Munchkin Game Changer

[Mister Ed]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hackard

* This does absolutely nothing to make Munchkinomicon Dice more cost-effective. Sorry.

I just thought that the continued availability of Munchkinomicon in some form might make it more plausible to do an add-on for it. Oh well. I didn't have MUCH of a hope. :-)

[UncleBob]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hackard

* We are not reprinting booster packs; my statement was very carefully worded. I never said we would not reprint or reuse the *cards* from those booster packs, and in fact Holiday Surprise should have served as notice that we very well might do exactly that.

I don't disagree that your statement, as you say, was "carefully worded".

All I'm saying is if I was a more casual player who didn't follow everything Munchkin, read the post that you said the booster wasn't going to be reprinted, went out and spent $20 on getting one, then, three days later, found out that you were re-releasing the exact cards from the booster along side a bunch of other stuff for, likely, around the same price I just paid for the booster alone... I'd be irked. Not something worth fighting about over, as it wasn't me who got ripped off. It just, for a second time, serves as a warning to me not to take anything stated here at face value and to always try to read between the lines to see what tricks are being played behind the curtain. That's all. "Caveat emptor" and all that jazz.

[Enzzo]

Even if The Munchkinomicon would never be available again, you can still get it for its retail price. The person who paid $18 got ripped off, for sure, but it's not the fault of anyone at SJG. They just failed to shop around.

[RL]

Andrew, are you allowed to tell us the names of the "four cards formerly only available directly from Steve Jackson Games"?

[Andrew Hackard]

I would prefer to wait until the set is available at B&N.

A general note: please remember that our company policy is that we cannot and do not discuss unannounced releases. In this case, that prohibition extended even to hinting about it, because doing otherwise would harm not only SJ Games but quite possibly B&N as well -- and it certainly wouldn't do anything good for one of SJ Games' strongest partnerships!

And I think I have been pretty transparent about saying that, in general, it's a very bad idea to pay several times cover price for anything that is recently out of print; if you dig around, you can almost always find a store that has backstock and would be happy to make the sale at cover price.

People are upset because I answered a question that was asked and didn't volunteer information that was not mine to share. I'm really not sure what I would be expected to do differently except ignore the question entirely, and that seems even less likely to please folks.

[UncleBob]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hackard

I would prefer to wait until the set is available at B&N.

A general note: please remember that our company policy is that we cannot and do not discuss unannounced releases. In this case, that prohibition extended even to hinting about it, because doing otherwise would harm not only SJ Games but quite possibly B&N as well -- and it certainly wouldn't do anything good for one of SJ Games' strongest partnerships!

And I think I have been pretty transparent about saying that, in general, it's a very bad idea to pay several times cover price for anything that is recently out of print; if you dig around, you can almost always find a store that has backstock and would be happy to make the sale at cover price.

People are upset because I answered a question that was asked and didn't volunteer information that was not mine to share. I'm really not sure what I would be expected to do differently except ignore the question entirely, and that seems even less likely to please folks.

Andrew,

I'm not "mad" or "upset" with you. As I said, ultimately, as someone who bought these boosters several months ago, it doesn't effect me at all (actually, I'm kinda excited, as I'm thinking a second Munchkinomicon would go well in one of my other core sets).

But, that's not to say that I don't feel that what was stated, while factually correct, was morally questionable - at best.

Let's be real. The difference between "reprinting a booster" and "reprinting the cards in a booster" is, to the vast majority of people, a miniscule difference. Actually, I'll take that back - to the vast majority of people, there's no difference.

Even your "strongest partners" and BFFs at Barnes and Noble can't tell the difference "boosters" and "cards in the boosters" - the product description on their website VERY CLEARLY says that the set is "a way to get five hard to find boosters all at once." Not "a way to get the cards from five hard to get boosters."

What could have been done differently? Well, there was the Illuminator post that said "Grab one quick, because they won't be getting any more." And sure, FLGS's aren't getting any more, but the intent of this post was to convince folks that the set was going to be hard to get - right before you made a mass re-release at a nationwide retailer.

