Long Live ACTA!

[tneva82]

1.) only get minis through web ordering
2.) not all possible armies official supported
3.) interesting price policy ( WHAT should i pay for this ? )
4.) no clear future development

This means just GW epic sales might be dead. Players keep buying new armies though. Ebay is one good source(and heck. Who needs ebay. I have heaps of epic models. None which were bought from ebay. Few which were bought from GW). Other companies are. There are necron players for epic. Lack of official models is hardly a problem.

Oh and there are army lists, aka the most important part for support, for pretty much every army. Only variant lists(space wolves etc) are missing army lists. But they are coming.

Screw GW. Epic doesn't need GW to survive.

 

[thePirv]

Epic is still losing more players than there is new blood coming into the game. Thus it is a dying game. It's not dead yet, but providing GW never re-release it or produce new Epic stuff, it is simply a matter of time until it does die out. Just because it hasn't died out yet doesn't mean that it wont. No game survives forever without support, just some manage to hang on for a long time. One of the reasons that Epic survives is that GW do still sell the old mins through Mail Order and always have. If they stopped selling the minis, then the game would die faster, but make no mistakes, Epic is still dying, as any unsupported game eventually will

 

[DrSeltsam]

The problem is, companies do need to continue to sell a stream of figures to generate revenue. GW has thought of their specialist games as sudden sources of short term revenue while Warhammer and 40k are the long term continuing streams. They were foolish enough to think that Lord of the Rings would be one too.

ACTA, like any game, will need new miniatures to survive as a profitable entity. The trick is to constantly make new ships/fleets while avoiding the tendency to make the new stuff more powerful/useful than the old to push it.

<Trying to catch this discussion and pull it back to the topic ...>

That's correct but there is a big difference between make new stuff and make NEW stuff. The minis have to be interesting in terms of model, stats and background. Nobody wants the sediment of ship development as a improvment ... yeah i look at you Neroon, pseudo-Vree-base-ship and Drazi-what-ever :wink:
Im sorry but i just don't buy ... and i mean it word by word !

Timing is also very important.
Who the f%&$ with more than 2 active brain cells thinks that a customer is happy to wait 6 or 7 years ( YEARS ! ) on a update for their army ? Again just look at GW to see how you should not make it. Don't try to copy the GW way and make a fleet the Space Marines of B5.

The best way i've seen up to date is to make the updates a continuously stream of new and shiny little minis ( and rules ) for all armies/fleets at the same time 8)

Take a cycle of 3 or 6 months and publish at the end of each quarter or half year a new ship for each faction. One ship for each faction each 3 or 6 months. Thats alot of time to test and produce. I understand that this is not easy to reach but other companies do it this way.

How long since the last new Abbai ( please don't mention the space-loudspeaker-of-Doom here ), Drakh, Dilgar, Vree, Shadow, Vorlon or Minbari ship was published ? And i mean new ship model with a interesting background and useable stats - not a alternative version with an existing model or a Armageddon PowerLevel that is too expensive PL wise - you do not need to buy more than 1 ( or maybe 2). Lower PL levels = more ships.

The company wants to sell minis ? Thats fine for me - produce new minis for my faction/fleet and i will be good customer and buy it !

 

[katadder]

yeah but once your army has been updated who wants it all to change in 2 years or less?

 

[Davesaint]

Lately one cannot but wonder why do some folk even play this game when it seems to cause just grief for them. Seems like more posts are for whining than for actually enjoying the game...Whines for every possible thing you can think of(hell. Even news of new B5 material brings it up!). And reading the forums one could come to following conclusions:

a) Game sucks
b) Mongoose is run by greedy idiots
c) JMS has suddenly become braindead vegetable who cannot write anything half-decent
d) ACTA is going to die.

Now part d is more or less what I'm going to address. Seems like people here think that ACTA is dying horrible because of Mongoose's actions. But here's small thought:

YOU folks decide wether game lives or dies!

Mongoose cannot kill the game regardless of what they do.
Games Workshop cannot kill the game regardless of what they do.
Any other company cannot kill the game regardless of what they do.

