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GalakStarscraper
The Big Man
Joined: 24 Nov 2005
Posts: 6176
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 Posted: Tue Jan 29, 2008 11:12 pm Post subject: |
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One of my cynical friends who owns a game store wondered if this was not a ploy by Grandma Wendy to get people to run out in droves and buy the new RPG rules.
1) Look here are the new rules.
2) Oh no, we are closing the company you better hurry to buy them.
3) Oh look its 6 months later and we are announcing a reorganization of the company and re-introducing the RPG product that we discontinued early under this "XYZ Publishing" umbrella. And look at the cool release schedule we have for it!
I don't know that I'm that cynical ... but I'm keeping my eye open now to watch what happens over the next year.
Galak
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Wed Jan 30, 2008 12:54 am Post subject: |
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Oh you mean like the Disney "Vault."
Oh my you better run out in droves and but the Hunchback of Notre Dame before we put it in the vault and you can never see this mediocre film again...that is unless you just go to the Disney and buy one of the billion copies collecting dust from its previous release.
You mean that kind of ploy?
Nah, Grandma Wendy would have to actually be able to have a business model or plan to do something like that.
IMO they are just stupid and all they want is to make the most money by spending the least.
We keep hearing about how share prices are down and the company isn't living up to projections...it seems logical that that are casting off the ballast and holding on to Warhammer and 40K even tighter than before.
Smart move? no. But not unprecedented either.
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fen
Joined: 03 Apr 2006
Posts: 685
Location: Not painting, that's for sure.
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| Posted: Wed Jan 30, 2008 2:01 am Post subject: |
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| GalakStarscraper wrote: | | One of my cynical friends who owns a game store wondered if this was not a ploy by Grandma Wendy to get people to run out in droves and buy the new RPG rules. |
They really don't need to pull that kind of stunt with Talisman, WFRP or DH. Dark Heresy in particular is one of the most anticipated RPGs of all time.
But, it is worth noting that they shipped the book out to bookstores and gaming stores this time (WFRP they sent only to games stores). So they certainly decided to offload it all asap.
DL: Careerwise you're pretty much stuck into a single path from the start. It's to represent the more limited nature of life in the Imperium and the fact that you're part of an Inquisitors retinue. You do have a branch choice in each career and the careers are very flexible in how you choose to advance. But it's not as free-form or chaotic as WFRP careers are. |
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Wed Jan 30, 2008 2:05 am Post subject: |
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Imagine what a (reasonably priced) box set of Warhammer Quest would do for them? 
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Darkson
On his best behaviour
Joined: 06 Apr 2006
Posts: 1165
Location: To your left.
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| Posted: Wed Jan 30, 2008 7:06 am Post subject: |
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| GalakStarscraper wrote: | | One of my cynical friends who owns a game store wondered if this was not a ploy by Grandma Wendy to get people to run out in droves and buy the new RPG rules. |
From a company that's shown a little more business sense over the last couple of years, I could see that.
Though to be honest, having waited for this RPG since the days of Rogue Trader, I was ina hurry to get wheter the liine was pulled or not. All this decision made me do was send my money to an eBay store, rather than wait till BI did a 2nd print run (so actually "lost" Grandma Wendy money  ).
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What the hell am I doing on a mini's forum? I DON'T PAINT!!!
Nor do I 
"Don't talk back to Darth Vader. He'll get ya. " |
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 6:41 pm Post subject: |
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So as fen posted Grandma Wendy is once again licensing their products to another publisher. Here is the link
Some of you see this as potentially Grandma Wendy moving into a new golden age or something...
Well I'm here to piss on your parade.
| Fen's Link wrote: | | The agreement does not include certain Grandma Wendy titles in which miniatures feature as the predominant component of the game, such as Space Hulk and fantasy football. |
So how is this any different than what they already do? FFG cannot publish a single one of the Ameritrash games that made Grandma Wendy the giant that it was. Hogshead (and others) have had the rights to these games before and nothing ever develops out of it.
Why? Well because Grandma Wendy treats the publishers as crappy as they treat their employees, their retailers, their customers and generally everyone except their shareholders...well they aren't doing much for them right now either.
