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<blockquote data-quote="buzz" data-source="post: 1394241" data-attributes="member: 6777"><p>Apologies in advance for the length of this post. Also, while I may argue vehemently, this is all friendly debate, amd I'm enjoying it. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite6" alt=":cool:" title="Cool :cool:" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":cool:" /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Understood, but I think it's just as true that people who play <em>Warhammer</em> and CCGs are also not necessarily disposed to role-playing. I'm in three different RPG groups, and a good portion of our players no interest in these sorts of games. If they were more RPG.net-type folk (i.e., people who eschew D&D for games like <em>Nobilis</em>), I'd imagine the precentage would be even smaller.</p><p></p><p>I understand that there is overlap, but I don't see how promoting wargames and CCGs is, by extension, direct support of the RPG hobby. Sure, you're getting warm bodies into the store, but there are lots of different ways you can do that, some of which probably don't involve selling people on products that are *not* RPGs.</p><p></p><p></p><p> </p><p>FYI, the CCG boom ended a while back. If anything, I would venture a guess that the recent resurgence has a lot to do with the release of 3e and the decline of CCGs. I have only anecdotal evidence, but I've seen a ton of posts on various fora by people who said that 3e "brought them back to the hobby." I'm one of them.</p><p></p><p>Of course, I was into <em>Magic</em> for a little while. It didn't make me want to role-play (other than realizing that I found RPGs a lot more fun than CCGs), and it was all money that didn't get spent on RPGs.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I just want to remind you that I never put forth the idea that the FLGS was wholly unnecessary or provided absolutely nothing to the RPG community. I was trying to see whether people felt they were "essential," particularly in the area of bringing in new players, i.e., is that how they were introduced to the hobby. The assumption that buying online is going to kill off FLGSs entirely is another assumption that's being made by everyone but me.</p><p></p><p>Now, whether what you describe does the "<strong>most</strong> to help the hobby as a whole" is something I think may be debatable.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Do the statistics you quote mention exposure to RPG products, or is that an extrapolation on your part? As I said above, I understand that anything that gets warm bodies into stores is a good thing, as it creates the *potential* that one of those bodies will buy an RPG product. However, I would imagine that promoting <em>Warhammer</em> does way more good for <em>Warhammer</em> than it does for RPGs.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>You</strong> claimed that if we rid the world of FLGSs (something I never advocated), there would be no printed RPGs. I'm telling you that there's no logic to this. A change in the *means* people purchase a product doesn't necessitate a change in the fundamental nature of the product. Just becasue I want to take advantage of the discounts offered by an online retailer doesn't mean I don't still want a printed product. Ergo, my example of Amazon.com. They're the biggest online retailer, and their primary business is *books*. The idea that printed RPGs would go away becasue there were no FLGSs is just nonsensical.</p><p></p><p>As for Games Plus, I don't want them to go away becasue they're a really, really great store. They also do cool things like host ENWorld Game Days and provide a fequent buyer program. In return, I give them my business when I attend Game Days (usually enough to use the frequent buyer program right then and there). Of course, they're not really local for me. My local store, Gamer's Paradise, doesn't provide me with any services other than their mere existence, and they rarely have discounts on any product. Consequently, I don't mind that they don't get a lot of my business.</p><p></p><p>Regardless... Would I be sad if Games Plus went away? Definitely. Would I stop buying printed RPGs if it did? Of course not. Do they add something to the local community? Sure. Would the local community wither and die without them? I don't know, that's part of what I'm trying to find out.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I can't really argue with you on this point, as I'm not a retailer and I don't have access to the data you apparently do. All I know is that, regardless of where I buy my games, the game companies still get my money, and that would seem to be the most important thing.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>So would I. Thankfully, this isn't going to happen.</p><p></p><p>The PDF industry is still young. I'm happy to see that small publishers have a means of delivering product without the initial investments in publishing and distribution, and that such a model can be profitable enough to help them make the jump to print products. It certainly seems to have worked for Malhavoc, RPGObjects, and Expeditious Retreat.</p><p></p><p></p><p> </p><p>As I stated in my previous post, my poll is not saying what you claim it does. If I had asked, "Do FLGSs suck because they do nothing for the hobby? Yes or No?" you might have a point.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I don't work for Gallup, so posting a poll in ENWorld, and a companion one on the HERO forums, is all I have access to. No one is claiming this is anything but informal, nor denying the bias and size of the sample. The poll also says NOTHING about online retailers or the necessity of the FLGS.</p><p></p><p>Still, I find it interesting that the results have been virutally identical on both polls, i.e., the respondents generally did not learn about RPGs from their FLGS. The posts people have made, however, seem to show that, *once they became gamers*, the FLGS (if they had one, and it was truly F) was certainly helpful.</p><p></p><p>Of course, we're tlaking about gamers who were nurtured before the dawn of the 'Net. It'll be interesting to see if this changes over the next 10-20 years.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>For the record, I started in 1980.</p><p></p><p>As for the poll, it doesn't need to "allow" for what you're talking about, because it's not about what you're talking about. It's simply asking how respondents were first exposed to the hobby. The poll wasn't created to definitively "prove" anything. I just wanted some data.