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 Mr. Burning wrote:
Retail cannot compete with some of the KS only offers.

Then retail needs to adapt or die.

Sining wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I have one semi local store that sells Mantic, and one that tried it but can't even sell warhammer. But that's two stores that I know of that have Mantic's KoW on the shelf. I also found a couple other stores, like The Guard Tower in Columbus, Ohio, that sell Mantic. It does happen. Maybe just not as frequent. Those places all sell Reaper as well, but I haven't seen Sedition Wars yet.

Is Sedition wars even out yet?

I know at least one local store here is selling zombicide

Not sure if it's out, haven't looked, to be honest. I think I saw Zombicide on the shelf, last time I was there, but I do know they have Cards Against Humanity, an insanely popular kickstarter game that sells out rapidly on Amazon, but this store has a couple copies (and expansions) in stock. This is also the most successful gaming store in the area (other gaming store in Albany is smaller with barely any customers, store in my town is only kept open by owner's pocket-as I was told by him when I used to work there, and business has slowed down since), and he has no issue selling kickstarted games. I expect Dreadball will hit his shelves, but Mantic has only been a 'cheap alternative to GW models for GW games' to most of the player base there, so I'm hoping to get a game in with him and show him how awesome it is. Get the owner to play, and everyone else will soon follow...

 Peregrine wrote:

 Mr. Burning wrote:
Retail cannot compete with some of the KS only offers.

Then retail needs to adapt or die.

That is easy to say. I think retail have adopted, or tried to, under certain circumstances. KS won't kill retail. I think there has been a shift on projects wanting KS funding though and the customers/investors perceptions of what they expect from crowd funded project.

I would think that some retailers will get on board with products funded with a nudge from kick starter but may avoid or pause on projects where the finished boxed product and expansiosn are offered as part of a pledge deal.

 paulson games wrote:
In the case of our laocal store they are really annoyed with KS. KS allows they to cut out the store by providing a product to the buyers months in advance of general release and also a better value for the money that the retailer cannot offer or try to compete with.

(although in some ways this also reflects the greater problem of internet sellers on the whole)

Zombicide for instance I could get cheaper than what I'd pay in store, got exclusive promos and extra figures making it a much better deal. By the time you add in 5-10 other players at the same store getting their copies through KS it leaves a very deflated interest from other gamers to buy it instore (assuming it's even available) By the time the general release has come around everyone has been playing it in store for two months and it no longer has that "must have now!" factor that a new release uses to capture impulse buys.

They don't mind us bringing it to play, but at the same time they weren't very happy and they don't expect to stock nearly as many copies as they would of other simular products. The demand already peaked before they could get product in, and they can't offer the same deal so it's a bit of a no win situation.

I was very interested in KS initially as it is a very good tool for a small business, but it has a very negative impact on the retail structure of the LFGS when established businesses are using it as a pre-order system. (which isn't the original intent of KS, but money has corrupted it)

This is a very good explanation of the whole situation.

Kickstarter was not started to fund production of niche products like SF wargames. It is supposed to be for crowd sponsorship of creative artistic projects like an indie movie.

The amount of oversubscription on a lot of the wargame projects shows that mostly probably everyone who might be interested in a copy will get one from the Kickstarter. That leaves nothing on the table for the local retailer, so why should he stock the game?

Kickstarter have started to resile from the position of funding startups, and it will be interesting to see how this affects their profitability.

At the same time, the popularity of projects from Flame Wars to Tentacle Bento to OGRE to Bug-a-Salt, shows there is a demand and a need for a site to do crowdfunding of actual products. But, it opens a new contractual relationship which needs to be worked out on a legal basis. (Tentacle Bento, of course, was in the end produced by Soda Pop on a standard contractual basis.)

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 paulson games wrote:
In the case of our laocal store they are really annoyed with KS. KS allows they to cut out the store by providing a product to the buyers months in advance of general release and also a better value for the money that the retailer cannot offer or try to compete with.

(although in some ways this also reflects the greater problem of internet sellers on the whole)

Zombicide for instance I could get cheaper than what I'd pay in store, got exclusive promos and extra figures making it a much better deal. By the time you add in 5-10 other players at the same store getting their copies through KS it leaves a very deflated interest from other gamers to buy it instore (assuming it's even available) By the time the general release has come around everyone has been playing it in store for two months and it no longer has that "must have now!" factor that a new release uses to capture impulse buys.

