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 Mmmpi wrote:
I want to talk about Heavy Beer.

For me, my preference depends on my mood, activity level, and if I'm eating something with it. If I'm sitting down for a large meal, I can definitely do with a heavy beer like a stout but if I'm just sipping then I prefer something lighter like a pale lager (Corona for instance). Was that a mobile phone autocorrect or a Freudian slip?

Not a mistype. Felt the thread needed a bit of a defusing laugh. Or a beer.

Personally, I like heavier beers with chicken.

New update: cleanup and grey primer

I think the main problem I'm going to have with these (apart from the lego-like hands) is that they will look serviceable enough on their own but are going to look super weird next to any of the metals I purchased previously.

Maybe that's their cunning plan - get you to buy the plastics, then replace the plastics with metals..

 Siygess wrote:
I think the main problem I'm going to have with these (apart from the lego-like hands) is that they will look serviceable enough on their own but are going to look super weird next to any of the metals I purchased previously.

Maybe that's their cunning plan - get you to buy the plastics, then replace the plastics with metals..

If you wanna avoid that, just go for CEF and Caprice and go all plastics plus resin HTs. Plastics are mostly good enough, and particularly in the case of Caprice it's not like you can afford the metals anyways

 Siygess wrote:
I think the main problem I'm going to have with these (apart from the lego-like hands) is that they will look serviceable enough on their own but are going to look super weird next to any of the metals I purchased previously.

Super weird may be a touch strong as a description. I'd say they're closer to the blitz metals than the old tacticals and even those old tacticals don't look super weird next to them (but do admittedly look a bit off). The plastics seem like a midway point between the two due to the compromises necessary to get them into plastic using the mould tech DP9 chose.

It'll be nice when the final test-pops are painted up, so we can see them directly beside some of the previous, metal and resin incarnations.

 Albertorius wrote:

 Siygess wrote:
I think the main problem I'm going to have with these (apart from the lego-like hands) is that they will look serviceable enough on their own but are going to look super weird next to any of the metals I purchased previously.

Maybe that's their cunning plan - get you to buy the plastics, then replace the plastics with metals..

If you wanna avoid that, just go for CEF and Caprice and go all plastics plus resin HTs. Plastics are mostly good enough, and particularly in the case of Caprice it's not like you can afford the metals anyways

Yeah, I can see a lot of people wanting Caprice out of this, as they won't have them and the Caprice models were the easiest to convert over.

But CEF? What if you already have a number of CEF models?!? The uncanny valley effect isn't as pronounced as North, to say nothing of South, but I think it's still there.

Definitely, the plastics are for new players. No issue with previous models or gear/weapon scale. What's not clear is whether the metals will still be available after the KS. I'm thinking the metals get clearanced and disappear in favor of the plastics going forward. The timeline for that is not clear, but it's what every other conversion from metal to plastic has done. This is why I've been buying clearance metal lately.

I think I remember Dave saying somewhere that the metals would all still be available.

Sure, for a while. How long? Hard to say. At some point, it'll be gone, just like the Tactical-era boxed sets.

Oh, hey, this is neat: Apparently there's an opponent-finding app getting released called Rumbl, and you can sign up for the beta before the June 1st soft release. It's got Heavy Gear listed as one of the games for finding and challenging opponents.

The metals should disappear, at some point. That's just the way the industry is going. Hell, even plastics are probably going to disappear, at least once we've all got a 3D printer in our basement. The thing is, the metals should disappear because they're being replaced by better (in every way!) alternatives, not just because of an arbitrary sales push.

These plastics - and thus the game - will live or die on the price. Same price as metal? Heavy Gear dies. Actually cheaper? Game's got a chance of coming back, if things are handled properly going forward. And let's not kid ourselves that it doesn't require a comeback. There is no Heavy Gear right now. Right now, there's old fans who remember it fondly. These plastics COULD bring the game back. Could. Might. Dare I say hopefully without getting branded a troll again?

