More stuff from dancy - relevant to rules fight!

Hot from the other non-magic newsgroup! I must say i think this is fascinating stuff! Even though, or because, i predicted it with my malkavian powers MONTHS ago! >Sorry, the poster has you nailed to a board (something that might happen in a >Vampire game). Netrunner and Vampire, the two post-Magic improvements, >languish in abandonment because of *the bottom line*. DANCY:I will point out that both of those games were inactive long before WotC acquired FRPG, and that I had absolutely nothing to do with stopping development of them. They were "dead" then, and they're "dead" now, and there are complex market forces at work that will keep them "dead" for some time longer, no matter how much you want the situation to be otherwise. I can make the games, and I can market the games, and I can support the games, but I don't sell the games. And the people who do sell the games aren't >INTERESTED< in Netrunner or VtES. > You have never denied it. DANCY:I am actively trying to determine if there is a case to be made for printing Silent Impact. If I can do so on a break-even basis (surely even you won't begrudge me the right to not lose money on a game), we'll print it. > You could care less if they are much better games. DANCY:I do not think that either product is a better game than the products we have in production currently, or planned for release in the future. Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. Both games, while cricitcally acclaimed are far below my minimum standards for game play and for quality of gaming experience. We're experimenting with that type of revision right now. You're about to see the results when Rage ships next month (you can see a preview right now if you want - I'd be happy to stick a Rage preview deck in with that Doomtown deck....). We spent nearly two years killing ourselves trying to update a TCG. We don't have any idea if it can be done successfuly yet. Ask me in a year if the effort was worth it.

On Sun, 19 Jul 1998 11:35:40 +0100, not.av...@your.security.clearance (Legbiter) wrote: >DANCY: That's "Dancey" with an 'e'. :) >I do not think that either product is a better game than the products >we have in production currently, or planned for release in the future. >Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, >and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, >problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require >substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but hasn't there been about 100+ messages in the past couple of weeks about this exact situation in Jyhad/VtES on this group? What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules and card base? Ryan S. Dancey Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group Wizards of the Coast

In article <35b25969...@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > On Sun, 19 Jul 1998 11:35:40 +0100, > not.av...@your.security.clearance (Legbiter) wrote: > > >DANCY: > > That's "Dancey" with an 'e'. :) > > >I do not think that either product is a better game than the products > >we have in production currently, or planned for release in the future. > >Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, > >and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, > >problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require > >substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. Ryan, can you tell me which gameplay flaws you mean? IMHO V:TES is the cardgame with the least flaws. There are some unbalanced cards, yes, but they are as well in L5R. What problems with rules do you address exactly, and what other severe difficulties do you refer to? > > Correct me if I'm mistaken, but hasn't there been about 100+ messages > in the past couple of weeks about this exact situation in Jyhad/VtES > on this group? I'd say it have been 1000+ messages in the past few weeks. I think that shows well that V:TES is still a highly played game. > > What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules > and card base? Well, Ryan, if I get you right, your point is: If we, the players, argue a lot about rules and cards, it implies that the gameplay is flawed and this can be taken as an posthume excuse for not supporting the game. I think this is not the case. A game without discussion about cards/rules is a dead game, though it might be the perfect game. > > Ryan S. Dancey > Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group > Wizards of the Coast > Nonetheless, thanks for your message. I think you are not talking often enough with us these times. We are eager for "official" opinions and open for discussions. If push comes to shove, every player will take the DCI rules as they are. But since the 7/7 rules aren't tourney-official yet, we are still free to argue about them. Please don't mistake that for us not liking the game anymore, that's surely not the case. -Carl -----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==----- http://www.dejanews.com/rg_mkgrp.xp Create Your Own Free Member Forum

Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) writes: > >I do not think that either product is a better game than the products > >we have in production currently, or planned for release in the future. > >Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, > >and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, > >problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require > >substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. I commented on this in rec.games.trading-cards.misc. Shortly put, I strongly disagree with you assessment of Vampire as being "behind the development curve". L5R, which is a not-bad game, has still *less* innovative features as compared to Magic than Vampire. The storyline approach has merit, but otherwise it's basically a glorified Magic clone. Is that your idea of a state-of-the-art game? > Correct me if I'm mistaken, but hasn't there been about 100+ messages > in the past couple of weeks about this exact situation in Jyhad/VtES > on this group? I'm not sure what you're commenting about on with that (seems you're commenting on your own comment ;), but... Yes, there has been a *lot* of discussion about the rules here recently, because of LSJ's rule errata to fix some stupid earlier Rules Team rulings and the few obviously overpowered cards in the game. Frankly, I would have been surprised if there hadn't been heated discussion. This game is played by a lot of people and has a long-established player base, all change always meets resistance ;) > What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules > and card base? Rules ----- A new edition of the rules would be great (i.e. the old rules with the new LSJ rulings added). I believe that LSJ is working on something like this. Otherwise, I think the current Vampire rules are fine, and the basic rules work very well both in a casual and a tournament setting. I love the fact that the game is balanced enough not to require a wildly different set of tournament rules, or a "banned from tournament play because of power" list of cards. Very few games can say the same. Having recently taught five new people to play, I find that the new rules are quite easily taught to newbies. The only thing causing confusion is the various older versions of errataed cards, and the ambiguous wordings on especially the older (Jyhad) cards. More on this below. Cards ----- I would *really* like to see a 2nd edition, using the same card art but correcting the card texts to match current errata. It would immeasurably help new players, and older players would like it as well -- there has been discussion about this in this newsgroup. Yes, I would personally buy boxloads of a 2nd edition, even though I already have all the Jyhad/Vampire cards. Having correct and unambiguous card texts would be fantastic. There are also the few severely erratad problem cards from the expansions, including reprints of them in a hyphotetical 2nd edition would gain great favor from players, I suspect. The current card base is usable (i.e. the game can continue to grow in popularity with what exists), but a new expansion would give a huge boost. Especially the Sabbat clans are greatly hampered right now, an expansion with more Sabbat vampires would go to great lengths to fix this... and since the Sabbat expansion sold so well, I doubt that such an expansion would be a financial flop. I know for a fact that the players over here would line up to buy such a thing. Mr. Dancey, despite my having said some perhaps harsh words about the percieved lack of FRPG support for Vampire before, I really appreciate the effort you put into being online and communicating with us. I don't agree with many of your views, but I hope that we can pursuade you and your company that supporting Vampire is viable. I think it is, and I have hands-on experience with the fact that that if anything, the game is gaining players. If FRPG would put even a part of the effort they put into supporting L5R into support for Vampire, the game would flourish (with the side effect of turning an exisiting and time-proven product into cash for WotC, which is naturally FRPG's goal in this exercise). //Petri

mboh...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > > What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules > > and card base? > > I think you accidentally deleted the "muahahahaha" from your post. You > can read what we all think about the current state by reading the > messages in this newsgroup (ie very differing opinions). To me, this line > is flame bait. Or is it arrogance? Or is it laziness to not look through > the posts yourself to see what the current state is? I believe Mr. Dancey was looking for feedback on the game/rules/cards as a whole - not merely on the recent Rules Team Rulings. You know, like: * What do you think about the current mix of vampires? (per clan/ per capacity/ etc.) * What do you think about the current mix of skill-based minion cards? etc. (Ryan, please correct me if I'm wrong or have omitted anything.) -- L. Scott Johnson (vte...@wizards.com) VTES Net.Rep for Wizards of the Coast. Searchable database of official card text, errata, and rulings: http://deckserver.net/cgi-deckserver/rulemonger.cgi/powersearch