They don't mind us bringing it to play, but at the same time they weren't very happy and they don't expect to stock nearly as many copies as they would of other simular products. The demand already peaked before they could get product in, and they can't offer the same deal so it's a bit of a no win situation.

I was very interested in KS initially as it is a very good tool for a small business, but it has a very negative impact on the retail structure of the LFGS when established businesses are using it as a pre-order system. (which isn't the original intent of KS, but money has corrupted it)

This is a very good explanation of the whole situation.

Kickstarter was not started to fund production of niche products like SF wargames. It is supposed to be for crowd sponsorship of creative artistic projects like an indie movie.

The amount of oversubscription on a lot of the wargame projects shows that mostly probably everyone who might be interested in a copy will get one from the Kickstarter. That leaves nothing on the table for the local retailer, so why should he stock the game?

Kickstarter have started to resile from the position of funding startups, and it will be interesting to see how this affects their profitability.

At the same time, the popularity of projects from Flame Wars to Tentacle Bento to OGRE to Bug-a-Salt, shows there is a demand and a need for a site to do crowdfunding of actual products. But, it opens a new contractual relationship which needs to be worked out on a legal basis. (Tentacle Bento, of course, was in the end produced by Soda Pop on a standard contractual basis.)

The above two posts pretty much sum up a lot of the situation as it pertains to retailers. I don't necessarily have a rule against KS products. In the case of OGRE, Steve Jackson gave us a no win situation. We could order the 100 game, one time only. No reorders, and after he'd sold them to everyone on KS. Why bother? Niche product with those enthusiastic about the game already having it. Any effort put into promotion it is wasted, as they won't sell us more. Dead Game. I don't order dead games.

Reaper's bones line suceeded. They will be using the money for ongoing production. I'll be able to order more models, and much quicker. I can sell their models for years. Win/Win/Win for everyone.

Other games? First, would I order them anyway? Second, how many people already got them? Third, how bad does my price look in comparison to the KS price?

These questions you have to ask. This is a NON-RETURNABLE business. If it doesn't sell, the business eats it. Order 5 copies of OGRE that don't sell, it's 300.00 out of my paycheck. KS adds a huge amount of variables into the ordering equation. Higher profile, yet initial demand for the product fullfilled straight from the company.

The final variable is the consumer: Sorry, but 99% of gamers are selfish as hell, and jump at the chance of extra goodies or a better price. (Yes, I know, 99% of you will now hammer me for pointing out the obvious, and in fairness, 99% of humanity is selfish. ) One store I know of took pre-orders from 6 customers for OGRE. All 6 then went for the kickstarter deal.

Some stores don't like kickstarter and won't carry the games, because it's not a level playing field.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

Kickstarter was not started to fund production of niche products like SF wargames. It is supposed to be for crowd sponsorship of creative artistic projects like an indie movie.

I could not disgaree with you more. Kickstarter was meant for crowd funding of artistic projects period. It has nothing to do with indie films vs SF wargames. A wargame is an expression of creativity and artistic expression on multiple levels. You have creativity, drawing, painting, and often times sculpting.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

The amount of oversubscription on a lot of the wargame projects shows that mostly probably everyone who might be interested in a copy will get one from the Kickstarter. That leaves nothing on the table for the local retailer, so why should he stock the game?

Kickstarter have started to resile from the position of funding startups, and it will be interesting to see how this affects their profitability.

This I do tend to agree with, though I don't undertand what you mean by oversubscription? But your sentiment does explain why it might not be a good idea for a FGS to stock an item that was already sold on Kickstarter. For the vast majority of Kickstarters the backers are most of the people that will ever buy into the game. I doubt this is true of games like Zombiecide, Sedition Wars, or Dreadball.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

At the same time, the popularity of projects from Flame Wars to Tentacle Bento to OGRE to Bug-a-Salt, shows there is a demand and a need for a site to do crowdfunding of actual products. But, it opens a new contractual relationship which needs to be worked out on a legal basis. (Tentacle Bento, of course, was in the end produced by Soda Pop on a standard contractual basis.)

