Math Mathonwy

I feel that Malifaux is a game that gets a lot faster once both players are really truly familiar with the rules (including both crews that are on the field). So yeah, a 90 minute tournament game means that both players should be playing at a fairly brisk pace but should be doable once people know what they're doing.

Without knowing what their methods are you could assume that but it would be nice to not have to make assumptions.

The numbers that have been posted in TGN's polls have had Malifaux in fifth place pretty consistent for the last six months.

But the problem with a top five list with no additional details is that you can't tell why something is now #5 when it wasn't previously.

For the polls that TGN has run the top six games have been the same pretty much since they started doing the polls and numbers 6 through ten have also been pretty much the same but they move around every month.

I would say that TGN favours non-GW gamers rather heavily simply due to the nature of the site. A lot (most?) GW-gamers only play GW games and therefore sites like TGN aren't of much interest to them which skews the results rather dramatically.

Also, since it's in English, a lot of French and Spanish gamers probably aren't reading it which in turn affects the numbers when it comes to Infinity, Nemesis and the French games (which tend to be in turmoil right now, so wouldn't rank all that high regardless).

Now as I said earlier I think it is a good result for Malifaux and any press that shows the game being more popular is great but my original interest in the results for this month were actually just that Dark Heavens, the defunct Reaper wargame from years ago, wasn't in fifth place anymore.

Aye, I had noticed the same thing. I kinda supposed that they put all Reaper sales under Dark Haven for some inexplicable reason but since they differentiate between WM and Hordes, it seems really nonsensical and doesn't raise my confidence in the numbers.

Yup. Warhammer Fantasy isn't a big seller. Not at the same size that 40K is and certainly nowhere near as popular as Warmachine.

Are you thinking North America or world wide? As I would be somewhat surprised if what you're saying is true of Europe.

Can someone show me a minis game where minimizing the chance of catastrophe doesn't yield more wins in the long run as opposed to playing recklessly hoping for the silver bullet? As I haven't yet run across it* and I've been looking at games from this POV for a long time.

the few times when it makes sense to do so have been mentioned

OP asked about general strategy, and people have said yes hang on to it omg can't cheat suxorz

And the other side is saying lolwut haxxorz l33t skillzors will win the day I pwn blck jokerz!

Oh, wait, no they are not. OTOH claiming that they are certainly makes it easier to "win points" in the argument so perhaps we should all keep rallying against strawmen.

Your comparison to playing a game with one soul stone less than the opponent was extremely silly. In fact, probably the silliest thing yet said in this thread. It's not nearly the same in any way and even the most casual of observations should reveal that fact, which kinda casts everything you say in a bit dubious light, to tell the truth.

*as in, it's blindingly obvious in games such as WHFB, Warmaster, Helldorado, Alkemy and Blood Bowl and a bit less obvious in games like Infinity and LotR though I argue that it is still there.

And this is why they say the fear has big eyes.

Would you save that Duet if you pulled 1 or 3 instead of a Black Joker? Ok, I know you could've cheated then, but so could your opponent. Any guarantees?

In the end, the fear of the card will cripple your Control Hand.

In all the wargames that I've played during the 20 years in the hobby, the one constant thing from game to game is that minimizing the effects of chance tends to make you win more in the long run. Basically all minis games are about stacking the odds in your favour and first minimizing the chances and then the effects of catastrophes.

So unless you come up with a more compelling argument than "when drawing a Black Joker, you might have drawn a one instead" coated with some pompousness, I'm not discarding the BJ willy-nilly.

Your reasoning is that instead of drawing the Black Joker you might draw a one or your opponent might just draw better. Funnily enough, the same faulty reasoning is in effect when you discard the Black Joker in the hopes of drawing something better for your control hand. You might draw that one there and the situations where a one in hand is better than the BJ in hand are extremely rare.

That said, discarding BJ when you know the turn being the last of the make-or-break turns is often a justified move.

It is good news as this is the first time I have seen Malifaux in the ICv2 top five lists but these results need to be taken with a bit of salt since ICv2 doesn't specify how they gear this data and have in the past had RPG ranges conflated in the list.

What is more important to take from this is that whatever the actual sales volume, Malifaux is on the minds of players and, more importantly, retailers and distributors. When a retailer calls his sales rep at a distributor and the distributor can talk up a game or is familiar with it then you are more likely to get a sale or get stocked.