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>So how does pimping <em>Magic</em> and <em>Warhammer</em> promote RPGs? <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite5" alt=":confused:" title="Confused :confused:" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":confused:" /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Okay, "leaving in droves" may have been inaccurate. However, it seems widely aknowledged that the ascendance of WW was one of the few positive things that happened with RPGs in that era, and that most gamer dollars were going to other types of games (namely CCGs). As I stated above, anecdotally, I know a lot of people who, despite being "lifers", didn't spend squat on RPGs during that time. In the wake of 3e, however, I probably sepnd about $100 a month.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes, I understand the foot traffic argument. I just still don't necessarily buy that this is direct support of RPGs. You could theoretically generate foot traffic buy offering premium coffee, too.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I don't want a world without game stores. </p><p></p><p>However, and I may be in the minority, I don't really need to see a book physically to know if I want to buy it. Not always, at least. My decisions are primarily based on whether it's part of a game line I follow/play, what kind of reviews it's gotten, and price. And when you take into account the Web previews that companies generally offer for new products nowadays, along with Amazon often letting you look at scanned pages of a book, one does, in a way, get to see the book before they buy. Also, I don't tend to sit in stores for hours at a time reading a product I'm inetersted in, so physical contact isn't necessarily going to stop me from buying a product I end up not liking.</p><p></p><p>But not everyone is like me.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>FWIW, I met all three of my current groups via the Web. In the case of two, some were friends and they invited me, a total stranger, to come join the group, as well as two guys who were mostly MageKnight and Battletech players. In the last, almost none of the players had ever met before.</p><p></p><p>It's been over a year since this happened, and all groups are still going strong.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Earlier you stated that "most other hobby gamers don't role-play." If these are people who hang out at the FLGS every week to play tournaments, and they're around RPG products all the time, and yet they haven't shown any interest in buying any of them, why is this suddenly going to change just becasue some RPG'ers start hassling them when they're trying to play <em>Warhammer</em>?</p><p></p><p>And isn't limiting recruitemnt efforts (boy that sounds weird) solely to the pool of people most often exposed to RPGs yet still apparently uninterested kind of self-defeating? Isn't it more useful to try and reach out to people who may not even know about these products, yet could possibly be interested? Wouldn't the hobby be better served by hosting RPG events that might attract people who are potentially interested in RPGs, but maybe not interested in more "juvenile" hobbies like clicky-toy games and trading cards?</p><p></p><p>This has all gotten way off-topic. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /> I'm not advocating the elimination of FLGSs, print RPGs, or face-to-face contact. It seems obvious that a *good* FLGS is a wholly positive thing *for people who are already gamers*. It also seems obvious to me that online retailers that let me buy RPGs at big discounts and helpful online communities like ENWorld are also wholly positive things. I don't necessarily think that they preclude or interfere with each other's existince. If anything, I think that they're complimentary.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="buzz, post: 1394241, member: 6777"] Apologies in advance for the length of this post. Also, while I may argue vehemently, this is all friendly debate, amd I'm enjoying it. :cool: Understood, but I think it's just as true that people who play [i]Warhammer[/i] and CCGs are also not necessarily disposed to role-playing. I'm in three different RPG groups, and a good portion of our players no interest in these sorts of games. If they were more RPG.net-type folk (i.e., people who eschew D&D for games like [i]Nobilis[/i]), I'd imagine the precentage would be even smaller. I understand that there is overlap, but I don't see how promoting wargames and CCGs is, by extension, direct support of the RPG hobby. Sure, you're getting warm bodies into the store, but there are lots of different ways you can do that, some of which probably don't involve selling people on products that are *not* RPGs. FYI, the CCG boom ended a while back. If anything, I would venture a guess that the recent resurgence has a lot to do with the release of 3e and the decline of CCGs. I have only anecdotal evidence, but I've seen a ton of posts on various fora by people who said that 3e "brought them back to the hobby." I'm one of them. Of course, I was into [i]Magic[/i] for a little while. It didn't make me want to role-play (other than realizing that I found RPGs a lot more fun than CCGs), and it was all money that didn't get spent on RPGs. I just want to remind you that I never put forth the idea that the FLGS was wholly unnecessary or provided absolutely nothing to the RPG community. I was trying to see whether people felt they were "essential," particularly in the area of bringing in new players, i.e., is that how they were introduced to the hobby. The assumption that buying online is going to kill off FLGSs entirely is another assumption that's being made by everyone but me. Now, whether what you describe does the "[b]most[/b] to help the hobby as a whole" is something I think may be debatable. Do the statistics you quote mention exposure to RPG products, or is that an extrapolation on your part? As I said above, I understand that anything that gets warm bodies into stores is a good thing, as it creates the *potential* that one of those bodies will buy an RPG product. However, I would imagine that promoting [i]Warhammer[/i] does way more good for [i]Warhammer[/i] than it does for RPGs. [b]You[/b] claimed that if we rid the world of FLGSs (something I never advocated), there would be no printed RPGs. I'm telling you that there's no logic to this. A change in