Support Your FLGS

[Thondor]

I have always loved Friendly Local Game Stores. I suspect I never would have run my own game sessions without having stumbled into a FLGS a year or so after my initial exposure to D&D.

For my Master’s thesis I visited just over 50 game and comic stores in the Greater Toronto Area. With many stores across Canada limited to curbside pick-up only once again, I wanted to come up with a way to support FLGS here in Canada.

--Edit to add--
With our January promotion ended, you can once again use our ship to store option to have RPG books delivered at discounted shipping to your local Canadian game store. Your friendly local retailer receives a 10% credit on all ship-to-store sales, and gets to see RPG products they may not have otherwise. This option is visible on check-out and lists the current stores we work with in your province. (We're always looking to add more too!)

In addition, for a short time, you can designate any Canadian FLGS to receive a 5% affiliate bonus on all sales (including PDF sales), just indicate the store on checkout.
--end edit--

So . . . for all of January, 20% all sales (both Print&PDF, and PDF only) from the CDG Marketplace go to support a Canadian FLGS of the customer's choosing - specified on checkout.

I hope some of you will use this to support your FLGS, and if you aren’t in Canada (which is most of you I am sure) I hope that you come up with your own innovative ways to support your local store. I’d love to hear about what you are doing.

If you happen to be a publisher, and you are interested in getting you titles up on the CDG Marketplace, please get in touch! We expect to have numerous titles added throughout the month.

The CDG Marketplace is a small Canadian focused indie RPG marketplace that sells to consumers, to retailers, and normally offers a ship to store option to many FLGS. If a customer doesn’t indicate a specific retailer they wish to support during the support your FLGS promotion this January, the 20% will be distributed among the many retailers who have purchased from us in the past.

I’d appreciate your thoughts, and questions!

If a mod feels this needs to move forums, I understand. This does seem to be where a lot of the "news" type of posts appear, and I thought this might qualify. But it has been a while since I regularly posted on EN World.

 

[R_J_K75]

For my Master’s thesis I visited just over 50 game and comic stores in the Greater Toronto Area.

Is the Silver Snail still open on Queen Street? We used to go to Toronto from the states at least twice a month through the early to mid 80s. I loved going there to stock up on comics when I was younger, that place was epic. I haven't been there in over 30 years but hope its still open.

 

[Thondor]

Is the Silver Snail still open on Queen Street? We used to go to Toronto from the states at least twice a month through the early to mid 80s. I loved going there to stock up on comics when I was younger, that place was epic. I haven't been there in over 30 years but hope its still open.

They moved to Yonge Street, just north of Dundas about . . . 7 years ago? Black Canary cafe is part of it. There's a nice place to sit drink tea, look over the street below and read your recent purchases.

I had my Toronto launch party for Simple Superheroes in that location in 2016

That section of Queen street used to have half a dozen comic shops. They slowly moved out as the cost of the area increased. Silver Snail stayed the longest as they owned their building.

 

[R_J_K75]

They moved to Yonge Street, just north of Dundas about . . . 7 years ago? Black Canary cafe is part of it. There's a nice place to sit drink tea, look over the street below and read your recent purchases.

I had my Toronto launch party for Simple Superheroes in that location in 2016

That section of Queen street used to have half a dozen comic shops. They slowly moved out as the cost of the area increased. Silver Snail stayed the longest as they owned their building.

Glad to hear they are still around. That store they were in on Queen Street was 3-4 stories iirc. I bought the first series of Secret Wars month to month as it came out there. Toronto is a fun city, havent been there since 2010, hopefully I'll get back there soon.

 

[Fenris-77]

I worked at my FLGS for a bunch of years while I was at school. During that time I think 3 other stores opened and closed in the city. The FLGS is a pretty precarious business in many cases and they deserve some support.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

As the owner of a Canadian FLGS... thanks!

 

[Thondor]

As the owner of a Canadian FLGS... thanks!

You are most welcome. Thank you for providing physical space for people to enjoy RPGs.

