Dead collectible games -- what are they good for? Part I

With the possible exception of Magic: The Gathering, which seems immortal, there comes a time in the life cycle of every collectible game when it "dies." That is, it's discontinued by its maker, official company support comes to an end, tournaments and sponsored or "sanctioned" events are no more and the would-be collector/player is faced with the question of "now what?"

It's in the nature of collectible games that they're much more dependent on the continued support of the game maker, a steady flow of new material and some sort of tournament style venue for play. This is much less true for other types of games. Indeed, an ordinary boardgame can "live on" almost indefinitely once published. A good example are the old Avalon Hill games Dune or Up Front which, due to licensing and rights issues, seem highly unlikely to ever see print again despite proven long-term popularity. It's hard for new players to break in, sadly, but both games have a devoted fan base and the existing copies of the game (undoubtedly carefully treated) will see many more years of play despite the demise of official support.

On the other hand, collectible games that, even though popular, fail to meet market goals and are discontinued by their game maker leave the collectors and players who sank their treasure into the game in a quandary. While it's possible that demand for their collection will increase eventually (because, after all, no new ones are being made) over the short term so far the usual pattern has been for the bottom to more or less fall out of the market for most games.

The lack of official support means the end of tournament play, which is problematical for games that are highly competitive. The lack of official sponsorship means that playing opportunities will quickly dry up and opponents will be hard to find.

Finally, the end of the line usually means that the game is still incomplete in important ways unless it's had a long run. There may be pieces, powers, factions and aspects of the game that are left high and dry because the planned follow-ons will never materialize.

So what now?

The answer will vary depending on the game and the collector, but here's how I see what's in MY collection and how I answer that question.

Axis & Allies Miniatures:

This game system hasn't been declared officially "dead" yet, but there's been no announcement of when the next set (Late War) is scheduled to appear and in my opinion there's a good chance it will never come -- or if it does, it will be the last expansion. This game has had a good long runs, however, and there aren't too many critical holes in the lineup. This game is much less dependent on the tournament scene than most collectibles because a large part of its market is made up of purchasers who are buying it purely for collection or to use the miniatures in other games. Wisely, the miniatures are easily usable in other games and with the scale change in the second half of the run are mostly compatible with other military miniatures. I expect to keep these and find them useful while playing other games and for the occasional game of AAM, itself.

Axis & Allies War at Sea Naval Miniatures:

This is not dead yet and it looks to have several more sets of life in it, BUT as a history-based line there are natural limits on how long it can go on, as opposed to a fictional setting. There's already been some trouble filling out the Axis fleets because they simply weren't very big. As an expedient some what-if ships have already appeared and some ships that appeared earlier in the series are being reissued but at some point the well will run dry. Like its AAM, however, A&A War at Sea miniatures can easily be used with other wargames and while it's a unique scale, the line has gotten large enough that it includes nearly every important ship from th war and if it goes on for 2-3 more sets there's not going to be naught but odds and ends left out. This is a real keeper. The War at Sea game is a good lite wargame (rather better than the land game, in my view) and is always be useful for more traditional gaming as well.

Dreamblade:

Dreamblade is both quite dead and yet still pretty popular. While the plug was pulled a little early (after just four expansions after the base set) the existing universe of product is just big enough to make it a workable game for the long haul. This game has been hurt by the collapse of the tournament scene, so opponents with their own sets are scarce, but if you own a big enough collection (I have a few hundred figures) so that you can provide a drafting pool then you can get some reasonable gaming in. I've had some success getting people to play. It's really a pretty good game, fundamentally, so I expect to keep it for occasional play. The game pieces aren't really usable for any other purposes, though, which is limiting.

Heroclix:

This game was 'dead" and then resurrected in a new incarnation. From what I can see, there's less vitality in the new version, but there's still some life. It's no thanks to me, however. I bought and played the game when it was WizKids. largely because it was the most gaming action I could find locally for a while, but when that sanctioned game scene evaporated I cut way back on my collection. I now have about 200 or so, left, mostly DC and I can't see re-entering the tournament scene by buying new product. For me what I have will have to last me as fodder for casual play. The game isn't bad, but it's also not one of my top interests. It's another game where the pieces aren't really usable for other purposes and I haven't been ale to generate much interest in scenario-based play in my local area. Nearly everybody who plays this seems only interested in playing it competitively -- and I'm not getting back into that scene. So this game's future on my shelf is very much up in the air. I've been chipping away at the edges of the collection through eBay sales for a while and if I ever have to move this is probably the first or second collection to go en masse.