In article <35B331...@wizards.com>, LSJ <vte...@wizards.com> wrote: > I believe Mr. Dancey was looking for feedback on the game/rules/cards > as a whole - not merely on the recent Rules Team Rulings. With the current atmosphere, I think his wording was poorly chosen at best. > You know, like: > * What do you think about the current mix of vampires? (per clan/ per > capacity/ etc.) I think there needs to be another expansion to give the single-expansion clans some more vampires. Some of these clans seem to have gotten poor mixes of disciplines on their vampires. Lasombra and Assamite (my two favorite clans) being two that come to mind. Examples include no 3-capacity vampire with Quietus and Celerity for Assamites, and no 3-capacity vampire with Obtenebration and Potence or Dominate for the Lasombra. Most clans appearing in more than one expansion have these types of vampires. > * What do you think about the current mix of skill-based minion > cards? The clan specific disciplines that have only appeared in one expansion are limited and could use another expansion. From everything I've read from Mr. Dancey (btw, why does everyone use Mr?) since the time that he took over the brand (primarily on this newsgroup and on the VTES-L), I haven't been exactly impressed with his diplomacy and his consistency on answers (ie http://www.dejanews.com/getdoc.xp?AN=373123439 ). True, he's not dealing with an always diplomatic audience or an always consistent audience, but they're the consumer and he's the business. IMHO, a business person should never, never, never, never, never, never treat customers or potential customers in a public manner such as he has done. Contradicting one's self only works toward making everyone believe you're full of it. I'm sorry I flew off the handle on my post from last night, but I was tired and it had been a long week. Normally, I prefer the high road and being the level headed one. Mike [ quoted text not captured ]

> What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules > and card base? Current state of Jyhad/VtES rules : The major problem with the rules set is the complex of rules, errata, and addenda (for lack of anything else to call it) which were grafted onto the rules set by the Rules Team. In the earliest days, with only one card set, the rules set was explained and some minor shifts in rules occurred (I was going through an old Duellist last night when the D Bleed issue was being put forward for vote ie. should D Bleeds be omni-directional?) The shift from Jyhad to V:tES caused some problems in the rules set as cards were 're-worded' to fit a template. The card templates changed as fundamental sections of the rulebook were re-evaluated (omni-directional D-Bleeds, eg.) LSJ , in his earliest days, compiled the errata and the rulings together (much as Jeff Alexander does for L5R - a volunteer archivist). It became increasingly clear that the Rules Team was out of touch with the game itself, and was relying largely on rules- lawyering (rather than playtesting) to resolve disputes. Templates were re-written, and cards were issued errata to fit into these revised templates. The players' guide which was printed contained many inaccuracies and omissions, obvious to anyone with a casual knowledge of Jyhad's operations. With the expansions, the newest templates were followed; this caused problems if the fundamental rule changed, causing the templates to be no longer functional. (eg. weapons going from 1 hand damage to +1 hand damage to strike:+1 hand damage - this gave rise to large convoluted explanations that weapons were not hand strikes but based on basic hand damage of the acting minion... etc.) The current crisis is based on the efforts of LSJ to bring consistency to the rules set and balance to the game. (Read that as neutral; I have an opinion, but I am also trying to be fair to the opposing opinion) LSJ has an immense knowledge of how the rules/errata/explanations work; however, the wordings of the rules and the way that the rules have operated in the past have caused diverging opinions on how the errata _ought_ to be interpreted/ understood. Current state of Jyhad/V:tES cardbase : The initial print run of Jyhad was, in most opinions, and incredibly balanced and well-conceived set. A multitude of varying play styles and deck strategies were possible. The balance was such that observable changes in deck construction were visible : the metagame was a real and almost predictable element of Jyhad play. V:tES was printed with abundant supplies of Jyhad still in-print. The first of the 'abusive' cards was printed, Archon Investigation, indicating a power escalation within the game. The first expansion, Dark Sovereigns, received only a lukewarm reception; the second, Ancient Hearts, was more avidly sought (largely because of the presence of two broken cards : Return to Innocence and the Tomb of Raamses III. As I recall, Dog Packs were also quite prized at the time... The problem with the two expansions here was the conscious decision of Wizards not to print many vamps in them, nor to make their disciplines as robust as the original ones. The Followers of Set are underpowered and designed in such a way that their 3 in-clan disciplines are only on the largest vampires. The Giovanni received some interesting cards without really making Necromancy a viable discipline. Sabbat re-introduced the set (trying to do for Vampire what Ice Age did for Magic ). taking into consideration 4CL individuals by re-introducing cards with effects similar to ones in the first set but with new names. Unfortunately, it also introduced a counterspell card, Direct Intervention, which became the standard 'excuse' for any card in the game. It is no coincidence that, of the top 5 cards considered 'broken' that 4 come from expansions. The sets were engineered with a 'power escalation' model which made the game increasingly reliant on having one of these 'power cards'. My opinions ------------------- I see no overwhelming reason not to create a new expansion. There would be several predicates before such an expansion would be viable : 1) The distributors would need to be convinced that a demand exists. I subscribe to the Ars Magica listserv, and John Nephew, the president of Atlas Games, regularly comments on the state of the industry, and explains the status of products (so to speak). Your comments on distributor's reluctance to carry 'inert' product echoes what Mr. Nephew says : distributors don't take chances on anything anymore. Atlas games has a warehouse full of On the Edge cards, Ars Magica and Over the Edge sourcebooks, etc., all of which his distributors insist is 'out of print'. Not because of misinformation, but because they don't _want_ to carry it. 2) The market needs to be acknowledged for its real size and enthusiasm. This goes both ways : the end-users need to accurately evaluate how big the demand is; contrariwise, the producer needs to acknowledge and support the product itself in an attempt to 'create' a new market. After all, L5R had _no_ market initially -- it's not based on a licence, it had no backstory, no word-of-mouth, nothing but a dream and a hope. A market was _created_ for L5R, and there is nothing to say that a similar thing couldn't happen with V:tES. 3) The rules need to be adequately revised and a new rulebook issued. A single, standardized rulebook with examples should be issued, taking into account all templates and rules clarifications. To quote your message : Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. A single standardized rulebook could address these issues. I differ in my opinion that Vampire suffers from 'serious gameplay flaws'; the only questionable areas of rules regarded paralyzation and aggrivated damage. Aggrivated damage has been returned to its original state (before it was 'revised' by the Rules Team) and Paralyzation has been removed from the rules set. 4) The game has to change to a 'player-friendly' format. The history of V:tES players to its producers has not been happy. It is an unfortunate fact that Jyhad was created in the post-Magic boom that saw dozens of games created only to die out. Jyhad has survived that boom (largely because it was coupled to Magic through WotC, and so would be retained rather than written off as a bankruptcy loss). Jyhad was overproduced, then kept alive through a series of ill-advised and poorly handled expansions. The Rules Team waffled on rulings, the net-reps didn't interact with the list (largely because of their competing duties re: Magic) and poor business decisions were made regarding card-backs. Much of the hostility from the V:tES players is 'backseat' phenomena - we were an afterthought to the success of Magic. Player-interaction (on the model of L5R's Imerial Assembly) may do much to bring the feud to a close. 5) My very own humble opinion : There is absolutely no reason why Vampire could not be brought into a Storyline/Clan War format. Long ago, you remarked that Netrunner failed because of its 'abstractness' - it couldn't be lodged into an 'identity' modality where the player of the deck could enter into the storyline of the game. V:tES is suited to doing so, having well-defined Clans and tactics associated with each clan. Clans such as the Malkavians and the Setites would benefit from such specificity, gaining in character what they have lacked hitherto in gameplay. As you have noted, storyline increases player interest, as they begin to feel that they are involved with the future of the playset. As people have noted, Jyhad is a much more interesting game than Rage (I have large collections of both, but it is Jyhad that I play most often), and has greater depth-of-play. I'm emailing this as well as posting it, to ensure that everyone gets a look at my ideas. :) (I'm arrogant that way, I guess...) Alan (aj)

In article <35b25969...@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > On Sun, 19 Jul 1998 11:35:40 +0100, > not.av...@your.security.clearance (Legbiter) wrote: > > >DANCY: > > That's "Dancey" with an 'e'. :) Oops, sorry! > > >I do not think that either product is a better game than the products > >we have in production currently, or planned for release in the future. > >Both games are now more than two years behind the development curve, > >and both suffer from serious gameplay flaws, unbalanced cards, > >problems with rules and other severe difficulties that would require > >substantial revision before I'd be willing to move forward. > > Correct me if I'm mistaken, but hasn't there been about 100+ messages > in the past couple of weeks about this exact situation in Jyhad/VtES > on this group? > > What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules > and card base? > > > Ryan S. Dancey > Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group > Wizards of the Coast Welcome to the Jyhad newsgroup! I can't say what we ALL think. It does seem to me that there are two camps on the NG. Camp1 agrees with you that there is a problem with broken cards and serious gameplay flaws, and they want to fix it by rewriting cards and revisiting old errata. Camp1 is divided within itself over which cards and aspects of gameplay constitute problems. Camp2 is divided about whether there is a problem but is united against the concept of rewriting cards. This is because the adherents of camp2 think that reams of errata discourage new players, and new players [and card sales] is what VTES needs. I personally am in camp2, but i would change my mind if VTES were next up [after Rage] for the rewrite treatment! BTW what DOES the "S" stand for?????