Mind share is an important thing to gain and it is easy to convert that into sales and players.

This is a very important point. ICv2 is not a very reliable source of information only accounting for the sales numbers in certain stores and only in the states, right?

Thanks for your response, do you have any recommendations for a brand new starter that offers an easier learning curve to learn the rules? Or should I go for which minis I like the look of?

The easiest Master box to start with is Lady Justice but all the Guild lady Masters are rather beginner friedly, so I suggest going with your gut (meaning aesthetic sensibilities ).

I see your concern on the new player end. I can see how someone would feel as though they were being lied to, if it's presented in a way that says the pdf is everything they'll need, rather than a super basic introduction. A super basic intro that is really stylishly done....

"Super basic intro" is a bit extreme as all that is lacking is diagrams and scenarios, right? It's just that the format makes it hard to use.

And whether piracy concerns are just paranoia or not, they are a real problem, just like buying from the internet is, to brick and mortar owners.

The sad thing here of course is that it's very easy to make the PDF flat (but not easy enough to be meant to be done, which is why I haven't done so) and I'm almost certain that I could get a pirated version of the full rules manual that would work on mobile devices were I so inclined. In other words, pirates are the ones who get the superior product in this case.

You chose the wrong definition of 'personal'. My meaning was that the evaluation of whether or not Wyrd has met their obligations to the customer is a personal one.

Ah, fair enough, mea culpa.

Eric has stated that many distributors and stores are uncomfortable, if not outright hostile, towards methods of electronic rules distribution that take books off the shelves. I take him at his word on that, and if it is the case then yes - your expectation may very well be unrealistic. At the very least, he's stated that the intention with the PDF was never to provide a fully capable primary rules source. He's explained why they made that decision. What more do you actually want?

I somehow doubt that flattening can be the deciding factor there but if someone from Wyrd comes and says that that is why the PDF is how it is, then I concede my point and stop mentioning the free PDF when promoing (as currently it, anecdotally, breeds bad blood as opposed to positive PR when these prospective players see it for themselves).

And for the record, Math, I didn't feel like tadaka's posts had any sort of 'tone' to them at all. So, remember to be careful when reading posts online, as 'tone' is conveyed very poorly in written text. It's tough, in discussions like this, because we all get a little heated sometimes, but it's good to remember to always assume that the other person is NOT using a 'tone' or such.

Remember to be careful in reading posts as I never said anything about tadaka's tone. There's this multiquote function that makes it easy to quote several people in a single message, you know .

The tone comment was aimed at magicpockets who compared criticizing the PDF to calling someone's child ugly or stupid which is escalating the thing to ludicrousness. And I say that as someone who makes a living writing stuff and then having others mercilessly try to find faults in it.

The sad reality is that some people seem to have expectations that Wyrd simply isn't going to meet. They essentially feel, for whatever reason, that Wyrd should hand them the full, complete, updated rules for free. They aren't going to do that.

That might be a sad reality, but I'm not convinced that anyone on this thread has suggested such. Or if you'd like to quote someone asking for that, I'd be happy to be shown to be wrong.

The core question is whether or not they've done enough.

Huh? That's not a core question at all and is, all in all, a very silly metric.

They bash them because the PDF is too clunky and expensive to print, or you can't use it without a computer (Who'da thunk?)

Eh, that's a bit low as it's obvious twisting of words. It was extremely clear that the "without a computer" meant without a desktop computer as in the PDF doesn't work in portable devices.

The baseline truth is that this is all personal.

Though this kinda explains your previous comments, it's a really weird take on things. This isn't personal to me and it shouldn't be to you.

The people objecting to needing a new $15 book laud a company that reprints $200 worth of books and provides no useful shorthand reference at all.

The word 'people' is plural, not singular. I'm not sure why you're trying to paint all the critics with the same brush and trying to construct some kinda heavy-handed "us vs them"-mentality when it's not needed. I also feel that it's very unconstructive. If you have a response to someone's singular comment, respond to that person as opposed to talking vaguely about "people".

I honestly don't feel like I'm defending Wyrd. I'm more just shaking my head at the unrealistic expectations.

You feel that a flattened PDF that works on an iPad is an unrealistic expectation?

Honestly, I think you should take a deep breath, not take this discussion as a slight aimed at your person and all in all pay more attention to what people are saying instead of exaggerating it into something and then railing against that.

I had no intended tone to any one. I have no issue with any one or even there views.

LoboStele misread my post - no one mentioned anything about your tone.

And Bulhallin, I believe it more than reasonable to want a usable pdf now they've actually released one. Would it take that much effort to strip it and make it usable? Tech types may know more but I doubt its more than a few hours work and if I could do it myself I would.

I know a fair bit about electronic publishing and yeah, it would be very simple. Flattening the PDF to make it much faster and smaller would take less than a minute. Stripping the background, as it's in its own layer, would also take only a couple of minutes.

I defend it because I think the PDF does what it should. Lets players get the rules to play a few games but not enough that they can just skip the book.

The cumbersomeness doesn't seem to serve any purpose that I can think of, though.

My only issue is I see no reason people should not be able to print it but dont think its a major issue.

I have 0 problems telling wyrd when they are not doing right. I have done so on a number of posts. End of the day I think its a usefull product given for free. If they sold it to me and I could not print and it ran like crap on any digital medium I could support people saying this is not a good product.

That being said I would like to see the rules offered in a digital medium for things like Nooks and smartphones.

In other words you agree with the crux of the criticism (and indeed the reason I posted this in the first place) put forward in this thread. Why did you frame that support as if it was some small part as opposed to the whole?

Is everyone forgetting here that Wyrd are a handful of guys?

Who exactly is this "everyone" you refer to here? Why make sweeping generalizations that aren't true and will only darken the tone? I realize that you're passionate about this (so am I) but there's no need for such hostility.

Personally I think theyve done really well to achieve what they've achieved with the resources they've got - and we shouldn't judge them on their early days, as of right now with the rule manual and V2 cards there's little problem with the game.

I agree. I also kinda think that everyone else here agrees with this as well.

I agree they need to give some thought now to the path new players take into the game (perhaps redoing book 1 and 2 to bring them in line with current erratas, rule book and v2 stats), but that's something I see in every new business I work with - every business starts on one path then ends up being moved to the "right" path by it's customers. Wyrd are learning from that and (by the look of it) moving as fast as they can to keep up.

OK, so you actually agree with the criticism that has been voiced in this thread. Makes the tone of your reply even more baffling.

Seriously, why not try to mellow the tone of a heated topic instead of escalating with strange comparisons and defenses against stuff that no one has even implied? Defending Wyrd is all good and well (they are awesome as I keep saying) but retaining perspective there is extremely important. A mindless dogpile serves absolutely no purpose.

Yeah, I get what you mean. Also, from a security point of view it makes sense to flatten the layers on the distributed version so they can't be removed later. But the thing with Wyrd is they're smart guys and every time I've seen someone challenge their decisions they've either responded to the feedback or there's been a reason we haven't thought of why they've done what they've done.

If it IS something as simple as an oversight or not knowing how to properly optimise a PDF for online distribution I'd be very surprised. (Although if it is Wyrd, email me and I'll do it for you - it's a 2 minute job and no credit is needed )

I agree with you 100%!

At risk of speaking out of turn, it's relatively simple to flatten and optimize the PDF yourelf. I hope that not the kind of behavior that is referred to above, but it can be done.

Aye, I'm sure that I could do that (working on my PhD in essentially computer science) but my concern here isn't my personal use (loving my Rules Manual) but rather in promoing the game. Since the printing has been disabled, flattening the PDF isn't trivial, so mentioning it in promoing is weird, to say the least.

I suppose what I'm saying is that the Wyrd guys already shut down two other threads because people kept continuing to hammer on about points like this. The idea for flattening the PDF has been suggested. The point that the PDF is cumbersome has been made. Repeating it over and over again isn't likely to make any difference at this point.

Where (other than on this thread) has the suggestion of flattening the PDF been made? It's possible that I've missed it, but I hadn't seen it before.

I saw the previous train wreck, but thought that a new thread was in order now that the PDF has been out for a while and now that I've used it as a selling point to potential new players (which kinda turned out to not be as I had advertised it). I was looking for other people's experiences and maybe some pointers on where I was going wrong.