More to come .... .

Hasbro giveth, Hasbro taketh away. Dreamblade site is gone

No sooner do I notice the release date for the upcoming Axis & Allies Europe 1940 announcement than I see some bad news.

It appears that the official Dreamblade site, including the useful Dreamcatcher utility, is gone. There's still a forum limping along, but I think it's days are also numbered.

It's really a pity, but the game itself is good. I can still gin up some interest at the local game store when I haul it out. But, as a collectible game, it really loses something when I'm the only one with figures. I end up seeing my own constructed warbands fighting my own warbands.

This sort of slow death is common for discontinued collectible games, of course, but it's one reason why I'll never get into another game with that format. I think Magic: The Gathering is probably as immortal as such a game can be, but other than that I think the format is doomed.

I'm following the A&A minis franchises, but I expect those will peter out eventually. Mitigating their fate is the usefulness of those minis for general purpose wargaming use, so they'll never really be obsolete.

Right now I'm sitting on three "dead" collectible miniatures games that I still like well enough to keep and play, but their long-term future appears very questionable: Dreamblade, Navia Dratp and Lord of the Rings: Tradeable Miniatures Game. So long as I have space and a stepson who'll play on occasion they're worth keeping. But should space become tight and/or Young General's interest shift I'll have a hard time justifying the play value vs. storage space tradeoff of these games.

Of the three, the LOTR:TMG is the weakest game and I mostly keep the miniatures because I like how they look. Navia Dratp is almost more of a big regular game than a collectible because it was discontinued so early. It's biggest problem is the obscure theme and terminology. Dreamblade was a nice combo of nice-looking miniatures and a more accessible theme, but it doesn't appear to be enough to save it over the long haul. I rather doubt I'll keep it for my retirement years gaming.

Cruising around looking for Dreamblade info turns up an unexpected warning and lesson

So I'm poking around the Internet on the Dreamblade official site, and Boardgame Geek and such and I happened to be looking at who else on BGG had played a lot of Dreamblade and I spot this fellow who had played about 50 times. And then I noted that his Geekbadge had the years 1970-2007 listed.

Hmm. That's awful young, I thought to myself, but that sure appears to be a lifespan. I quick check of his Dreamblade games showed they were all in 2006. Soon I spot a Memorial Tab on his BGG profile and it turns out the gentleman did, indeed, die back in 2007 around 37 years old. Apparently Scott Kelton was a game store owner, too.

And then this message by a friend reveals that this nice fellow (by all reports and he was a gamer, after all) died from an overdose of over-the-counter medicine. He had been persistently sick with a cold or flu (I know that routine) and had been taking Nyquil for several weeks straight. It shut down his liver. The friend noted that the bottle warns users not to use the medicine for more than 4 days. A sobering lesson.

Playing surfaces for collectible and expandable miniatures games -- a review: paper

One of the things I don't care for about collectible and expandable miniatures games is that you have all these really nice-looking miniatures moving around on cheap paper battlefields for the most part.

The notable exception is Heroscape, of course, where the terrain gets pretty much equal billing with the miniatures and is one of the distinctive aspects of that game.

And the truncated Navia Dratp also featured an actual mounted playing board as standard equipment.

But for the most part the standard has been to provide rather flimsy paper maps, usually poster-sized and poster-quality, that simply can't stand up to the normal wear and tear of multiple folding, let alone play. Among the games that come with this sort of playing surface are Lord of the Rings Tradeable Miniatures Game; HeroClix, Axis & Allies miniatures, A&A War at Sea, Star Wars, Dreamblade and Dungeons & Dragons miniatures.

Suitable playing surfaces are also an issue for more traditional miniatures games like Wings of War, Check Your 6, the Admiralty Trilogy and the Flames of War, but the traditional solution was for players to spend the time and effort to create their own terrain, not just armies. Still, there are some portable solutions for the problem of providing suitable battlefields to go with your miniatures from these lines as well.