LSJ wrote: > I believe Mr. Dancey was looking for feedback on the game/rules/cards > as a whole - not merely on the recent Rules Team Rulings. > > You know, like: > * What do you think about the current mix of vampires? (per clan/ per > capacity/ etc.) > * What do you think about the current mix of skill-based minion > cards? > > etc. > > (Ryan, please correct me if I'm wrong or have omitted anything.) > > -- > L. Scott Johnson (vte...@wizards.com) VTES Net.Rep for Wizards of the Coast. > Searchable database of official card text, errata, and rulings: > http://deckserver.net/cgi-deckserver/rulemonger.cgi/powersearch Well that being the case all I have to say is the expansion disciplines (Nec, Chi, Ser, Qui) and to a lesser extent Vis, Obt, and Dem, need both more vampires with these disciplines. Especially out of clan for Chi and Nec. Along the same line the afformentiond Disciplines need new cards to round out the selection and bring them into line with the strength and diversity of the original disciplines. I have to think that had expansions continued to be published that this would have been a goal of the PT and design teams. As it is the expansion disciplines are incomplete at best. Karl

On Mon, 20 Jul 1998 09:45:10 -0700, Alan Flesch <afl...@calvin.usc.edu> wrote: >Current state of Jyhad/VtES rules : { Much text deleted ] That, sir, is >exactly< my analysis of the game as it stands presently. Well done. I'll add to your analysis the concern that one of the biggest issues that WotC has looked at for a very long time is the issue of competitive play. We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality opponents in order to generate sales. I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< rather than your superior play. Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES event is more determined by luck than by skill. To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have yet to find a viable solution. While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated regular TCG players. [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <35b4590e....@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that > regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for > expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but > expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality > opponents in order to generate sales. I'll buy that. > I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have > played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken > to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > > 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively It's a multiplayer game. It's a multiplayer game. It is perfectly playable with 3 people or even 2 people. But the dynamic doesn't show until you play with 4 people. It's kind of like playing basketball 1-on-1. It's fun and you do a lot of the same stuff. But where you really have fun is 2-on-2 through 4-on-4 (5-on-5 being too crowded for pickup games). > 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< > rather than your superior play. I actually almost gagged when I read this. I find this statement to be totally off the mark and insulting. I'd love to see these play groups that the people who win are supposedly the ones who don't make as many mistakes. Watching a VtES game takes a lot of judgement to determine whether a player is doing the right thing. The ONLY way you can justifiably say that people lose more often by mistakes they make is by using hindsight, ie you should have bled because he didn't have any more Wakes. If that's the case, then every single friggin game evolves down to who makes more mistakes. > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > event is more determined by luck than by skill. Laughable. Absolutely laughable. If you are playing a game that uses the previously broken cards as the central strategy, than I could grant you that the winner is determined by luck. However, with the cards now fixed, the tournament game has returned to what most people play: a strategy game. There is NO luck involved. I still can't believe you made this statement. It makes me feel like you've never played the game. > To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes > for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the > game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have > yet to find a viable solution. There is no mess but that imagined by these DCI people. > While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES > brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is > capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated > regular TCG players. Which people feel that winning is capricious and luck-based? I certainly haven't met any. If anything, VtES is the LEAST luck based game there is because there is no card limit. You can have as little luck as you want depending on how you build your deck. I'm still shaking my head...... [ quoted text not captured ]

> To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes > for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the > game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have > yet to find a viable solution. > > While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES > brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is > capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated > regular TCG players. > Umm... "sophisticated TCG players?" As far as I know, most of those play Jyhad. I'm sure there are a number playing L5R (after all, *I* play that... 8) ), but sophisticated players don't play Magic, S:TNG, or SW. And other games are too minor to count, really... -Chris [ quoted text not captured ]

<snip> > I'll add to your analysis the concern that one of the biggest issues > that WotC has looked at for a very long time is the issue of > competitive play. Okay. Fair point. > We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that > regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for > expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but > expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality > opponents in order to generate sales. Okay. I disagree with this, but can't come up with any counter- arguments, so I'll assume it to be true for the purposes of the discussion. > I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have > played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken > to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > > 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively > 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< > rather than your superior play. > > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > event is more determined by luck than by skill. How does this differ from, say, chess, bridge, or poker? Part of skill is 'not making significant mistakes' in game play; most of the iterations of a chess game are well-known and even named; it can be argued that chess devolves into 'who knows the most iterations' and can steer play into one inevitable result. Contract bridge depends on the skill of your partner, and relying that your partner doesn't make any mistakes. Poker, the most random of the games here mentioned, still requires a tremendous amount of skill to play : each individual hand of poker dealt is randomly determined - but the superior poker player will beat me over a set of games. Each of these three games (chess, bridge, poker) has a significant tournament following, despite significant 'gameplay' flaws re: luck. CCG's have an aggrivated problem with luck with deck construction. Deck construction is almost entirely skill based (an experienced player can design tightly-focussed decks with defenses against various possible counter-strategies). Also, an experienced player can reasonably expect what kinds of decks will be present at an active tournament scene. However, the pairing of individual decks is always a matter of luck. You have very little control in arranging who your opponants will be. Returning to a point thrown out earlier : a significant part of skill is the ability to recognize the failures of gameplay on the part of your opponant and to exploit these failures. To recognize this isn't the same thing as saying that 'the game is driven by luck'. It requires a high degree of skill to recognize that a 'mistake' has been made in many cases. You may even put under the category of skill the ability to minimize luck. Alan (aj)

In article <35b4590e....@news.isomedia.com>, Ryan S. Dancey <Ry...@frpg.com> wrote: [snip] >I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have >played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken >to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > >1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively >2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< >rather than your superior play. Huh? So? That can be said of all strategy games (especially from a hindsight perspective). It applies perfectly well to chess, which has plenty of "competitive viability". The only time when an opponents mistake doesn't enter into a win is when the opponent had no chance to win at all (for example in games where deck building is the biggest key). Personally, I like games where how you play is important. [snip] >Ryan S. Dancey -- /\ Jasper Phillips /VVVVVVVVVVVVVV|~"~"~"~"~"~"----------........____ jaz j^^^^^^^^^^^^^\/"~"~"~"~-----------........._____ ~"~--. * http://www.engr.orst.edu/~philljas/ "~"~'--`

> > > > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > > at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > > event is more determined by luck than by skill. > {snip - it's the same as bridge, poker, chess} > > Returning to a point thrown out earlier : a significant part of skill is > the ability to recognize the failures of gameplay on the part of your > opponant and to exploit these failures. To recognize this isn't the > same thing as saying that 'the game is driven by luck'. It requires > a high degree of skill to recognize that a 'mistake' has been made > in many cases. You may even put under the category of skill the > ability to minimize luck. > One thing that Mr. Dancey has failed to mention is the amount of luck in L5R tournaments. A Scorpion dishonour deck will generally defeat honour runners and "non-honour" decks (those which don't try to gain honour, but aren't really prepared to lose it either... a lot of Mantis decks fall into this category, because they have few high-honour personalities). That deck will fall miserably to a really fast attack deck (especially Lion), and even more miserably to a Shadowlands deck. A well-constructed Kaiu Crab honour-runner (or a "Pink Floyd" deck as I like to call them... due to their reliance on walls) will probably beat other honour runners and a lot of attack decks. Against Naga (or other decks that can rack up triple-digit force totals), you haven't a chance. Pheonix Cheesing-Disease decks can take out just about any personalities, and so has a good chance of winning. However, against Shadowlands-hosers, Shugenja-hosers (of which there are a lot), or Pink Floyd decks, the Pheonix will fall horribly short. They also have a hard time dealing with dishonour, usually. Note that your matchups will be determined by luck of the draw, so if I were to resurrect my Crane deck and try it out in a tournament, the game would basically be whether or not I draw to play against Scorpion. If so, I lose. If not, I win. Crane beats Lion beats Scorpion beats Crane. (It's possible that some of my comparisons are wrong, but the gist is the same and is true to fact.) True, there are steps being taken to reduce the reliance on one-trick-pony decks, but as it stands a diverse deck will not beat anyone, while a focused deck will beat only those who it is focused to beat. (Whereas Monks will not beat anyone.) IMO, Jyhad games rely less on luck of seating. -Chris BTW, Ryan... I'm very happy that you are taking the time to discuss this. While I think most people here are genuinely trying to discuss the issue, I apologize for the one or two people who seem to think that insults are the way to get an expansion printed (and I apologize if I've insulted you at all). I hope you don't decide to ignore our pleas rather than put up with abuse. (IOW, please put up with abuse for my sake... ;-) ) Although, I suppose there are more painful things in life than being insulted on USENET... 8) [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6p2rij$6t8$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, ber...@cco.caltech.edu wrote: > BTW, Ryan... I'm very happy that you are taking the time to discuss this. Me, too. > While I think most people here are genuinely trying to discuss the issue, I > apologize for the one or two people who seem to think that insults are the > way to get an expansion printed (and I apologize if I've insulted you at > all). I hope you don't decide to ignore our pleas rather than put up with > abuse. (IOW, please put up with abuse for my sake... ;-) ) Although, I > suppose there are more painful things in life than being insulted on > USENET... 8) I hope that I haven't been insulting directly, although I do realise that my words are pretty cynical. However, I don't think I should be expected to be treat a person as I normally do when that person says that I play a game that is equivalent to a game where the player is a concentration camp commander with the goal of exterminating Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, handicapped, Jehovah's Witnesses....... In other words, I treat people with total professionalism until they do something to lose their "professional" status in my view. Carries over to lieing: I'll trust you with just about anything until you betray my trust. And then I'll treat you like shi*. Mike [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6p2rij$6t8$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, <ber...@cco.caltech.edu> wrote: [snip] Note: Most of this is in reference to Ryan's post, the text of which is 2 messages back. >Crane beats Lion beats Scorpion beats Crane. (It's possible that some of my >comparisons are wrong, but the gist is the same and is true to fact.) > >True, there are steps being taken to reduce the reliance on one-trick-pony >decks, but as it stands a diverse deck will not beat anyone, while a focused >deck will beat only those who it is focused to beat. (Whereas Monks will not >beat anyone.) Ah, there it is in a nutshell. It's the reason everyone here quit playing L5R and picked up Jyhad again. L5R feels very much like paper scissors rock (well, I stopped playing after Time of the Void), and quite frankly is hardly "more evolved" than Jyhad. Perhaps "more evolved" in a card selling sense, but the game isn't even close -- and that's comparing it to the 2nd (or was it 3rd?) CCG ever released. Anyway, like a lot of other players I'd be interested in seeing how L5R is (by implication) so evolved. [ quoted text not captured ]

>What do you all think about the current state of the Jyhad/VtES rules >and card base? > > >Ryan S. Dancey >Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group >Wizards of the Coast The current V:TES rules need slight modification and another edition to clear up a few textual problems and rules slights.. The Sabbat had great potential as an excellent expansion, instead it came off with less kudos that it should have. * Card Rarity was a joke, Rares from Jyhad/V:TES had reprints taking up valuable slots in Sabbat packs which could have been used for more cards. * Released as a Stand Alone set, it contained tons of cards already in print reducing the amount of sales generated by the parent product. * The opportunity to "Fix" known card issues was blown (which is attributable to our ranting these past weeks) by not printing corrected versions in the Sabbat set. While V:TES is fairly solid in it's current form, it really needs at least one more expansion to fill out the current mix. Some of these issues could be fixed by releasing small sets of new Promo Cards. From there if you really wanted to invest time/money (which it seems that you don't), spin the game in new direction/marketing based your successful L5R Model. Create a Good Setting (Dark Ages anyone?) Create Semi-Playable starters based on Clan Give a little Clan Story on the back of each starter box Include Fixed Cards only found in a Starter (Hunting Ground, Clan Leader/Inner Circle) NEW RULE BOOK - w/o the Basic Game. The Rules are The Rules. Put it on the Rolling Thunder shedule (bi-monthly) Continue to use the Vampire Card back Use the Uncommon/Common distribution similar to Magic's "Antiquities" expansion. You have the perfect format for rolling out this game, all you need to have is the desire to get it to market.. Bernard Bresnahan Michigan Jyhad League

Funny thing, I first saw L5R at Origins 2 years ago, and the people that were showing me the game were Jyhad/V:TES players. Makes me wonder how many folks picked up on L5R due to the inefficiencies of WOTC. In fact, if V:TES were to pick up steam again would L5R sales be affected due to the limited money flow of the gaming populace? Hmmm.. BTW, could you tell some of them thar sofisticatered Magic players to scrounge up a bar o' soap n' use it once in awhile? Or is raw stench now part of tournyment playstile? - Bernie ======================= [ quoted text not captured ]

On Tue, 21 Jul 1998 08:04:52 -0700, Alan Flesch <afl...@calvin.usc.edu> wrote: >How does this differ from, say, chess, bridge, or poker? Perhaps you misunderstand me. In chess, there are no third party players. In poker, the play can be influenced by third party players, but it is normally very difficult for one player's "poor play" to improve the play of another participant without improving the play of all the participants in the game. I have no opinion on bridge - I've not played enough (or recently enough) to formulate a comparative argument. Imagine a four player game of VtES, players named A, B, C and D. A preys on B, B on C, etc. The problem with the current way that competitive VtES is played is that if Person B plays poorly, it benefits Person C (due to the fact that you cannot normally attack anyone in the game - only the person defined as your prey. So the disruptivly "bad" effects of B are all directed solely at C. Please - let's leave voting and other general type actions aside for the moment, this example is for illustrative purposes only) So, even if players A and D are doing fine, player C has a cumulative advantage over them, because the person who should be affecting Player C in a negative way, Player B, is playing poorly. So players A and D are in the unfortunate position of being "crippled" in this game because they are not seated adjacent to poor player B. Rather, I should say that player C is receiving an "unfair advantage" by being lucky enough to be preyed on by Player B. If a "swiss" system is used to determine matchups, the result is often a situation where the winner goes undefeated. Because of the effect I describe above, the putative "best player" in the event may lose a game or two >through no fault of their own, or due to the luck of the draw<, but because >another player< inadvertantly assisted a third competitor to victory. Please tell me that's not as confusing as it reads. :) [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <35b57bd5....@news.isomedia.com>, Ryan S. Dancey <Ry...@frpg.com> wrote: >On Tue, 21 Jul 1998 08:04:52 -0700, Alan Flesch ><afl...@calvin.usc.edu> wrote: > >>How does this differ from, say, chess, bridge, or poker? [snip] >So players A and D are in the unfortunate position of being "crippled" >in this game because they are not seated adjacent to poor player B. >Rather, I should say that player C is receiving an "unfair advantage" >by being lucky enough to be preyed on by Player B. [snip] >Please tell me that's not as confusing as it reads. :) No, made perfect sense. It's a reasonable argument, although it's not much different an advantage than a player gets from having easy wins in early rounds in one on one games -- especially those that give you points based upon how well you won. In any event all multiplayer games with any sort of "geography" (even such things as a set turn order) have this problem, since some players are bound to be closer to the "gimp" and benefit more. I don't see this problem as so bad, nor that Jyhad suffers particularily from it. What you seem to be saying is that multi-player tournaments don't really work. I'm not sure I agree, it just seems to me that since Magic and L5R are the most popular, and only really work in one on one, that people are just used to one on one tournaments. [ quoted text not captured ]

