Meta BrikWars Topic

[Natalya]

So I am wondering about the future of BrikWars. Rayhawk conjured up the game over 15 years ago or something and it was totally ghetto and no one played it, but now we have an active forum with many members who love the game and it has a legit rulebook and a great number of dedicated BrikWarriors. The forum has taken a life of its own and player participation on the message boards has influenced the rules and changed the way the game is played, especially with the forum battles.

What I want to know is where do we go from here? Some more dedicated forum members envisioned Ragnablock, which I dismissed immediately because I figured it would never happen. BrikWars as a game is not played frequently enough. In fact, I would guess that most of the increase in it being played over the last three years could be attributed to the invention of Forum Battles. It is incredibly rare for two (or more) members of this board to meet eachother and fight. In total I have probably met more of you than anyone else including Rayhawk, but the total number of you all that I have played against IRL is only 6. 7 if you count this one guy who I played against at Dragon*Con 2011 and got to join the board, but he only ended up posting here twice.

The point is I would like this game's fanbase to mature enough so that we could have a Ragnablok type event (even if it was small) or something, instead of it just being me travelling literally thousands of miles to battle with y'all. If more people were on this board because they played BrikWars then we would all have an easier time finding opponents to play with.

I think it is worth it because I have my most recent battle (with Blitzen and aoffan23) fresh in my mind, and its awesomeness might have only lasted for like 5 hours but it was damn fun. I want to do that more often. We need to bring BrikWars to more people so that we can play it more often and to show them the awesomeness.

[aoffan23]

I'm just going to post some thoughts here, but keep in mind that I've only known this game for two years. Some of you that have been around longer (or that can't make sense of what I'm saying) might just completely denounce this as dumb, but I'm just making stuff up as I type.

I think the main reason that Brikwars isn't really well-known is because of one simple fact: it's completely web-based, with no officially released rulebook. One way for a game to get a good start is to sit on a shelf in a store so that it can be noticed by people browsing through. Now, I'm not saying Mike should get the rulebook published and make it into a profitable product, because 1) he'd have a hard time selling a rulebook with no eye-catching merchandise like cards or minis to go with it, and 2) I think he just wants to offer people a new way to play with their toys. All I'm saying is that it's hard to get a solid following on something that's just hidden away somewhere on the internet.

I also think we see such little interaction between members because many people seem to sign up because they happened to stumble upon the site. Most of the members seem to be in terms of players in their area, which means that they don't really spread the word. If every active member got one of their friends to sign up and start playing, we'd see more than double the members. We'd see a huge increase of battle reports simply because they could play against each other. There's be less time spent organizing battles, and more "hey, wanna come over and Brikwar?"

That being said, I also think Brikwars has huge potential for growth. Lots of people play stuff like Warhammer, as you would find out if you went to a convention (I've been to Games Day twice, and it's a pretty serious fanbase). But one thing that I see a lot in former wargamers is that it took up too much of their time, or that it was too expensive. This is where Brikwars comes in. A wargame that you can take as seriously as you want, and can be played using your old toy collection in your basement? It's like the ideal wargame for college/university students. It can cost almost nothing to play, and doesn't demand the same dedication that comes from painted miniature games.

We could totally get more people into this game. All it takes it spreading the word. If you're hanging out with a friend and don't have anything else to do, just say "Hey, I know a game we can play!"

[Natalya]

I was thinking that but I have personally had trouble bringing in people who are my friends IRL (probably because I didn't have many growing up) except for minor battles where they use maybe a few of their own dudes. I haven't gotten anyone to like start building an army and join the board or whatever. I assume that most of the people on this board have had similar experiences, otherwise we would see a ton of new players right?

I think there could be more than one way to grow this game. I have had no success with getting anyone I have met IRL to join this forum, except one guy who made two posts. I have wondered about trying to get a MOC done by either me or someone else who is a good builder here to be featured on The Brothers Brick or other Lego blogs because that would draw a lot of traffic to the site. I want to get my my Spider Tank on there, but I will need better pictures, and a link-back would need to come somewhere on here. Maybe I can redesign the back and then get better photos or something.




Another idea is to post on other Lego message boards. For example, posting a MOC that you used in a battle with a picture of it in that battle linking it back to the battle readout here would be good. Excellent candidate sites for that are 4chan and the BrickArms forums.

[The Shadowscythe]

I've been trying to get /tg/ over here for a while - but for some reason all the threads I post seem to autosage into the depths, as for brothers brick and other such lego blogs - aside for picture quality, has anyone actually been in contact with them? Some of the photos on here are more than high enough quality to go up on thier frontpage, I get the feeling that a lot of people are simply too self-concious about thier skills to realise how awesome thier stuff really is.

