Paul Baldowski is a writer, roleplayer and husband - a split role that leans heavily towards the lattermost, with smatterings of the others interspersed. He has spent the last twenty years roleplaying, watching short-lived TV series, and reading books at a speed equivalent to an asthmatic ant carrying some particularly heavy shopping.
He has written or contributed to several books in the PARANOIA roleplaying game series from Mongoose Publishing - including the main rules, Crash Priority, Service, Service!, STUFF and the whole of The Underplex (bar some much appreciated snippets from the Traitor Recycling Studio).
Paul Twitters as boreders, where his nonsense is not necessarily confined to Fight Klub or gaming. He also Boos on occasion.
So, this is the first post to my Fight Klüb blog. Tough spelling on Klüb there. Not sure that’s even right… maybe Fight Klub would suffice?
Anyway, I read up on the rules over the last week and played for the first time yesterday at Game ‘09 in Manchester. I have been playing TCGs for the last 10 years or more (Magic, Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Warcraft, Middle-Earth, Wars), so I’m not a TCG virgin or anything here and I’ve attended many organised events - large and small. I’d have to say that the game has potential mechanically, less potential financially, and the convention event was middling.
Firstly, I like the game concept of a fairly fixed card set, where solid deck construction and card play will win you the game rather than just having the money to buy a million rare cards. I played an Ash deck - which I appreciated having the chance to borrow for the event, though I also think it probably needed some tuning! It felt a little hampered by a lack of certain synergies in the cards, so I managed two wins, but also scored two losses.
In terms of potential for Fight Klüb, I have to wonder. The smallest card set you can start with is a 120 card kilo - costing about $35 shipped. The smallest viable card set for customisation is probably $70 (a box of Kilo 1 and Kilo 2), though you’d likely want more of the latter and a box (or two) of Kilo 3 when it comes out. Regardless, having nothing smaller than a $35 box makes it tough to introduce people to the game - especially as you need to order from Decipher direct. Store distribution of the game just isn’t viable financially - and I did discuss it with a store holder to get their take on it. I know a demo/starter set is in the pipeline and it can’t come soon enough, because…
The reason the event I attended didn’t work for me was I came out of it with nothing to show for the experience. If I play a Magic event, I expect to at least walk away with a booster pack, and it’s viable to do that. I know I only paid £3 to participate, but that was money lost for me. In the end there were six prize positions and I came 8th (I think). Of the top 6, I’m almost certain five already played the game - and the top 3 definitely did. I hate to be critical as a newcomer to this game, but one of the organisers came in that top set and walked away with a prize of a Kilo. I have run Yu-Gi-Oh demo events before and you want people to walk away with a good feeling about the event and something to show for it (like a booster or a foil card). If the event hadn’t awarded organisers participating in the event, I might have scraped in for a prize - and then could have gone on to promote the game amongst my own circle of friends. However, I have nothing to show but a sort of vague enthusiasm…
Yes, I can print out a demo set, but it would have been nice to walk away from an organised event with good feelings and a few cards. Knowing that the top players in this event walked away with more cards to further customise their already tuned decks doesn’t leave me with anything much but the knowledge that Fight Klüb demands both a tough learning curve and a tougher spending curve simply just to get one foot on the bottom rung of the participation ladder…
