Post from Ryan Dancey re:Jyhad/VTES
Alan Flesch
list, for those who don't read that forum.
Alan (aj)
------------------------------------------------------
>Grr... this is the second time I've seen Jyhad bashing on this ng. Do you
>people know what you're talking about?
{ BIG SIGH ]
Yes, unlike everyone else on this list, >I< know exactly what I'm
talking about when it comes to VtES/Jyhad. Unlike >you< I have seen
the financials, the P&L, the contracts, the cost of goods, the
business plan, the expenses in marketing, the organized play figures,
and every other scrap of detail regarding the brand.
TCGs die. That's an observable fact. The reasons why they die are
legion, but there is one underlying reason that each and every dead
TCG has passed away:
LACK OF SALES.
I just don't know how to put it in any plainer terms. VtES >DOESN"T
SELL< It sells in dribs and drabs and bits and peices, and in some
places it sells really, really well. Those places are an anomoly, and
there are not enough of them to justify printing new cards. And
what's worse, VtES, unlike a whole lot of other games, has an
international base of players, so sales can come globally, not just
domestically - AND IT STILL DOESN'T SELL ENOUGH CARDS.
Sales for every printing of Jyhad/VtES product were vastly smaller
than projected. The final product, The Sabbat, even though it was
printed in two batches, was had a huge card count, and had the most
consumer-unfriendly distribution packout in the entire industry
>barely< broke even, and if all costs were fully and accurately
loaded, it would have lost tens of thousands of dollars. Products at
FRPG >always< have full and accurate cost loads - when I say something
makes money, it makes money. When I say something loses money, it
loses money - no cheap accounting tricks to shift dollars around.
See, with a trading card game, you can't print a couple of hundred
thousand cards. You've got to print at least six million cards,
minimum, in order to break even on all the costs associated with
supporting a TCG brand. Six million cards works out to be about
10,000 displays of product (15 card boosters, 36 boosters per
display). In order to sell 10,000 displays of product, every actively
purchasing adventure game store in the US would have to purchase >FOUR
DISPLAYS OF PRODUCT<. That's an unreasonable amount to expect to sell
sucessfully. What's worse, on average, only 30% of the domestic AGI
stores buy any TCG other than Magic, Star Wars or L5R with any
regularity. If only 30% of them bought those displays, they'd each
need to buy twelve units - an impossibility.
Another VtES problem: I can't put it into Rolling Thunder. If the
initial sales of the product tank, I'm stuck with 2/3 of the print run
and absolutely no way to sell it. With a risky proposition like a
VtES expansion, to protect myself and the company, I've got to ship
those six million cards out the door on release day. We couldn't RT
the game until we were certain that we'd sell at least three
consecutive months of product.
The overseas market for non Magic, non media-licensend TCGs is about
25% the size of the domestic market. For VtES, the European market
offers some hope, as they tended to buy VtES product in higher ratios
than other similar products, but even there, the purchase potential is
vastly smaller than that necessary to make the brand viable.
I could go into a long diatribe on the current condition of the market
(the channel is >really< messed up, even though many of the retailers
are healthy and the consumer base remains enthusiastic), but I won't,
not only because it's a depressing speech, but it is somewhat
proprietary information. I will say that sales on TCGs across the
board are down, that the distributors are unwilling to take any
inventory risk (thus, there is no sales potential) for anything but
the most viable TCG brands, and that the immense amount of unsold
Jyhad/VtES product clogging the channel is a nearly unscalable barrier
to entry for a new VtES release. Even if we printed it, it's
debatable wether we could get anyone to stock it at distribution, or
anyone to order it at retail.
If all of those issues were addressed, and we had a strong business
case to invest in further VtES work, then there are several second
order issues involving the product that would need to be addressed
internally, not only within FRPG, but within WotC as well before we
moved ahead with that development. In the great scheme of things, I
only have so many dollars, and so many people to allocate to
developing products, and I have to choose those brands that I believe
have the highest percentage chance of returning the most money on that
investment possible. VtES faces >substantial< challenges in that
department as well.