the *means* people purchase a product doesn't necessitate a change in the fundamental nature of the product. Just becasue I want to take advantage of the discounts offered by an online retailer doesn't mean I don't still want a printed product. Ergo, my example of Amazon.com. They're the biggest online retailer, and their primary business is *books*. The idea that printed RPGs would go away becasue there were no FLGSs is just nonsensical. As for Games Plus, I don't want them to go away becasue they're a really, really great store. They also do cool things like host ENWorld Game Days and provide a fequent buyer program. In return, I give them my business when I attend Game Days (usually enough to use the frequent buyer program right then and there). Of course, they're not really local for me. My local store, Gamer's Paradise, doesn't provide me with any services other than their mere existence, and they rarely have discounts on any product. Consequently, I don't mind that they don't get a lot of my business. Regardless... Would I be sad if Games Plus went away? Definitely. Would I stop buying printed RPGs if it did? Of course not. Do they add something to the local community? Sure. Would the local community wither and die without them? I don't know, that's part of what I'm trying to find out. I can't really argue with you on this point, as I'm not a retailer and I don't have access to the data you apparently do. All I know is that, regardless of where I buy my games, the game companies still get my money, and that would seem to be the most important thing. So would I. Thankfully, this isn't going to happen. The PDF industry is still young. I'm happy to see that small publishers have a means of delivering product without the initial investments in publishing and distribution, and that such a model can be profitable enough to help them make the jump to print products. It certainly seems to have worked for Malhavoc, RPGObjects, and Expeditious Retreat. As I stated in my previous post, my poll is not saying what you claim it does. If I had asked, "Do FLGSs suck because they do nothing for the hobby? Yes or No?" you might have a point. I don't work for Gallup, so posting a poll in ENWorld, and a companion one on the HERO forums, is all I have access to. No one is claiming this is anything but informal, nor denying the bias and size of the sample. The poll also says NOTHING about online retailers or the necessity of the FLGS. Still, I find it interesting that the results have been virutally identical on both polls, i.e., the respondents generally did not learn about RPGs from their FLGS. The posts people have made, however, seem to show that, *once they became gamers*, the FLGS (if they had one, and it was truly F) was certainly helpful. Of course, we're tlaking about gamers who were nurtured before the dawn of the 'Net. It'll be interesting to see if this changes over the next 10-20 years. For the record, I started in 1980. As for the poll, it doesn't need to "allow" for what you're talking about, because it's not about what you're talking about. It's simply asking how respondents were first exposed to the hobby. The poll wasn't created to definitively "prove" anything. I just wanted some data. So how does pimping [i]Magic[/i] and [i]Warhammer[/i] promote RPGs? :confused: Okay, "leaving in droves" may have been inaccurate. However, it seems widely aknowledged that the ascendance of WW was one of the few positive things that happened with RPGs in that era, and that most gamer dollars were going to other types of games (namely CCGs). As I stated above, anecdotally, I know a lot of people who, despite being "lifers", didn't spend squat on RPGs during that time. In the wake of 3e, however, I probably sepnd about $100 a month. Yes, I understand the foot traffic argument. I just still don't necessarily buy that this is direct support of RPGs. You could theoretically generate foot traffic buy offering premium coffee, too. I don't want a world without game stores. However, and I may be in the minority, I don't really need to see a book physically to know if I want to buy it. Not always, at least. My decisions are primarily based on whether it's part of a game line I follow/play, what kind of reviews it's gotten, and price. And when you take into account the Web previews that companies generally offer for new products nowadays, along with Amazon often letting you look at scanned pages of a book, one does, in a way, get to see the book before they buy. Also, I don't tend to sit in stores for hours at a time reading a product I'm inetersted in, so physical contact isn't necessarily going to stop me from buying a product I end up not liking. But not everyone is like me. FWIW, I met all three of my current groups via the Web. In the case of two, some were friends and they invited me, a total stranger, to come join the group, as well as two guys who were mostly MageKnight and Battletech players. In the last, almost none of the players had ever met before. It's been over a year since this happened, and all groups are still going strong. Earlier you stated that "most other hobby gamers don't role-play." If these are people who hang out at the FLGS every week to play tournaments, and they're around RPG products all the time, and yet they haven't shown any interest in buying any of them, why is this suddenly going to change just becasue some RPG'ers start hassling them when they're trying to play [i]Warhammer[/i]? And isn't limiting recruitemnt efforts (boy that sounds weird) solely to the pool of people most often exposed to RPGs yet still apparently uninterested kind of self-defeating? Isn't it more useful to try and reach out to people who may not even know about these products, yet could possibly be interested? Wouldn't the hobby be better served by hosting RPG events that might attract people who are potentially interested in RPGs, but maybe not interested in more "juvenile" hobbies like clicky-toy games and trading cards? This has all gotten way off-topic. :) I'm not advocating the elimination of FLGSs, print RPGs, or face-to-face contact. It seems obvious that a *good* FLGS is a wholly positive thing *for people who are already gamers*. It also seems obvious to me that online retailers that let me buy RPGs at big discounts and helpful online communities like ENWorld are also wholly positive things. I don't necessarily think that they preclude or interfere with each other's existince. If anything, I think that they're complimentary. [/QUOTE]
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