Best 3.5 pre-order prices: $17.62 each at Walmart ($52.86 + $5.88 S&H = $58.74)

[Mark Chance]

Yeah, the general public was really clamoring for Sheryl Crow to remove her references to Walmart from an album that hadn't been released, yet.

Tee hee.

But, in all fairness, I can't imagine the general public clamoring for Sheryl Crow at all.

 

[bwgwl]

And as for the person that said that Walmart would not be carrying books that don't move 10,000 units, such as Green Ronin or Necromancer Games books...

Green Ronin
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/search-ng.gsp?search_constraint=3920&search_query=green+ronin

why the heck is Plot & Poison listed in the Home and Garden section?

i guess i'm lucky that my FLGS is actually friendly. i like going there and talking with the guys who run the place. they are very nice, very courteous, and very knowledgeable about the industry. i like that if there's something i want that's not on the shelves, they'll say, "come back next week. a copy will be waiting for you."

they've earned my loyalty, so i give them mine. i was in a comic book shop the other day that carries some RPG stuff. i saw something i wanted, picked it up... and put it back. the next day i went to my FLGS and bought the book from them.

i don't care if Wal-Mart has cheaper prices. until the cashier at Wal-Mart is willing to listen to me yammer on about my latest PC for 45 minutes, i'm not going to buy RPG stuff there.

 

[CrusaderX]

I wish I had a FLGS.

I don't.

So Walmart it is!

 

[Numion]

Yeah, the general public was really clamoring for Sheryl Crow to remove her references to Walmart from an album that hadn't been released, yet.

Thats not the type of censorship I was talking about. We can get back to that argument the moment first D&D product mentions Wal-Mart

 

[WizarDru]

But, in all fairness, I can't imagine the general public clamoring for Sheryl Crow at all.

I really, really had to restrain myself from making that joke. I'm glad someone made it.

 

[SemperJase]

Yeah, the general public was really clamoring for Sheryl Crow to remove her references to Walmart from an album that hadn't been released, yet.

Again, not censorship. Sheryl Crow and her record company were not prevented from publishing the CD.

In light of the fact that Sheryl Crow and her record company are in the business of selling music, it shows incredibily bad judgement on their part to put a derogatory statement about a company in a CD then expect that company to sell it.

 

[Gizzard]

And as for the person that said that Walmart would not be carrying books that don't move 10,000 units, such as Green Ronin or Necromancer Games books...

Hrm, OK, mea culpa. Or half a mea culpa anyway:

I was talking about stuff that would actually be stocked at physical Wal-Marts. Looking back, I can see this thread is bouncing back and forth between WalMart and Walmart.com. The online business is obviously a totally different animal than WalMart in terms of selection. (Or at least my local Walmart has no copies of Death in Freeport or Chaos Rising!)

Anyway, I imagined that the 3.5E books might be a big enough draw for a while that they'd pile up a pallet of them somewhere in the toy aisle of physical WalMarts. But that's probably sadly wrong.

I'm a bit disappointed by that, actually. I'd like to see the hobby reach a point where the major releases can make a blip in the mass market.

 

[The Little Raven]

Personally, I abhor Walmart. The commercials make me sick, the customer service there is... well... let's just say it's lacking. However, when they offer me a book at about half-price, I take it. For the price of the three core books, the ELH, and shipping, I could buy the three core books at my FLGS, which isn't very F'ing friendly.

You see, my local gaming store believes that miniature gaming and CCG gaming is the end-all be-all, and when I ask them about books they have on their shelves, I usually get a blank stare or an uncertainly pointed finger towards the D&D section. I don't ask them what the books are like, I merely ask if they carry them, because I know five times as much about upcoming releases as they do.

Not all gaming stores support the RPG community. However, a mass-market company such as Walmart selling these products and making them more readily available to the public, they are supporting the community.

Oh, and I picked up my copy of the Book of Vile Darkness at my local Walmart. It was shrink-wrapped, stickered, but wasn't censored down to the Book of Vile Unfriendliness.

 

[Najo]

If you do a search for Walmart censorship of music, you will find numerous webpages and musician coalitions dedicated to fighting Walmart's policies. Two of the examples that come to mind for me regarding their censorship is where they made both Rob Zombie and John Mellencamp change their album cover art. Rob Zombie's had a strategically positioned naked girl on the cover that showed no nudity, but they made him put a air brushed bikini on her, and John Mellencamp's album had a devil on the cover standing next to either Jesus or an angel (don't remember - never owned the album). Any rate, they were told by Walmart to change the album's covers or Walmart wouldn't buy them. Record companies all the time are forced to make Wal Mart varients, so if you buy your music at wal mart then you may end up purchasing an album with altered lyrics, art, or other content not intended by the artist. Walmart has such an effect on teh music industry, that 10% on the annual releases are altered in this way. Those that won't complie Walmart doesn't carry. By buying your D&D books from walmart, long term they get your money and people who care about the games (such as En world, FLGS, other online game shops etc) don't. Long term, those businesses go away and all we have left to buy from is wal mart. Once that happens, where walmart isn't challenged, a company like WOTC is forced to censor their product content or they can't sell books. I personally am appalled by Wal mart's overly conversative policies as I trust our labelling and rating systems to allow us to make our own choices. Theer doesn't need to be another level of content control. Here are some links I came across that gathers the more interesting aspects of Walmart practices together.

http://www.walmartyrs.com/

http://www.theroc.org/boycotts/walmart.htm

http://coolplace2.tripod.com/codered/id12.html

 

[The Little Raven]

Semantics. It's not like I was trying to say that Wal Mart does the editing themselves. I'll let the recording industry share the blame with Wal Mart, they're greedy AND corrupt.

No, not semantics. The truth. Record labels censor their own songs in the recording studio, because the FCC will not allow most stations to air songs with explicit lyrics. These decisions are made before the marketing department decides which distributors they wish to market the product through.

You're trying to bash a company for both wanting to make a buck (which our system is built upon) and maintaining certain standards (which the company enforces without fail).

Nope, I want money too. But then I AM greedy. Wal Mart, however, is able to commit acts of greed on a larger scale than myself. I'm hoping to win the lottery so I can move my greed to more of a national or perhaps global level.
Wanting money might not be greedy, but wanting to have everything both ways is. Wishy washy too, come to think of it.

So, you think Walmart is corrupt merely because they have more opportunities to make money than you? And since when is heavy discounting, which results in a massive loss of net profit, so damned greedy? All Walmart is doing is cutting out all the middlemen (and believe me, getting from Wizards to the average FLGS goes through a LOT of channels) so they can offer their customers great prices. If the FLGS cannot compete, then the FLGS needs to change its strategy, because we live in a society of capitalism... adapt or die.