Jack said:
A friend brought a starter kit to our club meeting for everyone to have a look at. I was very impressed with it. Two things impressed me the most if I had to only pick two things. #1 was the two boards provided. They are not the traditional boards as we know and are used to playing on. Let me clarify they where not mounted on hard cardboard stock. They weren’t flimsy paper products either. It seemed to be a happy medium. This tells me that when I order new boards now to replace my old ones I can now preserve them with map tac. #2 was the manner in which the rules are written to introduce new members to the ASL community. I see this as a huge positive and as an avid ASL’er only good can come from it. What do you guys think?
Short version:
The starte kits are a great idea, and well executed from what I've seen. In fact, I've convinced at least one person to buy one, so then I"ll actually get to get myhands on a copy.
Longer version:
It would really help to have the next level (rulebook and beyond valor) in stock to sell to people hooked by the starter kits. I can understand otehr stuff going out of stock, but the basic game being out of stock/print threatens to kill any gains made by the starter kits. I realize that they're harder to sell, since most current players already have them, and that a new module will selel better as it will sell to those current players, but that's thinking too short term, new players are necessary, or the game will die. And MMP knows this, hence the starter kit, I just fear that the starter kit's been crippled from the beginning as far as actually bringing new players in by the lack of actual ASL core products in place to sell to those hooked by the starter kit.