The Battlefront Public Relations Fiasco

[ordnance11]

Battlefront is a company that has for the past 15 years or so, had came out with a popular 15mm WWII ruleset. The game is popular in Europe, Canada and the U.S. One of the popular things about the tournament scene is that you can use figures from any manufacturer, not just from Battlefront.
The first rumbling came from the European Grand Tournament rules:

Only Flames of War models may be used in the •
tournament. If non Flames of War models are used
then they will be removed from the army and the player
will play the rest of the tournament with the balance of
his army

There was immediate concern about this. John Paul Bisgotti, one of the BF game designer and founders wrote this as part of an article in the BF Forum as an answer:

The final change we are making is that from the
new season all the events we run with will be only allowing Battlefront
miniatures to be used. This is bound to cause some debate, so let me be
clear as to why we have chosen to go down this path. Joe, Gareth and our
events cost a great deal
of money to run: a little over a quarter of a million American dollars
this year alone. And, although it seems childish to draw a line in the
sand and say, “If you want to play at our events and support the FOW
hobby, you should not be bringing other people’s models along,” it is
absolutely that simple. Our business is a business and we want Flames Of
War to grow; we intend to give it the best support we can, but this
support has a cost.

Let me just say that the overall reaction among those who has been in the FOW community has been underwhelmingly positive.  Mr Bisgotti's response in the forum was this:

If I was a child and wanted to hold my breath I would not be letting
people run around on our forum spouting such utter nonsense but deleting
their posts and banning their accounts but that would be childish and
serve no real purpose as I prefer to read what is said and then comment
when I feel the need.

If Flames Of War is not creating our
own IP I dont know what is and I know that Pete, Phil, Wayne, Evan and
the guys would disagree as they have spent the last ten years of their
lives dedicated to creating a hobby that is the heart of our business
and completely unique. FOW is what drives the WWII 15mm gaming community
and has done for many years and despite other manufacturers of models
it was never any more than just another historical scale before FOW came
along. If supporting your hobby involves you changing sides every time a
business decision upsets you I would ask anybody who enjoyed their free
copy of 3rd edition to speak up and say that we behaved like GW. Stand
up and tell me that we are like any other company and I will give you
five exmaples where we have proven time and again we are not. We are
simply making a choice for our own events and even if you disagree you
should respect us for the right to do so as just like giving away the
rules free to over 50,000 people this year the same people made that
choice so we cant be as bad as some of you would make out.


The problem is that the vocal few with more opinion than understanding
would make it sound like this effects the entire hobby. You are wrong.
Competitive gaming is a part of our hobby and we support it becasue we
want to help that part grow but 90+% of all gamers are casual players
who play in stores and at friends houses and never particpate in a
tournament. These are the core of our business and despite some posters
in this thread claiming to "know" this is a small issue effecting a
gorup of players who however vocal are not the only gamers in the hobby.


Despite it being unwise to comment on this thread it is hard
to read personal attacks on yourself and your team without feeling a
little hurt and whilst I should not defend our choice more as it will
just give some of you more fuel to bleat I stand by what I say. Try and
look at the big picture, remember who we are, what we have done and how
FOW got here and then just decide if that is your hobby or not as you
shoud want to support your hobby and if this or any other decison we
make has you changing your mind then we wish you all the best and thank
you for your business but we will still be here doing our best and
behaving the way we always have.

If they want the business to grow, alienating your customer base is not the way to do it.  The Flames of War ruleset is not the WWII hobby, let alone THE hobby. I would had thought they would have avoided the GW mindset, but I guess not. What ever happens to the customer is always right?
 
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[Rod.H]

......

With what I've seen of Games Workshop, so far they've never done this type of thing in anything I've been at. Yes, there's a floating rule of Forgeworld stuff- yes/no. But to actually gank everything that's not 100% GW product...so many cool conversions they'd loose. I've had the store gretchens/grots go "OOOOH cool, me wants." when I've pulled out the FW stuff I've got (Storm Eagle & Repressor tank)

Meh, it's not like I live somewhere where they actually bother to run official (GW rHQ organised) events beside Games Day & its related modelling events (Golden Demon, Armies on Parade).

