrote:


Except it doesn't. GW is taking a lot more shortcuts with marketing, game design, etc. If WotC had to start over in a blank slate world they'd have a solid base of marketing experience to work with, continue their current policies, and quickly rebuild.

How do you figure? WotC has released many CCG's, all of which have been a failure save one. Seems like other than coming up the first one, they don't really have any kind of recipe for success.

Err, lol? I guess this is where I congratulate you on discovering that advertising doesn't work, and proving everyone else wrong?

Thank you!

It's only obvious if you don't know much about the game. The top of the power level is MUCH lower than in the past, and there's a complete absence of the "like X, but better" design that defines power creep.

I can't tell about that, since it's obvious that your "past" is like ten years ahead of when I quit. Btw, one reason I quit was precisely the fact that they began to release cards "like X, but better" (or worse, in some cases). It was horribly lazy design work.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jidmah wrote:

Backfire wrote:
And what it means is that 95% of the older editions are unusable for being obsolete, and rest are unusable for being broken.

I still play dozens of ice age, tempest, mirage and other cards. Eldar Dragon legends still see play in commander to this very day. What exactly are you talking about? Legends, Fallen Empires and Homelands? Isn't it rather an improvement that they no longer do sets like that?

Fallen Empires is my favourite set. It was balanced, with by far the best theme, atmosphere and backstory I ever saw in MtG set design.

But it had very few cards which were good in unlimited environment of tournament play. So people didn't like it. As I said, WotC noticed that by designing more powerful sets, they could sell more cards.

Oh, really? How much time did you spend online in 1994? When every person could pick up an AOL cd with free minutes on it, WotC dropped The Duelist in favor of an easier maintainable and cheaper web page, where they could answer rules question every Friday instead of once a month, post art, new cards and event infos or just have the lead designer talk about how he met his wife without wasting expensive paper. Don't care about that? No problem, you didn't pay for it, unlike for those 75% of the White Dwarf you don't give a damn about because you only play 40k.

Oh, and the designers actually used to talk to people on the forums, rather than being a mythical beings sometimes seen at conventions like Ward, Cruddance or Kelly.

WotC didn't drop Duelist for a webpage, they dropped it for Sideboard which wasn't discontinued until 2003.

Old Duelist was a great magazine and I was very saddened to see it decline and die. I doubt web had anything to do with it, they just ran out of competent people to write it.

Btw, if I was a major game designer, I would probably never visit the forums. My blood pressure couldn't deal with it. Nor would I say, keep a blog. I hate blogs.

The difference is that WotC supports the game being demoed. Promo Cards, tshirts, and promotional material for all events instead of power-point fliers, official and organized Judges in form of the DCI rather than incompetent Redshirts and house-ruling TOs, easy entry into all playing stiles, rather than a single starter box with only two Factions, ready available rules instead of hunting down that one issue of White Dwarf, and actual and timely reactions to game play and rule problems instead of "Forge a Narrative". Well, at least the last part seems to be getting better.
It would be naive to think they do all this because they really like Richard Garfield's awesome game so much. It's all marketing.

Instead of echoing "But WotC is the same" name one thing that GW does for their customers, which WotC doesn't? I'm really curious of the answer.

They have their own stores where to demo the game. WotC used to have, but they closed them. Mind you, I'm not saying that was necessarily wrong decision, but it's just hilarious to criticize GW for cutting costs by closing stores, when WotC cut all their stores.

Backfire wrote:
How do you figure? WotC has released many CCG's, all of which have been a failure save one. Seems like other than coming up the first one, they don't really have any kind of recipe for success.

Pokemon and Duel Masters were both made by WotC, and both pretty successful. Since you are never "done" collecting a CCG (while can comparably easily to be done collecting an army), there is little reason to play more than one CCG at once. Many of those CCG choked on their home-made competition which Magic posed. Plus, few CCG (WotC or not) really play a lot different than Magic.

Fallen Empires is my favourite set. It was balanced, with by far the best theme, atmosphere and backstory I ever saw in MtG set design.

But it had very few cards which were good in unlimited environment of tournament play. So people didn't like it. As I said, WotC noticed that by designing more powerful sets, they could sell more cards.

Can't argue taste, but have you seen the background of Tempest? Onslaught? Ravnica? Alara? Innistrad? That's some pretty awesome stuff, even if you don't like the other, more abstract settings like Lorwyn, Mirrodin or Kamigawa. The Mirrodin book was awesome though.
As for the overpowered part... printing cards so far below the power level of everything else is just bad design, and can't be blamed on overpowered sets. Kamigawa is also a very low-powered block and it still sold quite well (except Dissension, which really was FE level), because the cards still did their job without being overpowered, unlike most Fallen Empires cards. Mirrodin Block was as much a mistake as Fallen Empires was.

WotC didn't drop Duelist for a webpage, they dropped it for Sideboard which wasn't discontinued until 2003.

MaRo announced the end of The Duelist on their webpage, I read that article at school when I was still living in the US. Back when it still was wizards.com/magic rather than magicthegathering.com. I never bothered with Sideboard. A bunch of articles on that page were written by former duelist writers, so I doubt it was a problem of finding people to write stuff.

