Rogue One 3.75" Wave 1

[Darby]

I agree K2 has the potential to be a popular figure. He'll definitely get a SA version, which I may hold out for, though this one appears to have a greater range of movement than the typical 5 POA offering. I'd prefer Sabine be more available just to avoid the echo chamber that happens any time a certain figure is short packed - she's rare! I can't find her! But not too worried about it.

[Jesse James]

Yeah I don't give 2 poos on Rebels stuff, so she's not on my list, but making her hard to find out of the gate is just gonna be a complain-a-palooza and Hasbro is already sneaking a repack in...  I get it, Kylo is the new Darth Maul (or so goes the hope) and he does seem to sell.  Even his deluxe figure sold better than the others did, and for all intents and purposes, Poe was a pretty unique figure.  Ren was just no hood up, but still harder to find than the others if you were looking it seemed.

That said, I say don't kick off this group on Force Friday with 2 Kylo...  1 wouldn't have hurt anything.

[Jeff]

I'd prefer Sabine be more available just to avoid the echo chamber that happens any time a certain figure is short packed - she's rare! I can't find her!

Get ready to hear it again in Wave 2 after we learn that Rebels Leia is 1x per case and Darth Vader is 2x per case. 

I totally get why Hasbro decided to 2x pack the 'bad guy from the $900 million dollar movie" over 'female character from the cable network cartoon show'.  Shouldn't be a surprise in the kids line.

[Jesse James]

Yeah I don't see this changing either...  Like I said, Rebels doesn't seem like it's that big a deal to Hasbro, and I suppose Disney either...  It's there, it's filler, and it does a job, but it's not an event carrying the franchise like TCW was.

Wonder what ratings have been like for SWR compared to TCW now that we're a little deeper into Rebels for the comparison to be made.

[Darby]

Rebels ratings for the last season finale were 1.2 million total viewers:

http://variety.com/2016/tv/news/ratings-disney-xd-star-wars-rebels-finale-1201757980/

Ratings for Clone Wars are a bit harder to find but Wikipedia states the premiere was watched by an average of 3 million viewers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars:_The_Clone_Wars_(2008_TV_series)#Reception

I know anecdotally those numbers fell as the show went on.

[CHEWIE]

I have zero interest in 5POA animated figures, so the Rebels short-packed stuff is fine by me.  I could see myself getting Sabine for my son, but he really doesn't seem interested in 5POA figures.  Each time he asks when I show him new figures online - "do these ones bend?" - when I tell him no, he says he doesn't want them then.  Sure, I'm an influence on that but I have noticed he doesn't even touch his 5POA toys at all anymore.  The SA Star Wars and Joes, he plays with a lot.

Anyways... assuming I can find them, I'll probably make purchases about like this...

Kylo - 0
Jyn - 2 or 3 (at least 1 for a custom)
K2-SO - 2 or 3 (at least 1 for a custom)
Stormtrooper - 3 or 4
Ground Crew - 3 or 4
Kanan - 0
Sabine - 1 (only for my son, if he even wants it)

[P-Siddy]

Anyways... assuming I can find them, I'll probably make purchases about like this...
Ground Crew - 3 or 4

Will we be fighting over these at FF?

[Scockery]

Even I found these things at a Krogers. Street date rape! Bwahahaha! 

But at $10.99 each, I passed. They didn't have Kanan

[Pete_Fett]

I posted a bit about this over on the vehicle thread in my post about finding Hera's A-Wing. So in one WalMart I went to, I got there as the girl working the aisle was putting the figures on the pegs. I asked her if I was allowed to buy them and she said "yes". I took them up to the register but was shut-down. Took the figures back to her, she scanned them and indicated that scanning the figures yielded no information about them being blocked or prohibited from sale. She said maybe it had to do with the fact that she hadn't set the "mod" for the figures yet, which she was going to do later in the morning. So I left and thanked her for the help.

This morning I went into the store to find 2x of Kylo Ren, 2x of the Imperial Ground Crew and 1x of K-2SO on the pegs - the remaining figures were gone.

