Arcane Wonders Forum
Mage Wars => Rules Discussion => Topic started by: Moonglow on July 30, 2013, 12:30:32 AM
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Pretty much as the title says.
I was wondering if new print runs for both upcoming expansions and new runs of existing base set, spell tombs, and expansions will be based on the errata'd version of the cards. If so, will there be a way for buyers to know what version they're getting?
Guess I was thinking I'd play with a printed version in the card sleeve, but long term would like to swap out the make shift card. One way to do that would be to buy a 'fixed' release, which I probably want to do at some point anyway....
Thoughts?
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All I can do is direct you here, where they discuss it slightly.
http://forum.arcanewonders.com/index.php?topic=12796.0
It was said that they will be reprinted for a new set where they fit, however that wasn't planned until roughly 2014. If they will change the core set printing to modify it however, I do not know.
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Depends what you mean by fit. Its esentially where they are printing the cards as part of a set, they'll use the new wording (see below). My question is more about reprints of the existing expansions I guess.
"...John is correct that we are planning revised wordings of these cards for a release next year. We would have to cut cards from Druid vs Necro, to fit in these reprints. Though we do have mages down the road who it makes far more sense would use these cards. We decided to work them into a set where they would also fit thematically..."
All I can do is direct you here, where they discuss it slightly.
http://forum.arcanewonders.com/index.php?topic=12796.0
It was said that they will be reprinted for a new set where they fit, however that wasn't planned until roughly 2014. If they will change the core set printing to modify it however, I do not know.
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I understand. I guess my thinking is that if they went out of their way to say they would be reprinted next year in a new set, it just seems odd they wouldn't just say that next run of the core it would be modified, if that was considered. I'm not an official answer however, just speculating, so feel free to ignore my ramblings.
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No worries, me too :) I mean it makes sense they'd use the new wording in new print runs. But I have not idea how often a print run of a game like this may take to get to. I hear some games only ever get a single print run, other games seem to have a couple a year. I guess as much an issue in there will be whether we can tell if its got the new cards/wording or not.
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"...John is correct that we are planning revised wordings of these cards for a release next year. We would have to cut cards from Druid vs Necro, to fit in these reprints. Though we do have mages down the road who it makes far more sense would use these cards. We decided to work them into a set where they would also fit thematically..."
All I can do is direct you here, where they discuss it slightly.
http://forum.arcanewonders.com/index.php?topic=12796.0
It was said that they will be reprinted for a new set where they fit, however that wasn't planned until roughly 2014. If they will change the core set printing to modify it however, I do not know.
Q1. Why would they have to 'cut' cards from Druid vs Necro to include these in that set? Couldn't they include whatever cards are going in that expansion AND include these cards? Seems if they would make a change they wouldn't want to make customers wait until 2014 to get new cards and in the mean time have to use make shift ones. Or at least make the update closer to the expansion that it would be released?
Q2. Since it mentions it would be printed in a new set where they fit, and in the 'future' there would be mages that could make use of the new cards does that mean the Druid will not include Holy as one of it's types so the Druid can't make use of the temples, or by 'thematically' it just means it wouldn't meld well with it's general strategy?
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Q1. I'm just under the assumption that they have to keep the card count at a certain range for either msrp reasons (to keep the cost where they want it to be) or for print run reasons. I don't need the new cards, I have them printed out and memorized. However the fact they even said they would put in new copies at some point makes me happy.
Q2. In one of the news letters.. hold on.. http://us5.campaign-archive1.com/?u=9da956a569c65d5b054e80642&id=4ce4268cb9 Druid is supposedly going to be nature/water. Or at least be nature with a subfocus on water. The ad for it is about halfway down. Thematically seems to just mean to go along with that mages particular stratagy, though they always seem to include spells for all the schools in each set so I don't know. Like I said, I'm in no big rush, with the pdf file out and all.
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Q1: Right now the druid and the necro are two of the most card intensive mages we've made. We only get so many cards in an expansion and these two mages are very demanding on that limit.
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Hi, it doesn't seem like I'm framing my question very well.
I'm not asking whether AW is going to print a bucket load of cards. I'm asking whether new print runs of boxes that have the TOL in them now, like the base game, and spell tombs will be updated to the new wording and if this will be marked on the box somehow.
The latter part is probably the main point, although it's redundant if there isn't a print run planned for like 2 years.
I must admit I don't really get the arguments about the limits on cards in the expansion. I don't think people are asking for more cards in the expansions. Or to replace cards. Just when you go to the printer you say, when you print these 100k cards for us, wrap and box them, we also want 500 or 1000 of each of these, unbundled.
