Author Topic: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle  (Read 16622 times)

Asuo

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #105 on: February 18, 2018, 01:34:36 pm »
Studio Invite accepted, as soon as i can convince the misses to let me out :P, going to Salute might be a stretch as it is.

Covertwalrus

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #106 on: February 18, 2018, 11:18:27 pm »

 Well, I suppose you have clarified a few things, Rich, however at the risk of being labelled a violent lunatic, may I take issue with a couple of your statement, please?

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It wasn't neatly organised. As it had already been chucked into a lorry randomly and put in an old aircraft hanger.  We had to remove it from that location pretty quickly once the purchase had completed.   This then made its way to our warehouse and was stored and slowly each item is being assessed.
  That took a while for you to make clear to us as well. Point conceded, though.

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We don't have finished stock. We don't have all masters, we don't have all molds.  But that isn't something we could have said day one as there are tens of thousands of items to check and identify.
You don't have x, you don't have y, you have ten of thousands of . . . Well, not x and y, so what exactly do you have? Now, there's where I and a lot of others are getting confused, rich my friend. There's no logical link between the sentences. Granted, you clearly have something but it's not "transparent' as to what it is you have. Maybe that's just me, but it would be nice if your statements made that clearer.
 
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Come and visit us and we will show you what we started with.
Like I can afford that :) That sounds hostile to me, along the lines of "If you think you can do better . . .". And it's not making me feel any less unhappy ( NOT [bangry][/b], just unhappy )

 
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however, it appears we have molds from day 1 of Spartans existence and it is clear by comments in the community that a lot of product shipped with casting issues. We want to eliminate those and therefore we are not just going to pour resin in old molds without testing them.
I wish I could convince you that the next sentence here is true, Rich. I understand that many of the molds have reached the point where they are too old to use, or have had problems in the past. I tell you three times, as Lewis Carroll used to have it..
 However, I recall the whole RAF/Dream Pod 9 debacle over the "thousands of email complaints over QA/QC" thing, and the way DP9, shall we say, rebuilt that narrative to suit themselves ( As the Post-Modernists say ). RAFM worked hard to correct complaints when they had them, and so did Spartan, but in the RAFM situation they never received them. I have to wonder, knowing as I do the gamer mind and humans in general, how many of the complaints have been made by people who have had these problems legitimately . . . and they have let them fester and grow in their memories into much larger problems than they were at the time? ( Still, that's nothing really to do with Warcradle's handling, it's more a case of Warcradle listening to the disgruntled who rarely are effective witnesses. ).

 
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There is no secret agenda at work just a desire to release a game that has the best chance of success.
Now here's where you seem to be getting hostile again, Rich. Could you please show me at what point did I claim you had a "secret agenda"? I may have said that you had plans you weren't telling us about,  and given your concentration on "commercial realities" such maintenance of security around your project is perfectly understandable to me - Even more so, given the sudden rush by several games companies to have a Weird/horror/Lovecraftian/Steampunk Western style game in their inventory.  Competition is stiff and , as in the Cold War, espionage and protecting ideas has become entirely proper and vital. I hardly think you've got any "secret agenda", Rich, and if I may be sarcastic for a moment, there are many people who wonder if Warcradle has an "agenda" at all :) As you say however, things take time, and I understand that; It's just that during that time, some effort to keep people abreast of things, in a manner that is not so vague as to generate rumors and be open to interpretation might be needed. I and a lot of others think that while Warcradle havemade efforts in this direction, it has not been all that successful in results. Though I believe it's fixable :) ( Stuart and I have talked about this, and we seem to have reached an agreement there. )

 
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And our efforts are better spent getting the product released more than a few people will buy.

 Something we both would like to see happen. Of course, there are a good number of people who are willing to buy the older product when they can, and who do, not a few who are new players hoping to get in before the rush of new releases I believe in at least one case. But as I have asked before, are you certain that your new and revamped approach will bring in new players, and in greater numbers than before? Some re-released game shave done so, and they did it without having a great number of redesigned game items as well - Yes, *sigh* I am talking Battletech, which I am reliably informed is played in many games stores, at conventions and clubs in the US, though I have to concede that these reports also underline how Catalyst Games, like Spartan, seems a bit hit-and-miss with production and distribution :/ yet there are new players coming in, and that's always good for any game: I hope that Warcradle, with it's much-talked about business acumen, will do far better along that side of the system, and I'm waiting for evidence that that will happen.

 
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We have told you a few times about the process, it isn't some magical thing that happens overnight. It takes a while as well as the multitude of other issues we need to resolve to get the miniatures back into production.  It takes lots of time, effort and money to achieve.

