Renegade Con Virtual: Axis and Allies

@reloader-1 said in Renegade Con Virtual: Axis and Allies:

…owning sculpts for games you don’t yet have is an incredible incentive to buy that game!

But by definition then you’re paying more money than you needed to play the game you wanted to play. My goal with the above is to make the game in all it’s flavors as inexpensive and non-redundant as possible at each desired level of complexity.

“Axis and Allies” should be slightly cheaper than AA:Z today - no zombie bits or deck.

“Advanced” should be far cheaper than Anniversary today - all you would be buying is a new board, new rules, and a handful of advanced units for each power, plus the full set of Italian/Axis Minors units.

“Global War” would be the most expensive of the three but would still be far cheaper than the $200 MSRP it is today - all you would be buying is the new board, new rules, and a handful of “Expert” units for each power, plus the full set(s) of Allied Minors units.

I’ll try to actually work out the math for each tier using today’s bloated games as a basline.

@vodot

I think we are on the same page, but I still believe that you are overlooking a huge chunk of the cost (and complexity). Let me explain:

The majority of the “cost” of the modern Axis & Allies games (or any board game, for that matter) is transportation cost of the size and weight of the box, with the actual components (paper/plastic/cardboard) as the secondary driver. These games are made and boxed in China, then packed in containers for oceanic shipping. Those are priced by the cubic foot, of course. Once they arrive stateside, they are loaded into trucks or trains (price per pallet), taken to distribution centers, and from there shipped in smaller mixed loads to stores, or mailed via a common carrier (all based on size/weight.

I think it is critical to divorce the boards, which make up a huge chunk of “cost” when taking this into account, from the game. We already have Axis & Allies 1941 as an example, assuming that Hasbro/Renegade is making some profit then about $25 is a fair expectation for 200 pieces + board/rules/box.

Your pricing, for a G40 player, would be as follows:

1. Axis & Allies Base - $30 (a bit more expensive than 41 as it would have a few more pieces - injection molded plastic isn’t wildly expensive however).

2. Axis & Allies Advanced - $30 (I can’t drop the price any cheaper than 1941, as the components are quite similar - map + some pieces, but the board is bigger)

3. Axis & Allies Global - around $60 (the pieces are minimal, but the combined weight of the boards drives much of this price)

Here is the problem - your hypothetical G40 player HAS to spend $30 extra for Italy + some minor pieces, and ends up with a map that they don’t really need or use. Here’s my solution:

1. Axis & Allies Base - $30 (as above)

2. Axis & Allies Advanced - $25 (pieces ONLY - nothing else. Small box, about half the size of the 1941 box, with about 600 - 700 pieces). Smaller size = less cost.

3. Axis & Allies Games - as most of these are map and rules only, they can actually be a bit thinner than the current boxes , but still sufficient to stand on a shelf. Each one of these assumes you own #1, and some will have to explicitly state if you need to own #2. Of course, if any new pieces are introduced they will be included here.

This also neatly avoids the issues of a game that requires Italy + other advanced pieces requiring a customer to purchase 4 games, under your system. For example, Axis & Allies North Africa. A buyer in your system would need the base game, plus advanced for Italy, plus G40 for all of the mechanized infantry, French pieces etc, PLUS the actual North Africa game. That sounds like game DLC hell.

Meanwhile, my system would just required base + advanced plus the actual game. No need to have an AA50 board and a G40 board taking up space in your house because you don’t need it!

@reloader-1 said in Renegade Con Virtual: Axis and Allies:

2. Axis & Allies Advanced - $25 (pieces ONLY - nothing else. Small box, about half the size of the 1941 box, with about 600 - 700 pieces). Smaller size = less cost.

Well, I think that 600 pieces retailing on a shelf in the US for $25 is a bit off, even looking at aliexpress’s bottom-barrel quality as a comparison. Also in your version an “Advanced-only” player would have to pay for pieces he does not currently want, which I was trying to avoid.

But yes, whether it’s pieces packaged as separate from the boards and rules or whether they are generally bundled I think a base game + layered expansions/modules system is the way to go.

