Jaded Spartancast

[Ryjak]

Alex Mann recently quit his volunteer position with Spartan Games as the lead Firestorm Armada game designer.  Yesterday, he posted a new podcast and blew up bridges with some C4-F Bombs, as he explains to the Jaded Gamercast why he finally got fed up with the company and quit:

http://mannmomo.blogspot.com/p/the-hub-systems-podcast.html

 Adult content warning

[Dakkar]

Disturbing to hear, and I'll listen when I'm home (if its not past midnight before I get to leave work)

Especially sad in light of the positive strides the survey seems to be prompting.

[Ryjak]

Here's the quote I think that best summarizes it:

"Neil doesn't know what the expletive he's doing". -Lange

[Dakkar]

Here's the quote I think that best summarizes it:

"Neil doesn't know what the expletive he's doing". -Lange

Shhhh ... no one tell our LGS owner.

Here I am with my new dream Syndicate Fleet, over 1200pts of painted Relthoza and counting, still loving Planetfall, and finally back into Dystopian with 2 full and 2 half factions I really enjoy. And it all might be a house of cards.

I feel like Master Po on the old KUNG FU. He finally gets to his life ambition to visit the Imperial City, and gets shot by some snot-nosed nobleman line-cutter.
:-/

But its all wait and see really. And could be worse ... Spartan could be Mongoose. ;-)

[Ruckdog]

I think that the even better quote is that Spartsn is a small game company that is trying to figure out how to be a big one. Or, as I like to say, it's a business being run as a hobby, where game companies that are successful long term are hobbies run as businesses.

Overall, while I have some quibbles with what was said (DW 2.0 is a big improvement IMO), I agree with many of the critiques that Alex, Oliver, Nathan, and Lange brought up in this episode. Spartan has indeed tended to over-promise and under-deliver, missed a lot of opportunities, and not been very forthcoming on its plans for the future. I can't say I blame Alex for wanting to end his association with Spartan if none of his hard work was ever going to see the light of day. In the end, Spartan has a clear pattern of jumping from project to project, and has struggled to provide support evenly across its games. Will that change based on the survey they did and the feedback they have received? Maybe, time will tell.

Even if they do not, I don't see it affecting my enjoyment of their games too much. In this, I find myself in a very different place than the hosts of this show; I remain excited about Spartan's games, especially FSA and DW, and I'm looking forward to playing in the events planned for Adepticon.

[Landlubber]

Here's the quote I think that best summarizes it:

"Neil doesn't know what the expletive he's doing". -Lange

Shhhh ... no one tell our LGS owner.

Here I am with my new dream Syndicate Fleet, over 1200pts of painted Relthoza and counting, still loving Planetfall, and finally back into Dystopian with 2 full and 2 half factions I really enjoy. And it all might be a house of cards.

I feel like Master Po on the old KUNG FU. He finally gets to his life ambition to visit the Imperial City, and gets shot by some snot-nosed nobleman line-cutter.
:-/

But its all wait and see really. And could be worse ... Spartan could be Mongoose. ;-)

I haven't yet listened to it, but...I doubt Spartan is going away anytime soon. And even if it did, Dystopian Wars and Firestorm Armada both have a solid rule set, plenty of factions, and hundreds of models, so we wouldn't lack for playing material for quite awhile. Planetfall is in the same position too.

Ruckdog, I tend to agree with your final analysis--the company has flaws to be sure, but I'm far too casual a gamer to get wrapped around the axle about them. There certainly are things I wished they would do differently, but that hasn't stopped me (nor will it stop me) from collecting models for and playing their games. Real Life is stressful enough--I'm not going to get bent out of shape over a hobby. I have cool models that I enjoy painting and rule sets that work for me, so I'm happy.

[Dakkar]

Real Life is stressful enough--I'm not going to get bent out of shape over a hobby.

I'm not allowed to get bent out of shape over work, so that's part of what my hobbies are for, right? ;-)

Perhaps this explains why I'm playing a lot of Khorne lately in AoS...

[Charbe86]

I just listened to this episode, and I think it makes a lot of valid points, but realistically if spartan stopped supporting firestorm armada tomorrow all it would really mean is that we might have to play with crapy models right? The rules are electronic, the mechanics depend on the base rather than the actual model attached to it, and it sounds like most of the hard graft of development was actually done by a community group rather than spartan anyway. 

[Fracas]

i am collecting factions i like the looks of
i can always modified the rules
and write my own fluffs

[Ryjak]

I think that the even better quote is that Spartsn is a small game company that is trying to figure out how to be a big one. Or, as I like to say, it's a business being run as a hobby, where game companies that are successful long term are hobbies run as businesses.

That's the serious, brass tacs version of my quote, and not nearly as good for click bait. :p

I'm not a serious gamer either; I basically play with my buddy Ben once or twice a month, and sometimes give up my Sunday for a two-hour round trip to Baltimore for 1-2 games.  I don't see the former stopping anytime soon, but the latter has lost a lot of momentum.  It's the only store I know in the area which carries SG products, and they decided to stop stocking it.  The product just sits on the shelves, particularly since the support SG provides to Vanguard Bill is via online gift certificates.  Now that everyone has a pile of models, and I don't see new players, I see why they want to clear out inventory and not support store events.

This makes me wonder what happened with the 2.0 creators:
Christopher Worth, Franco Sammarco, Derek Sinclair, Michael Hetherington.  I assume it's the same Derek behind Planetfall; did everyone else leave after their non-paid work was also ignored and Alex stepped up and took over?  Was Alex put in charge before Christopher formally cut ties, just as Josh was put in charge a few months ago?

Ultimately, while I am now heavily invested, I don't really care as long as I can find people like Ben and Andy to play with... worst case, I have two painted fleets with Syndicate/OSO in the works, so I can run a variety of games on my own with a solid game system.

[Dakkar]

particularly since the support SG provides to Vanguard Bill is via online gift certificates.

This has turned into a fair issue locally I think... when I use my Vanguard credits, or folks get their event certs, it tends to bunch up orders for just online Spartan direct. I've included this gripe in my event feedback forms for months - that they need to supply the STORE with the prizes, not the players.

Spartan just doesn't support local sales enough. And we can only seem to get product moving in spurts.

[Ruckdog]

New blog post from Spartan:

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/feedback-from-the-survey-part-ii

This seems like a step in the right direction, but time will tell as to what actually comes from the statements made in the post.

[Dakkar]

This seems like a step in the right direction, but time will tell as to what actually comes from the statements made in the post.

If you'll forgive the political analogy, that blog post felt a lot like:

"We've got tremendous plans and minis coming for all the games. You won't believe how fantastic these minis are, that we haven't made yet. But they're going to be the best, just the best. And the rules too, the best you've ever seen. We're going so bigly on these games, players will just love it."

;-D

[Ruckdog]

As long as their not planning on producing a new game and having GW pay for it...

[Dakkar]

As long as their not planning on producing a new game and having GW pay for it...

LAWLZ!!!