My personal opinion is that Kickstarter is a good thing. Any vehicle that keeps more of the money with the people who actually created the game is a good thing. This keeps creative people creating.

I spent a number of years in book retailing, and I can understand why stores are reluctant to carry Kickstarter products. In businesses like books and games, 50-80% of the total sales of a product happen in the first 8 weeks after it is released. Kickstarter projects basically take a chunk of that away from retailers to help the product get produced in the first place. That means that any product created by a Kickstarter project is probably going to have lower sales expectations than a product that was funded conventionally.

If I owned a game store, I would think twice about carrying products from a Kickstarter. Unless I had good reason to believe that I was going to sell a lot of it,, I probably wouldn't carry it. That's nothing against Kickstarter, it's simply good business practice. Of course, I'm tempted to say that good business practice rarely involves owning a gaming store, so that's something to consider as well.

tldr: it's not about Kickstarter, it's about whether you can make money off of something.

Its probably better if the game or thing funded by KS wasn't self-contained like a boardgame and was more miniatures based. I'm pretty sure KOW or Warpath or even dreadball would still have people buying stuff from FLGS because new things would come out for them after the KS.

I would question how many people who would buy from their FLGS would be in the kickstarter market to begin with. ie, how many who support the kickstarter would have simply bought from an online retailer if the kickstarter hadn't happened. Also, if the deals are that good there is nothing stopping local stores from backing and then selling them at a markup (esp. in the case of limited edition stuff) I understand they wouldn't be able to compete with the price, but how many can compete with normal online discounters anyhow.

I think it depends on the product .. Something like Ogre might not work for stores if it's just a 1 time thing, but miniatures that are going to continue to be produced is different. But then, a store isn't going to invest in a line of miniatures if no one is going to buy them.

I'm using Kickstarter to actually "kickstart" my game, and get the funding I need to make it happen because I'm too poor to do it myself. My goal is to get to the point where I don't need KS anymore and I can just fund the models I want to fund and let the game grow from there. Thats one of the reasons I went with Game Salute for my publisher, they do a lot to support stores like with demo copies and special events & programs for stores.

You might be able to make some cash with Kickstarter and get your game made, but if you want your game to stick around for good, you gotta get it in the stores.

So yeah I can see why some stores won't want to stock KS games, but I think in the end it will depend on if there's actually a demand for the game a year later and customers are asking for it.

Its an interesting point. I think there is a difference between a KS for a game and a KS just for miniatures.

I think Sedition Wars will be a good case study. I think many people bought it because it was such a good deal just for the miniatures themselves. The game itself is an unknown really. Now factor in that when that box hits the shelves it will be more expensive and not have all the goodies. However there were plenty of people that bought extra boxes to put on ebay. So now you have an inferior product, many of the zealots already have it, and I'm sure you will be able to pick up the packed promo box for about the same price on ebay. If I was a retailer I would be concerned about carrying it.

That being said the KS allowed them to make a better game with better components, so its an interesting argument.

I think kickstarters for miniatures might be different though. Such as Dreamforge's KS. When those stormtroopers and leviathans hit the shelves I think they will sell like hotcakes. They are great sculpts and they will be priced to sell. Just look at how many of those WGF great coat Shock Trooper boxes sold and they are not nearly as nice as Dreamforge's storm troopers. As for the leviathans, Dream forge and Forge world were selling resin warhound titan sized kits at over $300 a pop, so yeah I think the affordable plastic ones will sell really well. So with their KS Dreamforge is able to get a great product into some customers hands so that gamers can see that it is a good quality product. If I was a retailer I don't think I would have a problem carrying these.

There are many issues with kickstarter projects and FLGS's carrying them.

They may have already reached their market through the kickstarter, the kickstarter project may offer more attractive deals, the store may not be able to get them at a price it can sell them (e.g. it may have to pay full retail to buy them itself), they may not be able to get them through regular distribution channels, or they may just not know about them.

brettz123 wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

Kickstarter was not started to fund production of niche products like SF wargames. It is supposed to be for crowd sponsorship of creative artistic projects like an indie movie.

I could not disgaree with you more. Kickstarter was meant for crowd funding of artistic projects period. It has nothing to do with indie films vs SF wargames. A wargame is an expression of creativity and artistic expression on multiple levels. You have creativity, drawing, painting, and often times sculpting.