Small card runs are obviously possible, they're being done as part of the foil releases and Dice tower promos. Most other companies seem to be able to get promo items printed. You've done it.. Why can't you do it for these cards? Sure, you're busy, maybe you don't want to do it right now. But it seems strange to be suggesting it can't be done.
It feels more like the responses are saying we don't want to spend any money fixing this. And I don't understand why, when we'll buy them off you. Preferably at cost, and probably not without the odd complaint. But we'd buy them.
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I must admit I don't really get the arguments about the limits on cards in the expansion.
Cards are printed in large sheets. The set size is determined by the number of cards that can fit on a set number of sheets.
If you add more cards then you have to do it in multiples of the number that fit in a sheet or you are just wasting money.
So if each sheet has 50 cards on it (for arguments sake) then your set will be in multiples of 50 cards. If you add four cards to a set then it has to be printed on another sheet which would require you to either come up with 46 other cards (or card variants) to print or you lose money.
So if a set had 50 cards in it, printed on a single sheet, you'd either have to come up with 46 other cards and double your printing cost or take out 4 cards in order to maintain your budgeted printing cost.
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When you do it - dont forget to add:
6 Black cubes
2 red cubes
2 player boards
10 damage counters
I didnt even realize that i didnt have all i needed for a 4 player game after buying:
base game
tome 1
tome 2
Warlord vs forcemaster
Action marker set
Spellbook pack (1)
GREAT dissapointment. And tbh... very unacceptable.
Bonus
12 red dice (for a total of 20 - 10 for each player)
1 D12 (1 for each player in total)
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I must admit I don't really get the arguments about the limits on cards in the expansion.
Cards are printed in large sheets. The set size is determined by the number of cards that can fit on a set number of sheets.
If you add more cards then you have to do it in multiples of the number that fit in a sheet or you are just wasting money.
So if each sheet has 50 cards on it (for arguments sake) then your set will be in multiples of 50 cards. If you add four cards to a set then it has to be printed on another sheet which would require you to either come up with 46 other cards (or card variants) to print or you lose money.
So if a set had 50 cards in it, printed on a single sheet, you'd either have to come up with 46 other cards and double your printing cost or take out 4 cards in order to maintain your budgeted printing cost.
Are you printing them in a automated process that doesn't allow for sorting of cards, or is very restricted in how they can be sorted? I'm just curious, because this logic implies that you need to fit each individual printing of a set onto it's own sheets without any overlap.
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I suspect that the cards are printed in sheets with x amount of cards. Each expansion uses x amount of full sheets per unit. If that is the case they would have to remove cards from the set to make room for the replacements or print a whole new sheet of cards which would definitely change the cost, probably change the release date, and possibly require new packaging.
If I am correct they will have to work them into future expansions based on all the above factors.
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Wiz-Pig, Yes?
I'm sort of confused by the question.
It costs money and time to set up an offset press. You send one job that is a run of 10,000 all-inclusive sheets, rather than 50 different jobs that get run 2,000 sheets.
Each print sheet contains the whole set (or a well defined, predictable part of it) and then its all cut up and collated by machine.
There's no "Tanglevine" sheet with 50 tanglevines on it. Setting up the press is the major expense, and running it at high speed over and over again is what it's good at. So you set up a sheet with one of every card on it, and you run that sheet all day.
(Actually, for the base set, maybe you run one sheet with all the unique cards, and one sheet with all the cards included in the box twice, and you just run the latter sheet in print runs twice as large as the former.
So you have a single sheet with all the spells that are included in quadruplicate, and you run that sheet 4 times per boxed set you're making. Simplifying the collation probably saves AW money, too.)
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Wiz-Pig, Yes?
I'm sort of confused by the question.
It costs money and time to set up an offset press. You send one job that is a run of 10,000 all-inclusive sheets, rather than 50 different jobs that get run 2,000 sheets.
Each print sheet contains the whole set (or a well defined, predictable part of it) and then its all cut up and collated by machine.
There's no "Tanglevine" sheet with 50 tanglevines on it. Setting up the press is the major expense, and running it at high speed over and over again is what it's good at. So you set up a sheet with one of every card on it, and you run that sheet all day.
(Actually, for the base set, maybe you run one sheet with all the unique cards, and one sheet with all the cards included in the box twice, and you just run the latter sheet in print runs twice as large as the former.
So you have a single sheet with all the spells that are included in quadruplicate, and you run that sheet 4 times per boxed set you're making. Simplifying the collation probably saves AW money, too.)