After price, the next hurdle will be being able to buy the damn things.

Quite frankly, I think it's more than just price. I see the same HG stuff at clearance prices of $5 per Gear just sitting on eBay and Amazon. Some of the stuff is even lower, than when I bought, and it's still sitting. If you think price is the key, just how cheap do you think the per-model prices need to be? $4 per Gear? $3? Can't be $2, because that's a breakeven number.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Quite frankly, I think it's more than just price. I see the same HG stuff at clearance prices of $5 per Gear just sitting on eBay and Amazon. Some of the stuff is even lower, than when I bought, and it's still sitting. If you think price is the key, just how cheap do you think the per-model prices need to be? $4 per Gear? $3? Can't be $2, because that's a breakeven number.

While I don't dispute your quoted prices (most everything I bought during the post L&L era when I came back to HG was 40-75% off MSRP), I would point out that the new material, easier to assemble and convert models, and new first time in 20 years not just tweaked rules are supposed to increase demand. I think $5 per plastic gear is a very reasonable MSRP for plastics sold in squads of 4 per box (little less for each scout, more for fire support gears) but I suspect the real MSRP will probably be about 30% higher and that will be the online discount price. If I wasn't a jaded malcontent (or whatever the term earlier in the thread being bandied about was), either one would be fair for what you're getting assuming the rules stay a free pdf.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Quite frankly, I think it's more than just price. I see the same HG stuff at clearance prices of $5 per Gear just sitting on eBay and Amazon. Some of the stuff is even lower, than when I bought, and it's still sitting. If you think price is the key, just how cheap do you think the per-model prices need to be? $4 per Gear? $3? Can't be $2, because that's a breakeven number.

I suppose that's the entire crux of this thread, or at least was originally. "Why aren't you playing this game? Money? Distribution? Rules? Do you even know what Heavy Gear is?"

$3 a gear (more in Canada, I bet! ) isn't a magic cure-all. But the plastics aren't stellar. As molds, they're not going to win awards, they don't look nearly as good as the competition out there these days, so they do need to be cheap. And I mean actually cheap, not "this price is because of...." cheap, and just cost the same as the metals.

Maybe it's grandiose to say cheap plastics will save the game - but expensive ones WILL be the coffin nail. Good rules don't really matter, not when they make you no money anyway and can be played with the vast collections that already exist. (Or, frankly, any kind of counter you want.) I don't know if they're ever going to make a proper rulebook again, even GW seems to be going away from that. (They should, HG books were always amazing.) But for the moment, the rules, I feel (perhaps incorrectly) are secondary to getting people to actually give the company their money.

If the prices stay as high as they are today, yeah, the game is dead. No new customer is going to pay $10 per plastic Gear that is markedly inferior to the 40k3E Space Marines that were produced nearly 2 decades ago. They might pay $5, but my sense is that is still too high based on what I see in the market today. I think the starter bundle needs to be cheap enough that it becomes an impulse buy, something that nobody would regret if it turned out badly.

Assuming you can get the product in people's hands, at that point it depends on the rules. Based on experiences with prior rules by the Pod, well, that's not particularly encouraging.

So yeah, a "cheap enough" model price will be a necessary condition, but it won't be sufficient one to guarantee success.

It's not about "cheap enough" but whether people feel like they're getting value. People will pay any amount if they feel like they're getting value for their money, and reducing the price without considering value is pointless; if there's no value then no price is cheap enough.

I think that Heavy Gear has a considerable value-proposition, especially with all those former Battletech players and whatnot out there. I personally prefer the way it plays t BT or CAV. So the issue isn't going to be whether the game is being sold at a sufficiently low price, but whether people can be exposed to it, both the fluff and the gameplay. That's going to be the tricky part, but I think GW has proven that there's no short-cuts to good old fashioned gaming evangelism and playing demo games to move a product.

Hm. Value may in fact be a better way of looking at it. But the way I see it, that value has to come from cheapness.