 I tell you three times, I believe all of that. :) Then again, I've seen the managerial approach to things . . . . Well, let's just say it's why I prefer to say 'problems' rather than 'issues'; Problems have solutions, issues have binders, staples and constantly pile up. :D

 Anyway, i apologize for any thread hijacking or hostility I have directed at anyone . . . Given the number of Facebook friend request I have had from Warcradle staff, I am surprised to learn that they find me such an angry and vicious individual :) It might be the way I sound when I type, so I assure everyone that I bear no ill will to Warcradle as a company or its individual members as people. ( I do reserve the right to say if I don't like something, which might be considered hostile in this day and age, perhaps? :/)

 

Fracas

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #107 on: February 19, 2018, 12:23:20 am »
I don’t think Rich was hostile; defensive yes but not hostile.

Regarding the fluff changes: on one hand owning the ip allows WC to do as they please without having to explain themselves. But on the other in dealing with customers they must also sell themselves and their rationale; why they should be preferred over other products. There hasn’t been much of why it will be better and plenty of because we could.
Guess I will wait for the big reveal.
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RuleBritannia

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #108 on: February 19, 2018, 01:50:29 am »
I don’t think Rich was hostile; defensive yes but not hostile.

Regarding the fluff changes: on one hand owning the ip allows WC to do as they please without having to explain themselves. But on the other in dealing with customers they must also sell themselves and their rationale; why they should be preferred over other products. There hasn’t been much of why it will be better and plenty of because we could.
Guess I will wait for the big reveal.

I have seen snarkier comments, but yes the big thing our conversation was building towards was looking for positive reasons to get on board with the WC steampunk madness rather than negative comments about Spartan.  Just saying everything needs to be remastered without explaining its because of mould problems makes it sound like a denigration of the models we collected and have spent so much time painting.  Just saying its a good business decision to make the game more fantasy doesn't tell me its a good thing, only a popular thing, and that WC puts profits over creative vision.  Because fans haven't received a positive message and instead only had things we liked derided we unfortunately find it easy to take a negative vision of decisions made.

Ruckdog

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #109 on: February 19, 2018, 11:15:12 am »
Let’s keep this thread on fluff discussions. I’ve split off the mold discussion into its own thread.

Covertwalrus

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #110 on: February 19, 2018, 05:16:55 pm »
I don’t think Rich was hostile; defensive yes but not hostile.

Regarding the fluff changes: on one hand owning the ip allows WC to do as they please without having to explain themselves. But on the other in dealing with customers they must also sell themselves and their rationale; why they should be preferred over other products. There hasn’t been much of why it will be better and plenty of because we could.
Guess I will wait for the big reveal.

I have seen snarkier comments, but yes the big thing our conversation was building towards was looking for positive reasons to get on board with the WC steampunk madness rather than negative comments about Spartan.  Just saying everything needs to be remastered without explaining its because of mould problems makes it sound like a denigration of the models we collected and have spent so much time painting.  Just saying its a good business decision to make the game more fantasy doesn't tell me its a good thing, only a popular thing, and that WC puts profits over creative vision.  Because fans haven't received a positive message and instead only had things we liked derided we unfortunately find it easy to take a negative vision of decisions made.

 I suppose that's pretty much correct. I'm to blame for the distraction, and I only did so to show how WC's announcements tend to mislead on that topic, and thus on others. I apologies for that Ruckdog and to everyone else .

RuleBritannia

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #111 on: February 20, 2018, 07:01:09 am »
WC have released a new version of 2.5 rulebook minus the fluff, although not yet deleted the fluff from the Spartan Website.  I do hope the fluff document is preserved and available as a separate document so that the Sturginium age isn't removed entirely, but available as a separate document.  Why not provide download versions of the old campaign books too?  I liked the suggestion of alt universes, preserving at least some of the heritage.

Covertwalrus

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Re: DWars fluff is dead, long live Warcradle
« Reply #112 on: February 20, 2018, 01:28:51 pm »
WC have released a new version of 2.5 rulebook minus the fluff, although not yet deleted the fluff from the Spartan Website.  I do hope the fluff document is preserved and available as a separate document so that the Sturginium age isn't removed entirely, but available as a separate document.  Why not provide download versions of the old campaign books too?  I liked the suggestion of alt universes, preserving at least some of the heritage.

 I literally cannot see why this isn't a reasonable and fairly cheap thing to do.

 However, i suspect it would be answered by a long tirade about how hard  such an undertaking would be and who we are are being belligerent and unsympathetic about the difficulties involved going by past experience. :)

 Still, I think electronic copies do exist on the web, notably here and on some Facebook files areas too, so i don't think they'd be utterly lost. :)And if anyone asks, say it's a divergent timeline caused by an unfortunate accident with a Covenant Telemachus Time Orb :D