Only ones who have power to kill the game are YOU! YOU the fans. Fans are what make games live or die. THEY decide fate of the game. If you want ACTA to die then it dies. If you want ACTA to live then it lives. Doesn't really matter what Mongoose does. Hell they could even stop producing material(or models) for ACTA tomorrow and it would still come down to this: Do the fans want game to live or die?

Some folk have got the right idea around here. So Warlock should be war level rather than Armageddon? Some folks have instantly stated they will use SFOS stats for it and keep it as war. Good move for them! If that fits them then go ahead. Are we lemmings or gamers? Lemmings need everything to be stamped 100% official but gamers can simply nudge things around. So your favourite ship got a shaft in update? There was perfectly fine and balanced version before? Just talk to folks you play with. 99% times they are reasonable and let you use the balanced version. Simple problem solved.

Before somebody comes and shouts "whatabout tournaments!" let me ask a question. How big % of your games are represented by games where you absolutly cannot have gentlemens agreement like above? I would wager very small partion for most folks.

And whatabout more serious problems? What if Mongoose foobars 2nd edition completely and rules are suddenly unplayable? Well let's look at comparable event...Epic 40k...Rules were foobar as far as most of epic fans were concerned and the game...Well just flopped. What did epic fans do? Did they complain and let game die? Nope. They made ruleset of their own(called netepic). Say something about getting rid of officialness...That ruleset has been tweaked and tweaked over the years so that it's very possibly most balanced version of epic ever produced. Epic Armageddon's rules are similary at the hands of gamers rather than GW.

Epic has suffered far worse(including 3, or is it 4th now, attempts to kill the game by GW...) than ACTA and yet game is alive. Take heart from that example and refuse to let the ACTA die. Long live ACTA!

Actually game companies can kill a game. Ask Excelsior Entertainment about Chronopia and Warzone. Poor marketing, poor distribution for their figs = dead game. Too bad, as the games were pretty darn good.


Dave

 

[DrSeltsam]

yeah but once your army has been updated who wants it all to change in 2 years or less?

I said nothing about changing the fleet every x months/years. I was talking about expanding the total available ships ( and models ) for all fleets continuously.

The Octurion, Nova, Sharlin, G'Quan, Omega, Whitestar and whatever will stay in your list but you get a new ship. It looks different and is differnent - something new you want to buy.
Do you thing Mongoose/ACtA can survive with the current range of models infinite ? At one point all people have all the available models they want ... what's than ?

That's also a point regarding fluff and copyright issues. Is Mongoose allowed to make own models that were never shown in the series ? I think so after Armageddon ...

 

[Greg Smith]

Take a cycle of 3 or 6 months and publish at the end of each quarter or half year a new ship for each faction.

How long since the last new Abbai ( please don't mention the space-loudspeaker-of-Doom here ),

A couple of months.

Drakh, Dilgar, Vree,

6,10,2 months respectively.

... or Minbari ship was published ?

2 months.

And i mean new ship model with a interesting background and useable stats - not a alternative version with an existing model or a Armageddon PowerLevel that is too expensive PL wise .

So not only does it have to produce new minis every 3-6 months, they have to be ones that you like.

Mongoose are expanding the range of minis, just every 12 months and not with ships to your tatse.

 

[Hans Olo]

Take a cycle of 3 or 6 months and publish at the end of each quarter or half year a new ship for each faction.

How long since the last new Abbai ( please don't mention the space-loudspeaker-of-Doom here ),

A couple of months.

Drakh, Dilgar, Vree,

6,10,2 months respectively.

... or Minbari ship was published ?

2 months.

And i mean new ship model with a interesting background and useable stats - not a alternative version with an existing model or a Armageddon PowerLevel that is too expensive PL wise .

So not only does it have to produce new minis every 3-6 months, they have to be ones that you like.

Mongoose are expanding the range of minis, just every 12 months and not with ships to your tatse.

Neroon that's all I want to say about this.

 

[Greg Smith]

Neroon that's all I want to say about this.