I get what you are saying, but...

When the creator moves from the prototype to volume production, the Kickstarter funding is not longer paying for the creative work, it is paying for the factory work. That is when it stops being an artistic endeavour. In that sense, the Kickstarter could be for the development work, then subscribers will have to buy the actual product at retail.

However perhaps I am dragging the thread off topic.

If a KS product wants to reach retail saturation in order to grow future customerbase, then maybe they need to design the stretch goals in such a way that every product unlocked for KS rewards also unlocks a product for retail release.

So when the KS delivers and the 'product' launches and your hundreds of KS backers get models X, Y and Z, there is also a release of new models of A, B and C only available at retail stockers. Then you basically send hundreds or thousands of customers canvassing the street to their FLGS to buy new product.

And then stores are incentivized to carry X, Y and Z even though most customers have it.

It all depends if having your game sold and played in FLGS is part of your successful product line and ongoing business or if you just want to make a fist-full of figures, mail them out and be done with it.

To what extent are Kickstarter projects allowed to make a profit?

 Dawnbringer wrote:
I would question how many people who would buy from their FLGS would be in the kickstarter market to begin with. ie, how many who support the kickstarter would have simply bought from an online retailer if the kickstarter hadn't happened. Also, if the deals are that good there is nothing stopping local stores from backing and then selling them at a markup (esp. in the case of limited edition stuff) I understand they wouldn't be able to compete with the price, but how many can compete with normal online discounters anyhow.

I almost never buy anything from local stores. But then again, I don't play in their store, so I see no reason to pay extra for play space I don't use.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
To what extent are Kickstarter projects allowed to make a profit?

I assume a kickstarter can 'reward' whatever their backers will accept. I see nothing that regulates profit except consumers expectations. If they can produce a product with a 50% markup and they convince people to back the KS with rewards which give them a 50% mark up, then they get profit.

I notice in the 'vaporware' market, a lot of the 'profit' goes to getting a developer and an artist time to just crank out code and produce a game. And then you get said game for 'free' because of your pledge or you get to contribute to the game. That seems like a lot of profit.

I have also seen 'web shows' where you are KS a 'season' of their show and you get a DVD. You are basically kickstarting a salary so if animator X gets 50k, he will make 20 cartoons in a 3 month period and release a DVD. As an independent animator, this is basically 'booking a gig' for himself. he gets paid, he makes a product people like, people get a show they may not have gotten as he would have had to do commercial work.

Different groups have different expectations. I feel like mini producers have backers who basically want a 50% retail discount for backing a KS. So people feel a 'man-sized' figure is between 8-10$ so they want it for 5$ less. If you can squeeze a profit margin into those deep discounts... more power to you!

 -Loki- wrote:

Generally yes. Store owners like you to buy in their store. The tables are there primarily for advertising, for that to pay off they need people to buy in store. If you got a crap ton of models from a kickstarter, and go and play in a store with them, they're seeing no money from you for the use of their tables. Similarly, if you budget buy a whole army from an online store and play on their tables, it's the same situation.

This is exactly why many hobby shops carry snack food. The longer you are in the store, the more likely you are to buy some junk food. Also, hobby shops typically get models at a reduced price and sell them at "website" pricing levels letting both of them make a profit without any "real" competition. I know of a few local hobby shops that charge $1-$2 every day you play on their tables as well. I heard a few shops even have a membership system for it. $<x> for a year of play or $<w> for every day you come and play.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Brother SRM wrote:
Selling the game on Kickstarter counts as bypassing the store for sales, and is therefore an insult? I guess selling it online straight from the distributor does too by that same logic.

Exactly. Why isn't every game shop out there refusing to buy FFG products. I mean, they sell their own stuff direct.

Becouse the store gets the games the same time FFG starts selling them online, the way it should be. Not, months or almost a year later then the kickstart sold it. I think thats the biggest issue a store would have.

As a retailer, I would take a game in stock if I think there is (still) a market for it. And I believe it sells fast enough.
Not if it was funded through kickstarter or not.
Of course, you take the initial sales through kickstarter in account. And some products are too niche-like to be viable to keep in stock (which is why a lot of games are funded through kickstarter).