They are still doing the same old song and dance...they just got a better offer for the licenses that they already sell because they included the 40K RPG...the WHF RPG was already licensed.
When the contract is up they will sell it to the highest bidder again (if they still exist by then) and the fanboys will talk about a new era of Grandma Wendy games.
Sorry, Grandma Wendy is over, they peaked 12 years ago.
FFG is the new Ameritrash king. I would love it if they aquired Grandma Wendy's games that once made them great but they didn't. They got the RPGs and the card games...two things that they publish but aren't their strong points.
FFG produces Ameritrash (I hate that negative sounding name) but those games are about mood, miniatures, and cardboard tiles and they can't do any of those with their license
I know there's gonna be some major disagreeing with me here, but only time will tell. I predicted the death of Grandma Wendy support for Bl00d B0wl several years ago and I have been proven right. Grandma Wendy has ZERO involvement with fantasy football right now...aside from allowing Tom to sell off their back stock.
Grandma Wendy will declare bankruptcy within 5 years.
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GalakStarscraper
The Big Man
Joined: 24 Nov 2005
Posts: 6176
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:14 pm Post subject: |
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| Dark Lord wrote: | | I know there's gonna be some major disagreeing with me here, but only time will tell. I predicted the death of Grandma Wendy support for Bl00d B0wl several years ago and I have been proven right. |
I will confirm this ... however at the same time you also predicted that FF tournament attendance overall and internet play would disappear over the same time span.
So you were one for three in my mind on those predictions. You nailed your prediction about Grandma Wendy. You underestimated back then how much the fans of the game will continue to support fantasy football board gaming regardless of the support of the publishing company.
I also think your current prediction could end up being very accurate as well. So I'm not really arguing with you ... just pointing out the rest of the stuff that went with that old prediction.
I agree with your current thoughts ... (however I don't think fen meant to imply that the FFG announcement really was a new era (or even a good thing)). I don't think the FFG announcment will amount to much.
I also think if Grandma Wendy doesn't work out the bugs fast they are looking at some serious issues 5 years from now as they've published back to back financial losses for their last 2 years and while you can go a while that way... you cannot go on forever that way.
Galak |
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GalakStarscraper
The Big Man
Joined: 24 Nov 2005
Posts: 6176
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:23 pm Post subject: |
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Took me a second to find them on my hard drive. Here are DL's predictions ... I don't know why ... but I kept a copy because I really was curious to see how close he would be to accurate:
| Quote: |
Posted: Mon May 16, 2005 1:52 am Post subject:
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My predictions:
1. Fanatic and the specialist range will be dissolved before the new handbook ever sees print.
2. There will not be another edition of fantasy football in the near future nor another Rules Review.
3. Grandma Wendy will not support any tournaments after the fall of 2005.
4. The community will continue to play something between LRB 2.0 and 4.0 depending on their level of net access.
5. Online fantasy football and tournament play will slowly decrease over the following years until it reaches a level somewhere close to what it was in 99 or 2000.
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1) Yes I fully agree that this came true
2) Not true ... LRB 5.0 did come out and another Rules Review did occur
3) Not true ... while it isn't great support ... Grandma Wendy does directly still support 3 of Majors (fantasy football, Chaos Cup, and Dungeonbowl) ... all planned for this year.
4) Difficult for me to argue this one as I'm not able to see the community. But I see a lot of LRB 5.0 leagues out there logging into the SG site for the first time to ask a question.
5) Not the case. FUMBBL just had its 1000000th game played and the MBBL has the highest number of coaches its ever had.
====
However .... any of DL's predictions that didn't come true were directly due to the fans of the game not Grandma Wendy ... so on that count I say his thoughts were correct.
Without me ... I honestly believe that #2 would have been true as I single handledly produced LRBs 3.0/4.0 PDFs (after getting a big helping hand from one of Darkson's friends with a Word version of the rulebook) and I'm not sure LRB 5.0 would have ever come out at all without me.
Without the FF fanatics helping Grandma Wendy get these events rolling ... I seriously question if there would be any Majors supported by Grandma Wendy at this time for #3.
