I think it's more likely that Atomic Mass Games was created for the purpose of concentrating Asmodee's miniatures development in a single studio, and after it proved itself with Marvel then Asmodee went forward with the plan. How much of that was known by FFG or AMG, I don't know.

Agreed. 

If you sincerely believe they do all this stuff on purpose you need to stick around a little longer. If it were all about predatory marketing tactics with little regard for game balance, pray tell why did they interrupt the normal schedule for this emergency fix?
Spoiler: it's because if you want to create a sustainable business model that makes you the most money in the long run, you do it by creating a fun and balanced game that people continue to love year after year. I don't see any perverse motives here. If you're looking for them, there are plenty of smoking guns in the hands of their competitors.

The art style is amazing, its difrent but amazing in my opinion. Card layouts, app etc all look very coherently.  
I played LOTR:JiME couple of times and had a blast, app gives some immersion and its just evolution of boardgames. Not for every game but in game like that, dungeoncrawlers? It fits IMO.
Minis are very nice, tiles probably will look better in real life. 
 
For me its a good succesor and step forward. Wish i had more time to play games

So far a colossal let down.
I watched the live stream today and it didn't do anything to win me over.
The art is horrendous (looks like they hired someone from tumbler do the art and create the characters) and i'm not a fan of app assisted games
With such a glut of new dungeon crawlers coming out ( Darkest Dungeon, Frost Haven, Massive Darkness 2) and the hefty price tag,  Descent really has it's work cut out for it.
 
For now this is a whiff...

I think the art looks really good. The figures are also really nicely sculpted, and I'm excited to paint them. I don't mind the app, it likely replaces about 50 decks of cards and about 100 different tokens. The price point looks accurate and I'm ok with it. Also the UNDO button in the app is worth at least $40-$50.

When you activate a ship, [each player draws] a damage card. 😂

Jar Jar would either be worthless, or absolutely game-breaking and I refuse any card effect in between.

Oh jeez that is huge. Is that "to scale"? Idk one way or the other - I don't know its description in canon - but sure looks out of scale.
I'm out of the loop about everything Armada atm (out of range of play since mid 2018), but that looks like it's increased price is warranted. I'm not kidding anyone I'll be getting it regardless, but that thing is beefy. 

This. So. Much. This. As a casual Netrunner player who did not buy everything there was, it was irritating to find similar comments on netrunnerdb. But with L5R I find the same kind of black and white pronouncement on Discord. It's especially funny when two people speak with the same level certainty but are at complete opposite as to what they claim is the best. I just shrug and move along.
It has to be said, LCGs are hybrid creatures. Built for competitive play, but layered with enough theme, flavor and overall production quality to attract non-competitive gamers. A weird outlier might be Arkham, because it's coop, but that might actually confirm the weird place "PvP" LCGs are at.
I therefore wish the casual gamer would find himself or herself more at home with these kinds of games. To me this means a broader support of related products and variants (such as multiplayer, which was mentioned by someone else).
I've always found idea behind the Terminal Directive box for Netrunner nothing short of awesome. L5R is so well suited for that. Just imagine a story around the fight for Hisu Mori Toride. Or Tadaka's journey to the Crab lands. Or whatever shenanigans we're expecting between Sotorii and Daisetsu. Those story-oriented boxes could come with basic deck themselves, I'd pay the extra for that.
 

/More nervous Neimoidian/
This is getting out of hand! Now there are *eight* of them!

It is not new stuff, but god does this make me so excited, i do not think people even understand.  

truly 

#2 for me. I enjoy being together w other players, but my life is crazy busy so I really can't go too far out of my way. That and being a new player, I'm content playing even just w 1 core set, and so far loving it. 

#2 for me. I enjoy being together w other players, but my life is crazy busy so I really can't go too far out of my way. That and being a new player, I'm content playing even just w 1 core set, and so far loving it. 

I think really there could be 3 categories of people:
1) Won't do Tournaments at all
2) Will do tournaments locally/when convenient (Ex, If you are already going to GenCon and decide to do an L5R thing there, I feel like you might fall in this category)
3) Will travel to do tournaments.
And then there is distance you are willing to travel for a tournament.  I personally think if I can find any Kotei within about 6 hours of me, I'll probably do it.

Amen brotha. Such a sweet spot we're in!

As a store owner, we have not been made to look foolish. FFG was quite clear that this release was a special case. Not only that, but every single player that purchased the game from us is overwhelmingly excited about this.

And how many people would have passed or waited on the game, but will now buy it because there's a larger card pool, and they may even be able to get into it with one core and six packs?  You're focusing exclusively on the negatives without even considering the positives.
We already knew from how big the hype was at GenCon that there would be some attrition and people dropping out before the community stabilized.  How many of these people quitting are doing so solely because of this decision, and how many were just looking for an excuse to quit?
I'm just saying, for every complaint I see about this decision, I also see at least one cheer.  How about waiting to see the effects next year before we judge how good/bad this decision is?
EDIT:  Also, it is helpful if you actually use the "Quote" feature on the board.  That way the people you're responding to will get a notice that you've answered.

I'm honestly failing to see a problem here. I've been a competitive l5r player for over a decade. 
Any competitive players will get the cards they need for their deck. Price is rarely a deterrent for us. I used to buy easily $400+ in booster boxes and about 120 in starters, and still not get every card I needed. If then have to find and either trade or purchase the cards I was missing. This was very common in the competitive scene.
Now, we only have to spend $120 on 3 cores, and $72 on the expansions and we get every card. Thats a huge savings for competitive players.
For the casual players, buy them at your leisure. Trade for cards you want with other casual players to help one another save money. Pick the packs that help you the most.
This casual approach is how we played the game of thrones 1st edition lcg. We had a lot of fun and didn't have to spend a lot to enjoy our games.
This change is only really bothering people who want to be competitive but still somewhat casual. I can tell you, l5r doesn't really do that well. The players in this game are rabid fanatics. We have payed to travel the world to win a story character or affect the story. It's both feet in for competitive l5r.

While they are two different games, I prefer Armada a million fold over Xwing. Everything about this game is way better IMO.

That sounds pretty typical for our learn to play scenarios.  When you said in the first post that you "got severely" thrashed, I assumed it went worse than that.
 
In that scenario the rebels are hard pressed to pile enough damage on the VSD in 6 turns, and not get severely hurt in the process.  Most of our games came down to fighter casualties once we got the hang of the game.

1 Imp 1 Rebel I may will buy more because I like to hoard miniatures.

Core set and one expansion each plus fighters will allow good 300 point games. Although, I was very happy playing a single Core before Wave 1 broke things open. It's better at 300, but I still had tons of fun playing 200.

I disagree. If you play both sides you get a feel for how the whole game plays out. 
 
Rebels shows you how GSD's move and how tougher squadrons works. Imperials shows you how bigger ships work and how their fire power is dispersed. 
 
The core set is really a great intro to the game. From there if he/she likes it, they can buy more ships and squadrons to their hearts content. 
 
What one really needs is to feel the scale of the game which really is the biggest draw of this game. Capital ships Feel like capital ships. Just my opinion though