The End of the War

Games Prime War
#21

To Christopher, Adam, Paul and everyone at GTG,

First off, I'd like to thank Katie and Morph147 who asked to send out remiders to those who don't get to go on the Forums much...like me.  It saddens me that this project failed and is dead in the water.  I enjoyed playing SENTINEL TACTICS and I was interested to see what PRIME WAR had.  And I backed this way back with BROKEN CITY and FOR PROFIT.  However, I believe that things happen for a reason.  When one door closes, another one opens.

I just sent an email to Paul about my refund.  In the email, I had an idea if it's possible to do.  Instead of getting my refund, can GTG just "reinvest" it in the SENTINEL COMICS RPG.  Due to funds (at the time) I wasn't able to get some of the add ons.  Now that I had money coming back, I might as well keep it with GTG and get some other products...especially witht the RPG which I am excited about.  Now I haven't received an answer yet (I just sent the email a couple of minutes ago) but I am hoping they could acquiesce.  Like I said before when one door closes, another one opens.  I am not saying that you shouldn't take your money back.  It's your money do with it as you please.  But if you're like me, a fan of GTG and want to support then maybe this is an opportunity.  Besides in my opinion, I waited this long for the money, I might as well get another product out of it.  

So to end,  Christopher entitled this post as "The End of the War" and that may be for the Miststorm Universe, but for the RPG universe, things are still going strong and I hope will continue to grow (by having lots and lots of expansion books) which brings these words to my mind for the RPG universe..WE'VE ONLY BEGUN TO FIGHT!!!

'Nuff said. Pax.

#22

So essentially this was a 5 year no interest loan. Would of been a nice gesture to do something for those that stuck it out. 5% discount code or something from the store. Puts a pretty bad taste in my mouth to do any other pre orders/support.

#23

I can dig it but I just want my refund and me and GTG are through. They’re not to be trusted to deliver on what they promise.

#24

Sad to hear, fenianb, but it’s certainly an understandable position. I (and I’d wager many others) don’t agree, but you should do what is right for you.

Personally I’m glad they have shown – with this decision – an ability to “read the room” of the industry. If they were to go forward with this and it sunk, they would be out all the funds they drop into manufacturing, and that would not be good for the company. For those of us who want to see the company continue making great stuff like the SCRPG, Definitive Edition of Sentinels of the Multiverse, Spirit Island expansions, and whatever they come out with that’s the next SotM/Spirit Island, we don’t want that!!! :frowning:

#25

Yeah. I’m sad that it’s not happening, but kinda relieved I can stop worrying about it and just wait for whatever new products they’re actually making.

all I could find was one preorder receipt for miniatures BC & FP painted for $89.95 and the two games for 39.95 and 19.95. Was there anything else I likely would have preordered at a “max” level?

#26

I just recieved the email about this and came over. This is frankly devastating news to me. I went and played the Prime War demos at every opportunity and enjoyed every moment of it. I felt the stories, not only about the Prime Aspects, but this Multiversal contest involving characters we know and love, but also alternates and new characters, was going to be a blast lore-wise.

I don't want to get my money back, to be honest, I'd love to put it into this company a different way, but with changes going on in my personal life, the virus, and everything else, it is probably the best choice for me personally.

I look forward to seeing what arises out of these ashes, but this one hurt to be honest.

#27

While I understand wanting a refund and moving on to other things, this is honestly one project they failed to deliver out of many successful ones.

I’m personally more sad than angry as a result. No company has all of their projects succeed, and it sucks that one that didn’t was one many of us were really looking forward to, but I’ve been happy with their other Sentinels products and spin-offs and I hope there will still be something more marketable done with the Prime War story content in the future. And as others have said, it’s better to cut losses than keep throwing good money after bad.

#28

Just gonna point out that there was a backer update today about the new Spirit Island expansion finishing production. Supposed to be here in a month or so.

#29

Thanks for the closure.  Hate to see a game I love end this way, but it is understandable.

#30

That’s one project. How about all the other delayed projects including the original Spirit Island? Or changes to products from initial campaigns? Failed delivery priorities? All of which were at least somewhat mitigated by efforts to keep backers updated. For this project we were kept almost constantly in the dark, our questions ignored or given slight uninformative responses.