 Tabletop Games wrote:
As a retailer, I would take a game in stock if I think there is (still) a market for it. And I believe it sells fast enough.
Not if it was funded through kickstarter or not.
Of course, you take the initial sales through kickstarter in account. And some products are too niche-like to be viable to keep in stock (which is why a lot of games are funded through kickstarter).

I think Mantic did a good job with their Dreadball KS. They introduced a game sold it at a cheap rate with lots of goodies for the KS people. Retailers will make money on the expansions and additional seasons that come from a game that was marketed well using the KS.

Sining wrote:
Is Sedition wars even out yet?

No, not yet - IIRC, the original timeline had the first wave of releases arriving in November.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

brettz123 wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

Kickstarter was not started to fund production of niche products like SF wargames. It is supposed to be for crowd sponsorship of creative artistic projects like an indie movie.

I could not disgaree with you more. Kickstarter was meant for crowd funding of artistic projects period. It has nothing to do with indie films vs SF wargames. A wargame is an expression of creativity and artistic expression on multiple levels. You have creativity, drawing, painting, and often times sculpting.

I get what you are saying, but...

When the creator moves from the prototype to volume production, the Kickstarter funding is not longer paying for the creative work, it is paying for the factory work. That is when it stops being an artistic endeavour. In that sense, the Kickstarter could be for the development work, then subscribers will have to buy the actual product at retail.

However perhaps I am dragging the thread off topic.

Perhaps you are but it is an interesting discussion. I don't see a need to draw the line at development and production. Why do I have to only launch a kickstarter before I have anything finished? Personally I launched my kickstarter after I already had the greens for the miniatures finished. I spent most of my extra cash getting the greens made and the help from kickstarter really helped bring the miniatures into production. At the end of the day the kickstarter is either financially supporting the development or the production. Either way it allows an artistic product to get out to people that it (or at least part of it) would not otherwise have been able to do on its own.

The gaming business is a tough one and just because one company is bigger than another doesn't mean the ability to run a kickstarter isn't extremely helpful and allow them to bring a product to market that they would not be able to otherwise.

It is an interesting thing though.

Noir wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Brother SRM wrote:
Selling the game on Kickstarter counts as bypassing the store for sales, and is therefore an insult? I guess selling it online straight from the distributor does too by that same logic.

Exactly. Why isn't every game shop out there refusing to buy FFG products. I mean, they sell their own stuff direct.

Becouse the store gets the games the same time FFG starts selling them online, the way it should be. Not, months or almost a year later then the kickstart sold it. I think thats the biggest issue a store would have.

That's not really true. Backers don't get the product a year before and maybe not even months before stores would get the product. What they get is the opportunity to pay 1 year before the product is even made or ships -_- and then hope their investment goes through. Hey, maybe someone should do a special KS for stores, where stores can pledge to give money first to the manufacturers so they can come up with their product and then wait 1 year to get the product.

Bossk_Hogg wrote:

 Dawnbringer wrote:
I would question how many people who would buy from their FLGS would be in the kickstarter market to begin with. ie, how many who support the kickstarter would have simply bought from an online retailer if the kickstarter hadn't happened. Also, if the deals are that good there is nothing stopping local stores from backing and then selling them at a markup (esp. in the case of limited edition stuff) I understand they wouldn't be able to compete with the price, but how many can compete with normal online discounters anyhow.

I almost never buy anything from local stores. But then again, I don't play in their store, so I see no reason to pay extra for play space I don't use.

A local FLGS opened up near me a few months ago. I've bought all my stuff from the net for years now, and frankly I only play at home. I've bought a bit of stuff from him, but he feels entitled to my money, and has an unfortunately over-complicated discount scheme. So, I just keep buying 99% of my stuff online and go in there less and less often. The second-to-final straw was when I ordered some minis in to support his store (paying a little more than I would have by going direct) and he put them all on the shelf as soon as they came in. Apparently he got "burned" by "unreliable gamers" in his previous store in another state, and so now doesn't put anything aside unless you've pre-paid for it. Like, not even for a few days to give you time to get in. I've seen him do it to other people as well. So I bought about 70% of what I'd ordered and left the rest on the shelf. If he doesn't feel obliged to put my order aside for a week or so, so I can come in - and instead puts it on the shelf, I don't feel obliged to buy it. I may as well pay less for it - if he has to order it, where's the difference if I order it myself? Well, I get it delivered to my door and not sold on me!

