From time to time, I get an email from the WizKids Information Network telling me how much they miss me. It’s a pretty elaborate email. They tell me that they notice I haven’t logged in for a while, that I’ve been silent on the communities, and that there are all kinds of exciting events coming up.

It’s honestly kinda sweet. It’s nice to feel missed. But WizKids, I hate to break it to you… It’s not me; it’s you.

See, for while – about a year – I was incredibly active on the WizKids event sites – because I was playing in their events thanks to a game called D&D Attack Wing. The D&D Attack Wing game is a miniatures skirmish game that shares its roots and basic gameplay with Star Wars X-Wing and the Star Trek Attack Wing games. The big difference – obviously – was that it used monsters and characters from D&D.

There were other differences as well – some subtle rules changes that made it, in my opinion, the best iteration of the Attack Wing style games. For my money, it was one of the most exciting and fun skirmish style games I’d ever played. And it really caught on with our local store. We had tournaments, I set up a league, people were excited to play.

And then, poof, one day – after just about a year of release – it was… Gone. There were rumors… “We’re making new plans.” “We’re reconfiguring some game issues.” Sure, there were all the standard rumors. But let’s be fair here, it’s a WizKids game. Once it was gone, it’s just gone. And the community around it petered out.

Now, I could forgive WizKids if they had a solid track record in this regard. But WizKids has burned me so many times… with the ridiculous swingy-ness of Heroclix, the debacle that was Mage Knight 2.0, Horror Clix, Crimson Skies, Mechwarrior: The Dark Age. On top of those games, which were at least “real” lets not forget the abominable track record of idiocy that are games like MLB SportsClix, and Creepy Freaks. How much time and energy did WizKids spend on Creepy Freaks that could have been spent supporting other lines?

Ultimately, of all those games, HeroClix is the only one that has endured, and that only by the grace of corporate backers.

WizKids has burned me so many times as a consumer of games – and games that I like – that I’ve lost all trust in them. I won’t buy any new WizKids games, or invest in anything they are making because I know I’m in for another thrilling heartbreak. I have some truly wonderful memories of playing WizKids games and all of them are tainted by WizKids business decisions.

So yeah, it’s nice to be missed. But really, it’s not me; it’s you.

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P.S. – I know this was a little bit rant-y but I needed to get that off my chest.