mboh...@my-dejanews.com writes: [I don't have Ryan's original article here, so I'll comment on a followup] > In article <35b4590e....@news.isomedia.com>, > Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > > > We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that > > regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for > > expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but > > expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality > > opponents in order to generate sales. > > I'll buy that. > > > I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have > > played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken > > to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > > > > 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively > > It's a multiplayer game. It's a multiplayer game. It is perfectly playable > with 3 people or even 2 people. But the dynamic doesn't show until you > play with 4 people. It's kind of like playing basketball 1-on-1. It's > fun and you do a lot of the same stuff. But where you really have fun is > 2-on-2 through 4-on-4 (5-on-5 being too crowded for pickup games). Same reaction with me. In other words: "And your point was?" Saying that VtES virtually requires 4 people in order to be fun is like sayind that it's composed of little bits of cardboard. True, but fairly irrelevant. Like Mike said, it's a multiplayer game, ergo by definition requires more than 2 people ;) Babylon 5 plays like crap with less than 4 people. You *can* play it with 3 people (like VtES), but it loses much of the political flavor (like VtES). Yet I don't see anyone arguing that B5 is in some way "inferior" because of this, on the contrary. It's a design issue. Games are designed to mainly be two-person or multiplayer. Oh, you *can* play just about any game with a number of players it wasn't meant for, but the gameplay usually suffers. > > 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< > > rather than your superior play. > > I actually almost gagged when I read this. I find this statement to > be totally off the mark and insulting. I'd love to see these play > groups that the people who win are supposedly the ones who don't > make as many mistakes. Watching a VtES game takes a lot of > judgement to determine whether a player is doing the right thing. > The ONLY way you can justifiably say that people lose more often by > mistakes they make is by using hindsight, ie you should have bled > because he didn't have any more Wakes. If that's the case, then > every single friggin game evolves down to who makes more mistakes. > > > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > > at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > > event is more determined by luck than by skill. > > Laughable. Absolutely laughable. If you are playing a game that > uses the previously broken cards as the central strategy, than I > could grant you that the winner is determined by luck. However, > with the cards now fixed, the tournament game has returned to what > most people play: a strategy game. There is NO luck involved. I > still can't believe you made this statement. It makes me feel like > you've never played the game. Likewise. These are the kinds of opinions one easily picks up by listening to rumors about a game without actually playing it. VtES games have *very* little to do with luck. As someone said in a followup to this thred, L5R is *much* more luck-based than VtES (if you lose out in the rock-scissors-paper of the deck types, you're out of luck). Yes, it helps you if your opponent makes mistakes. Duh. This applies to every game there is, from tennis to football. But claiming that VtES wins require luck reveals a total lack of knowledge about the game. > > To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes > > for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the > > game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have > > yet to find a viable solution. > > There is no mess but that imagined by these DCI people. Yup. I would be interested to know who these "DCI people" are, since so far the DCI "support" for VtES has been laughable, and there have been multiple reports of GenCon-level VtES "DCI" tournaments in which the official DCI judges had no idea of the basic game rules, let alone the relevant errata. I truly hope you aren't using these people for too much input, their track record has not been brilliant so far. A *much* more balanced and experienced view can be gotten from the people who play the game a lot. The group rec.games-trading-cards.jyhad is full of such people, as is the VAMPIRE-L list. I have followed this game since it came out, and this is the *first* time anyone has made this "luck, and based on opponent mistakes" claim. The FIRST, and this is one of the most established CCGs there is. Don't you think that *someone* would have noticed this alleged problem before this if it existed in the first place? ;-) > > While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES > > brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is > > capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated > > regular TCG players. > > Which people feel that winning is capricious and luck-based? I certainly > haven't met any. If anything, VtES is the LEAST luck based game there is > because there is no card limit. You can have as little luck as you want > depending on how you build your deck. > > I'm still shaking my head...... Same here. You refer to "people feeling that". Which people are these? They certainly aren't the people who play the game, and in my opinion the players are the one whose opinion matters in this deal. Ryan, I think you've been misled on this point. By about a mile ;) //Petri

In article <35b57bd5....@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > On Tue, 21 Jul 1998 08:04:52 -0700, Alan Flesch > <afl...@calvin.usc.edu> wrote: > > >How does this differ from, say, chess, bridge, or poker? > > Perhaps you misunderstand me. In chess, there are no third party > players. In poker, the play can be influenced by third party players, > but it is normally very difficult for one player's "poor play" to > improve the play of another participant without improving the play of > all the participants in the game. I have no opinion on bridge - I've > not played enough (or recently enough) to formulate a comparative > argument. > > Imagine a four player game of VtES, players named A, B, C and D. A > preys on B, B on C, etc. > > The problem with the current way that competitive VtES is played is > that if Person B plays poorly, it benefits Person C (due to the fact > that you cannot normally attack anyone in the game - only the person > defined as your prey. So the disruptivly "bad" effects of B are all > directed solely at C. Please - let's leave voting and other general > type actions aside for the moment, this example is for illustrative > purposes only) So, even if players A and D are doing fine, player C > has a cumulative advantage over them, because the person who should be > affecting Player C in a negative way, Player B, is playing poorly. > > So players A and D are in the unfortunate position of being "crippled" > in this game because they are not seated adjacent to poor player B. > Rather, I should say that player C is receiving an "unfair advantage" > by being lucky enough to be preyed on by Player B. > > If a "swiss" system is used to determine matchups, the result is often > a situation where the winner goes undefeated. Because of the effect I > describe above, the putative "best player" in the event may lose a > game or two >through no fault of their own, or due to the luck of the > draw<, but because >another player< inadvertantly assisted a third > competitor to victory. > > Please tell me that's not as confusing as it reads. :) Hm, a great deal of the flavor of V:TES comes from interaction between the players. *Nothing* stops a player from giving advice to another during the game (like: "Now, don't block his Consanguineous Boon vote, 'cause then he'll Parity shift you! You have only one vamp with a sport bike!"). If a player is playing "bad", he shouldn't be playing at a tournament. It's the same with L5R of Magic: if I would participate and play badly, this would result in a "free ticket" to the next round of my opponent. In a 4-player game, if my "Achse" (i.e. grandpredator) is in trouble, I usually try to help him in a possible way, that doesn't damage me. Options are: rescueing vamps from Torpor, removing PF, Pentex Subversion, etc. I could vote in his favor, or if a vote damages him, against it. I can play Suddens on harmful Masters, I can D-attack my predator or prey just to put pressure on him. There's Rötschreck, Frenzy, the Boons. Fifth Tradition is good the help him, also votes with steal locations (I can give him one!), change seating order, give pool. Sometimes D-bleeds (yes they still exist) against my predator can help my Achse to oust my predator or at least weaken him. And in some cases, with Eagles Sight or Anneke, you can block a killing bleed. Ignis Fatuus just comes to my mind - reducing a bleed against anyone. And sometimes plain politics help also. Another point is: ousting one player doesn't mean you win the game. Okay, maybe I said a little bit too much here, but I wanted to show you how many possibilities there are. My point I want to get across is: yes, a "bad" player affects the whole game; but, no, this doesnt screw the other players. And, as stated above, a player should have some minimum experience to participate in a tournament. I for my part would never encourage a newbie to play in "next weekend's tournament". Can you follow my arguments? (Ahem, what are we debating at the moment, is this really an issue?) -Carl [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <35b4590e....@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: >1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively >2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< >rather than your superior play. > >Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative >errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people >at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES >event is more determined by luck than by skill. (for reasons that should be obvious i have to word this carefully, don't flame me for being spineless) IMPO point 2 would be valid if there was no social interaction between players around the table. This point is the case in other TCGs where play is a one on one challenge with only three possible outcomes (win, lose,draw) as the number of players increases the number of variables in the game increases to a point where social interaction between those players becomes an important factor in deciding the outcome of a game. I disagree with point 2. To support this: Rob Treasure's V:TES match record: GenCon UK 8/97 1st place Praxis Seizure: Isle of White 2/98 2nd place Cardwars three 3/98 1st place Portsmouth V:TES 1 5/98 2nd place Portsmouth V:TES 2 6/98 2nd place I would argue, as would he if he had net access, that this type of record supports a non-random distribution. Matt Green UK Customer Services Wizards of the Coast Obligatory plug for Gen Con UK '98: UK V:TES Championships 12midnight to 9.00am sunday 6th september 1st prize: Trophy + original artwork Further information from me at the address below. Tell your friends. -- "We need a bowling ball, some chewing gum and a yo-yo" The Ant Hill Mob. Questions on Wizards of the Coast/TSR games to: u...@wizards.com --