A month or so later, one guy ordered a full FoW army and came in on the day to find it had all been stuck on the shelf. He was pretty upset, and while the staff guy there was apologetic and understanding, all he could say was "yeah I was told to put it all out". When the owner came in a it later and the guy who ordered the army (who was still not happy) asked "what if someone bought some of my stuff?" the owner just laughed it off and told him "I'll just order it in again for you!"

The final straw for me was with White Dwarf, which I'd asked him to put aside a copy for me when they came in, and I'd buy it from him instead of the local GW. You know, support the local indie. Picked up three issues over three months, and they were on the shelf each time. The last one, was in a batch that sold out on release day. Which prompted him to declare that if you want a WD aside, all you have to do is pay in full for each issue in advance. At that point I subscribed to WD and haven't been in since.

I'd have liked to support the local FLGS, but hell. It's more expensive and more difficult than dealing with online. He's a nice guy, but painful to deal with as a customer. I guess if I need a single paint or something, I'll go up there and buy it, but FFS!
Conversely I've got a good relationship with my local online retailers. They actually put stuff aside for me for weeks at a time, their prices are great, and I repay them by spending thousands.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sining wrote:

Noir wrote:

Becouse the store gets the games the same time FFG starts selling them online, the way it should be. Not, months or almost a year later then the kickstart sold it. I think thats the biggest issue a store would have.

That's not really true. Backers don't get the product a year before and maybe not even months before stores would get the product. What they get is the opportunity to pay 1 year before the product is even made or ships -_- and then hope their investment goes through. Hey, maybe someone should do a special KS for stores, where stores can pledge to give money first to the manufacturers so they can come up with their product and then wait 1 year to get the product.

This is an excellent point. KS operates under consumers giving up their cash months and months in advance. That's why there's (usually) the extra value. Retailers operate on credit from distributors.

I'm down for:
3 copies of Sedition Wars plus a pile of extras
2 Copies of Dreadbowl plus a pile of extras
4 big Leviathans plus 4 smaller leviathans a bunch of troopers
3x Reaper "Vampire" plus at least 2 of each add-on, plus paints
A ton of Dredd figures
A ton of KoW figures
A bunch of dwarves
100 or so plastic Zombies
A couple of AoW dwarves (good luck seeing them before I die!)
A bunch of "Babes"
A few goblins
A pile of RBG miniatures

All of that was paid for months ago. There's a lot of money there. I couldn't see retailers paying upfront for all of that to be made (or pre-ordered). They, like many retail businesses generally operate under a credit system, after all.


Also relevant - What have I gotten from Kickstarter so far?

2 Kow Rulebooks, some Kow Dice and a Mantic Battlefoam Bag.

A more legit gripe from retail would be that Kickstarters are taking money that might have gone through the retail stream for other products. You know who (some of) the money spent on all those KS projects I've listed would have gone to? Places like Puppetswar and GW onsellers, Some random boxed FFG games, and crap from Sideshow Collectables and Hot Toys, probably some savings. Most of the products I'll end up buying anyway in the end. But mostly not miniatures and gaming stuff in terms of dollar value.

To reiterate something that has been touched on, it seems the critical point to much of this is the two extremes of products that seem to be coming out of kickstarter right now;

1) Products that would have been done with or without the KS, where backers are uniquely situated and the product is self-contained. The most obvious example of this (at least, that I am familiar with) would seem to be Sedition Wars. Here, anyone who had any real interest in the game would have been foolish not to have gotten in on the KS: for a very minor premium (retail MSRP was I think $80, sweet spot pledge was $100), you received the complete game... but an enormous number of additional models. I think it ended up you got doubles of basically everything in the box, as well as half a dozen exclusive miniatures (more?).

A retailer might well be quite cautious about stocking such a product, which was quite well known during its campaign, with a huge purchase base, and people looking to buy the retail box are getting a dramatically lesser value then people that bought into the campaign. It also creates a rather awkward situation for "evangelicals", that is, people looking to get others into the game. The difference in value for money is stark.