Fifteen years ago, these plastics would have been competitive. Twenty years ago, they would have been, if not revolutionary, at least extremely competitive. Today though, they really aren't. They are certainly serviceable and I personally believe exactly what Heavy Gear needs at the moment, but they won't ever get held up as great designs or molds. Maybe great production, that remains to be seen. But they're not impressive, plunked down next to what's out there these days.

And that's okay! They don't need to be. But since they aren't, they do have to be cheaper than the other guys. The rules are free. They can be bulletproof and revolutionize tabletop wargaming - but they won't save Heavy Gear or help the Pod at all. The fluff and worldbuilding can help, but it all comes down to how much money they can make.

I agree. While people will buy anything they see value in, that value has to outweigh the cost involved.

Personally I prefer the simplified miniatures, as there's plenty of overly busy or fancy miniatures out there, and not having to trim all the fancy cruft off them is great (currently drilling out suckers on Shadows of Brimstone tentacles and I have to keep reminding myself I chose them because they were cheap) so there's a cost-savings on time there. I feel like they'll paint up nicely with a bright, anime-style paint-job.

The value, I think, will come from the mixture of the game, the miniatures, and the people bringing new blood into the game. I think that third part tends to be ignored by TTG makers despite these games being, at their most essential, about the people you're playing with more than the knick-knacks or imaginary worlds involved. Having the knick-knacks available helps though, because they're something people can own. They're the 'buy-in.'

The quality/price brings another problem. From what I understand, HG is a rather low model game. More than infinity, but less than Warmachine, or 40K. If the models are priced at, say $20 for a box of 5 with all the trimmings (weapons, upgrade options, ect.), and the average player only needs three boxes to make a competitive army, than pod only made 30ish dollars off the deal. And that's before their expenses.

Assuming that the old guard aren't going to be buying these (they already have 1+ armies TYVM), and assuming the Pod *ONLY* needs 1,000,000 US to keep the doors open each year, it means that they need to attract over 33,000 new players a year, or have factions likeable enough to inspire people to buy a combined total of 33,000 *ARMIES* (not boxes).

*This assumes that Pod only needs 1,000,000 and that people are buying their starter gears from someone other than the Pod. Also, that the Pod makes 50% of the sticker price on each box before expenses.

Honestly, I think the Pod is going to live, or die on the rules. They need to be simple enough to attract people, and deep enough to keep them interested. If the rules work, people will stay for the minis. The current ones are about "starter box" quality, and the metals are really good. They should keep the KS box as a starter, aka a North/South 2-player box, and starter army boxes for each faction, and keep the metals for everything else, until they get enough exp. with plastics to make competitive models.

Use the cheaper plastics to lure people to what will hopefully be good rules. Once in, the more expensive higher detailed metals will be more interesting, and will get more sales.

But it all depends on the rules.

Kinda got off on a side tangent from my main point. Pod needs good rules to get people in, because cheap models by themselves won't help. AKA good rules keep players.

 Mmmpi wrote:


Assuming that the old guard aren't going to be buying these (they already have 1+ armies TYVM), and assuming the Pod *ONLY* needs 1,000,000 US to keep the doors open each year, it means that they need to attract over 33,000 new players a year, or have factions likeable enough to inspire people to buy a combined total of 33,000 *ARMIES* (not boxes).

Your overall point is correct but I'm quite certain you are vastly overestimating DP9's expenses.

The Pod is what? 2 guys? $200k USD would be enough to keep them fed.

Plus, it's not like they don't have boatloads of revenue coming in from Jovian Chronicles, Tribe 8, Gear Krieg and other stuff to keep them fat and happy.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
The Pod is what? 2 guys? $200k USD would be enough to keep them fed.

Plus, it's not like they don't have boatloads of revenue coming in from Jovian Chronicles, Tribe 8, Gear Krieg and other stuff to keep them fat and happy.

