Rolling Thunder sucked ass. The idea itself was decent... but the implementation was terrible.
To make it work you need two things to be true: 1. There is an existing base set that is always in print to make it easy for new people to join the game. (this is where Rage Tribal War died. no base set!) 2. You need to make the set small enough that people can reasonably buy the whole set in a month, every month. (that's where ALL the games flunked)
The basic problem with Rolling Thunder is the sets were Too Damn Big. And were collectible. To get a whole set you dropping around $60 a month, as opposed to $80 every 4 months. it knocked all the casual players out of the game and pissed off the serious players. Sets were ranging about 70-100 cards per set.
It also pissed off the retailers so they wouldn't order the next release because they still had too much money tied up in last months inventory. So they woudn't order the next one til the first one sold though, which meant they might miss a month, which annoyed players...
Chulhulu might work as a monthly because of the fixed card strategy and if they keep the set size small enough that people can resaonably pick it up every month. If the retailer can sell through at least half the stock in the month, he'll probably place the order for the next month.
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Date: 2008-02-06 04:49 pm (UTC)To make it work you need two things to be true:
1. There is an existing base set that is always in print to make it easy for new people to join the game. (this is where Rage Tribal War died. no base set!)
2. You need to make the set small enough that people can reasonably buy the whole set in a month, every month. (that's where ALL the games flunked)
The basic problem with Rolling Thunder is the sets were Too Damn Big. And were collectible. To get a whole set you dropping around $60 a month, as opposed to $80 every 4 months. it knocked all the casual players out of the game and pissed off the serious players. Sets were ranging about 70-100 cards per set.
It also pissed off the retailers so they wouldn't order the next release because they still had too much money tied up in last months inventory. So they woudn't order the next one til the first one sold though, which meant they might miss a month, which annoyed players...
Chulhulu might work as a monthly because of the fixed card strategy and if they keep the set size small enough that people can resaonably pick it up every month. If the retailer can sell through at least half the stock in the month, he'll probably place the order for the next month.