As for people IRL - I have played a grand total of two fights against real players - one with an old friend in farnbrough before I even joined the site (and thus I have no battle reports) and another with my best man, the night before my wedding (yeah - BRIKWAR STAG PARTEH!) but, my wife to be had the camera, so no pictures . . . while I had encouraged him to build an army (and of a fairly decent size too) he doesn't "have the time" to deal with the forums - but he has attempted to spread the game further throughout the gamer/LARP circles at his side of the country.

Other friends I know are interested in the game, have more lego than me - but cannot be arsed to bring it to university with them, even though they have the transport to do it with - so there isn't much I can do about thier lazyness.

Other than kill them, and steal thier lego.

[aoffan23]

I put all of my stuff in the LEGO Flickr group, which seems to be where they seem to take all of their posted stuff from. They also show some pictures from the group on the sidebar of the site, so even if it doesn't get posted, people may see it on the site.

My only issue is that most of my serious, blog-worthy (IMO) builds tend to be completely separate from Brikwars. The only thing I've posted so far that spans that gap is the mech I brought to both games I've played. Thing is, it's hard to get any MOCs noticed unless you are 1) a builder who already has a cult following of people that will leave a useless comment like "cool" on every single thing you post, or 2) blogged on TBB or FBtB, in which case you'll see a huge increase in comments and contact requests. The online Lego community is kind of like how high school is portrayed. No one really pays attention to anything you do unless you're one of the popular kids, or get recognized by the popular kids. After that, everyone acts like your best friend. It's weird.

[Silverdream]

Though I have played with several different people on several different occassions(one with my bros but they didn't get into it because they aren't really gamers, and the other times were with my gaming club, and they did enjoy it, even though my younger brother[16] had trouble understanding heroic feats and the point of the game). The problem is that I always have to plan in advance and hope that they aren't steered toward something else. Another problem is that I don't have many friends, or enough confidence to waltz into a gaming store with my Lego.

Though I am planning to hopefully brikwar with IVhorseman, it'll be based on luck and where in Vancouver he goes.

[Zahru II]

I would love to see a bigger community and actual organized play with big events happen... but I'm afraid I'm at the worst of places where it would never to be realized. I mean, stuck in the middle of Europe, the closest brikwarrior is Apollyon and he is about 400 kilometres (a rough guess) away.

As for popularizing the game locally, I have made previous attempts, even brought in armies to our local game store to demo the game, and it didn't really work out. Thing is, people still associate lego here with stuff that kiddies play with, and usually all I get is lengthy rants from 'mature and professional' modelers why lego is overpriced and they would rather invest in actual war games because it's more bang for your buck (oh the hypocrisy, spending 200$ on a starting army, amirite?). I could go on why the modeling community is a cancerous bunch of jerks with overbloated egos who think that painting tiny plastic figurines is an arcane sorcery only they can master (and they wonder why their hobby is dying with less and less people willing to start it), but that's not the point.

So... yeah. As long as being mature means shying away from playing a good game with fun toys, I'll be the only active brikwarrior here for a while.

[The Shadowscythe]

Zahru, party on you champion of sirs.

[Ben-Jammin]

Perhaps what aoffan said. I know it might sound a bit difficult, but why not do a kickstarter for the rulebook like MFZ? When I first saw it on kickstarter I was nervous that it wouldn't make it, but after the amount of money they raised just skyrocketed, I began to think that it might be possible to do the same for brikwars. Sure brikwars might not be out to make a profit, but publishing a rulebook and perhaps a few sheets of sample stat cards might get us noticed more.

Of course, I'm sure a lot of parents would rather have their kids playing a game of tearing up tiny little robots instead of one that promotes sheer violence and chaos.

As for popularizing the game locally, I have made previous attempts, even brought in armies to our local game store to demo the game, and it didn't really work out. Thing is, people still associate lego here with stuff that kiddies play with, and usually all I get is lengthy rants from 'mature and professional' modelers why lego is overpriced and they would rather invest in actual war games because it's more bang for your buck (oh the hypocrisy, spending 200$ on a starting army, amirite?). I could go on why the modeling community is a cancerous bunch of jerks with overbloated egos who think that painting tiny plastic figurines is an arcane sorcery only they can master (and they wonder why their hobby is dying with less and less people willing to start it), but that's not the point.

This is true. I'm sure that for $200 you could get about triple the number of minifigs and vehicles in lego that you could in a WH40k starter army.

Also, I think I have another idea. I always use Flickr to post my pictures of armies and forum battles and such. Perhaps when people see the random pictures in my thread of minifigs killing each other and thinking "what the heck" I could post a link to the Brikwars site like what Natalya said. Or I could advertise it by saying things like "Check out Brikwars.com" or whatever on each of my posts on other sites.