While I agree with the first part, I'm not sure if you're serious about the last part. Could you clarify that?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mrondeau wrote:

 Mmmpi wrote:


Assuming that the old guard aren't going to be buying these (they already have 1+ armies TYVM), and assuming the Pod *ONLY* needs 1,000,000 US to keep the doors open each year, it means that they need to attract over 33,000 new players a year, or have factions likeable enough to inspire people to buy a combined total of 33,000 *ARMIES* (not boxes).

Your overall point is correct but I'm quite certain you are vastly overestimating DP9's expenses.

Agreed. Two owner/operators plus a small office/manufacturing facility isn't a million dollar budget operation.

Read somewhere that the average small business makes one million before expenses, with the owner taking home something like 30-60k of it as profit.

Even assuming $500,000 (200K feels WAY too low), they still have to break 17K new customers a year to break even. How much do they even sell each year?

From the sounds of things, they don't have ANY revenue coming in from JC, T8, or GK. Those games are functionally dead. It's the main reason I didn't buy any of the figs when the JC stuff was put back on the market. I can't get HG games, and it's supported. When the hell am I going to find a JC player?

Actually, it would be more than 33K/17k. I forgot taxes...

 Mmmpi wrote:
From the sounds of things, they don't have ANY revenue coming in from JC, T8, or GK. Those games are functionally dead.

Not so! Did not the Pod just relaunch JC in some flavor? They had money to develop those things for JC, so JC must be a successful and self-sustaining line not to require KS funding. Really, I don't know why the Pod even bothers with HG when their other games are so successful.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Mmmpi wrote:
From the sounds of things, they don't have ANY revenue coming in from JC, T8, or GK. Those games are functionally dead.

Not so! Did not the Pod just relaunch JC in some flavor? They had money to develop those things for JC, so JC must be a successful and self-sustaining line not to require KS funding. Really, I don't know why the Pod even bothers with HG when their other games are so successful.

Again... are you joking or serious? I'd give both equal odds so I'm hesitant to respond by guessing.

I think he's being sarcastic. The last time the Pod release JC stuff a few months ago, they said it was a limited release, which they would do occasionally. Seems demand was high enough for them to put back into production, bot not high enough to keep in constant circulation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Forget I said anything. Just took another look at the online store, and the have Non-HG stuff for sale.

 warboss wrote:

Again... are you joking or serious? I'd give both equal odds so I'm hesitant to respond by guessing.

I'm assuming sarcasm in this case.

The Pod's yearly gross income is unknown at this point, but I'd put my guess at around 150-200k, and that's the generous estimation.
Memory is hazy, since it's been literally years, but I've been told their best year, at the height of Blitz, sometimes around NuCoal's release, was 350-400k. Their income and activity has dropped significantly since.

 Mmmpi wrote:
I think he's being sarcastic. The last time the Pod release JC stuff a few months ago, they said it was a limited release, which they would do occasionally. Seems demand was high enough for them to put back into production, bot not high enough to keep in constant circulation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Forget I said anything. Just took another look at the online store, and the have Non-HG stuff for sale.

He might be... but he occasionally posts some whoppers as well. They only trot out the non-HGB stuff once every season or two on a rotating schedule because the lines haven't had any new products for years (decade+) and weren't profitable enough to keep in stock year round... so they just make just what is preordered when it is trotted out plus maybe a few extra/leftovers. This has recently changed a bit though as I've seen some new JC stuff.

 warboss wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Mmmpi wrote:
From the sounds of things, they don't have ANY revenue coming in from JC, T8, or GK. Those games are functionally dead.

Not so! Did not the Pod just relaunch JC in some flavor? They had money to develop those things for JC, so JC must be a successful and self-sustaining line not to require KS funding. Really, I don't know why the Pod even bothers with HG when their other games are so successful.

Again... are you joking or serious?

Yes, I am.

As an aside, in my experience, different people may have wildly different definition of "success", and thus, may be held to wildly different standards. We praise a 1-year-old for not pooping their pants, and look askance at an adult when they do so. It is my belief that certain companies may exist at a level of "success" akin to that not-poopy toddler.