I'm not against you guys in this though. I have an iPhone and an iPad as well, and would love to be able to use the PDF on those more easily. I've made sure to copy some of the ideas and re-post them in the Henchmen forum area for further discussion, and to further hope that Wyrd sees the suggestions.

Thank you!

Beyond that, I was just cautioning to not let the thread devolve into the same stuff that got the last two threads closed down.

They devolved into accusations of unethicalness and greed and other such silliness. This thread has been entirely polite and constructive and though I naturally do share your wish that it remains so, there was no indication that it wouldn't.

@ anathema and others: Please be careful with your statements. No need to get further threads locked. Your complaints of that nature have been heard over and over again. At this point, it's water under the bridge, and the vast majority of people on the forum seem to be quite pleased with how things have turned out. In essence, you DO have the original Book 1 and Book 2, and an online Errata. The Errata may not be that simple to print out, but that is essentially what you've got at the moment. If it's not in the format that YOU want to see....then do like Ratty has, and re-write it in your preferred style. Wyrd has offered what they felt was the best solution for the majority of their players. Of course, this means that it's not going to match the ideal of some people, and that's just how it goes in life. If you can't get used to that kind of thing happening with a miniatures game, then you're going to be very unhappy in life overall, because it happens all the times (see politics, for example...always about serving the majority).

Instead of continuing to complain about something that isn't going to change at this point....do something about it.

I suppose that the "and others" includes me - I've been trying to be very polite as I honestly think that Wyrd has handled the issue well. It's just that their execution on one part is a bit lacking. I don't see any reason why the PDF can't be flattened. I mean, restricting printing is understandable, but making the PDF too cumbersome to use is silly IMHO and I'm not at all convinced that it was a conscious decision.

As for "not going to change" - that's very silly. Wyrd have an absolutely excellent record in listening to customer feedback and acting on it. The latest case being the allowing of printed v2 cards on tournament organizer's say so in tournaments that follow the official rules. People voiced their concerns, Wyrd considered them, and made a ruling that satisfied everyone.

Now, if Wyrd says that the PDF is cumbersome on purpose and won't change, then you could say that. But since they haven't said that, I think that you're being extremely counter productive and am baffled by what you're trying achieve.

So you'd rather that the game never developed further? No new fluff and no new minis/rules?

Or are you saying that each new book should contain everything from the old books aswell?

Either way sounds ridicolous to me..

Not speaking for anathema, but before the starting cost was one book and one starter. Now it's basically one book for the fluff and another one for the rules and then one starter.

Now, Wyrd saw that this wasn't what they wanted, so they released the updated rules for free. An excellent solution that I lauded and was very happy to pay for the Rules Manual knowing that newbies could ease up into the game just as efficiently as before. Unfortunately the release was in a file that is cumbersome enough to be unusable to most of us.

If they would just flatten the pdf into usability, I at least would be more than happy with how they handled the situation. But right now it feels somehow... bait and switchish. That's too strong a word as I'm 100% sure that Wyrd isn't doing this for some kinda cheap gain and, like I said, I lauded their handling of the situation. Merging the unwieldy errata into a new rulebook and then releasing it free of charge was a great idea but right now it's kinda unfinished and makes honest promoing a bit awkward.

The same maths works in reverse to be fair. You finish the duel with a +fate +fate +fate result and you've got a much higher chance of flipping the Black Joker too making all the cards and soulstones you cheated in to get your initial duel result worthless. That's the beauty of the system. The Jokers are wild cards like they're meant to be!

But you can count cards, which is painfully easy in the case of jokers (actually, since they're so important, it's kinda hard not to) so you can make informed decisions that can affect the chances in really big ways. Since the swing from weak damage to Red Joker damage is so huge, the impact can be game ruining. I've yet to see a Black Joker do something similar (well, other than in the case of Jack Daw).

I enjoy the red joker effect when it comes out of the deck but not out of some ones hand. That being said I enjoy crit's and fumbles found in other game systems.

Just to clarify my view, I like the red joker. I just don't like getting it on flips. Especially through cheating duels down (or through hard to wound effects and such). I mean, if you haven't seen the red joker yet, and have, say, only 12 cards left in the deck, cheating down from to :-fate changes your chances of getting the red joker from 16% to a whopping 25% with rather minimal changes to the expected non-Red Joker damage.