GTG may have meant the updates that were given at the time they were given, but they failed to tell us once benchmarks and goals started changing. Likewise despite assertions of commitment and saying more resources would be devoted this project has always seemed to be given lesser priority than anything else that was being worked on. As far as I’ve seen little has actually been done on this project except to fly assorted rules sets around and kite them at GenCon. Other campaigns at least got regularly information, even enthusiasm from GTG marketing and promotion. To me this has just been a series of empty promises because there’s been little shown for it for years.

#31

While it’s easy to say “I was told many things, and now I’m getting nothing, this is unfair and I have lost faith in GtG” from GtG’s point of view, all of this work was probably very, very expensive, and they’re not getting anything out of it. GtG has now had to, for the entire Sentinel Tactics/Prime War line of products decide “This is costing us money to develop, to produce, and won’t sell enough to turn a profit. We need to call almost all of this work a loss and move on.” From there, they are 100% refunding all money that DID come in for this project. They have spent time, money, and passion on these projects that didn’t work out. I’m sure they’re more disappointed than you are in this, but the product simply wasn’t viable. Would it have been better if they sent out a broken/unfun game and didn’t give any refunds? It makes sense you’d be disappointed with PW not being released, and the change from ST to PW was probably also frustrating, but the ENTIRE PROCESS you had the chance to get your KS funds returned if you were unhappy. Other than release a product that GtG is obviously not comfortable with, what better could they have done here by you? What other options did they have that you would have found acceptable?

#32

Bummer! So I guess GtG's market research showed that the tactical miniature genre was "full?"

What I wonder now is, as someone for whom RPGs never really clicked, what Sentinel Comics things are there to look forward to? I hope they keep pushing story content and gameplay improvements to Sentinels of Freedom, but the world of indie video games isn't exactly known for being stable...

#33

Have you tried the SCRPG, Trajector? It's focus on creating the most interesting comic-style story is very different from other RPGs I've played. :-D (And I've played a _lot_. ;-) 

Not saying SCRPG going to be "the exception". :-) There are folks I usually play RPGs with who won't play it; it really depends on play style, interests, etc. (It can also depend on the GM, but that's a whole different story... ;-) 

#34

I haven't...my general sticking point with RPGs is that I'm all about the "G" and not so much into the "RP." I want to figure out how to deploy the right abilities to achieve a goal. The times I've tried RPGs or tabletop games with RP elements and players who really lean into them, the between-action scenes tend to throw me off. *shrug* My usual game group also has 2-4 total people in it - well, pre-pandemic it did - and I imagine that's not the right number for SCRPG to work well.

So if somebody knows a link to a community-crafted set of full co-op rules and scenarios that use Sentinel Tactics boards and pieces, I'm ALL OVER that! ;) Co-op mode was the thing I was looking forward to the most about Prime War. Honestly, the co-op nature is one of the biggest hooks of SotM, and I imagine SCRPG, so I hope there are future co-op Sentinel Comics tabletop games in the pipeline.

 

#35

I’m with you on that! We never really had a (publicly-available) co-op scenario for Sentinels Tactics, which is disappointing. :frowning: Maybe this will promote folks who were fans to create something…

#36

Here's the post from Lore Forge Games on this:

https://loreforgegames.wordpress.com/2020/06/08/prime-war-postmortem/

#37

I’m sad to hear this isn’t happening - I really wanted to play around with the teams I’d heard about, and there was a lot about the system that sounded great. LFG mentioning the possibility of Print-and-Play gives me a bit of hope, and I’d love to try that if it’s possible.

#38

Yeah, Lore Forge's description of a co-op engine is exactly the gap in the Tactics line that I would have liked to see filled. I'm really curious about Lore Forge's engine, after finding the co-op adaptations to games like Scythe or Root to be ultimately disappointing. Maybe the PnP will give me enough to break out my dusty Tactics components!

They allude to a little of what might be the background behind the business decision:

> Sentinels players didn’t seem to want Competitive play as much as we did, and Competitive players wouldn’t look to a “Co-op brand” for a deep tactical experience.

> >

My guess is that it really came down to the second half of that statement. GtG probably figured that they have built their reputation on co-op games, especially in the Sentinel Comics property, and it would be hard to break into market share held by competitive tactical miniature games from shops with established reputations there.

#39

Yeah, that line made it sound like they were really designing a game for a very narrow selection of people.

#40

I will definitely look at trying the PnP with my group when it comes out, thanks for sharing that!