Not sure how that figure was calculated, but, if anything, a company should be able to model their broad customer categories. My guess is probably something like the Core set sales is more than 10X the average sales of any data pack.
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It may be likely that they use this stat as a basis to make the statement that casual play is 10X of competitive. But it seems equally, if not more accurate to take that data and as evidence that there is a missed opportunity in converting 90 percent of people who give the game a try into the kind of players who care enough about it to keep spending.
For what it’s worth I live in an area with no local meta and I’ve been active for about a year, going out of my way to travel to tournaments I can afford.
Card games aren’t exactly the easiest hobbies to sell to your friends in a vaccum, they’re expensive, require time to learn, and have social stigma ascossiated with them. Add to that the fact that Netrunner’s always kind of been a well kept secret in the card game community (I’ve been playing card games for about 18 years and I somehow missed out on this) and the barrier to entry can be quite high.
I’ve recruited the 5-10 friends I have across the country that would be interested just by getting them on Jinteki every week, sending them top decklists, explaining how they work, and just letting it rip. The next step for me is an open offer that if any of these friends want to go to tournaments with me I can lend them a spare set of decks. It isn’t much, but I think the most we can do is generate interest in the game, and if they want to make the investment by buying cards that’s their call. In this respect, Jinteki is the ultimate accessibility tool; I’ve managed to hook WAY more players than I ever have for MTG, Hearthstone, Duelyst, and Eternal combined.
Netrunner is pretty objectively easy to buy into competitively compared to other card games, and the core into deluxe box casual model makes a lot of sense money wise too. I don’t think the solution is to make competitive play more accessible by either tightening the available cardpool in tournament play, designing so that competitive decks and strategies are easy to grok, or discouraging non traditional decks because they can potentially provide negative play experiences for new players.
The community here is great, and I’ve seen that you guys are good at hosting your fair share of teaching leagues and tournaments online. I think that’s the direction to continue to take to really make sure the playerbase keeps growing. The only ones who can really grow the playerbase for a niche game like this are us, the passionate players who know how to sell the experience.
Which can mean a number of things.
It might mean many try out the game, but didn’t get hooked.
It might mean they have a higher profit margin on the core set.
It might mean they sell more of the core set since they have artificially created a situation where you need to buy three sets.
Or a combination of them all.
But isn’t the real question why don’t they earn more money on the deluxes and data packs? Shouldn’t that be the priority to earn more?
We are veering further and further into broader speculation as this thread has drug on. Without seeing their books, it’s hard to give unsolicited business on their books to them via message board.
