Well, its all over for another year...... ;-)
The huge Salute show yesterday was amazing, exhausting and, I'm glad to say,
very profitable! Held for the first time at Olympia rather than the usual
Kensington Town Hall, we thought the show went really well for traders, games
and punters alike. There was much more room to move both behind and in front
of the tradestands, and having everything in one huge hall was so much better
than the previous spread out affairs. Kudos and thanks to all from South
London Warlords for the massive organisational effort which (as far as we
could see anyway) ran amazingly smoothly all day.
Sales were phenomenal - despite bringing all we could get cast, by
mid-afternoon we were running out of many of the FT ships, especially
the Kra'Vak and the new UN stuff! There was literally no time during the day
when there wasn't at least one solid row of customers across the frontage of
the GZG stand (and flowing round the ends!), and for most of the time it was
actually two, three and sometimes even four rows deep with people trying to
buy stuff! Sorry if anyone had to wait too long, and many, many thanks and all
credit to the stand crew of Tim, Paul, Patrick and Alex who worked their butts
off all day! I did actually get a cursory look round the rest of the
tradestands, and there looks to be some interesting new stuff coming up here
and there.
Now, onto what proved to be the best and worst thing about the day -
Fleet
Book 2......
I collected a couple of boxes of advance copies from the printers on Friday
afternoon, had a flick through them while loading everything else up and it
all looked fine - the illustrations in particular have come out very
nicely, and I was just very relieved to actually have copies for the show! It
wasn't until Saturday morning when we arrived at the show that it was
discovered that the printers had f****d up........ they'd managed to print one
of the text pages twice, and leave one page out!!!!!!! Everything at all the
proofing stages had been fine, it was simply a mistake made when they were
making the plates for press; because of the rush to get some
copies out of the door, no-one had spotted it at all. The only fortunate
part of it all was that the missing page was the first part of the Phalon
introductory background bumf, so at least it did not contain anything vital
to the actual rules, designs or gameplay - it was only the fluff.
After the shouting had died down and the printers (one of whom was with us on
the day....) had been suitably chastised (at one point I considered borrowing
a large sword from the Fight School stand so he could commit Seppuku quietly
in the corner, but decided that the Olympia security would probably bill us
for the carpet...), we had to decide what to do to rescue the situation. The
only options were to sell copies anyway, or to take orders and promise to mail
copies on once they were reprinted; in the end, we decided to do both. So, we
sold the books as normal (as the missing page really didn't affect the
usefulness of the book for its main function, that of a ship design and rule
supplement!) and at the same time explained to every purchaser exactly what
had happened, and took everyone's name and address. Every person who bought a
copy at Salute will have a second, corrected copy mailed out to them (entirely
at the printers' expense!) as soon as the revised version is off the presses,
so will actually end up with two copies for the price of one (and, of course,
the "rare" misprints may well become sought after gamers' collectables in
years to come.... <grin>).
I'm glad to say that this got round the potential disaster very well -
certainly no-one that I served personally had any reservations about
this, and a I don't think that we lost any sales over it.
We have been promised that the corrected reprint WILL by available for us the
take up to Triples at Sheffield next weekend, and I'll be mailing out
all the playetsters' freebies and the pre-ordered (mailorder) copies in
the following week (obviously, there is no point in sending out the faulty
ones by mailorder!).
Aside from all this, I must say the book looks very nice (worth all the effort
and pain!), and judging by the amount of KV, SV and Phalon ship minis we
shifted at the show there will be a lot of alien fleets out on game tables
around the country before too long....
So, Salute is over for another year- by next year we'll all have
forgotten just was a totally knackering day it really is, and we'll all go
back
again...... ;-)
From: "Ground Zero Games" <jon@gzg.com>
> Sales were phenomenal - despite bringing all we could get cast, by
So we can expect buckets full of aliens at the next show then Jon ;-)
Especially the Sa'Vasku, who seem to be one of the more "interesting" aliens
to play.
<joke> FLEET BOOK 2 ERRATA
</joke>
> So we can expect buckets full of aliens at the next show then Jon ;-)
aliens
> to play.
There'll be some, trust me....... ;-)
> </joke>
On the subject of errata, we've done a reprint run of FB1 at the same time as
FB2, and we've taken the opportunity to fix all the errors in the first
printing. Nothing else has changed (except our new logo is now on the cover in
place of the old version), so you don't need to rush out and get another copy
(unless you REALLY want to of course, in which case we won't turn your money
away....) but all the mistakes that we'd spotted or had pointed out to us
should now be fixed in all the copies we are selling from now on.
