D&D 5E I just don't see why they even bothered with the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.

[Gareman]

You're referring to my blog specifically here, so I thought I should reply. How do I know I'm losing sales? I talk to my customers. RPGs are especially a brutally idiosyncratic gaming category so it's imperative I understand what my RPG customers are playing, what they want, what they're waiting for, what direction they're going. I talk to them often. It's not uncommon to bring in an RPG product with ONE customer in mind, or carry an entire gaming system for 2-3 of them.

Many will tell me they already have a Kickstarter product or have backed it and hope to get it one day. This became very clear initially when as a store owner, I attempted to back EVERY RPG project on Kickstarter. There weren't that many initially, so it was possible. I've since backed about 40 projects in this fashion.

I can give you pretty nuanced numbers of my sales, but when it comes to sales I didn't make, you pretty much have to take my word for it. Believe me though when I say I'm not an outlier on this.

I also want to say my position on Kickstarter has become more nuanced over the years. I won't back projects as a retailer any longer, mostly because I've been burned too many time (I'm owed over $600 in failed to deliver KS projects). But I will bring in KS derived products in distribution if they meet certain criteria. For example, funding that hits over $50K is generally a go. Boardgames with a 7.5 on Boardgamegeek are safe for a copy. And I do carry Reaper Bones after they've pretty much given the middle finger to the game trade.

RPGs are tougher though and here's a secret: nobody in the game trade wants to touch them anymore. If you've got a KS derived RPG and you're not an established company, the consolidators have closed the doors. The amount of small press RPGs has diminished significantly *through the established channels.* It's partially the highly fragmented nature of today's RPG market but it's also a boom in board games that make the work to support an RPG just too much.

Anyway, it's a golden age for RPGs, but for the players, not the traditional sellers of such products.

 

[Dire Bare]

Anyway, it's a golden age for RPGs, but for the players, not the traditional sellers of such products.

Interesting perspective, and (anecdotally) is supported by what I'm seeing in my area. I have a wishlist of new RPGs I'd love to buy, but it's an overwhelming number. But they are all available digitally, some even exclusively. Even the ones available in print I don't see on the shelves of my FLGS, which is okay (for me), because I'm over the collapsing shelf of heavy RPG books in my home and have embraced digital.

But board games don't have the same appeal in digital form, and are definitely big now in the tabletop category. My FLGS is mostly dedicated to board games, and, well, Magic, but that doesn't take up a lot of space. They carry other styles of games, including RPGs . . . but it's mostly a decent-sized shelf of (non-moving) used titles next to a very small shelf of new D&D and Paizo titles.

Even if RPGs aren't bringing in the dough for you, I hope you are doing well with board games and Magic!

 

[Dire Bare]

There's a lot of back-and-forth on this thread that I, frankly, stopped reading as it really wasn't going anywhere. It feels like both "sides" are drawing unnecessary lines in the sand and arguing over semantics, and I'm not even sure what is the point.

Is Kickstarter a bad thing, or a good thing? If you love your FLGS, should you avoid Kickstarter? Is Kickstarter a scam, or a site riddled with scams or at least might-as-well-be-scams? Kickstarter is a part of the landscape now, and it brings in opportunity for some and pain for others, just like every innovation and change to the market. And Kickstarter has been a bit rocky, again, just like any innovation.

Does Kickstarter compete, and ultimately hurt, FLGSs? I would say, yes and no. Does Kickstarter provide incredibly opportunity for a startup to bring a new product to market that they would not be able to do otherwise? Is Kickstarter a gaming entrepreneur's dream? Hell yes!

I own game products that WOULD NOT EXIST without crowdfunding, and I count that as a positive in the changing landscape of the tabletop game industry.

When a company runs a successful Kickstarter, does that take away from FLGS sales? Sorta. It's likely the product would not exist without Kickstarter, and from that frame no sales are "moved" to Kickstarter. But when a Kickstarter wildly surpasses its goals and sells tons of units, could some of those units have instead gone to a retailer? Yes, very possibly, but it's hard to fault a game company for being more successful than they anticipated. And, I'm guessing, not all gaming companies feel the benefit of working in support for brick-and-mortar retailers, which is their prerogative.

Should an FLGS owner (or "supporter") whine about Kickstarter negatively affecting their sales, like some in my local area? No, waste of mental energy with no positive benefit. I think Black Market Games has the right idea, try to understand and get ahead of changing trends in the game industry. Sorry to hear Garemon lost money backing failed or delayed Kickstarters, but his new tactic of carefully analyzing new Kickstarter products individually to see if they are a good match for his customers, that seems very smart.

 

[pemerton]

Whether you treat it as a form of charitable donation, or an investment return, or even as a store, your personal approach to the process doesn't matter in terms of what the thing itself actually is. Just because you treat it like a store doesn't change the fact that all Kickstarter projects are, well, projects that you're helping to fund. That's all.

<snip>

It's worth noting that it is incorrect that the backers must necessarily all receive some reward. All Kickstarter pledges have a built-in option (as part of the platform) to allow backers to donate without receiving any reward at all. That said, the remainder of the point here goes back to the popular perception of Kickstarter as a storefront, even though the reality of it is different. A lot of people now take the rewards as a given, and virtually always choose to receive them, most often in the form of a copy of the finished product. But that's still an issue of perception, rather than actual functionality.