I figured I'd provide a brief mention of some of the titles we have. I have a least one from each publisher, but there are many more titles:

Like 5e D&D but looking for rules for a modern setting? Check out Resistance: EARTH by Sword’s Edge Publishing.

Fans of Planescape may be interested in Sig: Manual of the Primes, for it’s planar nexus setting, or for it’s easy to run Spark based rules. (by Genesis of Legend Publishing)

Looking for a GM less game? Try Ribbon Drive, where each player makes a playlist of music before the session, and you play a story about a road trip. You could also grab one of our last copies of Hope Inhumanity from Lost Cause Games.

Cyberpunk? Check out The Veil (Samjoko Publishing), or Headspace (Green Hat Design). The Veil is a more extensive volume for more general Cyberpunk fun, while Headspace focusses on the premise of your characters sharing a technological mind-link. Both are Powered by the Apocalypse engine.

Superheroes? Simple Superheroes from Compose Dream Games could be your jam if you love the freedom of defining your own powers and appreciate rulings vs rules within a solid framework.

Intrigued by Japanese Folklore? Check out Fox Magic, from Fool’s Moon Entertainment, where you get to play a kitsune of Japanese Legend.

OSR fan? The Pod Caverns of the Sinister Shroom is one of many of XPRs excellent adventures. If you are more interested in new monsters, pick up their Malevolent & Benign.

Do you remember Fighting Fantasy and Choose Your Own Adventure books with fondness? Pick up one of Chris Challice’s Choose Your Own FATE books, for some excellent solo-play fun.

Are detailed planning and careful execution your style? Then have a look at Killshot where you play assassins setting up the perfect hit, from Broken Ruler Games.

Many other titles are available, to see more RPG titles and support your local retailer head over to composedreamgames.com/marketplace

I'd be happy to answer questions about any of the titles we carry.

 

[Thondor]

We just added PDFs of Free Spacer! A sandbox science fiction roleplaying game about a crew of a commissioned starship performing contracts for a Patron faction in a quadrant wide cold war.
Mechanically you roll your positive salvo dice, and the GMs negative threat dice and cancel our successes on each. Getting multiple positive successes can let you "charge your related reactor" which allows you to carry forward your success into future tasks of a similar nature.

We also just added what I'm pretty certain is the largest megadungeon ever - The Halls of Arden Vul, from Expeditious Retreat Press. It is a mammoth tome at 1120 across 4 volumes, and 33 elaborate maps. OSRIC/AD&D compatible.

 

[TheAlkaizer]

Every time I've been to a local gamestore in the last couple of years I've had a very mediocre experience. I'm really not fond of Amazon, but its convenience, speed and lack of trouble far outweights what the local game stores have offered me.

My latest issues was last summer. The Advanced Player's Guide for Pathfinder 2E was announced like three months in advance. I go to my local game store, I ask them to put one copy aside from me and I confirm with them the date it'll release.

Comes release date, I phone them and they tell me they haven't had any news from their distributor and have no idea when the books will come in. I phone every week for four weeks, and they just can't tell me. I even went to another store a little while away and they had the same issue (my guess is that they had the same distributor).

Six weeks after the release of the book, I get phoned and told that they have the book in store. I get there, and the only thing they have is the deluxe edition. I had clearly said I wanted the regular edition but they tell me they only have deluxe editions. I ask them to phone me when they get them.

Four weeks later, I still am without a phone call and I stop at the game store to buy a cheap hourglass and I see the book on the shelves. I ask the owner why I wasn't noticed and I'm being told that they probably checked out my reservation when I came for the deluxe edition and didn't reinstate it when I asked to be notified for the regular edition.

As opposed, one of my coworkers received the book on the date of release with Amazon.

I like the idea of encouraging local game stores, but right now the gap is too big in term of pricing, convenience, service and speed. I have no advantages in any way to shop there. Most books are almost 20% pricier than on Amazon.

 

[Thondor]

That is unfortunate @TheAlkaizer.

There are good local stores out there (and sometimes you just hit staff at the wrong moment.)