I'll look at some of these next week, but first let's look at what's provided by the manufacturers as standard equipment.

In most cases the base game includes one or two poster-sized or smaller battlefields -- usually printed on both sides -- providing at least two and sometimes four basic battlefields. In some cases, such as Axis & Allies there are more maps of a smaller size, but in this case the maps are geomorphic, meaning they can be combined in various configurations to create more battlefields.

Generally the artwork is pretty decent for these sort of maps, although there are some exceptions. For example, the early HeroClix maps were very amateurish. Most of the time the maps look pretty good.

Another good thing about the paper maps is that they tend to be relatively inexpensive. Most of these miniatures games use quite large battlefields compared to typical boardgame standards.

The most serious drawback of the paper map usually becomes apparent right away -- the creases from folding the map. This can be corrected by folding against the crease to make the maps lie flat, but this begins the process of destroying the maps. In most cases the paper used to make the maps can't go through this sort of folding more than a half dozen times before you start to see tears. It's better to store the maps rolled. I use mailing tubes. This does result in the maps being curled, but it's less destructive to flatten out the curve than folds.

Some players go so far as to laminated their maps, but I think this is too expensive for general use. Most laminated maps are stored flat, but this takes a lot of room.

Of the games I have, I've stuck with paper maps only for Axis & Allies, Miniatures, D&D miniatures, Heroclix and LOTR:TMG. In each case the need to have many different battlefields available has required that I settle for paper maps. In some cases there's no alternative, but D&D minis do have some cardboard battlefields available and the are a couple of vinyl maps for Hero clix out there as well.

Some of the other games, however, due to their subject matter, don't vary the battlefield as much and here there are some more options. Among them are Dreamblade and A&A War at Sea. I'll look at them next.

Reviewing collectible games from a wargamer's prespective: Dreamblade

Dreamblade is an abstract strategy collectible miniatures game that may be on ground that's a little more familiar to wargamers because dice and probabilities play a significant role in the game action.

The premise is that players are "dream lords" who can summon various creatures and locations to battle over the "dreamscape" for dominance over the dreams of mankind.

The premise isn't really all that important except that it provides an excuse for some really imaginative miniatures and allows pretty much any kind of game mechanic because there's no "reality" to constrict the design.

The basic structure of a game turn is simple. Players each roll a regular six-sided die, with the higher roll winning the initiative and performing subsequent game actions first. The total of the die rolls is the number of "spawn points" each player can use to summon new creatures to the dreamscape. The more powerful creatures cost more, naturally. During his turn each player can perform two actions, in any order, either "shifting" or "striking." During a "shift" a player can move any or all creatures one cell on the dreamscrape. During a "strike" a player can conduct combat in cells that his pieces with enemy pieces. To conduct combat players roll as many special battle dice as the total "power" (a characteristic) of the creatures in the fight. Two of the sides are misses and three of the sides bear the numbers 1, 2 and 3. The sum of those numbers is used to inflict damage on opposing creatures. If the total equals the defending creature's "defense" (a characteristic) then the target creature is disrupted and sent to another empty cell of the attacker's choice. If it equals the "life" (another, often higher, characteristic) then the target creature is destroyed. The final side of the die is a "blade" which, when rolled, often activates some special power listed on an attacking piece.

Naturally, as a collectible game there are numerous variations among the creatures and interesting interactions among them and the rules. Creatures can have special abilities activated through rolling blades, or spending spawn points during the spawn phase, or as they enter play, or as they occupy certain cells, etc.

The game is won by scoring victory points. The most common way to score points is by occupying "key cells" in the center nine squares of the 5 by 5 dreamscape that are worth varying numbers of conquest points and/or destroying enemy creatures for conquest points. Whoever scores the most conquest points win the turn and a victory point. First player to six victory points wins the game. It doesn't matter whether you win a turn by many conquest points or a few, so long as you win the turn. These can also be modified by some pieces.