<snip>

"Buying" a product via a Kickstarter isn't done "over" a game store; as noted above, if it's on Kickstarter, then it cannot - by definition - also be available at your game store for you to choose as an alternate venue.

If the question is "Do kickstarter projects compete in the same marketplace as retail stores" then questions of definitions and functionality are mostly irrelevant. What matters is whether people are spending money on kickstarter projects to satisfy demand that, otherwise, they would satisfy by spending money in a retail store.

To provide some analogies: the Australian Broadcasting Corporation is not a commercial broadcaster, but a public one. That doesn't mean that commercial broadcasters (particularly in Australia) don't get angry at the ABC's extensive provision of free online content, which they (quite reasonably) see as undercutting their own paywalled offerings.

The fact that a thrift store is a charitable enterprise, whose customers feel that they are not only acquiring goods but supporting a worthy cause, doesn't mean that it is not in competition with other retailers of the products sold in the thrift store.

Etc. Etc.

People only have a finite amount of money they are going to spend on RPGs. If they spend it backing kickstarter projects, that is likely to have a detrimental impact on retail store sales.

 

[Alzrius]

If the question is "Do kickstarter projects compete in the same marketplace as retail stores" then questions of definitions and functionality are mostly irrelevant. What matters is whether people are spending money on kickstarter projects to satisfy demand that, otherwise, they would satisfy by spending money in a retail store.

To provide some analogies: the Australian Broadcasting Corporation is not a commercial broadcaster, but a public one. That doesn't mean that commercial broadcasters (particularly in Australia) don't get angry at the ABC's extensive provision of free online content, which they (quite reasonably) see as undercutting their own paywalled offerings.

The fact that a thrift store is a charitable enterprise, whose customers feel that they are not only acquiring goods but supporting a worthy cause, doesn't mean that it is not in competition with other retailers of the products sold in the thrift store.

Etc. Etc.

People only have a finite amount of money they are going to spend on RPGs. If they spend it backing kickstarter projects, that is likely to have a detrimental impact on retail store sales.

All of this speaks to indirect competition, which nobody is arguing isn't there (or at least, I'm not). There's only so much money to go around, and if you spend it on X, then that's money that doesn't go to everything else that isn't X. This isn't being debated, at least not by me. Rather, the question is one of direct competition, which is asking whether or not Kickstarter is competing with retail stores over the same products. That "sameness" is literal, in that this isn't about books that are RPG based, but are instead referring to copies of the same title.

 

[Alzrius]

You're referring to my blog specifically here, so I thought I should reply.

Awesome! Thanks for doing so, it's very much appreciated!

How do I know I'm losing sales? I talk to my customers. RPGs are especially a brutally idiosyncratic gaming category so it's imperative I understand what my RPG customers are playing, what they want, what they're waiting for, what direction they're going. I talk to them often. It's not uncommon to bring in an RPG product with ONE customer in mind, or carry an entire gaming system for 2-3 of them.

Many will tell me they already have a Kickstarter product or have backed it and hope to get it one day.

This is about what I expected you to say, mostly because I couldn't anticipate any other possible answer, and there's an aspect of it that I'm hoping you can elaborate on. If the idiosyncratic nature of what your customers order plays such a strong role in what products you carry, and if they're readily admitting to backing certain products (and subsequently receiving a copy of the finished product as a reward), then what's your impetus for carrying a retail copy of the game to begin with? That is, if the only customers who would buy it are telling you that they already have it, or will, why carry a copy to sell in the first place?

This became very clear initially when as a store owner, I attempted to back EVERY RPG project on Kickstarter. There weren't that many initially, so it was possible. I've since backed about 40 projects in this fashion.

I vaguely recall the beginning of the RPG book on Kickstarter, but backing every single one? I don't understand why you'd do this when you make mention of how many RPGs are sold at your store with specific customers in mind.

I can give you pretty nuanced numbers of my sales, but when it comes to sales I didn't make, you pretty much have to take my word for it. Believe me though when I say I'm not an outlier on this.

I don't think that sales numbers are necessary. Rather, I'm hoping you can expand on the nature of the sales you didn't make. I am taking your word for it, I'm just unclear on how you were ever going to make those sales if, from what you're saying, the only possible outcomes were that they weren't funded (and thus were never available to sell) or were already funded and everyone who wanted them got them. That doesn't seem like competition so much as the illusion of a possible sale, which was never going to happen.

In that case, having established that this is a product that nobody who comes to your store is going to buy, why stock it in the first place? If there was never an opportunity to get the supply (e.g. the book can initially only be acquired from the Kickstarter pledge), and there was subsequently no demand (e.g. all of your potential customers had it already), then were you ever "competing" with Kickstarter, per se?

I also want to say my position on Kickstarter has become more nuanced over the years. I won't back projects as a retailer any longer, mostly because I've been burned too many time (I'm owed over $600 in failed to deliver KS projects). But I will bring in KS derived products in distribution if they meet certain criteria. For example, funding that hits over $50K is generally a go. Boardgames with a 7.5 on Boardgamegeek are safe for a copy. And I do carry Reaper Bones after they've pretty much given the middle finger to the game trade.