I have a printed copy i look at frequently.

How did you get it printed? In my PDF the printing has been disabled. Could you maybe print a flattened PDF version as that would basically solve all my problems with it?

I all ready know the rules so it hard to learn the game from it.

There were quite a number of changes in the Rules manual, though. I at least read it from start to finish.

I find it to work well enough to look through when I dont have my rules manual handy ( I keep it at my desk at work when I try and figure some thing out) I dont see any reason you could not use it to play a game tho.

I promoed it as a resource for new players who, when they tried using it, got quite disappointed, so that's where I'm coming from. Personally I own the Rules Manual and think it's a good product. It's just that from a newbie's perspective the PDF could've been really nice.

I have had no issues with it down loaded and works fine.

It works fine for me, too, in theory. But did you do anything with it? I mean, can you use it as a reference during a game (the great thing about PDFs is that they are searchable and nicely portable given the right devices)? Or did you read the whole thing through to learn the rules? Because currently both of those prospects seem like they're not working for me (the first because the PDF is too heavy for my portable devices and the second because it's so slow to go from page to page on my desktop comp).

To each their own, but I hate it when I win through a random red joker on a highly negative flip. Feels a bit like the joker robbing me of the game - "it would've been a great, even game, but that random :-fate:-fate Red Joker killing your master kinda ruined it." Definitely my least favourite rule in the game.

I'm rather disappointed that no one posted anything positive in defense of the pdf. I mean, I was hoping that I was just doing something wrong and it was working as intended, but I'm kinda forced to conclude that no one is actually using the pdf for anything.

Judging from the previous replies, I'm not sure anyone here appreciates this (a bit further afield, so to speak), but I've always thought that Earth's album Hex; Or Printing in the Infernal Method is the perfect Malifaux soundtrack. Desolate, slightly alien, instrumental, very western:

[ame]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zD-J8O2fLf4[/ame]

Another good one is Sephiroth's Draconian Poetry album. Again instrumental. It has powerful ambience, very foreboding, but also features some faster tracks:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPk5IQbuOSk[/ame]

Thank you, downloading now

Edit: Done, thank you

So.... did you get it to work in a satisfactory way?

Winner cheats fate/uses soulstone first.

Its a small one, but the implications are mighty. I think it would add an excellent layer of strategy to the game.

Try it as a scenario condition in a tournament. "The stars of Malifaux have aligned, the cauldron of Zoraida bubbles in colors never before seen, the rich lock up their doors while the paupers strut the streets - this is The Underdog's Day."

Seriously, I've always liked really weird scenarios that mess up things in strange new ways. This one is extremely simple but with far reaching ramifications.

Don't know that I would bother printing it. You'd pretty much HAVE to print it in color in order for it to be readable. The actual manual only costs $15. By the time you blow through 60 pages of printer ink, you might as well just buy the manual itself.

Could be but I've been promoing the game to my friends as having a free rulebook available online and it's not looking all that good when, though technically true, the rulebook is completely useless. Compare and contrast to, say, Infinity or Alkemy which really do have the rulebooks available in a usable format (Alkemy's is downright brilliant, but that's a high bar I don't honestly expect other companies to follow).

I do own the rules manual, but promoing this game is kinda awkward at the moment. "You need to buy these two books to know the fluff and then you need this small book to know the rules as the rules in the previous books are outdated. Oh, and they contain stats and such, but they're not reliable. For those you need the cards but the cards you get in blisters might not be the right ones so if that happens you need to order new cards from over seas. It's a really fun game, though."

I'm not critiquing Wyrd here of all those things here, mind. Things happen and on the whole I think that they've done a good job fixing stuff and I don't know how one could've done the fixing better. It's just that the Rules Manual pdf is kinda negative ATM as it's like a tease in that it's there but unusable. I mean, yeah, it's possible to read it on a powerful desktop computer, but at least when I read the rules, I flip back and forth quite a bit and it's such a paint in the behind with this ultra heavy pdf even on my powerful desktop that I really wouldn't want to learn the rules that way.

And yeah, I was hoping to print it into a smaller, flattened pdf, though an ink copy would've been nice for promoing purposes to be able to show the free rulebook they offer.