I agree that activity on the forums has drastically decreased over time and a ton of people who used to be really into the game have left. In fact I would say that the majority of competitive Mage Wars players that we've had in this community over the past few years have already left.
I totally agree, this forum is basically a ghost town at the moment.
I don't think the slow release schedule is the problem. Mage Wars has a very large amount of possible viable spellbooks and arena maps and custom formats that it basically has infinite replayability. The slow release schedule would be fine if there was more community engagement and more frequent release of mage wars products in general besides just card expansions.
What we need is more content in general and more communication from AW, not just expansions. All of the organized play story material was taken down when the website was updated, and they still only have ONE book released and everything else story related is posted on the forums rather than being published in books where more casual players are more likely to see it. And the game has been out for almost six years.
The problem simply put in my opinion is that Arcane Wonders bit off more than they could chew by creating a game that was too big for them to support on their own with such a small staff. I think they should have asked for more help. Either by making some sort of partnership with another company that's willing to supply extra people to help but still lets AW do their own thing, or simply asking for more volunteer help from the fanbase.
I know there are probably a lot of things that they might not be comfortable having people do without paying people for it, but I think it's important to be realistic. There were many times where I felt like Arcane Wonders and the Mage Wars game and community would be much better off and much more engaging and active if they asked more fans to volunteer. I for one would have jumped at the chance to help write some official story material or help assist in designing official alternate variants for new battlegrounds sets if I was ever asked to, even if I wasn't being paid for it. And I doubt I was the only one to ever feel like this.
At this point I think that if Arcane Wonders wants their flagship game's online community to survive, they're basically depending on a few key fans. In particular the members of Arcane Duels. If sharkbait, coshade, and puddnhead stopped playing or even just got really busy for a long stretch of time at some point in the future, I suspect that the online mage wars community would largely disappear.
There are some offline playgroups that were built up enough that they're unlikely to disappear any time soon, such as the group in Charlotte, North Carolina. They probably will still be around and playing mage wars even after most everyone else stops playing.
The really sad thing is that mage wars is such a great game and has so much potential that in the hands of a bigger company it would most likely have been a much bigger success and would have almost certainly given collectable games like Magic or Warhammer a run for their money if not simply outshining them altogether.
I think that unless Arcane Wonders has a strategy for revitalizing their flagship game's community some time soon on their own, they should make some sort of deal with another company or perhaps even sell the game outright so they can focus more on their dice tower essentials line. They've bitten off more than they could chew and I think they should be honest with themselves and admit that. They should not let their love and attachment to mage wars make them succumb to sunk cost fallacy.
That being said, please take everything I've said here with a grain of salt. I've never run a business before and I don't have any expertise in the field. I'm just saying how things look to me as I see it with the limited understanding that I have. That being said, I am a die-hard fan of the game and I've been playing it since 2013, and if I am seeing things this way, there's a good chance that others have similar perspectives. That might even be why so many well known mage wars lovers in this community have left. Nobody wants to stick around on what they perceive to be a sinking ship.
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