As always when I discuss VtES, I must stress that I found the game to
be well designed and executed, and that the underlying license from
White Wolf is one of the most well concieved and executed licenses in
the gaming industry.
Ryan S. Dancey
Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group
Wizards of the Coast
Petri Wessman
Ryan Dancey commented:
> As always when I discuss VtES, I must stress that I found the game to
> be well designed and executed, and that the underlying license from
> White Wolf is one of the most well concieved and executed licenses in
> the gaming industry.
while earlier Ryan Dancey also commented:
>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.
Will the real Ryan S. Dancey please stand up?
//Petri
Petri Wessman
> SELL< It sells in dribs and drabs and bits and peices, and in some
> places it sells really, really well. Those places are an anomoly, and
> there are not enough of them to justify printing new cards. And
> what's worse, VtES, unlike a whole lot of other games, has an
> international base of players, so sales can come globally, not just
> domestically - AND IT STILL DOESN'T SELL ENOUGH CARDS.
But you also admitted that Sabbat sold well (despite, as you said,
having a "consumer-unfriendly" distribution package).
The game is also gaining players steadily, both over here in Europe,
and as far as I know (by what I've heard on the net) in other places
as well.
Isn't this a situation in which we should try to figure out a solution
that both gives the game a future and makes WotC/FRPG money? The whole
CCG industry is in a "slump" according to your own words, and it seems
to me that a big part of the problem is precisely what is happening
here: companies, WotC in particular, dropping games and concentrating
on their newest offerings, which will in turn get dumped a year down
the line.
The problem is that CCGs require a large investure of both money and
time. Players have discovered this, and are extremely leery of new
titles that have a very high chance of becoming obsolete in the near
future. As a company, you have to start supporting the older games (or
at least the ones with a reasonable player base), and you have to
aquire a repotation of such support. Otherwise the future doesn't look
good for any new products you may wish to come out with.
//Petri
Neal
>
> Ryan Dancey commented:
>
> > As always when I discuss VtES, I must stress that I found the game to
> > be well designed and executed, and that the underlying license from
> > White Wolf is one of the most well concieved and executed licenses in
> > the gaming industry.
>
>
> >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.
>
> Will the real Ryan S. Dancey please stand up?
Thanks a million.
I don't mind if someone disagrees with me, even though the effects might make
me sad or angry. But when you never know what they will say next, what's the point?
Another thing a careful reader will note is that Ryan writes large paragraphs
full of information that is irrelevant to the points being made. He also
refuses to address questions for which he cannot provide a reasonable answer.
EXAMPLE:
Q: What is the CCG "development curve" (see above)? Are there new CCG
technologies that render old CCGs obsolete?
A: There is no "development curve" for CCGs. That was a spurious reason with
no substance at all. I created the phrase to fill my paragraph. It means nothing.
Now watch >his< answer.
-Neal
Neal's Last Words
http://www.coos.or.us/~byron
P.S. Ryan, I know you are not forgetting that you will tell me the *two*
methods for generating infinite bits in Netrunner. These were referred to you
by your playtest staff, which you trust explicitly, and which brought you a
Dune that was broken so badly the starting conditions had to be changed after
publication. All part of the CCG "development curve", I suppose.
Ryan S. Dancey
<or...@termiitti.akumiitti.fi> wrote:
>Will the real Ryan S. Dancey please stand up?
Sure. In 199>4< when Jyhad was released, it was state of the art. In
1998, it is dated and requires a major overhaul to become competitive
in today's marketplace, which is substantially more evolved than it
was four years ago.
We don't know yet if that kind of overhaul can be done successfully.
That's the point of the whole Rage experiment. We'll know more in a
year.
Ryan S. Dancey
<or...@termiitti.akumiitti.fi> wrote:
>But you also admitted that Sabbat sold well (despite, as you said,
>having a "consumer-unfriendly" distribution package).