#4 and #5 ... the fans of this game keep playing it no matter what and they don't stop and if anything they seem at times to be growing.
Galak
Last edited by GalakStarscraper on Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:30 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Tarota
Joined: 19 Sep 2007
Posts: 101
Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:29 pm Post subject: |
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| Dark Lord wrote: | | FFG is the new Ameritrash king. I would love it if they aquired Grandma Wendy's games that once made them great but they didn't. They got the RPGs and the card games...two things that they publish but aren't their strong points. |
Well, they did get the rights to Talisman, which is generally lauded as one of the greats. It certainly fetches enough on eBay. And they also got the rights to develop new board and card games. That has the potential to be huge... if Grandma Wendy actually allows them any design freedom. I'm not going to hold my breath on that, though.
| Dark Lord wrote: | | Grandma Wendy has ZERO involvement with fantasy football right now...aside from allowing Tom to sell off their back stock. |
Well, I hadn't even heard that they were doing that, so that's good news!
I'm not seeing a new golden age for Grandma Wendy either, but if they can stabilize things a bit I think they can at least avoid bankruptcy. So far all they're doing is cutting side ventures though--I haven't heard word one about changes to their main lines. Without the latter, I think they're just rearranging deck chairs. |
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GalakStarscraper
The Big Man
Joined: 24 Nov 2005
Posts: 6176
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:33 pm Post subject: |
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| Tarota wrote: | | Dark Lord wrote: | | Grandma Wendy has ZERO involvement with fantasy football right now...aside from allowing Tom to sell off their back stock. |
Well, I hadn't even heard that they were doing that, so that's good news! |
At this time I have a deal worked out to purchase Grandma Wendy stock from Grandma Wendy and break up the team boxes and sell out the individual figures as long as the entire operation is done by Impact! UK (Grandma Wendy-USA doesn't allow online sales of their product). However this relationship is touch and go ... and I would not be surprised to see it get killed if a Grandma Wendy exec not currently involved decides he doesn't approve.
Assuming decent sales in the store to give us the cash to do this ... we should have all 21 B.B. teams in stock in the store as individual figures by middle of August.
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:45 pm Post subject: |
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| Tarota wrote: | | Dark Lord wrote: | | FFG is the new Ameritrash king. I would love it if they aquired Grandma Wendy's games that once made them great but they didn't. They got the RPGs and the card games...two things that they publish but aren't their strong points. |
Well, they did get the rights to Talisman, which is generally lauded as one of the greats. It certainly fetches enough on eBay. And they also got the rights to develop new board and card games. That has the potential to be huge... if Grandma Wendy actually allows them any design freedom. I'm not going to hold my breath on that, though. |
They cannot produce any game that uses miniatures.
That means Talisman is an exception and AFAIK was a one time deal.
There will be no Warhammer Quest, no Chainsaw Warrior, no Space Hulk etc.
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 8:10 pm Post subject: |
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| GalakStarscraper wrote: |
1) Yes I fully agree that this came true
2) Not true ... LRB 5.0 did come out and another Rules Review did occur
3) Not true ... while it isn't great support ... Grandma Wendy does directly still support 3 of Majors (fantasy football, Chaos Cup, and Dungeonbowl) ... all planned for this year.
4) Difficult for me to argue this one as I'm not able to see the community. But I see a lot of LRB 5.0 leagues out there logging into the SG site for the first time to ask a question.
5) Not the case. FUMBBL just had its 1000000th game played and the MBBL has the highest number of coaches its ever had.
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I'd like put a little context on these if I may.
#3. Okay...the tournaments still exist but as far as Grandma Wendy support...what is it? They don't staff them and they don't advertise them.
What exactly to do you call support? And can you even honestly begin to say that there is MORE or EQUAL official support of these tournaments than there was 3 years ago?
The only support I see is just enough so that Grandma Wendy doesn't have to give the profits to the people who did the work.
Sorry, I don't see me underestimating Grandma Wendy greed as a sign that I was off the mark.