I know. Its a nice looking ship.

(The missing release sucks though).

 

[Hans Olo]

You surely know what I meant.
Its nice looking after you got rid of all that metal stuff. (Take a fine saw and cut it off)
Stat wise it's one of the worst chokes I have ever seen

 

[DrSeltsam]

Take a cycle of 3 or 6 months and publish at the end of each quarter or half year a new ship for each faction.

How long since the last new Abbai ( please don't mention the space-loudspeaker-of-Doom here ),

A couple of months.

Drakh, Dilgar, Vree,

6,10,2 months respectively.

... or Minbari ship was published ?

2 months.

And i mean new ship model with a interesting background and useable stats - not a alternative version with an existing model or a Armageddon PowerLevel that is too expensive PL wise .

So not only does it have to produce new minis every 3-6 months, they have to be ones that you like.

Mongoose are expanding the range of minis, just every 12 months and not with ships to your tatse.

The release cylce was a suggestion - nothing more :roll:

No, they don't have to produce mini that i like. If i don't like a mini it's my personal problem.
If the majority of the customer bases likes it - that's fine for the company. I do not decide what the company has to produce and what mini is good/interesting - this is done finally by the turnover figures.

Im just trying to express my personal opinion on this. If other people share it - fine. If im alone with it - that's also fine. I believe it concerns the exchange of opinions and experiences.

 

[Greg Smith]

Dr. Seltsam, you were bemoaning the lack of new ships published, when in fact there have been ships published.

Now if you were bemoaning the lack of miniatures released, I could understand. Mongoose has singularly failed to release many of the ships from Armageddon, has long-lasting problems with the Drakh ships and casting issues with older ships.

I have been told there will be a delay with my ordered Warlock. There was a delay with my previously ordered Olympus. A friend of mine has just bought a large number of Centauri ships, none of which had holes suitable to take the stands and an Octurion that was shockingly badly cast and impossible to assemble.

Now I think ACTA is a great game, and I think Mongoose supports the rules very well and responds to the requests of the players, even though the constant changes put some people off. They obviously have problems with the minis though.

 

[emperorpenguin]

A friend of mine has just bought a large number of Centauri ships, none of which had holes suitable to take the stands and an Octurion that was shockingly badly cast and impossible to assemble. .

I finally received a well cast left side of an Octurion a few days ago, took Chris rummaging through a bits box to get it for me though. The actual casting of the Octurion (among others) seems to be a real problem

 

[H]

doing to much at once.

 

[urobach81]

A really serious discusion...but the tread starter has right.
a nice example for MGP problems

...yesterday i ordered two ships from my local gamestore...today i received a mail, the owner tell me that MGP don´t deliever his store, since two weeks, his stock of models are nearly empty.

HELLO...MGP "what´s going on"

be warned, i am very angry, now.
every ship that i had ordered since i am a ACTA player, have i become with a long time to wait...WHY?...because i live in germany, i must wait three months for one warlock...WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:

 

[katadder]

happens sometimes in the UK too i believe.

 

[Greg Smith]

doing to much at once.

Too much too soon maybe. They've only been doing minis for around two years. And running a manufacturing business is more complicated than publishing.

 

[urobach81]

happens sometimes in the UK too i believe.

i know... you can buy your stuff in the land who are the publisher has its home. and you must wait...
ok i don´t know whether MGP manufacture his minis in the UK or USA, current. but what are the problems... (i know it but i don´t understand it) :roll:

 

[Greg Smith]

The metal minis are manufactered in the US by Mongoose themselves. The SST plastics were manufactured in China. I don't know about the new Evo ones.

 

[urobach81]

doing to much at once.

Too much too soon maybe. They've only been doing minis for around two years. And running a manufacturing business is more complicated than publishing.

too much too soon, exactly....we players know this but why don´t MGP see this... they must fix the current problems, first and then you can look into the future... a past with fatal errors is bad for this game.
the centauri gets stronger and stronger and the rest of the races...and players and rules..buhuhuhuhuh WHY? :twisted: