My Studios

^^^ Great explanation, HeroicEkin. It is about value.

The way i see it is if you pick an expensive blockbuster and it fails, you're almost certainly screwed. As for mid-range picks if one of them fails, most of the time you have enough money to work around it.

Also, usually blockbusters cant exceed expectations as mid-range picks can.

One of the advantages in picking blockbusters is that you can cause chaos in the slates of your opponents. Even the perception of you crushing them utterly in box office will drive some players into completely wrecking their slates so that they can compete. Everyone is filled with a certain amount of self-doubt. Exploiting this can be greatly advantageous. It's the same as front-loading your slate and taking an early lead. Insecurity can cause some players to sacrifice what might actually be a slate that will beat yours into one that doesn't fit with their core strategy. Act and cause others to constantly react. Be flexible in your vision but immune to panic and nerves.

Those are some words of wisdom right there A_Roode.

haha, well preached Master Roode....

i totally forgot what i call the "Blockbusterfly Effect"

where one person loads heavily with IM opening in the first week of the season, and in response, 3 others do it, and a chain reaction follows.... and you end up with only the most seasoned/confident minds leaving their slates untouched....

That is a very interesting idea Roode. I hadn't ever thought of that. I try not to pay attention to other people's slates once the game starts and just play what I think is best for me, play my game, but I never really thought of the idea that other people are looking at my slate and letting that influence them. Interesting....

I am with the mid rangers for all the reasons stated. Basing all your hope on one movie is just too risky.

mooreland: how about if the movie turns in IM-like numbers, i.e. if you knew beforehand (via Mase's projections) that the movie was a BO/PTA (and in this case, UR) monster....just some food for thought....

also, i do look at other people's slates (well the top few in my league at least), but it's usually to gauge how well i'm going to do comparatively. i've only changed my slate in response to another slate twice, and the first time i tied for the league victory and the second time, i won a regulars league....my point is, the only time i change my slate is when i look at another person's slate and think, "he can gain 8 points in the PTA leaderboard with that, but i'll only gain 6 in BO...." so i have to come up with an imaginative solution and pick a different movie/combo....

case in point....in the oct-dec leagues, i believe another regular (i won't mention names) was in first place while i was in 2nd, and he had TGCompass and American Gangster releasing, while i had the same and a $2 filler movie that wasn't going anywhere....i realised that i had to come up with a combo that would work better and so i worked in the Enchanted-NTreasure 2 combo and ended up winning the league....

so i only change my slate if i'm sure someone's got a better one than me, otherwise i just go with my instincts....or rather Mase's instincts....

Alright so I skimmed through most of these and figured I'd offer my two cents.

I really think this debate comes down to the films that are surrounding the blockbusters. You know they are going to perform well. It's usually a given. But you also know that they are going to cost a lot of money. Now this is where those small $2 fillers comes in. If you can grab them and actually get some value out of them, it doesn't hurt you at all to spend lots of money on the big blockbusters. This was my strategy in the April-June leagues, where I have Iron Man and Indy. I was able to spend $76 on those two movies, because of the smaller films I could fill in. Films like Flight of the Red Balloon, Street Kings, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Deception (ok that one failed). I still have What Happens in Vegas and Savage Grace left. So far that is $13 spent, for 11 PTA and 11 top 5, with $73 million in box office and an average 7.3 imdb. Combine this with the potential top 5s and box office from WHIV and the possibility for PTA from Savage grace and you have a formidable slate of films. That is why I chose to go the double blockbuster route in April.

In May on the other hand, I could not make a feasable slate going with Iron Man and Indy. This is because of the lack of solid options at the bottom of the barrel. Sure, you would get lots of solid points from those two, but you would have spent $72 on them. That leaves you with $28 for 6 movies. I think that the only sub $5 movie worth taking is The Edge of Heaven. So that is $4 right there. If you took Mr. Lonely, that's a good call, spent $3 more. I didn't see that one coming. We are up to $79. We need 4 more at an average of $5 each. This is where I have a serious problem. I can't come up with a good combination of 4 films that won't give a devastating hit in any category for $21 dollars. Where are you going to find top 5 points in that dreck? Where are you going to find PTA? I don't see a lot of solid imdb scores down there either. There are no Sarah Marshall's, no Street Kinds, no The Visitor, no FOTRB. Are you going to rely on the Strangers, Savage Grace, Padre Nuestro, The Foot Fist Way, fucking Space Chimps and Meet Dave? I mean come on, those films will get you absolutely nothing of value.

As already mentioned, everyone has Indy, so it is a wash. So you have Iron Man for $39. Obviously it is kicking ass right now. But for that price you can get, as Surfer pointed out, Get Smart, The Incredible Hulk, and Zohan, for the same price. The combination of these three movies, will give you an obviously much higher imdb score than just the one, and won't have you scrambling to spread $28 bucks over 6 movies. They also could very make more box office dollars, more top 5s and more PTA. If each of them bring in 8 top 5 points, and 6 PTA on average, thats 24 top 5s and 18 PTA. They could each average 100 million and give you $300 million. I can't see Iron Man doing those numbers. Not even close. This also leaves you with options like Hellboy 2, What Happens in Vegas, and The X Files. That's what I went with in the May-July season in Ultimates. I went with Surfer and took the mid-rangers. I just see those 3 outperforming Iron Man in every category. If one bombs then I'll be in trouble, but I don't hink they will.