No, I did not. I said that because it was printed >twice< it managed
to barely break even, and that if all costs had been fairly loaded, it
would have lost money. That is not "selling well" in any sense.
Petri Wessman
> On 20 Jul 1998 13:36:54 +0300, Petri Wessman
> <or...@termiitti.akumiitti.fi> wrote:
>
> >Will the real Ryan S. Dancey please stand up?
>
> Sure. In 199>4< when Jyhad was released, it was state of the art. In
> 1998, it is dated and requires a major overhaul to become competitive
> in today's marketplace, which is substantially more evolved than it
> was four years ago.
Ok. I strongly disagree with you on your claim that the "marketplace
has become more evolved", care to elaborate on that? Having played
CCGs since they came out, I do not see anything to support your claim.
Vampire managed to avoid just about all of the classic CCG traps
("power rares", "instant win rule holes", "hideously complex timing
errata") on the first try. I'd assert that it's still the most
balanced multiplayer CCG on the market today. I would really like to
know in which way Vampire is obsolete, in your view.
The storyline concept in L5R is nice (and could concievably be
integrated with Vampire), but otherwise L5R is a *lot* closer to Magic
than Vampire, so much that it could agruably be called a Magic
clone. Is your argument that all "modern" games must be like Magic, or
are you referring to something else.
Ok, I'll bite: what do *you* consider to be the state of the art in
CCGs right now, and why?
> We don't know yet if that kind of overhaul can be done successfully.
> That's the point of the whole Rage experiment. We'll know more in a
> year.
Yup, I applaud you on trying it, although I think that Rage is a
misguided target for your efforts. But still, I hope it works out.
But. If you are saying "we'll wait a year and then see what happens",
then you are just trying to avoid argument with Vampire players while
still effectively doing your best to kill the game. This game needs
support from FRGP/WotC *now*, not in a year. Not a major overhaul or
anything even remotely like that, just an expansion. That would give
the players enough to chew on and buy so that we would be content to
go back to discussing game mechanics for another year ;)
You simply cannot say "we'll wait a year" and still say yuo have any
intention of supporting this game.
//Petri
CPilh...@bhak12.ac.at
Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote:
> On 20 Jul 1998 13:46:53 +0300, Petri Wessman
> <or...@termiitti.akumiitti.fi> wrote:
>
> >But you also admitted that Sabbat sold well (despite, as you said,
> >having a "consumer-unfriendly" distribution package).
>
> No, I did not. I said that because it was printed >twice< it managed
> to barely break even, and that if all costs had been fairly loaded, it
> would have lost money. That is not "selling well" in any sense.
Excuse me, Ryan, but why had it to be printed twice? Did you print the
expansion on purpose in two seperate tranches, or did you one print-run
only to see that it was too few cards and demand was still high?
If the latter was the case, then your company should have made profit,
because any booster you sell after the break even point is reached is
a net profit. That's basic business-lore.
Perhaps you could also explain a bit how an expansion is made and
where the major costs lie?
Thanks, Carl
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mboh...@my-dejanews.com
Ry...@frpg.com (Ryan S. Dancey) wrote:
> We don't know yet if that kind of overhaul can be done successfully.
> That's the point of the whole Rage experiment. We'll know more in a
> year.
Based on what you've said in this thread and others, I think I'd rather
not see a overhaul of Jyhad from FRPG (or anyone for that matter). Overhaul
implies very significant changes. And anyone actually in touch with the game
would realise that VtES is in no need of such an overhaul (or there wouldn't
be so many people playing it in increasing numbers).
Mike
ber...@cco.caltech.edu
> Sure. In 199>4< when Jyhad was released, it was state of the art. In
> 1998, it is dated and requires a major overhaul to become competitive
> in today's marketplace, which is substantially more evolved than it
> was four years ago.
>
> We don't know yet if that kind of overhaul can be done successfully.
> That's the point of the whole Rage experiment. We'll know more in a
> year.