#2 was made when people were saying there would be an anniversary edition of Bl00d B0wl released and rumors of new minis were rampant. A "new edition" meant new box art, new range of minis etc. None of that came to fruition.
And the Rules Reviews (which in my prediction DID include a new version of LRB) did happen, I admit being wrong on that. But you know, as well as I do, that the process was changed to have less involvement by JJ and Andy.
And sorry, if they don't upload it to the website, I don't consider it "official." I consider it Oberwald 3.0. So I may have been wrong about LRB 5 but I don't think I am wrong about 6.0. I KNOW I'm not wrong about LRB 7.
It's dead, Jim.
As far as #4 goes. I'm sure there's plenty of non-house ruled LRB 5 leagues out there...or at least they are non-house ruled for one season but I don't know of any. I don't a single league that ran LRB 5 for more than one season without house rules.
Now I could get technical and say that scheduled leagues count as house rules, and leagues that play more than 12 games are house ruled but I don't need to.
The last published rule set was LRB 2.0. And that is what most people playing fantasy football in leagues are playing...those not in the online community. Or at least they play a derivative of that...at least in my experience which is admittedly small. Even on my last brief stint on TBB there was a poll 22/19 about house ruling LRB and when I brought up that not using the CHallenge system was house rules a lot of people said, "Ooops. yes we do use HR."
And here in Springfield the league was 2.0 but it disbanded because they couldn't get the minis in the store. They attempted to run LRB 5 but nobody could agree on house rules.
Incidentally this is why I think this place is ripe for an Elf Ball conversion.
So from where I sit it looks like a lot of leagues playing different rules.
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fen
Joined: 03 Apr 2006
Posts: 685
Location: Not painting, that's for sure.
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 8:42 pm Post subject: |
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The CYMBBL ran LRB5 for 4 seasons without house rules, the last league I played in ran without any house rules as well. I did run the CYMBBL, but I did not run the other league. The only changes that will occur next season will be to try out the experimental rules for LRB6, frankly I don't see that as house ruling.
No-where did I mention any chance of a golden era, but the fact that Grandma Wendy have quickly surrendered several successfull products to another company shows they are thinking about alternative strategies instead of burying their heads in the space marine sand. I'm not saying Grandma Wendy aren't going to screw it up, but at least they are attempting to change their old pattern.
It's also worth noting that FFG already have the rights to old Grandma Wendy games like Fury of Dracula and Warrior Knights (and the new edition of Talisman). Games which cannot be described as Ameritrash.
Speculating beyond that is hard to do, but there are old classics like Chainsaw Warrior, Dungeon Quest, Battle for Armageddon, Blood Royale, Curse of the Mummy's Tomb , Apocalypse and even Oi! Dat's My Leg! that might be in the mix.
I'm cautiously optimistic. Grandma Wendy have a poor track record, but not letting WFRP, Talisman and Dark Heresy simply die is unexpected. |
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Dark Lord
Joined: 23 May 2006
Posts: 2682
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 10:12 pm Post subject: |
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| fen wrote: | | The CYMBBL ran LRB5 for 4 seasons without house rules, the last league I played in ran without any house rules as well. I did run the CYMBBL, but I did not run the other league. The only changes that will occur next season will be to try out the experimental rules for LRB6, frankly I don't see that as house ruling. |
Sigh...same old stuff. Sure. I know a poster here and there can list anecdotal counters to my claim as if I claim it was true across the board. I simply said that I don't know of any and the poll on TBB showed that more than don't use house rules.
Beyond that the last published rules were 2.0. That IN THE CONTEXT OF MY PREDICTION means that we are far from the claim that the LRB would be a universal rule book. It is not. And since it is not I am claiming that I was correct in predicting it has not become that.
| fen wrote: | | No-where did I mention any chance of a golden era, but the fact that Grandma Wendy have quickly surrendered several successfull products to another company shows they are thinking about alternative strategies instead of burying their heads in the space marine sand. I'm not saying Grandma Wendy aren't going to screw it up, but at least they are attempting to change their old pattern. |
I'm sorry I said "golden era."