Right, and I can understand that, since it's (presumably) catering to demand that you've established exists after the Kickstarter has closed. In which case, there are people who want the product now that it's been made, and didn't receive a copy otherwise. In that case, now the supply and the demand are simultaneously present, and Kickstarter isn't an avenue for them to go to instead or your store, right?

RPGs are tougher though and here's a secret: nobody in the game trade wants to touch them anymore. If you've got a KS derived RPG and you're not an established company, the consolidators have closed the doors. The amount of small press RPGs has diminished significantly *through the established channels.* It's partially the highly fragmented nature of today's RPG market but it's also a boom in board games that make the work to support an RPG just too much.

Anyway, it's a golden age for RPGs, but for the players, not the traditional sellers of such products.

I can imagine that it's a tough time for brick-and-mortar stores, and that for what it's worth I hope that you (and other stores) have your fortunes turn around soon. Thanks again for stopping by to talk about this in further detail!

 

[Gareman]

I backed products predicting certain customers would be interested, and they were. It's much like how every item I carry in the store (500 RPG titles for example) is speculative in this way. You buy it with your customer base in mind, including predicting depth of interest. In the case of Kickstarter, I backed products with customers and depth of interest in mind and then tried to market those products to those customers after the fact.

"Hey, I've got this really cool game coming out by your favorite author, Monte Cook. Would you like to pre-order it?"

"Oh yeah, it's wonderful, isn't it ? I'm a backer at the super platinum level!"

"I see." (kicking myself and reaizing I'm going to be stuck with half a dozen $60 books that nobody wants in 18 months, while I lose the opportunity cost on $180).

This kind of discussion happened A LOT. In the case of board games, the revelation came with the quarterly "clearance cart." I had a cart full of board games that hadn't sold a single copy. Each one had good BGG ratings. The commonality? They were crowd funded.

This is all early on, so just as I wanted to back EVERY game coming from KS, backers wanted to back them too. The success of KS has changed this a bit. There are simply too many games for everyone to back AND the quality of products can be described as no better or even slightly worse than conventionally financed game products. A lot of people got burned on low quality or undelivered product (myself included). But it also means there's nuance to what I support as a retailer, using metrics and research to cherry pick likely good sellers. Cool Mini Or Not, for example, sell very well for us. In the RPG space, Evil Hat products are mostly crowd funded and we do great with those. I will even give Evil Hat my money for the KS at a retail level because I like those guys.

As for demand after the fact, sales generally peak in the first 30 days of a release. People who buy games in the first 30 days are "alpha" gamers. They are influencers, in marketing speak. They will report to their friends whether a product is good or not. For a crowd funded product, that can be good and bad for retailers. It's good because now that secondary customer will want the product and it generally won't be available direct from a source. They need the retailer. It's bad because there are often far, far fewer secondary customers, and in many cases, there are no secondary customers at all. So the demand for this product which would normally be high is much less or nonexistent.

The way a specialty store like ours works is we bring in a huge number of products at one copy. About half of those products are "one and done." We sell it, it's gone, we don't re-order. We're banking on break out hits to raise up our sales and inventory efficiency. In the case of KS derived products, there is usually not enough "gas in the tank," not enough demand for a title to break out. It's also a problem because most KS games are "one and done" on the production side, so even if it's popular, the game quickly disappears after release, impeding our ability to sell that game long term. Eventually you find yourself with a lot of one and done KS games AND a lot of great, high demand games with no supply. It becomes a no win situation. Again, with some nuanced buying, you can cherry pick winners. However, the overall effect is most game store owners will avoid most Kickstarter derived titles.

if this all sounds fuzzy, subjective, seat of the pants and a bit crazy, well that's the game trade!

 

[Alzrius]

It definitely sounds like all of those things!

Based on what you're saying here, it sounds like it's not so much an issue of competition as it is with them being functioning like a different sort of distributor. You can order products from them for the purposes of retail sale, but there's an issue of how much demand is there after the ordering period has closed, due to the fact that the distributor also makes itself available to non-retail outlets (e.g. other individuals). In that case, this becomes a balancing act of trying to anticipate whether the demand that's still there when you can make it available for retail will be sufficient for however much supply you've ordered. Given that that's almost entirely an act of guesswork - particularly in case of those "one and done" titles you mentioned, which essentially make you have a small window for figuring out what level of orders you need to place - I can see how that'd be hair-pullingly frustrating!

 

[Gareman]

In regards to how relevant Kickstarter is in the game trade, it's worth about $200 million at this point.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/crowdfunding-is-driving-a-196-million-board-game-renaissance/

The game trade itself is about a $2 billion dollar industry.

KS is now 10% of the trade, big growth in a short time. I used to refer to it as a rounding error.

 

[Alzrius]

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/crowdfunding-is-driving-a-196-million-board-game-renaissance/

Fivethirtyeight touches on gaming? I can see where this is going...

"Drunk Nate Silver predicts all the to-hit rolls for the evening!"