>
Great. The future of Jyhad, unarguably the best CCG ever made (okay, I'm
biased... take that with a smiley...), hinges on the fate of Rage. I bought
some Rage cards. Even though I love Werewolf:The Apocalypse (my favourite
WOD game by far), and I liked the concept of a combat deck and the normal
"library" deck, the game was just not very good. I haven't found anyone to
play it with me in years. Not that I'd really want to play...
I'm almost tempted to buy Rage, just so that V:TES will get printed again,
but I don't know if anything is really worth that...
-Chris
James Coupe
<Ry...@frpg.com> writes
>No, I did not. I said that because it was printed >twice< it managed
>to barely break even, and that if all costs had been fairly loaded, it
>would have lost money. That is not "selling well" in any sense.
If it did not sell well, why was it was printed twice? If the first
printing had not sold a hell of a lot of cards, then there should surely
have been a lot of cards still lying round to be sold. I know that in
England I couldn't find any Sabbat for a while before the re-release.
Or was it a case of a lot of cards having been sent to some places and
not being sold and so not being available in the popular places? If
they were not being sold, why weren't they returned?
From what you have said, it would *seem* that Sabbat itself actually
sold fairly well, but the financial side was mismanaged so that, despite
requiring a second print run, it only managed to break even. Would that
be a fair statement?
--
James Coupe (Prince of Mercia) Change nospam to obeah to reply
Vampire: Elder Kindred Network
madnessnetwork.hexagon.net
Ryan S. Dancey
>Excuse me, Ryan, but why had it to be printed twice?
I honestly don't know. The first printing was completed before WotC
acquired FRPG, and the second was done before I was placed in charge
of the brands. I do know that combined the print runs barely broke
even, and that WotC still has Sabbat in stock today to sell to
distributors who want to order it. They have all the VtES expansions,
as well, if anyone ever wanted any. In fact, they've sold close to
200 booster packs of Ancient Hearts through their web site, which is
heartning!
CPilh...@bhak12.ac.at
>
> >Excuse me, Ryan, but why had it to be printed twice?
>
> I honestly don't know. The first printing was completed before WotC
> acquired FRPG, and the second was done before I was placed in charge
> of the brands. I do know that combined the print runs barely broke
> even, and that WotC still has Sabbat in stock today to sell to
> distributors who want to order it. They have all the VtES expansions,
> as well, if anyone ever wanted any. In fact, they've sold close to
> 200 booster packs of Ancient Hearts through their web site, which is
> heartning!
>
> Brand Manager, Five Rings Publishing Group
> Wizards of the Coast
>
I would like to know which of the sets (including V:TES) had the smallest
print run. Is it possible to have a significantly smaller print run and
break even (say half of the smallest exp. so far)?
What if some of the cost can be raised by funds outside the
company (I have an idea in that direction)?
-Carl
Robert Goudie
>
> > Sure. In 199>4< when Jyhad was released, it was state of the art. In
> > 1998, it is dated and requires a major overhaul to become competitive
> > in today's marketplace, which is substantially more evolved than it
> > was four years ago.
> >
> > We don't know yet if that kind of overhaul can be done successfully.
> > That's the point of the whole Rage experiment. We'll know more in a
> > year.
> >
>
> Great. The future of Jyhad, unarguably the best CCG ever made (okay, I'm
> biased... take that with a smiley...), hinges on the fate of Rage. I bought
> some Rage cards. Even though I love Werewolf:The Apocalypse (my favourite
> WOD game by far), and I liked the concept of a combat deck and the normal
> "library" deck, the game was just not very good. I haven't found anyone to
> play it with me in years. Not that I'd really want to play...
He he he.
> I'm almost tempted to buy Rage, just so that V:TES will get printed again,
> but I don't know if anything is really worth that...
Not only that but aren't you afraid of the "updated" version of VTES
that Ryan and FRPG would create? Old Rage is probably better than any
updated Rage or updated VTES.
--
Robert Goudie, Chairman rrgo...@earthlink.net
Vampire: Elder Kindred Network http://madnessnetwork.hexagon.net
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