We lost a friend....

On Wednesday July, 26 we lost a member of our local gaming community. Britt Daniel was a staple feature in gaming around the Bay Area for years, and years. At age 39, he had been playing games for at least 30 of those years and was well versed in the hobby. He had an eclectic taste in his minis and RPGs, and a deep knowledge of both. He had so many friends within in small community, and I know he will be missed. There is a touching eulogy over at 1000 Buffalo by Brian Isikoff. I encourage you to read it.If Britt had any charities or organizations he favored, please contact me so that I might get those details posted here. To the friends and family (and there were many), we offer our sincerest regrets. Britt will be missed.

Thank you GamesWorkshop!!!

In his 2006 "why we are sucking wind in terms of profitablility, but don't really have a clear explaination of why" preamble, the Chairman of GW lays it out as to why the FLGS is suffering:

"On the 'investor relations' section of our corporate web site (which has all our annual reports since 2001, and the institutional presentations we make) there is a place where people can post questions for me to answer. Mostly they are about what new models we are planning (read White Dwarf), or why we haven't got a store in Omaha, Nebraska (yet), or why we put our prices up all the time (we don't) but every now and then I get one that touches on something that needs to be explained. Blair Svendson from Missouri asked '[why am I] seeing my favorite independent hobby stores going out of business?'. He was referring to the United States, and so is my response. This is a question that concerns all of us at Games Workshop - staff, managers, customers and owners. I'm not certain I know THE answer, but I have an explanation that fits the facts. Most of these small owner-manager hobby stores have thrived over the last 20 years or so on role play games, collectible card games (CCGs) and niche merchandise from fantasy movie imagery. Role play games and movie merchandise are in decline; CCGs can now be bought in mass market outlets which hurts hobby store sales. Many of these stores carry our products very successfully, but they are not enough to support the whole store. Additionally many of these stores are run as lifestyle enterprises rather than as for profit businesses; when times get hard they sometimes respond slowly and weakly which can be, and has been in many cases, disastrous."

If you wanna read all of the awesome that is this post, go here:
Teh Hawesome
Man, if it weren't for GW products, we would have all been flat out in the cold years ago. Whew.

(Sorry, I am in a snarky mood this AM.)

DJ Vader

Sometimes you just gotta watch the Lord of the Sith scratch...

Hounds of the lord...

I want to say, really quick, before I go to bed.

I LOVE DOGS IN THE VINEYARD.

So Much! Thanks to Carl Rigney for teaching me the game, and running a fantastic first session.

More when I haven't just put in a 16 hour day.

Why I like Battlefront...

(This was posted elsewhere, but I thought I was brilliant so I reposted it here. (Ok, you are right, I am not only brilliant, but lazy. I have been meaning to say this for a while. Hooray Lazy!)


I am going to step out on a limb here, and say I am a pretty big proponent of the line (Flames of War), even though the discount blows goats.

1) It introduces historicals to kids in a very consumer friendly way. We have had some of the 40k kids buy some FoW stuff over the past year. That gives me a more palatable option for some of the kids who may not a) really have the cash for a full 1850pt space marine army, b) a more comprehensive simple game system to teach them, than we currently have with 40k.

2) Older gamers who have left gaming (fed up with 40k, wandered off for no good reason, etc) are finding this game, and _it is bringing them back to gaming_. That is huge in my mind. More players in gaming (especially ones with disposable income) = A'OK in my book.

3) Historicals gamers like the models. No not all of them, and many dislike the blah blah blah nature of the rules, but I now have historicals customers back in the store. Even occasionally. And the they find things like Warhammer Ancients, and our modeling tools. We have a couple loyal customers who work with us first to try and Special order their esoteric minis, before they order online.

4) I personally like the company. I like Jean-Paul, and I like his main sales guy Chris Frye. My personal opinion, not really looking for an argument.

5) I think in tandem, Battlefront and Privateer have made such an impact in GW, that I (finally) am starting to see some advanced steps from GW into improving some things wrong in their business process. Who knows, both GW and BF may only end up shooting themselves in the foot, but they are causing each other to do some very interesting things.

So basically, in a way roundabout fashion, I think more than anything Battefront is making some sweeping changes, that aren't solely in sales of it's own game. I dunno if they even mean to be doing it, but after a few conversations, I am pretty sure they do. So, I am willing to take a short discount on a game that is having that much positive impact. Whew. I'll shut up now.

Some days teh Internets is not your friend...

Man oh man, sometimes I love me my Internets. And sometimes I hate me some Internets. This week is the later. As this is my own Personal Rant Zone^TM,, I feel that it is totally ok to vent on the suck-age of teh Internets, on my blog...and not come off as hypocritical. So there.

I just have been dealing with drama after drama this week. And you know what, _not a single one_ of these dramas would have occurred face to face. Not one. Why? Ya'll now all about the anonymity of the Internets...so, I will just attribute it to total suck-age. There, I said it. As far as I am concerned, teh Internets sucks this week.

On another note, I played Funny Friends by Friedemann Friese, yesterday. Aside from the fact that it has some fairly adult themes, it is one of the best party games I have played in ages. I can't recommend it enough. So that was good.