But what I am disagreeing on is that this is anything new. It's not. These products have been under license to other companies for awhile. (most recently Hogshead) and the link you provided says that no games can be produced that use miniatures. I'm not sure but I think Dracula and Talisman are licensed independently of this agreement.
That's pretty much where we have already been. The only difference is that FFG paid more for a lisence than Hoghead and will do more with the CCG's and RPGs than they did.
It doesn't do anything for any other games.
| fen wrote: | | It's also worth noting that FFG already have the rights to old Grandma Wendy games like Fury of Dracula and Warrior Knights (and the new edition of Talisman). Games which cannot be described as Ameritrash. |
These games are nearly the very definition of Ameritrash. I think you may need to check your definition or something.
| fen wrote: | | Speculating beyond that is hard to do, but there are old classics like Chainsaw Warrior, |
This one is possible but only if they did it with one mini.
Not a chance. First of all Descent is made by Fantasy Flight Games and secondly minis are the main component. YOu will not see any Grandma Wendy classic Dungeon Crawls from FFG. I'd be shocked to death if we did.
| fen wrote: | | Battle for Armageddon, |
Possible but didn't SG games have this one up for free? I never played it but never felt very inspired to either. If I had to choose between Twilight Imperium and this late model Grandma Wendy thing...the choice is clear to me.
This I would love to see, and it could compete in todays market against Settlers and other Eurogame titles. IMO it stradles the line of Eurogame and Ameritrash. I wouldn't expect it soon, it's not really the type of game I think of when I think of FFG. The only real Ameritrash component was the money and the marriage agreements. Plus they have Avalon already.
| fen wrote: | | Curse of the Mummy's Tomb , Apocalypse and even Oi! Dat's My Leg! that might be in the mix. |
CotMT: Seriously? You think they'd remake a turd like that? If you do see it my guess is that it would be a Dracula expansion rather than a faithful remake.
Apocalypse: Not sure what this is. The only Apocalypse I know is that 40K expansion. What is Apocalypse?
And Oi! that's my leg...yer joking right? Even if Oi! and Trolls in the Pantry or whatever were good games (which they aren't) they were marketed to children and that isn't FFG's bag either.
FFG isn't going to make a seperate division and market these games as classics reborn. They are gonna take what suits their company and discard the rest. They won't make Grandma Wendy games...they will make FFG games so anything that isn't in their style will not be done, you can count on it.
| fen wrote: | | I'm cautiously optimistic. Grandma Wendy have a poor track record, but not letting WFRP, Talisman and Dark Heresy simply die is unexpected. |
As I said, don't be, unless you were waiting on Hogshead to publish the old games because I'm pretty FFG got a very similar agreement.
I can't see Grandma Wendy suddenly doing a 180 here. The new CEO is the former head of marketing...isn't he?
All that happened here is that the license expired with Hogshead publishing, Dark Heresy was created and FFG saw an opportunity and put in the highest bid for the contract.
Nothing new is going on except that the games they were already licensing include one more title. Dark Heresy.
It get sad when you guys put faith in Grandma Wendy and are repeatedly kicked in the groin for it. There is nothing here that is a good sign for the games that most people remember from Games Workshops golden era.
Sorry. I'm just sure of it. What you will see is support for the Grandma Wendy CCGs and the Warhammer RPGs.
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"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."
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GalakStarscraper
The Big Man
Joined: 24 Nov 2005
Posts: 6176
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| Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 10:41 pm Post subject: |
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| Dark Lord wrote: | | And sorry, if they don't upload it to the website, I don't consider it "official." I consider it Oberwald 3.0. So I may have been wrong about LRB 5 but I don't think I am wrong about 6.0. I KNOW I'm not wrong about LRB 7. |
ohhhh Galak smells a wager in there.
I'm definitely willing to place a high wager on LRB 6.0 making onto the SG website in 2009 as planned especially since the testbed rules for it are already on the website.
As for LRB 7.0 there we agree because the BBRC has at this time agreed to let LRB 6.0 sit for a very extended time period without modification. So LRB 7.0 is not a topic of lack of Grandma Wendy support but is an intentional decision already to not modify the rulebook for an extended period.
Galak
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