Shadowrun at your local game store contest! Options

[Adam]

Here’s the deal: Visit your local game store on August 11th-15th and buy a copy of Shadowrun, Fourth Edition, 20th Anniversary Edition or Dawn of the Artifacts: Dusk — both of these books have a street date of August 11th, so your FLGS should have them on the shelves that day (assuming they’re in the USA — international stores may be later than that. Sorry, guys!).

After you’ve bought your books, take at least two pictures of yourself at the store, with those books — one with the store clerk/owner/manager (Ask first, of course) and then one of you in front of the store itself, with their sign clearly visible.

Mail those pictures to info@shadowrun4.com with the subject line “I bought Shadowrun!� by August 18th with your name and the name/address/email address of your local store. Please include a note if you don’t want us to publish your pictures on our blog.

We’ll be picking a random Shadowrun fan from the submissions and be awarding them a secret prize!

http://www.shadowrun4.com/wordpress/2009/0...-store-contest/

[McAllister]

I'm awfully tempted. Even assuming I don't have a chance of winning the prize (and I take the pessimistic view of such lotteries), it will A. support the people who make Shadowrun and enable them to make more great things happen in my life, B. convince my local game store that Shadowrun products are commercially valuable so they stock a greater variety of them, and C. give me a great chance of either meeting new SR players in my area or convincing people that this is a game with a thriving community behind it that they should try. So I really should, shouldn't I?

Well, no promises, but I will say that if I win the secret prize, y'all'll hear about it (though not necessary WHAT the prize was).

[Aaron]

I'm guessing that as is usual with such contests, employees are not eligible, right? So I can enter, seeing as I'm not an employee?

[BookWyrm]

I too am very tempted, but there are several factors I must take into account;

1) I may not have the cash for either of them by then. Financial constraints. I still have to travel into NYC to pick up my books (truly, I do love going to The Compleat Strategist when I can), but I have to factor in train-fare.
2) Would just the pictures do, without having to purchase the books? Again, I have to point out that I may not have the cash for either in such short a time.
3) Few books actually are available on their release dates. I give them usually a month's leeway. I don't pre-order (usually because something comes up, I can't pick up the book(s) and they get sold to someone else until I can get another chance).

[Adam]

2) Would just the pictures do, without having to purchase the books?

Nope, sorry.

[Backgammon]

Adam, I've seen people get sued hardcore for trying to set up cute little contests out of the goodness of their hearts. Your contest doesn't have the 15 pages of legal disclaimer you need to CYA. Be careful...

[otakusensei]

That's the week on our normal in store game. I'm so telling everyone about this.

Edit:

Threw up a link on the store forums. We only play every other week, but we had eight people show up last week. Shadowrun has been a hit and I hope they bought some stock to move next week.

[BookWyrm]

Nope, sorry.

Oh well.

[TBRMInsanity]

I'm totally buying a copy of SR4A when I get back from vacation.

[Larsine]

I'm guessing that as is usual with such contests, employees are not eligible, right? So I can enter, seeing as I'm not an employee?

The joy of "only" being a freelancer (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Lars

[Red-ROM]

1) My local game stores are horrible about stocking shadowrun at all, and I end up buying my books on Amazon.com

2) I like to wait for the 2nd or 3rd printing to avoid some of the erratta's. Of course, with the anniversary ed. it pretty much is an Eratta. so that might be ok.

3) It's my b-day on the 31st, so the wife might get mad if i buy myself somethin the week or two before

but good luck to all!

[Adam]

1) My local game stores are horrible about stocking shadowrun at all, and I end up buying my books on Amazon.com

And this is one of the reasons for doing this contest -- the more we can drive gamers to their store right when a new book comes out, the more those game stores are going to sit up and take notice of Shadowrun, and stock it better.

That's why we use Street Dates, also. So we can announce the solid street date and then have fans call and visit their stores to ask them to pre-order the titles for them.

[CodeBreaker]

'raginfragin livin in the UK...

Anything on a Street Date for overseas by the way? This is one of the books I would quite like to have a hardcopy of, not just a PDF.

[Adam]

It should only take a week or two for the books to make it to the UK. Keep an eye on Leisure Games website --http://www.leisuregames.com/acatalog/NewReleases.html -- as they're always on the ball for getting new releases.

[BlueMax]

And this is one of the reasons for doing this contest -- the more we can drive gamers to their store right when a new book comes out, the more those game stores are going to sit up and take notice of Shadowrun, and stock it better.