Flames Of War had, before this, began to catch some of my attention. Now, it's lost it, for I've got enough wargaming minatures to work on and to find local places to play games with them.

--Rod.H

[robkelk]

Hmmmmm... Somebody at Battlefront needs to take a look at how companies in other industries do this sort of thing.

For example:

Battlefront makes its base 15mm-minis ruleset available for free. Daz3D makes its base 3D-modeling software available for free.

Battlefront makes a line of minis that can be used with its base ruleset. Daz3D makes a line of content that can be used with its base software.

Battlefront designed its base ruleset to be compatible with anybody's minis in the same broad class. Daz3D designed its base software to be compatible with anybody's content in the same broad class.

Battlefront gets upset when people use other companies' minis. Daz3D promotes the use of other companies' content... and appear to be doing better financially than are their competition.

Somebody want to compare FoW with the iPod?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[ordnance11]

......

With what I've seen of Games Workshop, so far they've never done this type of thing in anything I've been at. Yes, there's a floating rule of Forgeworld stuff- yes/no. But to actually gank everything that's not 100% GW product...so many cool conversions they'd loose. I've had the store gretchens/grots go "OOOOH cool, me wants." when I've pulled out the FW stuff I've got (Storm Eagle & Repressor tank)

Meh, it's not like I live somewhere where they actually bother to run official (GW rHQ organised) events beside Games Day & its related modelling events (Golden Demon, Armies on Parade).

Flames Of War had, before this, began to catch some of my attention. Now, it's lost it, for I've got enough wargaming minatures to work on and to find local places to play games with them.

--Rod.H

Rod, their rule applies to tournaments that is run directly by Battlefront. Your local LGS or any the big regional competitions that is not run by Battlefront does not apply. Currently, only the 3 National tournaments in the U.S. plus the Masters fall under this rule.
What is to prevent them from pushing this rule down the chain eventually, though? This rule smacks of all sorts of -isms. A hobby is by definition is something you pay to do because it's fun.
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[ordnance11]

The main thread in the FOW forum had 838 replies and 48384 views within 48 hours. Considering there are about 50000 registered members, that's just about everybody, even with multiple views. It also spawned about 8 other threads. All of which are in lock down.
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[WengFook]

Good luck if they attempt to push it down the chain.. They'll run into the old problem of trying to enforce it.

That said I'm not quite sure what the fuss is about. What exactly is wrong with them wanting people to play with their official mini's at their official/sanctioned tournaments? Is it the way it was presented or is there something else that is offending people?
_________________________________
Take Your Candle, Go Light Your World.

[ordnance11]

Good luck if they attempt to push it down the chain.. They'll run into the old problem of trying to enforce it.

That said I'm not quite sure what the fuss is about. What exactly is wrong with them wanting people to play with their official mini's at their official/sanctioned tournaments? Is it the way it was presented or is there something else that is offending people?