Then, when the other post came up, you could have stated something along the lines of "Currently, Munchkinomicon stand-alone boosters are not available via distributors. Stay tuned though." Is that hinting at the B&N pack? No. Because it specifically mentioned the Munchkinomicon booster, which is a completely different product, right?

Originally Posted by Enzzo

Even if The Munchkinomicon would never be available again, you can still get it for its retail price. The person who paid $18 got ripped off, for sure, but it's not the fault of anyone at SJG. They just failed to shop around.

I'm not saying the person who paid $18 got a great deal by any means. However, they indicated in their OP that the booster was hard for them to find, which tells me that they had tried shopping around some. They've given me no reason to disbelieve them.

[Donovan]

Well, now I can get get fairy dust, and have duplicates of everything else

I'll say I am mixed on the idea of exclusive products for big retailers, but I imagine they probably ask for those sort of things.

[charbow]

This is fantastic for me. I only need three of those listed since I bought Fairy Dice and Fairy Dust Dice already.

[MIB 9966]

UncleBob,

It's unrealistic to say that Andrew ocould have said anything at all or hint at the existence of a set like this if B&N suddenly chose to drop carrying the set for some reason prior to it being released, especialy if something like this leaked out and the partnership fell apart. Then the fans and the partner are now upset at SJG and that would be even less helpful, especially in the future as it would mean that Target or any other future partner may now be wary of SJG's for other exclusive products. The repercussions would be far worse than a one time brief upset group of fans, and extremely bad for the business. Of course, this is just the opinion of a fan/MIB and completely uninformed of the internal business side of things.

I would also say that buying something recently out of print but with a huge print run at such a huge markup is simply up to the buyer to research and make sure that they are not taken advantage of, not SJG, who have no control over the secondary market. The sellers usually have automated systems to bump up the prices of anything people list as out of print to insane numbers and they prey on people who see something as out of print and "need it immediately", so we see the outrageous multi-thousand dollar prices for a game that is still widely available. As Andrew said, if it is so recently out of print (or out of stock from the company, more accurately), I find it hard to believe that it could not be found for less than 4x list price.

No, without having seen the post in question, I see in the US, Paizo has it for $4.49 as of this writing: http://paizo.com/products/btpy8hem?M...icon-Expansion

A well known and reputable seller and it is indeed less than the listed retail price. I do note the buyer did state they found it cheaper than the $18+ shipping, so hopefully they did in fact get close to retail pricing.

[UncleBob]

As I said before, it's not really worth fighting over. It's really not that big of a deal, it just serves as a warning that official statements from the company should be taken with a grain of salt, that's all...

Originally Posted by MIB 9966

It's unrealistic to say that Andrew ocould have said anything at all or hint at the existence of a set like this [...]

... again, the suggestion I gave doesn't hint at a set like this, as it doesn't mention anything but the individual booster, which Andrew has very clearly said is a separate product and therefore unconnected with this one... right? Or are you saying you don't believe that either?

As for the "should have shopped around" comments... ugh.

I can't speak for anyone else, but do you know what "shopping around" for me would be? I have two Friendly "local" Game Stores. One is about an hour one direction, while the other is about an hour and a half in the other direction. The closer store is actually more of a comic shop and they carry a very small selection of Munchkin product. The other one ROCKS, but is a 3-hour round trip. Thankfully, if I need something, I can usually hit them up on Facebook.

Beyond that, there's a city about a two-hour drive away that used to have two stores in it, but I don't even know if they're still open.

Now, combine this with the "gotta have it now" that you mentioned (which would only be made more powerful by the Illuminator post saying "OMG get them now!!!111"), it's easy to understand why someone might be taken advantage of online. Even more so, when some sites are known for not managing their inventory very well. A few months ago, I placed an order through a very, very reputable site (and one that I'd still suggest ordering from) and got a message the next day of "whoops, we're out of stock of this."

Again, I'm not saying that paying $18 is wise.

Aside from that - if someone was in a hurry to get it (because they were given the false impression that if they don't get it now, they'll likely never get it), Ordering it from Paizo would have ran them $7.75 - about 40% of what the B&N set (which comes with some neat exclusives) would run.