I took those five figures up to the register and was again denied. This time I asked if I could please purchase them as it seems someone else had already purchased the other 12 figures in the case. They indicated that they had the figures up front, but when I asked if I could see them to confirm, they denied my request saying that they couldn't let me see them. So as far as I'm concerned they probably sold a few of them, maybe they had some others, who knows, doesn't matter really.

My point though is that there is nothing on these figures indicating a street date, it's a computer-thing ONLY. So basically this is going to keep happening throughout the week as more and more product starts to trickle in and employees put them out on the shelves...

While I'm never gonna try to "beat" the system and scan and alternate item, it would be nice if I could score a nice percentage of stuff early, so on FF, it's just a matter of hitting a few stores for a few minutes and being "done". I have contemplated the thought if just zeroing in on Kanan and Sabine and then ordering a case from EE of the wave 1 figures.

[Dave]

While I'm never gonna try to "beat" the system and scan and alternate item...

I've done this several times before with decent success, especially at a place like Wal-Mart where the general staff IQ seems lower.  Assuming they've got some TFA figures still on the pegs I would grab one TFA figure and all the Rogue One figures I wanted.  I would make sure they scanned the TFA figure first and when the error pops up on the Rogue One figures I would just say there were all on the same peg or were right next to them listed at the same price.  The checkout person has always just modified the quantity of the TFA figure scanned and shoved all the Rogue One figures in the bag.  Then later you can bring back the one TFA figure you don't need.

Either way, I'm going to avoid WM until Friday so I don't get frustrated by the stupidity.

[Diddly]

So if these Walmarts are putting stuff out early, will they even have stock to put out on Friday? I can easily see people lining up only to find empty pegs, or the same TFA pegwarmers that have been there for a year. This MM is shaping up to be just as much of a disaster as last year's.

[McMetal]

From what I gather a lot of Walmarts will be putting out large cardboard display stands stocked with 6" figures and the like. There are a few photos out there. Most of the early scores have been single case finds, so if that's all they plan to stock a lot of people would have left disappointed anyway. I'm sure there will be more at most stores. Walmart was literally the only store around here that stocked multiple cases last year.

[Diddly]

Found these at a local HEB (grocery store) tonight. They were mixed in on the pegs with the old TFA figures. Looked to have been a fresh case... 2x Jyn, 2x K2, 2x Kylo, 2x Stormtrooper, 2x Ground Crew, 1 Kanan and 1 Sabine. I grabbed a Jyn and a K2 and that'll probably be it for me 3.75 inch wise.

[Pete_Fett]

I've done this several times before with decent success, especially at a place like Wal-Mart where the general staff IQ seems lower.  Assuming they've got some TFA figures still on the pegs I would grab one TFA figure and all the Rogue One figures I wanted.  I would make sure they scanned the TFA figure first and when the error pops up on the Rogue One figures I would just say there were all on the same peg or were right next to them listed at the same price.  The checkout person has always just modified the quantity of the TFA figure scanned and shoved all the Rogue One figures in the bag.  Then later you can bring back the one TFA figure you don't need.

While that does work, make sure you do it at a WalMart where you DON'T normally go. The problem downstream would be that the WalMart where you do this would have a negative number of TFA figures to indicate that they sold more than they had in stock and still a positive sock quantity of the new Rogue One figures - that would NEVER decrease. So not until a competent manager/line supervisor figures that the -7 TFA figures really were the +7 R1 figures that are still plaguing the inventory, that store may NEVER see replenishment down the line because from the inventory computer's perspective, 7 R1 figures are peg-warming.

[McMetal]

FWIW, I asked my friend who works at Walmart about that Pete and he swore up and down that this was not true. He said they track inventory by the generic item #, not individual UPC, so whether they sold 6 Zuvios or 6 different R1 figures the inventory is updated accordingly. They don't differentiate between TFA and R1. At least that is my understanding.

Perhaps not all Walmarts handle their business the same way, but I'm not buying this "if you get R1 figures early, that store will definitely never re-stock" stuff. It's just JTA and that one crankypants over at RS that keep perpetuating that myth. Typical Chicken Little clickbait.