Btw, if I was a major game designer, I would probably never visit the forums. My blood pressure couldn't deal with it. Nor would I say, keep a blog. I hate blogs.

Mind you, the internet was a nicer place "back then". I don't know if they still contribute to their forum, but at least they have a forum, other than our favorite resin experts.

They have their own stores where to demo the game. WotC used to have, but they closed them.

Still, it's a lot easier to find a store where you can play magic than stores where you can buy (not even play) GW products. You can stumble in pretty much any store selling comics and/or games and find magic there, and it doesn't even matter whether you're in the US, Canada, Germany or the Netherlands. And half of those stores take part in the worldwide events organized by WotC.
I haven't ever seen a WotC store while they existed though.

Mind you, I'm not saying that was necessarily wrong decision, but it's just hilarious to criticize GW for cutting costs by closing stores, when WotC cut all their stores.

As above, if they provided regular gaming stores with the means to play their game and buy their products there, I couldn't care less. But they don't, so every closed store is a loss to us as a gamers.

So I live in Australia and pay double what all of you lads pay for the same models. How is this a long-term, sustainable business practice?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect

"The Osborne effect is a term referring to the unintended consequence of the announcement of a future product ahead of its availability and its impact upon the sales of the current product."

 Jidmah wrote:

Backfire wrote:
How do you figure? WotC has released many CCG's, all of which have been a failure save one. Seems like other than coming up the first one, they don't really have any kind of recipe for success.

Pokemon and Duel Masters were both made by WotC, and both pretty successful.

Pokemon was not made by WotC, it was an existing game which was licensed (for a while) by WotC. I've never heard of Duel Masters, according to Wikipedia it was discontinued in 2006 "due to weak sales".

I see TES is still alive, cool. Even though it is no longer WotC.

Can't argue taste, but have you seen the background of Tempest? Onslaught? Ravnica? Alara? Innistrad? That's some pretty awesome stuff, even if you don't like the other, more abstract settings like Lorwyn, Mirrodin or Kamigawa. The Mirrodin book was awesome though.

No, I stopped caring just before Tempest came out. You're correct in that Homelands was terrible, in every respect. I loved Ice Age, Mirage was meh. Fallen Empires was great for themed decks which I love. Goblin decks, Thallid decks, white military decks. Of course last one no longer works as Banding is removed.

Mind you, the internet was a nicer place "back then". I don't know if they still contribute to their forum, but at least they have a forum, other than our favorite resin experts.

I don't understand why people complain that GW does not have forums. What they would gain from their own forum when web is already full of active GW gaming communities? I say thank heavens that they don't and good for them. Official forums are usually terrible in quality, filled with uncritical fanbois with some bitter veterans around, and resulting flame wars. They're useful only for smaller companies/bands etc, when fanbase is too small to maintain independent communities.

Lots of people gush over PP forums. I went there once, and they were so full of rampant fanboyism I had to check the url that I hadn't accidentally ventured on Apple forum.

Backfire wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

Backfire wrote:
How do you figure? WotC has released many CCG's, all of which have been a failure save one. Seems like other than coming up the first one, they don't really have any kind of recipe for success.

Pokemon and Duel Masters were both made by WotC, and both pretty successful.

Pokemon was not made by WotC, it was an existing game which was licensed (for a while) by WotC. I've never heard of Duel Masters, according to Wikipedia it was discontinued in 2006 "due to weak sales".

They still did the sale, marketing, event organization, rules management and whatnot until nintendo took it back. The Duel Masters game disappeared half a year after the corresponding anime ended, which isn't too surprising. I still see kids playing it though.

No, I stopped caring just before Tempest came out. You're correct in that Homelands was terrible, in every respect. I loved Ice Age, Mirage was meh. Fallen Empires was great for themed decks which I love. Goblin decks, Thallid decks, white military decks. Of course last one no longer works as Banding is removed.

Banding wasn't removed, it still does the very same useless thing it did when alpha appeared. Goblin decks, thallid decks(now fungus decks) and white soldier or knight decks have gotten new cards in many different sets and are very playable, even if they don't win the grand prix all the time. They did learn from fallen empires and homelands.

I don't understand why people complain that GW does not have forums. What they would gain from their own forum when web is already full of active GW gaming communities? I say thank heavens that they don't and good for them. Official forums are usually terrible in quality, filled with uncritical fanbois with some bitter veterans around, and resulting flame wars. They're useful only for smaller companies/bands etc, when fanbase is too small to maintain independent communities.

Easy, to have a place where you announce stuff and collect feedback. Sure, they could pay people to read dakkadakka, bolter and chainsword, TheWaagh!, BoLS, 3++ and whatnot, but why not simply host a forum themselves? The people moderating the place just have to write a report about general tendencies. Just having their own YMDC would be a great boon to them - a 10 page topic on the same question for the seventh time is a pretty clear indication for the need of a FAQ. Or even better, they could just give an official answer right there.