Looking at the “waaaaay more complicated” end of the WW2 gaming spectrum, I think that ASL and ASLSK are at least somewhat good analogues for this, for anyone that knows that system. Enticing new players into a complicated system - whether that system is “insanely, ludicrously complicated” (ASL), “very, very complicated” (ASLSK) or even just “mildly complicated” (A&A) - is inherently difficult, and so the barriers should be re-examined from time to time to ensure they are as low as possible. I think the current state of the A&A family leaves a lot to be desired in that regard, even with the entry-level offerings like AA41 out there.

@vodot I’m definitely in agreement, and your point about the “base” being a standalone game is the most important part - people should be able to buy one box and have it include everything needed to play the game, albeit a basic version (your A&A Zombies example, minus Zombies is dead on. One of the best A&A maps!).

I think it’s important to avoid the “you need pack 3 and 4 to play this, and pack 2 and 6 to play that etc”, which many games do horribly. Of course, the easiest solution that no one would buy is EVERYTHING in one box, but that’s a massive barrier to entry for new players.

Although having all of the pieces in one “Advanced” booster/expansion pack means some players might end up with pieces they don’t need, I think it’s a better solution than more SKUs with pieces. I do think I lowballed the price, it’s probably more around $35.

$20 says that Renegade doesn’t do any of this, sadly 🙁

I have a giant box with all my smaller A&A games in their boxes. It’s almost too heavy to lift! haha

Takes up like an entire shelf in the closet. The boxes alone command a fair bit of space in cubic footage, just to store in your home as an enthusiast. Like it’s a lot to lug around too lol.

If the map board itself was broken into rigid sections, then these could be stored in something like a flat folder rather than a giant box. I don’t know some kind of decorative mission dossier looking thing.

With a slimmer attack profile than a box that’s like 4 inches tall but really beefy in the width/length. Envisioned more as a long haul map protector, flip display maybe. The kind of thing you can get with the bigger initial purchase, but then when newer maps are released they can just sell those as stand alone products that ship separate and slip into the collector’s case once they’re at home.

Instead of a folding map or a rolling mat, you’d get a series of rigid panels, say A3 but you lay them together. Basically aiming for something that doesn’t fold but stacks. Then the weight/sizing would be similar to a book rather than a board game box, and you could embellish it more in that way. Sturdier materials for the panels, or a standard slip protector that just comes with the thing initially. Perhaps doing prints on the obverse too so that each panel can do double duty. As collectors you’d be collecting the maps separately and treating them more like comic books or something I guess. Separate from the units for any expansion campaigns, so the cost isn’t too high there.

Instead of the expense going way up when you get more into the hobby and more advanced in the rules, the purchases would be more constant price, since it’d basically just be updated for the latest manual and map panels. The latter could also have display appeal probably. You know, like you have one box for your units like a cool themed kit box or wooden-looking crate to house the sculpts and dice, then a folder that holds the maps (or any future maps) with some room to spare. Doing this you could issue maps, and not necessarily need new editions or rules for those maps, it could just be like cosmetic updates and new looks periodically, switching the style to service different aesthetics.

Of course pushing out new maps with different connections as you scale up would be a lot of fun, and easier to pull off that too. I still think your starter box needs to have the basics, and be at a price point that’s sensible. If Zombies is 30 bucks at a big box store, then I guess that’s our entry level. If there’s a big scale up (advanced set with more sculpts) that costs another 30 bucks, but isn’t just duplicating what’s in box 1, that makes sense to me. As you push out into tactical boards and combo advanced maps like a G40, they could probably just sell the maps alone keep the price point reasonable and go for more collector appeal with that.

I don’t know seems like it might work. The boxes for these games are quite large right now. The 1940 boxes are large and in charge no doubt, and the giant AA50 I have sitting on it’s side on top a bookshelf cause it’s the only place I could fit the thing in my apartment. It would be really nice if these games could somehow rest conveniently on a regular bookcase, within a more standard sized shelf. AA50’s map panels would only be what like 8x10 inches if they were separated rather than folded? The box by comparison is pretty massive, in terms of the length I mean. And you know that last mile they’re sticking it in an even larger box to ship, just to keep the edges from denting heheh.

Something much taller but more compact in the length, taking up more space vertically but not as long/wide would be ideal. That would be a nice upgrade to how these things are sold. Nobody would want to discard a box to a game once they have it, but if it didn’t need a box to begin with, or only 1 box, that might pretty cool.

I imagine it looking more like a multi volume book collection or a fancy Encyclopedia when the maps are stacked all together on the shelf. They’d ship/present more like books than half a dozen larger board game boxes, if that makes sense. But then you open them and have the panels ready to rock.

Rigid Panels are better than folding cardboard or mats in my view, if only because they make it way easier to move the game once it’s set. Like if you have to carry the thing to another room or whatever. Otherwise you need a much larger rigid backing or have to lift the whole table lol. Rigid map panels could also stack on top of each other with pylons at the corners, so that the game can be stored while still set more easily. The pylons you’d keep in your unit box with all the rest of the kit. The manuals and maps would be in the slimmer book/dossiers type format, so you could keep 'em together all neatly in a row.

@black_elk Totally, I would love a conversion to a “bookshelf” type system for A&A.

Rigid map panels at A3 (like the paper size) would be pretty clutch. I mean it’s the name in the name right? haha

I just think that’d be a great way to present this stuff, like the OED or the Encyclopedia Britannica, except all emblazoned with A&A on the binding.

Maybe some of that cool filigree in the embossing, something fancy like that. I’d really go for a map ‘book’ that recalls the 1940s, like a period piece. Keep the badass cover artwork obviously, but instead of doing a highgloss D20-RPG style sourcebook, have it look more old school.

Top Secret mission dossier. Flat folder, maybe with a string to wrap it closed perhaps? hehe Just that kind of look. I think the box that holds the sculpts should also present like something you’d want to leave out on the shelf as well, rather than sticking in a storage closet or under the bed or wherever. Stuff that looks great for marketing on the shelf in a store, sometimes not quite as slick once you got it home. Especially if you have half a dozen already hehe. If the box was more cubic in shape and designed to hold all the plastic sculpts and pylons, dice, chips, towers, perhaps leave one plane of that box more plain lookin? You know instead of having the graphic flare lighting up on all 6 sides of the cube, leave 1 plane of the box that looks more simple, so that side can face out too.

Then sell the maps separately as campaign books. I prefer rigid panels to rolled mats. I have many mailer tubes and poster tubes, but these things live under beds or in the garage or in closets. If the maps stored more like a book I think it be would a lot easier to justify swooping yet more and more, or pushing them out in smaller editions.

Like you keep the starter set big-box edition in print much longer, but the add on maps can be printed in runs. Like do one every couple years even, tournament time, like the Olympics ya know. Keep the torch burning like that. Then we could collect them like Records. Fav album covers, that sort of present.

ps. one last idea for boxing, this may sound nuts, but organize the sculpts into boxes by unit type, rather than nation/tint color. All infantry of all colors in one box. All tanks of all colors in one box etc. It’s easier to fish by color than by type. It’s just as easy to clear the board for casualties when the units go back by type rather than color. I think players follow the convention of sorting units by color/nation because that was how it’s been done. But if the convention was switched in the initial packaging I think that method of unit storage makes the game faster to play, and easier to pick up.

Instead of the national set up cards drawn on the unit boxes, these boxes might have a larger graphics of each nation’s sculpt/equipment type with some details about it. The attack/def cost values of that unit on the box. When units die and need to be returned to the box, or purchased and need to be fished from the box, if these are already sorted by unit type, it’s very easy to just find your own color among the 6 others. Whereas if you have to dig around in your all-one-colored tray to fish by type this takes a fair bit longer. It’s worth trying if you never have before.

@thrasher1 i hope the judges use the Benny Hill criteria for picking the winner :)

I’m glad to see these back in print!!! I pine for 3rd editions for 1942 and G40 with A3 panels that stack, but I will take it for sure hehe.

I kinda got my hopes set on North Africa honestly. Like don’t get me wrong, firing up a Bridge too Far for Market Garden sounds fun. Or going all Enemy at the Gates Eastern Front or Stalingrad has appeal as well, although current events might have that last a bit charged. One reason I like North Africa is cause it kinda syncs up nicely with the 1942 starter board, whereas the others would feel a bit further along in the timeline of the war. Starting earlier for a tactical board might be cool, cause if they decide on releasing the others later, they could just do it chronologically. North Africa/Med first, then Stalingrad/Eastern front (could maybe be the same game right?) for the end of 2023. Then for 2024 an updated D-Day/Market Garden campaign and have that one hit on the 80 year anniversary. That would be a nice touch

@black_elk said in Renegade Con Virtual: Axis and Allies:

I kinda got my hopes set on North Africa honestly.

ditto :)

map ordered.