2) Products that would not have been realized without Kickstarter, where there simply was no other option: Dreamforge seems the paradigm here, with a product line that simply could not have happened without a large, up-front infusion of cash. Add to that, it's not a self-contained product. That is, save for people that pledged very, very heavily, most people will eventually be in the market for more material from the campaign.

This product type it seems would be a good deal more easily accepted by retailers: not only are people that backed the campaigns quite likely to continue to buy the line, but other buyers don't have to first stomach the fact that they lost out on huge deals.

For me, for example, I purchased some infantry units, but nothing like a complete army. If I am satisfied with the models (and the sprue shots seem to indicate I will be), I'll be buying troopers for months and years to come.

Then there are a lot of products in-between: Dreadball, for example, initially seems a lot like Sedition Wars, but there are some critical differences. One big one is that the discount is a lot less sharp. SW seemed to reach a point where they simply threw models at backers: Dreadball was quite a bit more parsimonious (a fact some people on the comments page have noted, in the vein of "did we really get such a great deal?"). Additionally, Dreadball had very, very few exclusive figures (I think 3 ultimately? Robot guy, Elf Guy and Bane?).

As an aside, purely from a store point of view, I can see a sports game being more embraced then a survival horror game, just from the idea that you can sell individual teams to people, run a league, etc. Games like Zombiecide, SW and so on that are not so easily "subdivided" seem like a much harder sell.

As an aside, purely from a store point of view, I can see a sports game being more embraced then a survival horror game, just from the idea that you can sell individual teams to people, run a league, etc. Games like Zombiecide, SW and so on that are not so easily "subdivided" seem like a much harder sell.

Only to miniature gamers. To board gamers (who are arguably the primary market for a board game), getting a complete game is a much bigger draw, rather than having to dick about with figuring out what all the teams are and buying them individually.

 Laughing Man wrote:

As an aside, purely from a store point of view, I can see a sports game being more embraced then a survival horror game, just from the idea that you can sell individual teams to people, run a league, etc. Games like Zombiecide, SW and so on that are not so easily "subdivided" seem like a much harder sell.

Only to miniature gamers. To board gamers (who are arguably the primary market for a board game), getting a complete game is a much bigger draw, rather than having to dick about with figuring out what all the teams are and buying them individually.

Hmm, while true, I'm not sure what impact that has on FLGS. It runs into the point I was making: If someone is demoing, say, the Sedition Wars they got from kickstarter, would it necessarily prompt interest to discover that several of the miniatures they are using are unavailable at this time and that there was an awesome bargain... that is no longer available?

Perhaps I am simply jaundiced by my locals: I think I once saw a game of Zombies!!! played, but cannot recall another instance of a board game actually being played at the store itself. A sports game, it would seem to me, would be more conducive to a store actually being able to monetize it.

Who knows?

Ah, that explains it then. The LGS where I work (Game Nite in Saint Louis) is primarily a board game store, although it's got about a dozen tables for miniature gaming as well. Thus, I'm exposed to a LOT more board gamers than I am miniature gamers (although there's still a ton of those around, with Warmachine night getting 15-30 people every week).

Really, it depends on what type of store you're looking at. If you're selling nothing but miniatures, a Bloodbowl-esque game might be a better idea. If you've got a big boardgaming community as well, however, games that don't require you to buy multiple boxes to get a single functioning product seem to sell better in my experience (well, to the stereotypical elitist eurogamer anyhow).

 Buzzsaw wrote:
Then there are a lot of products in-between: Dreadball, for example, initially seems a lot like Sedition Wars, but there are some critical differences. One big one is that the discount is a lot less sharp. SW seemed to reach a point where they simply threw models at backers: Dreadball was quite a bit more parsimonious (a fact some people on the comments page have noted, in the vein of "did we really get such a great deal?"). Additionally, Dreadball had very, very few exclusive figures (I think 3 ultimately? Robot guy, Elf Guy and Bane?).

As far as I can tell, only Nightshade an Wyn Greth'Ski were KS-exclusives. The Bane guy (Blaine/Convict) is just a really early preview for Season 4 - Dreadball Xtreme! I haven't seen anything via Mantic to indicate he was KS-only.