@aoffan23: If you join a bunch of lego-based groups and such on flickr and add your photos to the group's stream, they get noticed a lot more. Also try adding members from the groups to your contacts list. I used to have almost none and even if you add just a few they will often still notice your work even if they don't comment.

[The Shadowscythe]

Just pulled up my old costs sheet for Brikwars - allow me to regail you with how much it costed me to make the Scythian Empire a reality.

20 x Scythian marines.

£16.80 (with current exchange rates) $26.00

1 x Tarantula tank

£19.10 (with current exchange rates) $29.58

5 x cockroach Infantry support units

(£14.20 each) £71

£71 (with current exchange rates) $109.97

All together I have spent £142.20 on my Brikwars army (40 Scythian Marines, 1 Tank, 5 Infantry Support Units brought, plus more of my own lego, considering vehicles I had built before) - that equals $220.26

Now I don't know current Games Workshop prices - and I know I tend to be detail heavy when it comes to my stuff (I order a LOT of surplus bricks to use later on) but in comparison, I have a larger force for playing with right away, I already have a full colour printout of the 2005 rules in bound form that I only had to pay the price of ink/paper for - and I can take ANYTHING I BUILD apart and rebuild it later without having to worry about superglue, paint or otherwise - and If I ever want to expand, even into extra weapons, it will cost next to nothing for me to do so.

As far as I am aware - I wouldn't be able to even put an army on the table with GW prices, but I may be wrong.

But still - lego still has more of a play appeal, and is an investment beyond the game itself.

So yeah, Brikwars = superior. Enuff Said.

[Zahru II]

Funny you mention GW prices, I often see people on /tg/ bitching about recent price hikes. The guys hate GW as if it was Satan or something. Many, out of sheer defiance buy third party miniatures to substitute GW models, because 'it's cheaper and fuck GW'.

I want you to digest that. That is like buying best-lock instead of lego, because fuck lego. Not to mention this way they don't support their hobby, which would sell less, and eventually cost more... vicious circle, huh?

I am likely exaggerating here, but still, I see it far too many times popping up to be a small issue.

[501stCadians]

I've only got one player my age nearby, and he's still iffy on the whole "Brikwars thing", in his words. The only other Brikwarrior is Das Pirate, down in NYC.


So i'm busy teaching my little brother and his herd of friends Brikwars; they are playing almost every weekend now. And with the summer having started, i will have more time. I made a post about it on the local gaming store's forums, there was some interest, but it died quickly. I'll probably demo the game in the next few upcoming weeks. I've already talked to the Shop Owner about it; he loved the concept(this man has lego mechs in the model display case) and he liked the artwork. He said he could host a tournament, but would need to see a huge increase in players locally(to at least ~30).

[Colette]

Having an Asian mom and being an only son...yeah, although sometimes I can get my dad to drop in when he has time.

As for attracting more people to the game- I remember a post on another lego forum that was ranting about the "childish, immature, and inappropriate" language and attitude of brikwars. While I'm not saying we should completely sterilize the forums and rulebook, I think having Natalya as mod was an excellent decision as I think she cleans house around here to “acceptable” levels. We certainly shouldn’t give off the impression of being a degenerate cesspool.

I personally recommend Eurobricks because of my experience with the site- if Natalya or Zipps or Roc were to post stuff there and link back to us I think it would net us at least a dozen new members. Additionally, they have a “Mafia and RPG forum”, and I think it would be incredibly awesome if one of the more skilled members here were to cook up a beautiful forum battle and host it over there with the approval of their mod (I think his name is Dragonator).

Edit: I think we need more stuff like this, also.

[The Shadowscythe]

Attempted a post on /tg/ today . . . its almost like they have lost interest or some shit like that - attempting to bump it back up but to no luck.

boards.4chan.org/tg/res/19775634

Any chanfags want to help? Otherwise I am beating off a dead horse here.

[Tzan]

I think the main reason that Brikwars isn't really well-known is because of one simple fact: it's completely web-based, with no officially released rulebook. One way for a game to get a good start is to sit on a shelf in a store so that it can be noticed by people browsing through. Now, I am not saying Mike should get the rulebook published and make it into a profitable product, because

I was going to say that.

Also a KickStarter may help too, after the 2010 rules are fully done.
As a plea for funds to make a print run, but really for the publicity.

(Nice sig line)

We certainly shouldn’t give off the impression of being a degenerate cesspool.

I have no idea what you are talking about.

I am beating off a dead horse here.

Thats what Hitler said,
while in Russia.