That's why we use Street Dates, also. So we can announce the solid street date and then have fans call and visit their stores to ask them to pre-order the titles for them.

/me pulls the old "a friend of mine" routine.

A friend of mine has a local gamestore who does not like something, that frankly I do not understand, about how Shadowrun releases are done now. They will only work with pre-orders. He says that until two years ago they carried the best selection of shadowrun books in the area. If my friend could get the game store to talk to Catalyst, who could I direct them to?

As for me, I order all my SR books through Catalyst. I hope that way the most money goes to Catalyst. Besides, my local gamestore does not offer space for RPGs, only for CCGs and other collectible drek. On top of that, they took down the bulletin board . You know, the looking for a game board. It just hurt when they did that.

BlueMax
/who now organizes groups locally
//even ones he does not play in.

[Adam]

A friend of mine has a local gamestore who does not like something, that frankly I do not understand, about how Shadowrun releases are done now. They will only work with pre-orders. He says that until two years ago they carried the best selection of shadowrun books in the area. If my friend could get the game store to talk to Catalyst, who could I direct them to?

I'm a little confused, are you saying that you local store either:

a) Says Catalyst/the store's distributor will only deal with them if they pre-order, or
b) Will only order Shadowrun books if a fan pre-orders them, or
c) something else?

Whatever way, have your store get in touch with us -- http://catalystgamelabs.com/contact/ -- and explain the situation, and if there's some sort of misunderstanding or miscommunication going on, we'll see about sorting it out [bearing in mind that next week is Gen Con and we won't be "in the office," please!]

If it's situation B, well, again, this is why we push our fans to get in touch with their local stores before the Street Date and pre-order. Concentrated demand early in the release cycle is good for the stores [sales, woot!, accurate pre-ordering == not having excess stock on the shelves], good for gamers [more Shadowrun fans in the store on a given day, more networking/gaming chances], and good for us [sales, woot!, plus early information on how well titles are selling, not just TO stores, but FROM stores.]

[imperialus]

Cool. Anything I can do to help support my FLGS.

[otakusensei]

Ouch, My FLGS just opened last month and though they make a killing on the CCG and miniatures games, they have fully embraced traditional pen and paper games and have specifically started hosting games in store. In fact it's odd to stop by and not have a game going on right there. We run Shadowrun every other Thursday and I've been trying to get them to stock more books. This looks like a great opportunity to for everyone involved.

[Inferno_24]

I went to my local game store earlier today to try to get SR4A, only to find out that they think they might, possibly, be getting the book next week.
Also that even then they can only get in a very limited quantity, with very little chance of being able to order any more.

I understand the Limited Edition is meant to be limited, but I hadn't thought the 20th anniversary core book was as well.

Which leads me to wonder: is the entire 20th anniversary edition meant to be a limited run? or was their distributor given faulty information about the product, which they then passed on to the store?

So, while I won't be able to enter the contest for a chance to win a mystery prize, at least I didn't walk away empty handed, I did find a My Little Cthulhu at the store.

[Mongoose]

I was at my FLGS last week (Firday, the 7th?) and they had a 20th aniversery SR4 on display already. They stock SR pretty well, but I guess they missed the memo on the street date.

[Tiger Eyes]

Which leads me to wonder: is the entire 20th anniversary edition meant to be a limited run? or was their distributor given faulty information about the product, which they then passed on to the store?

The 20th anniversary edition (not the LE) will be the future printing for the core rulebook as well. When it sells out, it will be reprinted. There is still some in stock and it will be reprinted. Fear not, young one. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Inferno_24]

The 20th anniversary edition (not the LE) will be the future printing for the core rulebook as well. When it sells out, it will be reprinted. There is still some in stock and it will be reprinted. Fear not, young one. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Thanks for clearing that up for me.
I thought that was the case, I guess their distributor just got confused with the different versions and passed on faulty information to the store.

[Eugene]

Tried to pick up Dawn at the FLGS the other day, but no dice. They're not getting new Shadowrun stuff until next week, apparently, so no photo entry for me. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

[darthmord]

Talked with the owner of my FLGS and he's going to try his best to get me a copy of Dawn of the Artifacts tomorrow. He's placing the order in about 30 minutes.

/e crosses fingers

[Warlordtheft]

Picking up both today. Too lazy for the contest as I'll be going there straight from work.

PS:I don't have a cell phone.