A couple of problems:
1.  It was their previous policy that you can bring any WW II miniatures to their events. The abrupt way they announced the change (buried in the tournament packet of the European Grand Nationals) and then Brisgotti's reaction to the outcry further fanned the flames.
2.  The claim of BF that Flames of War is the HOBBY.  It's a subset of historical wargaming, not the entire hobby. No, more than GW is the HOBBY.
3. If their reason for this change is the amount of money they're spending for promotion of the game, then either cut back or be more creative in promotion. The tournament scene was doing fine when BF decided to do jump in as well. It wasn't a problem when they were holding only 1 Nationals. Deciding to expand it to 3 Nationals and then do a Masters tournament was not really necessary.
4. BF is a business, but they seem to forget that their customer base are hobbyists. Wargamers may be fond of game rules, but once someone decided to start imposing rules by fiat from above, that riles me and just about everyone else. Everyone else is defined by FOW players in America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Britain. Have not heard on the forums FOW players from anywhere else, chime in. It's bad enough when I have to deal with rules and regulations at work and I work for Uncle Sam. Telling me what to do in my fun time? *Raises the red flag*
5.  BF states it won't affect the casual gamer only the tournament player. Well, who are these guys? They're the ones that are really dedicated to the game. The equivalent of  "wandering warrior" of yore. The ones who spends time and money to go to tournaments. The ones who buy a great majority of FOW merchandise. The reason they might have non-FOW stuff is because BF has not made it yet or is out and also of budgetary constraints. The one who puts up with the falling pages from hard bound books and the "cut and paste" errors that BF won't fix until the next book (which you have to buy). The ones whose word carries weight in their local FOW community. And you want to piss these guys off to a man?
6. Last but not least, is the camel's nose in the tent scenario. If BF pushes it through for their tournaments, how long would it be before they decide to push it to the big regional tournaments they don't control. "Either certify they're all BF models in your tournament or it won't be recognize by us as a qualifier." Good luck with enforcing that.
7. Which leads us to the last question: Enforcement? Who are they going to do that? Get someone dressed like Arnold Toht to inspect the figures prior to the start of the game? I can see the con organizers having issues with that. All it takes is someone to bring a whole force of non-BF  figures, cause a scene and the word really gets out that BF has gone the way of GW. 
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[ordnance11]

http://www.flamesofwar.co...tabid=57&art_id=3380

In all the years we have been in business
we have had an open and honest policy about listening to our gamers and
genuinely taking their views on board to the extent of sometimes
changing our plans. We apologise for the confusion and angst our
announcement has caused as it was never our intention. We did not see
this change as a big problem as we were simply formalising something we
already thought was existing practise, albeit informally.


In the interests of compromise and fairness to everybody’s opinion we
will change the word “all” to “majority” (meaning over half) in the
tournament rules for the 2013 season. Although we were not clear enough
about this last week we did not consider die cast planes, scratch built
models or objectives (assuming they are the right size), terrain or
models we do not currently make to be covered by this. As is always the
case, if you are unsure simply get in touch with your tournament
organiser and clarify the situation but we are going to revert to the
best option in all cases, common sense.










The new season rules take effect from the masters in December this year and only apply
to the officially run Battlefront tournaments listed on our site.
Independent tournaments are free to choose their own system, as they
always have been.




One of the feedback ideas that did come back from our weekend
conversations that we really liked was to also further reward people who
came along with 100% Battlefront armies. This is an idea that we will
definitely work on for the future.



We are committed to supporting and growing the Flames Of War hobby
and want to invest more in the future, in events, the website and
programs like the Rangers all of which we are happy to spend money on to provide this to you for free.



We want to thank our moderators for doing such a sterling job this
weekend especially given they had no warning at all. We appreciate all
the civil comments whether for or against. We feel that our compromise
shows that we believed all views have merit. We hope this once again
proves that we do listen.

That's a relief. They did listen. I am amazed on how fast the problem was discovered and resolved.
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[ECSNorway]

Seems like they listened, but that's not much of a response.

They're still enforcing a "must buy our stuff" policy.

They're just defending it by saying "Well, we thought we were the only people selling them anyway".
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[robkelk]

So, who else publishes WWII minis rules nowadays?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[ordnance11]

The only one I see that is closest to BF is Blitzkreig Commander
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[Mark Skarr]

Two things:
#1 "The customer is always right" has never been an actual policy anywhere in the successful business world. Customers made that up to try to make themselves feel better. Customers have no idea what is going on, or why within the business. Sure, we'll try to do right by the customer, but they don't know anything that happens behind the scenes and that, invariably, makes them "wrong."

#2 Monkey Fist and I have the same question: "How could they tell? 15mm WWII figs all look the same. Not much room for detail."