Will the unit cards/rules be available separately?

[DM]

I'm sure you are right. I know that Peter Pig and Rod Langton (to name but two manufacturers of both rules and figures) don't make much from their rules, using them as a vehicle to promote sales of figures and ships. Mind you, they also don't worry about people buying toys from other companies to use with their rules

 

[Paladin]

I'd reather have them online or in a separate book than in the rulebook anyway. If they go in the rule book you end up with new items not being present or stats getting dated if they are changed via errata.

 

[Hiromoon]

I'm trying my hardest Paladin!

 

[SeattleGamer]

These are the types of business decisions that directly impact your possible market share. If you think about any minis game as having three main components:

Rules
Stats/Army Lists
Minis

When you package them all separately you can broaden your possible market to it's widest. Some want only the rules and stats. Others may only want the minis.

There will always be a bunch of folks who like the whole presentation, and will wanna buy all three: your rules, your minis, your stats. But there will be some who hear about the game, like the genre, and want to give it a shot. But not necessairly with "your" minis. Perhaps (using BFE as the example) you already have a fine collection of 15mm moderns. These people may not want to buy the rules AND the Army Books just to try out a sample game. And that is assuming the Army Books are a separate product. So if the stats don't come with the rule book, and they're not available separately, you will eliminate this segment of customers. They won't want to be "forced" (which is how it will feel to them) to buy "your" minis.

I think it's a given that rule sets don't make that much money for a company, they are the driving mechanism to get people to buy your minis. But the widest possible market for your rules gets you the widest possible market for your minis. So my way of looking at this is they should do everything possible to get as many people as possible to buy the rules.

What if that person in the example above buys the rules and heads to his FLGS and plays with his buddy, using his 15mm figs. Then I walk in and watch them play. Never heard of Mongoose. The game looks great, they are having lots of fun ... but I don't game in 15mm. I like larger stuff. I then find out that Mongoose makes minis to go with their game. Now I'm buying the rules AND the minis from Mongoose, all because I saw a game being played in a store. The fewer rules they sell, the fewer potential customers they can have.

I don't understand why anyone would deliberately reduce their possible market by forcing anyone to buy one thing (minis) in order to get the other thing (stats). Stats should be included in the rules or available separately (either free or as a sellable item).

Just my two cents.

Steve

 

[soulman]

I got my copy of VAS, of course comes with stats and nice B&W pictures of course, if the ship stats was not inside the book, but with the minis ( i know VAS is counters and no minis to follow ).
I would have not bought it, as it is VAS is a very nice set of rules
Alan

Also their is so much equiment to do for BF, like hummers and blackhawks, the list go`s on...
Somebody needs a full time job doing all stats from the 1970`d upwards
Alan

 

[SeattleGamer]

Soulman ... I thought the whole concept of BFE was "Today + 10 years". That gave them some lattitude to tweak weapons and add some stuff that may only be in prototype development stages. I don't believe they intend to "go back" in history and do weapons and troops and the whole thing from the 1970's onwards.

 

[Galatea]

I think best solution is to do a website section where you can get all the unit stats in pdf.
And there should be a set of cards (something like magic cards or better hard plastic cards) for each faction with all the 'basic units' of that army.
Then you can bring on expansion sets/pdfs with cards for the newest releases of every army.

As said, it is the most important that the game is played (and thus spread) after all.
I don't mind if anyone uses Tyranid Warriors as Warrior Bugs as long as he helps me spreading SST and build up a solid gaming group. He will be an exception and all people we gain with his help probably will use MGP Minis - maybe even he will add some to his force because he likes them so much (like Ripplers or Overseers).
And probably even some 40k players that watch us begin to like the models (actually I already got 2 - one is using Ripplers as Gargoyls and the other Grizzlys as Terminators).

That's the way things go.

 

[soulman]

Hi seattle gamer, even that the game is based in 2013, around 6 odd years from now, not a lot has changed, for british units, its the land warrior system for troops ( real life we will never get it in bulk ), and the euro fighter for air support in BF.

As you can guess no changes for the MEA, and time stand still, they just hate us more...!!!

As for the gamers in the world, BF is such a easy system to play and to Mod, and i hope this is where the System will grow on people..

Any battle from 70`s upwards and be done, from the falklands, to " red dawn, russia attacking the usa....

Also for battles set in 2040+, you can add GEV tanks, for going over terrain, and lasers in space attacking ground troops, and AI drone, infact TERMINATOR would be suited for this, as HK tanks and hover units would work really well, right upto Battlefield 2040..

One of the playtesters already did a little mod, on the usa army in 2040 time period, with better armour, sort of one step under SST EVO.

Good times ahead...

 

[Larac]

Will Mongoose mind if I did the following:

Made an Excel Spread Sheet with all the Stats of the units, and traits, point costs, and made it a download to the public?

That way folks could plan a force, before they buy?



Lee

 

[Lorcan Nagle]

You'd have to check with them, but they have yet to complain about peopel making similar resources for SST or ActA. And Hiro has already sone up some stat cards for the game.

 

[Hiromoon]

Wave 2 is inbound in card form.

With a special card in tribute to Maj. Bacon, British Army.

 

[Paladin]

With a special card in tribute to Maj. Bacon, British Army.

Forgive the ignorance, but who is that? A friend of yours?

 

[Hiromoon]

Nope, but I salute him at any rate. He died in Iraq from an explosive divice.

http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/DefenceNews/PeopleInDefence/BritishOfficerKilledInIraqMajorMatthewBacon.htm

 

[Ben2]

How it will work and why Matt has done what he has done:

Rules - downloadable free 4 page rules set, like in Warmachine or Hordes. You will be able to get this from the Mongoose site and in the boxes of minis.

Hardback rulebook - Complete rules, including aircraft and campaign, but no stats because that necessitates another hardback book after the first years releases/whenever a new faction is added/errata/etc.

Stat cards - in mini boxes and downloadable from Mongoose site.

This means that when (and it will be when) the initial release cycle is done and Matt adds more units and factions it doesn't mean people need to buy a new hardback book. It means if units have errata/adjustments (like the Saggitarius in ACTA) Matt can just post it on the site. It means if Matt has a cool idea for X it can be released and the card added to the site without people then having the problem that it is not in the rulebook.

People who want minis will be able to buy them with the card, people who want to know what other people have and to plan armies can download from the site.

Is everyone happy with this?

I am.

Ben

 

[Lorcan Nagle]

So long as the unit stats are readily availible outside the boxes, I'll be happy.