Now of course this is all in Ultimate. In every Box Office slate I took both Iron Man and Indiana Jones. Just had to include that for the BO only players.

you make a good point geez, but do you really believe that Zohan and Hulk will pull in 6 PTA each?? i can see Smart pulling in 6 PTA possibly, but Zohan and Hulk may pull in 3-4 on OW and maybe 1 more the next weekend....on the other hand, IM has already blasted its way to 10-10 in 2 weeks and this week will probably see a 4-3 or something for IM....as shryke pointed out in another thread or his column, the LEAST IM can do is 17 T5 and in PTA apparently the least it can do is 13-14 (which is more than i expected already)....

also, the issue of UR is a complex one IMO....like you said, Smart Zohan and Hulk will give you 3 times the UR, but don't forget that I have 2 more slots to fill and worst case scenario, i can pick 2 $2 fillers that give me 7-8 UR each....with IM's 8.4, that's a 24 in UR that Smart, Zohan and Hulk CANNOT POSSIBLY match!!

by the way, i believe this discussion started when we were talking about the April leagues....but when you mentioned May, i went back to look at my May slate and check out my lineup for May-July:

$39 - Iron Man
$3 - Mister Lonely
$7 - What Happens in Vegas
$33 - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
$4 - The Edge of Heaven
$3 - Savage Grace
$2 - The Strangers
$9 - YOU DON'T MESS WITH THE ZOHAN!!

how's that for squeezing in a beautiful last leg!!

depending on how 'Edge', 'Savage' and 'Strangers' do, I think I have a decent slate on my hands, no??

You absolutely do ash, as you always do. And I'm not saying that a double blockbuster slate won't win. Squeezing in Zohan is a great move. You were lucky to grab Mr. Lonely, I just didn't see that coming. But as far as your user rating goes, what films do you expect to get you those 7-8 points? Mr. Lonely is at a 5.5, WHIV is at a 4.2, Savage Grace is at a 6.0 and its gone down. The Strangers should be in the 3-5 range. And everyone is taking The Edge of Heaven. So I don't see where those 7-8 user ratings you speak of are coming from. You are going to suffer from a low imdb score. You just better hope that Incredible Hulk bombs or I don't see you winning. Of course, that is what you believe, so I can't fault you for sticking to your guns.

Damn it, every response I was going to give to ash's comments have been replied to by geez. You put my argument across very well!!

I do agree that sometimes a few movies can beat 1 blockbuster in terms of overall points and that would not be a big deal except that you can only have 8 movies. If you use up 3 to just beat my blockbuster, I have 7 movies to beat your 4.
There is no set strategy for every season although there are a few rules that apply in general. A 60 dollar (PotC) blockbuster summer is vastly different from a 40 dollar (IM) blockbuster season.

Does anybody else think that Marvel might have another hit on there hands with The Incredible Hulk? The latest trailer looks really good and it looks like Marvel really knows what they're doing.

Donte, no offense, but what you just said doesn't make any sense. I am not saying take 4 $25 movies and try your luck. That would be ridiculous. Taking the three mid-rangers, would still leave you plenty of money to take a full slate of 8 films. Your theory is completely backwards. I get to spread the wealth around 5 movies, where you need to spread it out over 7. Meaning the value of each movie you take will have to be less, because you need to spend $4 a movie, where I can spend about 6 on average. Doesn't seem like much of a difference, but it is, trust me.

I do agree that there is a difference between taking a $40 blockbuster and a $60 blockbuster, but that was when FM first started the new format and they were working out the bugs in the pricing. I think they have fixed it since then, that is why they are not completely overpriced.

Geez, it makes perfect sense if you look at the strategy a bit differently (total performance) than just performance vs dollar projections. If you use 3 of your 8 slots to beat 1 of my 8 slots then you must outperform my other 7 with only 5. You use 38 bucks on Hulk, Zohan, and Get Smart to offset my 41 dollar Iron Man. You now have 62 dollars to spend on 5 movies. I have 59 to spend on 7 slots. It is true I have less to spend on average but there are always movies to get for cheap that will kill. If a movie like Mister Lonely brings in 5 PTA for 3 bucks then I now have 150 Mil, 15 PTA and 10 Top 5 for 2 weeks with IM and ML. Hulk, Zohan and Get Smart and another random choice will have to all win their weekends to get even close to that many.

Sometimes those 2-4 dollar movie can easily fill in point cracks that the 9-10 dollars movies miss. What I am saying is that sometimes a blockbuster gets an assload of points and then a couple well bought 2-4 dollar movies give you the PTA and imdb to fill in to excel at a slate.

Example; I took Iron Man in Just the Right Mix 10. I then spent 10, 23, 4, 4, 2, 8, 2 on the rest of the slate. I spent 70 bucks on 2 movies and the other 30 on 6 movies. The 6 (well 5) movies perform well and my 47 dollar iron man cleans house as expected and voila, I am in 2nd place. I may not finish in 2nd but if I get less than 5th I will be shocked.

With that said, all the strategy in creating a slate is moot if a movie underperforms. Blockbusters very rarely do badly (unless its Speed Racer and we all saw that coming) and a smart player can gauge performance and react accordingly.
I did see Mister Lonely coming and had it on 7 slates in the two seasons. That is 5 PTA for 3 bucks. Under the Same Moon for $4 and Flight of the Red Balloon for $5 were other great picks that could easily propel a slate to win. I had them both on several slates.

We are all just making educated guesses (and sometimes even un-educated ones when going with instinct) and we will all pick a terrible movie once in a while. The only time 1 bad pick can ruin a slate is if the other picks are not very good either.

It really depends on the season though Donte. Try and fill your slate with 2 dollar movies in this season, you will get very little in return. Last season was a good month for cheap picks, but FM have been much better with their pricing for this season, and if you took IM and Indy, you will struggle to find six movies for $28 which can bring you anything without badly giving you a disadvantage in another category.

My Studios

ADVICE & ANALYSIS: