CMON's Hate, "Exclusivity," FOMO, and Josh's post about combat systems

That a mouthful of a subject line, eh?

I know there was a post about CMON's Hate. My Search-fu failed me, otherwise I would have necro-threaded the topic.

Hate!

I received an email sales promo from Miniature Market this week. They are the "exclusive retailer" for CMON's Hate. Hate was a successful 2018 CMON Kickstarter Campaign. Among it's many "features," Hate was marketed as a Kickstarter Exclusive. If you wanted a copy, you were led to believe that Kickstarter was the service for acquisition.

Funny how things change in three years.

Does anybody care to share their thoughts about this development?

I guess MM has done this before with other CMON titles, but not one that was originally marketed solely as a KS exclusive. MM is undercutting the core box price, but keeping the expansions higher. It's promoted as a "sale," and the website features prices slashed through retail figures. But... How do those even exist if it was a KS exclusive?

I don't own the game. At the time of the Kickstarter, I wasn't terribly impressed with the marketing gimmick, the game, or the artwork. This, despite me really digging Adrian Smith's illustrations.

I have not read the Hate comic/graphic novels.

But now... I wonder. I visited BGG and read the reviews. I jumped onto Facebook groups and admired the painted miniatures. This thing seems to be a big, overproduced, dice chucking skirmish game. It appears remarkably detailed, but the ruleset is remarkably simple.

Is that bad? Is it okay to be interested in some kill-or-be-killed war-band destroying a wickedly similar-looking war-band with a buddy for 60 minutes? I can't imaging playing this sober, so the idea of a simple combat system may not be that bad. I think the worse part may be the number of dice accidentally falling off the table.

It's all strange to me. Everything is strange. At least I can play Rangers of Shadow Deep solo...

Short of government mandate, there is no such thing as Exclusivity.

Ever.

It had an edgelord attitude that was the biggest of turnoffs. It's also CMON.

Don't do it.

FOMO bullshit is part of the Kickstarter experience. The lag time between "pledging" and actually getting something is usually so long that people forget about what they were FOMO-frothing about in the first place.

Couple that with the absolute deluge of boardgame campaigns on Kickstarter at any given time, people ultimately have very short attention spans for this kind of thing. Some may complain and vow never to support another CMON campaign ever again, but then The New Boardgame appears, with minis made out of FOMO-foam, and the cycle begins anew.

Josh Look wrote: It had an edgelord attitude that was the biggest of turnoffs.

yea i dont remember the exact stuff in question but there was some real offputting stuff in there if memory serves.

i mean this kickstarter trailer sums it up. its a 13yo's version of mature and cool edgy content.

You can drag people off and eat them I think.

I considered buying this but ultimately backed away. There is just no chance it's better than Mythic Battles Pantheon and Warhammer Underworlds.

Additionally, most people say it's only worth playing if you commit to a campaign.

A guy in my group decided to buy the base game so I will get to try it at some point. I would be a little upset if I backed this and then they sold it.

My experience with KS is pretty limited (Tiny Epic stuff, Leder Games stuff (i.e. Root)), mostly to things where it's just serving as a marketing platform for stuff that's going to be retail, anyway. I will say that it's been difficult obtaining things that were "KS exclusive" like the Fox clan for Rising Sun and that has generally turned me off to those kinds of campaigns. If it's going to be more difficult to trade for because of the campaign, I'm generally going to sign off on the game to begin with. The most prominent example of this was Etherfields. I was attracted because it was Michal Oracz, of Neuroshima Hex fame, but somewhat repelled because it looked like an overproduced mess (and it is...) But what made the decision for me, instantly, was when they included a "first 24 hours" pledge bonus. I'm just not interested in that kind of marketing, where someone else's copy of the game is "better" or "more complete" because they hover over Kickstarter. That doesn't speak to me of either good design principles or interest in actually engaging with your fans/consumers.

You lost me at "CMON".

Jackwraith wrote: That doesn't speak to me of either good design principles or interest in actually engaging with your fans/consumers.

Unfortunately it speaks to most, and that's always been the issue with the "wisdom of the masses". Kickstarter is as clear a confirmation of everything H.L. Mencken wrote as you're going to get. The rabble decides, and on occasion the rabble is stupid as hell. The rest of us are along for the ride.

Anything that is sold anywhere enters into the open market the minute it starts shipping to consumers. CMON's option to sell through Miniature Market is no different than individual owners selling their copies, often spares, for whatever price the market will provide. I'd be curious to know why the original buyers are more upset -- because they paid more than MM's price, or because their "investment" in the game got its legs kicked out from under it by MM have a few hundred copies to sell brand new.

I'm only interested in their underdeveloped "Or Not" catalog.

Josh Look wrote: I'm only interested in their underdeveloped "Or Not" catalog.

they reprinted Modern Art and Blue Moon City, and published The Grizzled, Ethnos, and Gizmos. pretty good lineup tbh.

I find that the further removed I am from anything CMON does, the happier I am. It’s a garbage company that makes garbage games. Give it a couple of months and this stupid bullshit will be on MM’s Big Summer Clearance or whatever.

They blundered their only good game, Ethnos, and I’m OK owning another edition of Modern Art.

Michael Barnes wrote: I find that the further removed I am from anything CMON does, the happier I am. It’s a garbage company that makes garbage games. Give it a couple of months and this stupid bullshit will be on MM’s Big Summer Clearance or whatever.

They blundered their only good game, Ethnos, and I’m OK owning another edition of Modern Art.

Yeah, I'm not on board with that at all. The Others is a great game. Blood Rage is a great game. Rising Sun is an excellent game. If you notice I'm listing all Eric Lang projects, then you'll understand my connection to CMON. That is, however, as far as it goes, aside from the aforementioned excellent reprint of Modern Art. (The art- so, in other words, the theme of the game -is just better in the CMON version.)

I have not read the Hate comic/graphic novels.

When I read this, I thought, "Huh! So they made Pete Bagge's comics into a board game? There's a board game about everything now!"

Jason Lutes wrote:

I have not read the Hate comic/graphic novels.

When I read this, I thought, "Huh! So they made Pete Bagge's comics into a board game? There's a board game about everything now!"

Truly one of my all time favorite comics.