In article <35b57bd5....@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > Perhaps you misunderstand me. Technically, I don't think anyone misunderstood you. You just didn't qualify your statement with what you were told made the games based on luck. > Imagine a four player game of VtES, players named A, B, C and D. A > preys on B, B on C, etc. [ Player B sucks ] Ok, I see what you're saying. However, good players D and A have to be able to recognize the situation and try to keep balance from swinging in C's favor. The table dynamic is really too great for the poor play of B to be that detrimental for the rest. The only way that B can truly give another player an advantage to winning the game (truthfully, it could be either A or C) is if player B doesn't have a full grasp of the game mechanics. Also, as others have pointed out, you have the same problem with one-on-one game tournaments where a mediochre player may reach a second round because he faced a rather poor player in the first round. While in another bracket, two really good players faced off and one was eliminated. > Please tell me that's not as confusing as it reads. :) Nope, perfectly fine. Mike -- Mike Bohlmann, MAIP mboh...@shout.net "Sell crazy somewhere else; we're all stocked up here." [ quoted text not captured ]

"Bernie Bresnahan" <ber...@mich.com> writes: > While V:TES is fairly solid in it's current form, it really needs at least > one more expansion to fill out the current mix. Some of these issues > could be fixed by releasing small sets of new Promo Cards. Now there's an idea... release reprints of the few problem cards as promos, with perhaps some vampires to help fill out the problem clans. The problem is, of course, that we would have to figure out a way for WotC to make money out of this, card art costs quite a lot -- not an issue for issuing reprints, but definitely an issue for new vampires. Promos would be a sign of WotC support for the game and as such would probably boost sales of older expansions a bit (and serve to keep the game alive), but still some sort of additional "catch" would be nice. But still, not a bad idea. Any idea of how to make it work in the resource/business sense for WotC/FRPG, anyone? How about combining this with the blank card idea that has been tossed around? Hmmm... //Petri

Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > Imagine a four player game of VtES, players named A, B, C and D. A > preys on B, B on C, etc. > > The problem with the current way that competitive VtES is played is > that if Person B plays poorly, it benefits Person C (due to the fact > that you cannot normally attack anyone in the game - only the person > defined as your prey. So the disruptivly "bad" effects of B are all > directed solely at C. Please - let's leave voting and other general > type actions aside for the moment, this example is for illustrative > purposes only) So, even if players A and D are doing fine, player C > has a cumulative advantage over them, because the person who should be > affecting Player C in a negative way, Player B, is playing poorly. Yes, in our circle of play this dynamic is referred to as the "ineffectual predator" syndrome. What typically happens is that player D recognizes that player B is an ineffectual predator, and actively assists player A to oust player B. If player D is playing a Rush Combat or a Vote deck, such assistance can be direct. If player D has an Intercept Combat deck, he "lets up" on player A and concentrates on intercepting player C. Prior to the 7/7 RTR rulings, if player D had a bleed deck, he could cross table bleed player B. Now, player D is pretty much stuck -- all he can do is "let up" on player A and do nothing. However, your comments ignore what I feel is the strongest point of VtES as a multiplayer game: it avoids the "gang up on the leader" syndrome. In games such as Shadowfist or Doomtown, when a player is identified as "leading" then every other player in the game gangs up on that player to stop him/her. What frequently happens is that the leader is weakened, and then some other player threatens to win, is weakened, etc., etc., ad nauseum. Eventually _all_ the players are within striking distance of winning no matter what deck they're playing. In VtES, since you don't care about the "leader" unless he/she is a near-term threat, this happens much, much less frequently. Normally, your deck is only concerned with predator and prey. This make VtES stand out in a positive way from all other multi-player CCGs I've seen. --- Eric Pettersen pett "at" cgl "dot" ucsf "dot" edu (NeXTmail capable)

In article <7xr9zd6...@termiitti.akumiitti.fi>, [ quoted text not captured ] Okay, first, I think that Promo-cards are not a viable way to fill the gaps still left open with the non-camarilla and Sabbat. I think Star Trek did once give out mini-boosters with important cards that they felt every player should have, for free. But this is no way for FRPG, cause Promo-cards *don't sell*. Of course, this would give some boost to the game, *if* the promo-cards would be available via retailers. This shows that there is movement with V:TES. An idea for promocards would be the two main characters of the V:TES-novel "House of Secrets"; I don't know their names now, but they are a Ventrue male and a Tremere female. This has been done with the second V:TES-novel "On a darkling plane" with Dan Murdock. Is this going to be expensive? Promo-cards could be put in the Duelist.... Perhaps WotC can print them "between" some other stuff as some-one has suggested for NR (was that Ryan?). The promo-cards could be mail-ordered by WotC at a certain price (e.g. 5$ a piece, is this too high for a promo card, would it bring in the costs?). Let's forget the blank cards for a while and think about the "possible" expansion Ryan proposed. First of all, before we run around and ask how many displays players want to pre-order, it has to be decided the setting of the exp., the size of it the contents. Since the printing of this expansion depends mostly on the European players, I deem it only proper and right that a good portion of the cards in it are connected to Europe, in some way that will both appeal the European players as well as to players outside of E. The next thing: it has to fill the gaps of the Sabbat and Non-cam. vamps the exist. Perhaps some interection between Sabbat and Camarilla to "finish" the game? We should look for ways to minimise the costs for making that expansion: the V:EKN could playtest it, perhaps some players know good artists who are willing to make some graphics for free. Another idea for keeping printing costs low: What about product placement? Why not having things (logos, texts, products) related to companies cunningly placed in the artwork or flavour text? I don't mind seeing a company-logo on a car (like the Mercedes-star on a sports-car) or having a flavour text like: "Since his days as a mortal, Jazz Wentworth liked to drive expensive Mercedes-limousines." Hm, it might be worht a second thought.... If we can clearly state the name of the expansion, it's size, what the overall contents will be, and approximately when it will be available, and how much a booster will cost, *then* and only then we should go out and ask everyone how many *displays* he wants to pre-order. There should also be an announcement of WotC's plan of printing another V:TES expansion if demand is met. The Duelist is a great forum for that, and the Retailer Direct, also. Interest definitly has to be raised. Let's go to work and discuss this on a matter of fact base. I know that some of my ideas and statements are a bit, hmmm... weird, but we will have to go weird ways to move something. -Carl [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6p742g$ank$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, Lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > First of all, before we run around and ask how many displays players > want to pre-order, it has to be decided the setting of the exp., the > size of it the contents. Unfortunately, I doubt that Ryan can make any kind of committment or comment on the expansion's type or theme. Usually, companies have strict rules on what and how they can accept new product ideas. For example, if you want to suggest a new book to White Wolf, you have to fill out some waivers and such before they'll even look at it. The problem comes if they use some private person's suggestions for a new product. Theoretically, a non-good natured person could then claim that they stole the idea from him and create a legal headache for the company. > We should look for ways to minimise the costs for making that expansion: > the V:EKN could playtest it, perhaps some players know good artists who > are willing to make some graphics for free. I think playtesting by V:EKN groups is important to get everyones flavor. VtES enjoys one of the most dynamic metagames of any game out there. Everyone's playgroup style is going to be different so diverse playtesters is important. As far as graphics go, most artists can't afford to do art for free unless it's a hobby and not an occupation. > Another idea for keeping printing costs low: What about product placement? This could work in Europe where the radical right wouldn't have a field day with a company that stuck its name on a vampire related product. But in the good old opinionated USA, it could create some bad publicity for a product. I imagine you could possibly get sponsors like comic book companies, some book publishers, x-games type sport equipment manufacturers, etc. but it's probably more trouble than it's worth unless one of these companies comes to FRPG about product placement. > what the overall contents will be, and approximately when it will be > available, and how much a booster will cost, *then* and only then we > should go out and ask everyone how many *displays* he wants to pre-order. I'd imagine something like Ancient Hearts or Dark Sovereigns. Player acceptance of a stand-alone was not as good as the others. If it were a stand-alone, it'd have to be targetted at a wider audience to bring in more players who would buy more cards. However, I could see the type of expansion being determined by the demand. If we only get right about the minimum, it will be a smaller expansion. If we surpass the minimum, it will be a larger expansion. > There should also be an announcement of WotC's plan of printing another > V:TES expansion if demand is met. The Duelist is a great forum for that, > and the Retailer Direct, also. Interest definitly has to be raised. I think this is a definite requirement. It only takes a small blurb. Maybe V:EKN could even get one of those small ads in the back of the Duelist (or do they still have those?) > Let's go to work and discuss this on a matter of fact base. I know that > some of my ideas and statements are a bit, hmmm... weird, but we will > have to go weird ways to move something. Bist Du verrueckt? Na, das glaube ich nicht, aber Du bist ministens ein Bissl kommisch. ;) Mike -- Mike Bohlmann, MAIP "Sell crazy somewhere else; we're all stocked up here." -----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==----- [ quoted text not captured ]

