Federation Admiral Public Update

Charles Lewis · Post by **Charles Lewis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 5:51 pm

My opinion of the playtesters' reactions was that it boiled down to whether they "got it" or not. One guy pretty much just flipped through, said "too complicated," then whipped off a long meandering email to Steven V. Cole trying to say that.

Others, like Battlegroup:Mufreesboro (check your playtesting credits on anything ADB has published for the last many years), struggled a little bit at first, then got the overall concept, and dove in head-first and really got into it.

The big thing is that VBAM is quite different from anything ADB has published both in form and function. Love it or hate it, ADB has developed a pretty unique identity for itself over the years, and I think some of the comments just stem from being presented a product not cast out of the same mold.

Jay's work on the local campaign system with the missions and objectives is truly phenomenal and truly gives one the feel of an episode (or even a season) of classic Star Trek. I think that's where a lot of players are going to settle in 1) because of the generally low unit density, it would actually possible to play out most, if not all, of the battles in Federation Commander where one so inclined and 2) it's just plain fun! and 3) quite different from previous ADB attempts at campaign play.

I'm anxious to see the general reaction from the community (both ours and ADB's) so hopefully it will still get published before year's end.

Gareth_Perkins · Post by **Gareth_Perkins** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:02 pm

Charles Lewis wrote:One guy pretty much just flipped through, said "too complicated," then whipped off a long meandering email to Steven V. Cole trying to say that.

Wow,

I mean, he's a SFB player right? SFB wrote the book on "too complicated" in many folks' books... (It's far more complex even than something like SITS - and that plays in full-3D),

Charles Lewis wrote:I'm anxious to see the general reaction from the community (both ours and ADB's) so hopefully it will still get published before year's end.

Trust me, we're all anxious to give you our reactions! And the bigger the delay the more anxious we're all going to feel about it...

Shadow Warrior · Post by **Shadow Warrior** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 10:26 pm

158 pages? That ain't so big. I mean the SFB rulebook is what, 500 pages or something? I know a lot of that is scenarios and ship descriptions but seems a lot of those 158 FA pages are scenarios as well.

Obviously I can't blame ADB for putting their own products first, who could, but seems this talk of the rulebook being too complicated or too long is a tad off beam. It's just a capacity scheduling issue, plain and simple.

I'm so gutted. It had better not slip to next year otherwise I will be... displeased.

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 11:50 am

Shadow Warrior wrote: I'm so gutted. It had better not slip to next year otherwise I will be... displeased.

Thank you for your support though. In the mean time I have a bunch of scenarios I am polishing up for the release and campaign testing the ships that will show up in Briefing 3. So we can always discuss and mull over new scenarios and the like.

I also owe Tyrel a review of the latest 2E stuff.

-Jay

Shadow Warrior · Post by **Shadow Warrior** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 3:26 pm

mwaschak wrote:Thank you for your support though. In the mean time I have a bunch of scenarios I am polishing up for the release and campaign testing the ships that will show up in Briefing 3. So we can always discuss and mull over new scenarios and the like.

I also owe Tyrel a review of the latest 2E stuff.

-Jay

Sounds good to me. Any chance of a sneaky peek at one of the scenarios, just so we can see the sort of thing we are talking about in terms of granularity and what have you?

Or maybe a draft table of contents?

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 4:24 pm

Shadow Warrior wrote: Sounds good to me. Any chance of a sneaky peek at one of the scenarios, just so we can see the sort of thing we are talking about in terms of granularity and what have you?

Or maybe a draft table of contents?

Sure! I need all kinds of help with the new scenarios I am working on. There is a mountain of fiction that needs checked, and some consistancy issues with the scenarios themselves. I can't share much about FA anymore, but the new stuff is fine. Just PM me your email address.

I hope they can get "First Campaigns" posted sometime too.

-Jay

Shadow Warrior · Post by **Shadow Warrior** » Fri Sep 18, 2009 1:44 pm

PM sent.

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Fri Sep 18, 2009 1:47 pm

Shadow Warrior wrote:PM sent.

Great, let's see if The Dissenter is worth reading

.

-Jay

Shadow Warrior · Post by **Shadow Warrior** » Mon Sep 21, 2009 12:43 pm

mwaschak wrote:
Shadow Warrior wrote:PM sent.
Great, let's see if The Dissenter is worth reading .

-Jay

Sorry, Jay, can you please send again? I had a d'oh moment and deleted it irreversibly!

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 12:38 pm

Crossposted from: http://www.federationcommander.com/blog/

"The delay in K20M will probably kick Federation Admiral (set for 19 October) back to November 16th. (And remember that F&E 2010, also set for November 16, has priority so if there is only time to do one, it won't be FA.) This is just an ugly reality of game production. We have thousands of dollars invested in countersheets for Hydran Attack and F&E 2010 and we need to get those products onto the market without delay. We have no cash tied up in Federation Admiral, and even if it will sell better than FCHA and F&E 2010, we have to print those first due to the cash tied up in them."

Gareth_Perkins · Post by **Gareth_Perkins** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 12:43 pm

Well, the basic delay doesn't seem too bad ('cept I'll also have to wait for it to ship to the UK as well...),

I guess we'll just have to hope for the best,

Thanks for the cross-post,

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 2:14 pm

Gareth_Perkins wrote: Thanks for the cross-post

You're welcome! I am glad I can give you some information on the progress.

I am still planning to run a PBEM for new players when something is available, and with any luck, you won't have to wait for First Campaigns to ship

.

This autumn will probably be busy with PBEMs between FA and the 2E playtesting.

-Jay

Gareth_Perkins · Post by **Gareth_Perkins** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 2:56 pm

I'm not sure I'd count as a new player (and I appreciate that new players should get priority), but if you do have any spare slots and don't mind me being in a totally different time-zone feel free to count me in for the pbem game,

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Sep 22, 2009 3:47 pm

Gareth_Perkins wrote:I'm not sure I'd count as a new player (and I appreciate that new players should get priority), but if you do have any spare slots and don't mind me being in a totally different time-zone feel free to count me in for the pbem game,

I think we will find room for everyone, honestly. A lot will depend on what kind of complexity and scale the players on the whole want to play too.

-Jay

mwaschak · Post by **mwaschak** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 11:30 am

ADB Staff Meeting: Reviewed progress on projects. Voted to kick F&E 2010, Fed Admiral, and FCB3 to next year and move Captain’s Log up to 16 November.

----

Sorry everyone.

-Jay

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