I guess I wasn't assuming that they were running these with offset or machine collation (though I considered the possibility of the later). Digital printing has become quite commonplace and gets around a lot of these issues. The newer ones operate in a way that is similar to an offset press and gives the same quality of print or better with a lot less hassle. And of course you aren't paying for plates to be made.
If AW is using offset presses I completely understand the lack of flexibility.
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I honestly don't know what printing techniques they're using, but even with a digital sheet fed press they would still want to simplify collating as much as possible, right? Repaginating a odd number of cards onto a looping print run sounds like a nightmare unless it could be done automatically or on a web fed press or something, and even then, sorting them could be a disaster.
I mean, does 10,000 copies sound about right for a print run of an expansion? More? They couldn't possibly do that by hand cheaply, even if they outsourced it to Mexico, could they?
I know that WotC (Magic the Gathering) used to get their printing done by Cartamundi and they had a rare sheet, an uncommon sheet, and a common sheet. Commons, at least, would be sorted into packs not completely randomly, but in pairs, so that any common was very likely to appear in a pack with either the common before it on the sheet, or the common after. This became such a part of high level tournament drafting that it was preserved when Wizards started selling digital packs for online play.
But the upshot of this was the same there as here, once the sheet is full, you cant print only one more card, you gotta print a multiple.
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What I didn't really get was the discussion - I don't really care if its done as part of an expansion or not. I can get that once the print sheets are setup, they don't want to change it.
But saying can't be done doesn't seem to make sense. How are promo cards done? Perhaps a minimum card set is more like 5 or 10, but that would still be a different discussion.
Essentially people are asking for a set of promo cards that are based on the errata'd ToL, HoB and Battle Fury. If AW can produce them as singles for Dice Tower, why can't they produce them for us? Feck it, heard of kickstarter?
Besides, this is all kinda off topic... every single frakin post, even my own! :)
What I actually wanted to know was:
I assume that new print runs of boxes that have the TOL in them now, like the base game, and spell tombs will be updated to the new wording and if this will be marked on the box somehow.
The latter part is probably the main point, although it's redundant if there isn't a print run planned for like 2 years.
Your post does suggest a reluctance to alter print sheets to accommodate the errata. If AW continue to get incorrect cards printed... now that would be annoying!
I must admit I don't really get the arguments about the limits on cards in the expansion.
Cards are printed in large sheets. The set size is determined by the number of cards that can fit on a set number of sheets.
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I mean, does 10,000 copies sound about right for a print run of an expansion? More? They couldn't possibly do that by hand cheaply, even if they outsourced it to Mexico, could they?
I suspect you're being a little enthusiastic. There are 3,300 owners of Mage Wars on BGG. 400 people wanting it. So you could estimate approximately 4000 BGG owners and some unknown (probably smaller) number of wider (real world) owners.... you'd be looking at 7-8k max I'd suspect. I'm sure AW know how many they've sold, but either way expansion runs would nearly always be a smaller sample of the base game sales...
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Yeah, I do wonder what's up with promos. I assume all promos were printed on a single sheet, and are being released piecemeal. New printings with errata would have to wait till the next sheet of promos gets printed, perhaps far in the future.
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Well, closer to 10k than 1k, anyway, as an order of magnitude estimate. I do wonder what percent of Mage Wars owners are on BGG. 50% sounds much too high to me, but I'm not in a good position to judge.
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Well, closer to 10k than 1k, anyway, as an order of magnitude estimate. I do wonder what percent of Mage Wars owners are on BGG. 50% sounds much too high to me, but I'm not in a good position to judge.
Yeah, it'd be interesting to see a couple of industry sales figures for particular games to use as a benchmark estimate of BGG to rest of world ownership. Say of a older historically popular game such as Settlers, and a couple of newer semi popular games like Carc, Dominion, Monopoly ;)
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Actually way off topic here, but answering my own question.
Settlers - in 2011 was approaching 25 million copies sold: 50,000 owners on BGG
Dominion - end of 2010 had exceeded 1 million copies sold: 38,000 owners on BGG.
I take it back, the BGG ownership is likely the smaller fraction :)
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It's interesting to see how much broader Settlers is than Dominion; likely because they sold in Barnes and Nobel and in malls. I expect Mage Wars would be even less broad than the other two, especially because BGG users are likely the hard core of early adopters and Mage Wars is so new. Still, 5% would be my guess.
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Dominion is 4%, I think the points you raise would push more for the 20-50%....anyway, stop encouraging me to derail my thread! :)
It's interesting to see how much broader Settlers is than Dominion; likely because they sold in Barnes and Nobel and in malls. I expect Mage Wars would be even less broad than the other two, especially because BGG users are likely the hard core of early adopters and Mage Wars is so new. Still, 5% would be my guess.