> I'll add to your analysis the concern that one of the biggest issues > that WotC has looked at for a very long time is the issue of > competitive play. > > We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that > regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for > expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but > expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality > opponents in order to generate sales. > > I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have > played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken > to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > > 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively AARGH!!!! > 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< > rather than your superior play. WHAAAT????? > > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > at the table. NO, IT'S JUST PLAIN FALSE!!!! But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > event is more determined by luck than by skill. > > To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes > for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the > game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have > yet to find a viable solution. > > While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES > brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is > capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated > regular TCG players. > Sorry, but this could NOT be more wrong. Sabbat is a VERY good game as a two-player stand alone. A LOT better than Rage, which i also play. And it simply isn't true that winning a competitive vampires game is down to luck. And vampires is VERY appealing to today's sophisticated TCG players. I think you need to get some new advisors, matey.

In article <6p7e62$l9s$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, mboh...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > In article <6p742g$ank$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, > Lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > > First of all, before we run around and ask how many displays players > > want to pre-order, it has to be decided the setting of the exp., the > > size of it the contents. > > Unfortunately, I doubt that Ryan can make any kind of committment or > comment on the expansion's type or theme. Usually, companies have strict > rules on what and how they can accept new product ideas. For example, > if you want to suggest a new book to White Wolf, you have to fill out some > waivers and such before they'll even look at it. Yes, you are right, but Ryan himself put the question what we think is missing or yet to do with V:TES. I interpret this as a question pertaining to setting and contents of a "hypothetical" expansion. > > The problem comes if they use some private person's suggestions for a new > product. Theoretically, a non-good natured person could then claim that > they stole the idea from him and create a legal headache for the company. A company has always the means of making sure something like that will not happen. > > > We should look for ways to minimise the costs for making that expansion: > > the V:EKN could playtest it, perhaps some players know good artists who > > are willing to make some graphics for free. > > I think playtesting by V:EKN groups is important to get everyones flavor. > VtES enjoys one of the most dynamic metagames of any game out there. > Everyone's playgroup style is going to be different so diverse playtesters > is important. As far as graphics go, most artists can't afford to do art > for free unless it's a hobby and not an occupation. Let's take the hobby-artist or young no-names than. Give them a chance. > > > Another idea for keeping printing costs low: What about product placement? > > This could work in Europe where the radical right wouldn't have a field day > with a company that stuck its name on a vampire related product. But in the > good old opinionated USA, it could create some bad publicity for a product. I cannot follow you there. Can you explain it to me? > I imagine you could possibly get sponsors like comic book companies, some > book publishers, x-games type sport equipment manufacturers, etc. but it's > probably more trouble than it's worth unless one of these companies comes to > FRPG about product placement. I thought mostly about European "sponsors" like well known car manufacturers, tele-communication companies, companies manufacturing guns or computer. A few good placed products could really give some realistic flavor to a possible expansion. > > > what the overall contents will be, and approximately when it will be > > available, and how much a booster will cost, *then* and only then we > > should go out and ask everyone how many *displays* he wants to pre-order. > > I'd imagine something like Ancient Hearts or Dark Sovereigns. Player > acceptance of a stand-alone was not as good as the others. If it were > a stand-alone, it'd have to be targetted at a wider audience to bring in > more players who would buy more cards. I concur, I real stand-alone would also cost to much, if executed correctly (i.e. with starters and rulebooks). > > However, I could see the type of expansion being determined by the demand. > If we only get right about the minimum, it will be a smaller expansion. > If we surpass the minimum, it will be a larger expansion. I assume that everyone agrees that the up-to-now underrated clans need a push with new vamps and discipline cards. I always thought that players wanted also more interaction between Sabbat and Camarilla. > > > There should also be an announcement of WotC's plan of printing another > > V:TES expansion if demand is met. The Duelist is a great forum for that, > > and the Retailer Direct, also. Interest definitly has to be raised. > > I think this is a definite requirement. It only takes a small blurb. > Maybe V:EKN could even get one of those small ads in the back of the Duelist > (or do they still have those?) Or in the "WotC News"-section. There is the Rumor Mill in this section.... -Carl [ quoted text not captured ]