> From: "Ground Zero Games" <jon@gzg.com>
> Ground Zero Games wrote:
> From: "Ground Zero Games" <jon@gzg.com>
;-)
> Jon (GZG)
Yes, of course. He forgot the Islamic Federation, the New
Israelis, the Chills--excuse me, Independent Antacrticans--and
others.
After all, Jon, you've got a few days until FB2.01 comes back
from the printer--you don't want to waste that time...
> On Sun, 2 Apr 2000 14:37:04 +0100, Ground Zero Games writes:
Is the [OFFICIAL] errata available somewhere online that I can print out and
stick into my FB1 copy?
> Jon T. wrote:
> <joke>
<g> I have one already (not exactly errata, more like a clarification):
The PBL description says that "...they inflict a number of full dice of damage
(...) equal to their size, on ALL ships within that radius...".
What it doesn't say, though it means it, is that fighters and missiles
within that radius are also hit (of course - it's an area effect weapon
just like WGs or NCs!) so they're automatically destroyed if they're within a
PB's burst radius. You *can* use fighters to shoot down PBs, but you'd better
destroy the PBs completely if you try this <g>
Later,
FTFB1 Errata is listed at:
http://members.xoom.com:80/rlyehable/ft/ft25/ftfb_errata.html
This is an early version of the Errata (May 17, 1998) and therefore may be
missing some errors found later.
---
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net <mailto:bkb@beol.net>
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/ft/
---
[quoted original message omitted]
The FB1 errata
Its been on the FT FAQ for ages and I've tracked most/all posted
issues from the list - JT can confer if its absolutley
up to date, but I assume it is, otherwise I'd like a ecopy too.
> From: "Ground Zero Games" <jon@gzg.com>
No way you've fianlly got ya FB2. Now let Jon start on work on the Alien
ground combat rules for DS and SG.:)
It was written:
> > OK Jon, time to start work on FB3: The UN, the OU, the Caliphate and
> No way you've finally got ya FB2. Now let Jon start on work on the
Indeed. With all those Sa'vasku, Phalon and Kravak ships, surely they must
protecting transports carrying an enormous armour contingent, ready to
assault the human worlds! :-)
DS2 players will gladly provide several armor columns and air cav to this
purpose.
-----
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
-----
> -----Original Message-----
> Bell, Brian K wrote:
> DS2 players will gladly provide several armor columns and air cav to
The SG2 players will provide several Spec Ops infantry platoons to the purpose
also.
"treat your plane like your women, jump in them about 5 times a day and take
'em
to heaven and back." -Captain FlashHeart
Bring 'em on.... Dulce et Decorum Est.....
BBack
----Original Message Follows----
From: "Andrew Martin" <Al.Bri@xtra.co.nz>
Reply-To: gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU
To: <gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU>
Subject: Re: [OFFICIAL] Salute, FB2 and stuff......
Date: Mon, 3 Apr 2000 20:37:41 +1200
It was written:
> > OK Jon, time to start work on FB3: The UN, the OU, the Caliphate
> No way you've finally got ya FB2. Now let Jon start on work on the
Indeed. With all those Sa'vasku, Phalon and Kravak ships, surely they must
protecting transports carrying an enormous armour contingent, ready to
assault the human worlds! :-)
I have several platoons of PA infantry and an Artillery battery who are just
slobbering to help....
(I know, I know, the Starboys will argue that groundpounders ALWAYS slobber,
but at least they don't do it to our faces....)
BBack
----Original Message Follows----
From: "Bell, Brian K" <Brian_Bell@dscc.dla.mil>
Reply-To: gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU
To: "'gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU'" <gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU>
Subject: RE: [OFFICIAL] Salute, FB2 and stuff......
Date: Mon, 3 Apr 2000 06:41:36 -0400
DS2 players will gladly provide several armor columns and air cav to this
purpose.
-----
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
-----
> -----Original Message-----
BBack slobbered:
> I have several platoons of PA infantry and an Artillery battery
Not "argue" but "observe". "Argue" implies that the facts are
in doubt. :-)
However, I'd be willing to agree that "Bugs Don't Surf" is due. One sheet 8.5"
x 11", printed on both sides, should be about
right...
From: Brian Bilderback <bbilderback@hotmail.com>
> Bring 'em on.... Dulce et Decorum Est.....
Remember that the guy who said that had never done it.
> There'll be some, trust me....... ;-)
Like the one in the miniatures list at the back? Or should we all order packs
of UNSC destroyers today? A pack of six for the price
that gets you a pack of two in the other fleets is a bargain. ;-)
Yet.....
----Original Message Follows----
> On 4-Apr-00 at 00:04, Laserlight (laserlight@quixnet.net) wrote:
I still think there needs to be an addendum to the SG rules so the grunts can
fight aboard the starships. Boarding party rules should be a natural.