As one can see, there's quite a bit of scope for strategy in the pure sense. As is always the case in collectible games, the first element of strategy is selecting your warband. Each player is limited to 16 pieces (unless modified by a special ability), so the selection of pieces involves a lot of analysis. It's good practice to include a good balance of spawn points among the selection so that any initiative roll can be used efficiently. If either player rolls a "1" then the spawn phase may be skipped (unless modified by special ability or by a tournament rule that prevents two consecutive skipped spawn phases) so a player is not guaranteed reinforcements, but it can be fatal if an opponent is able to spawn creatures and you cannot because you don't have creatures with the right spawn costs. Pieces come in one of four "aspects" which are basically factions that affect how much creatures cost and how well the work together, as well as provide a general guide for how they behave. For example, Passion creatures often have strong Power and can therefore attack well, but have low defense and life values and are therefore easily disrupted or destroyed.

Once a warband is selected there's a lot of thinking required about what order to summon your forces to the dreamscape, let alone what to do with them once they get there.

All in all it's a very deep and intricate game of the sort that will appeal to many wargamers. The biggest thing standing in the way will likely be the bizarre theme which, of course, bears no resemblance to reality, let alone any kind of history or warfare.

A lesser factor is the collectibility. Dreamblade is a discontinued game, so there is now a finite universe of pieces and boosters and singles can be had for reasonable prices except for a few prized pieces (especially the Scarab Warcharm, which still commands a premium). The competitive tournaments scene has ended, so all play now is basically casual play.

It's a reasonably popular game, according to BGG stats, with respectable numbers of plays for a boardgame, although obviously not the numbers that Hasbro/WOTC was looking for to support the game.

I like the game, but I have to admit that it's of questionable interest for wargamers. Many wargamers have other gaming interests of course, and if their those interests include abstract strategy or collectible games then I'd recommend Dreamblade. If, on the other hand, your interests are strongly geared toward historical or military-themed topics, then Dreamblade will likely be of minimal interest.

Dreamblade -- So what felled it?

Dreamblade was meant to be the "next big thing" in collectible/tradeable games.

Undoubtedly Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro conducted enough market research to persuade them it had potential. It had a big roll out, with big money tournaments and extensive Magic:The Gathering-style store support.

It's a pretty good game, with interesting strategies, an appropriate theme that gave players a sense of what the game was about while providing few constraints for designers, and some innovative ideas.

The physical presentation was top-notch, with a well-illustrated and clearly explained rule book. The miniatures were outstanding, with great art, fascinating and clever sculpts and ending up with an extensive line of 300 different figures from the base set and four expansions.

The game seems to have been generally well-received. On BGG it's rating of 7.39 places it at No. 282 among the tens of thousands of game titles rated by the site. This puts it about as popular as Bang! and World War II: Barbarossa to Berlin. It's owned by 617 BGG folks and has been played some 2,301 times by 273 distinct users, which also makes it pretty popular by BoardgameGeek standards. It has 15 pages of images on the site, another sign of some enthusiasm.

Yet, despite all this, the game ended up getting cancelled by WOTC before it's second anniversary.

I think Dreamblade's fate may illustrate the pitfalls of the collectible format for marketing a game. While obviously a great money-maker for a game company if it takes off, going collectible may raise the bar a lot for a game title. It's either all or nothing. Huge success or death. Despite being pretty darn successful by traditional boardgame standards, as a collectible game DreamBlade couldn't make the cut.

Most of the collectible figure games that have been successful seem to be based on some outside theme, not a self-contained one. It may be a fictional setting like HeroClix or Star Wars, a game universe like D&D or Halo or historical like Axis & Allies or Pirates, but figure-based games seem to need an anchor.

There may be some other reasons why DreamBlade faltered as well. I think the pace of the expansions was a bit too aggressive for most players to keep up with. There was a problem with balance with some pieces. Most tournament winning warbands seemed to have three Scarab Warcharms and most featured multiple rares. One piece (Kitsune) had to be banned.

Still, most collectible games have some problems with balance and Dreamblades expansion schedule wasn't more aggressive than HeroClix, so I doubt these were sufficient.

I know for myself, I'm very unlikely to take a chance on another collectible figure game based on a standalone theme.

First fiddlling with DreamBlade

Well, not exactly the first, but the first in a long time against an adult opponent. Played against Charlie K. down in New Haven.
Lost twice, but it was pretty instructive.
It's an interesting game. I just wonder if the collectibility aspect helped it or hurt it.
It might have been better off as an expandable game.