> > Let's go to work and discuss this on a matter of fact base. I know that > > some of my ideas and statements are a bit, hmmm... weird, but we will > > have to go weird ways to move something. > > Bist Du verrueckt? Na, das glaube ich nicht, aber Du bist ministens ein > Bissl kommisch. ;) Mike, natuerlich bin ich nicht verrueckt, meine Wortwahl ist halt nicht so gut. ;) Du denkst echt ich bin ein bisserl komisch? Na warte, das kriegst Du zurueck! :) [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6p9oe2$jca$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, Lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > Unfortunately, I doubt that Ryan can make any kind of committment or > > comment on the expansion's type or theme. Usually, companies have strict > > rules on what and how they can accept new product ideas. > Yes, you are right, but Ryan himself put the question what we think is > missing or yet to do with V:TES. I interpret this as a question pertaining > to setting and contents of a "hypothetical" expansion. True, maybe I should modify my statement with detailed new product ideas like: "A new expansion centering on the Sabbat in Europe as they clash with the Camarilla." > > This could work in Europe where the radical right wouldn't have a field day > > with a company that stuck its name on a vampire related product. But in the > > good old opinionated USA, it could create some bad publicity for a product. > > I cannot follow you there. Can you explain it to me? In the US, the radical, conservative religious right is always looking for reasons why something terrible happens. When some kids killed their parents a few years back, the kids said they were following their vampiric clan leader, a Gangrel if I remember correctly. Well, the radical right would say that this vampire game was the cause of these kids' actions, not a flaw in society r their mental stability. In Europe, you don't have these problems as far as I know. So if an American company like [insert name brand] had their name on one of these "evil" games, it'd tarnish their image in the US. > I thought mostly about European "sponsors" like well known car manufacturers, > tele-communication companies, companies manufacturing guns or computer. > A few good placed products could really give some realistic flavor to a > possible expansion. I think it's a really cool idea but like I said in my original reply, it's probably more trouble than it's worth trying to convince these companies to put their name on a card. > I assume that everyone agrees that the up-to-now underrated clans need > a push with new vamps and discipline cards. I always thought that players > wanted also more interaction between Sabbat and Camarilla. Assamite Antitribu....mmmmmmm. :) Mike -- Mike Bohlmann, MAIP "Sell crazy somewhere else; we're all stocked up here." -----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==----- [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6pa2ka$mrc$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, mboh...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > In article <6p9oe2$jca$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, > Lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > > > Unfortunately, I doubt that Ryan can make any kind of committment or > > > comment on the expansion's type or theme. Usually, companies have strict > > > rules on what and how they can accept new product ideas. > > > Yes, you are right, but Ryan himself put the question what we think is > > missing or yet to do with V:TES. I interpret this as a question pertaining > > to setting and contents of a "hypothetical" expansion. > > True, maybe I should modify my statement with detailed new product ideas like: > "A new expansion centering on the Sabbat in Europe as they clash with the > Camarilla." With your suggestion, we already have a theme to work with. :) > > > > This could work in Europe where the radical right wouldn't have a field day > > > with a company that stuck its name on a vampire related product. But in the > > > good old opinionated USA, it could create some bad publicity for a product. > > > > I cannot follow you there. Can you explain it to me? > > In the US, the radical, conservative religious right is always looking for > reasons why something terrible happens. When some kids killed their parents > a few years back, the kids said they were following their vampiric clan > leader, a Gangrel if I remember correctly. Well, the radical right would say > that this vampire game was the cause of these kids' actions, not a flaw in > society r their mental stability. In Europe, you don't have these problems > as far as I know. > > So if an American company like [insert name brand] had their name on one of > these "evil" games, it'd tarnish their image in the US. > > > I thought mostly about European "sponsors" like well known car manufacturers, > > tele-communication companies, companies manufacturing guns or computer. > > A few good placed products could really give some realistic flavor to a > > possible expansion. > > I think it's a really cool idea but like I said in my original reply, it's > probably more trouble than it's worth trying to convince these companies > to put their name on a card. I don't think that it's not worth the effort. But this decision is up to Ryan. I can only make suggestions. I wonder if he ponders my ingenious ideas? > > > I assume that everyone agrees that the up-to-now underrated clans need > > a push with new vamps and discipline cards. I always thought that players > > wanted also more interaction between Sabbat and Camarilla. > > Assamite Antitribu....mmmmmmm. :) Hm, don't you think that then they would be underrated, too? We would have to make a 400+ card expansion, just to fit the Assamite Antitribu in. And if they have to be there, the True Brujah, or Old Tzimisce have to be in it as well might some say, then the bloodlines, etc. There is not enough space! And *grin* we need some ideas after the next expansion! :) (Yeah, I'm still optimistic.) -Carl [ quoted text not captured ]

In article <6phv0q$avk$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, Lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > Assamite Antitribu....mmmmmmm. :) > > Hm, don't you think that then they would be underrated, too? We would > have to make a 400+ card expansion, just to fit the Assamite Antitribu in. Nah. I wouldn't want anything other than the vampires. They have the same disciplines. However, instead of vampire blood being poisonous, they can become addicted to it. I realised the other day that all Assamites have a significant penalty, but they don't get an extra point in disciplines. > And if they have to be there, the True Brujah, Temporis....hmmm. (Time oriented discipline) > or Old Tzimisce have to I know the old Tzimisce don't have Vicissitude, but what do they have instead? > be in it as well might some say, then the bloodlines, etc. There is not > enough space! And *grin* we need some ideas after the next expansion! :) > (Yeah, I'm still optimistic.) I'll accept most bloodlines except for that Toreador offshoot based on music. :) [ quoted text not captured ]

> > or Old Tzimisce have to > > I know the old Tzimisce don't have Vicissitude, but what do they have instead? Auspex, Animalism and << Dominate >>. :-)

In article <35b4590e....@news.isomedia.com>, Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote: > On Mon, 20 Jul 1998 09:45:10 -0700, Alan Flesch > <afl...@calvin.usc.edu> wrote: > > >Current state of Jyhad/VtES rules : > > { Much text deleted ] > > That, sir, is >exactly< my analysis of the game as it stands > presently. Well done. > > I'll add to your analysis the concern that one of the biggest issues > that WotC has looked at for a very long time is the issue of > competitive play. > > We know (as well as any such thing can be said to be "known") that > regular, organized competitive play is what drives the TCG market for > expansion product. Basic Sets can sell on their merits, but > expansions require an active metagame and a viable source of quality > opponents in order to generate sales. > > I have had long talks with the DCI and with other people who have > played VtES in a competitive environment, and everyone I have spoken > to acknowledges (if not agrees to) two salient points: > > 1) The game virtually requires 4 people to function effectively > 2) The games are more often determined by an opponent's >mistake< > rather than your superior play. > > Point 2 may very well be an artifiact of Point 1 - the cumulative > errors introduced during play are multiplied by the number of people > at the table. But what Point 2 says is: Winning a competitive VtES > event is more determined by luck than by skill. > > To find a way out of that mess, the DCI has looked at several schemes > for "point scoring" that would be less influenced by the people in the > game not being as effective as they should be objectively. They have > yet to find a viable solution. > > While that condition lingers, the organized play component of the VtES > brand will suffer greatly from people feeling that victory is > capricious and luck-based - very unappealing to today's sophisticated > regular TCG players. > > Ryan S. Dancey > Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group > Wizards of the Coast So as it stands the player who makes the least mistakes wins. Or put another way the best player wins. ei the guy who never makes mistakes. I find that this is the best game in telling the skill of the players involved, if you can take the VPS to win a tourney, then you really are a good player. At least within that group, anyhow. David McCarty [ quoted text not captured ]

Ryan S. Dancey wrote: > Imagine a four player game of VtES, players named A, B, C and D. A > preys on B, B on C, etc. > > Player B, is playing poorly. > So players A and D are in the unfortunate position of being "crippled" > in this game because they are not seated adjacent to poor player B. > Rather, I should say that player C is receiving an "unfair advantage" > by being lucky enough to be preyed on by Player B. I must say that my experience of a four player game (although I havent played V:tes for some time now) is somewhat different. Of course player C is strengthened by a weak player B but that means that he (C) can put more pressure than normal on player D. Since D becomes weaker than normal he can not attack player A as good as he should be able to, leading to a stronger player A. Then player A can in turn hammer even harder on player B. The point I am trying to make here is that it is the only the grandprey of a poorly performing player that suffers. Both the prey and pred become stronger. It is also my experience from five and six player games that it is *only* the grand prey of a poorly performing player that suffers. Although the strengthening of the predator is less in this case, he has an easy victory point and 6 pool coming his way early on in the game. As has allready been pointed out in other responces to Ryans post, when a player is performing poorly it upsets the game mechanics of V:tes. This is true (IMHO) for most games and I don't think that is a V:tes specific problem. TG

On Wed, 29 Jul 1998 17:05:34 +0200, tg <torbjor...@biochem.kth.se> wrote: >As has allready been pointed out in other responces to Ryans post, when >a player is performing poorly it upsets the game mechanics of V:tes. >This is true (IMHO) for most games and I don't think that is a V:tes >specific problem. The reason it is a VtES specific problem is that VtES is one of the very few games that for all intents and purposes requires 3+ player games in organized play events. Without a viable 2 player game option, we have got to plan on running multiplayer games, so the effect described in this thread matters far more than it does in 2 player games. Ryan [ quoted text not captured ]