I'll update as additional news comes out or if you ask questions. It's totally intimidating making a physical game because currently we're aiming for a $40k kickstarter (so about 700 preorders...) because the production of the game is very important to me. I know this is a no-spam kinda place, so I'll be restricting Scoundrels talk to this thread and blog posts.
As a relevant question to this project, how important is the quality of the game's production for you to enjoy AT games? Like, are any of you PnP folk? I have personally never printed a PnP, but have played a couple at others' because that's the only way they could obtain a game.
I print and play and I don't hesitate to go cheap. But I'd wager I'm the exception.
If you have a good game about pirates you should swag the shit out of it on Kickstarter, even if it means getting a publisher to help you do it. Stupid money follow miniatures.
Heh, can anyone explain to me the miniatures thing? If you're into miniatures, is it so you can use them elsewhere? Of the top 50 most successful tabletops on kickstarter, like, 95% of them are miniatures. I can't even tell if the games are interesting. I've been told several times to swag the hell out of the game, but I also want to be realistic about game expectations. Do I really want to model a bunch of ships to get people into the game just for miniatures?
It's good to know there are PnP players, though.
I have a few particular elements for the game that'll be cool swag. Ships, treasure chests (to mark where you've buried stuff) and hopefully plastic "Infamy" tokens. But the current plan is lower quality stuff and cardboard infamy tokens. Then stretch goals can switch the stuff into higher production quality.
Miniatures possess native value because they are expensive to produce and they have a stronger chance to hold that value or even increase in value over time.
For instance, try and PnP Space Hulk. I made my own 2nd edition Copy about 10 years ago. It took a lot of work cutting and gluing tiles, tracking down 40K miniatures, finding tokens for blips etc.
Now, try and PnP something like After Pablo, much cheaper.
When I back a miniatures game I typically assess its perceived value by the community as a whole and I'm more likely to back if I know I can resell it for a huge profit down the line (such as the current Conan kickstarter).
Minis won't make a shit game worth something later on (see Sedition Wars) but they boast an inherent greater payoff.
That's typically how I look at a Kickstarter miniature game, as an investment with an ROI of sorts.
Years ago the guy that owned the restaurant I worked in told me "people eat with their eyes" when I asked about big sandwiches and the small baskets we served them in. He had gotten small baskets on purpose, because he wanted people to have to pause and figure out how to lift the sandwich out without dumping it. "It makes the first bite an event" he said.
Minis are the same damn thing. You feel like you've eaten more when you play a game with a hundred minis in it. The game may suck, but it has huge portions.
1) Print and play is a lot of work, IMO. At least if you want to make something decent and durable. And it can actually be pretty expensive if you don't have the stuff to do it yourself. I've PNP'ed a couple of things over the years- most notably Tales of the Arabian Nights (HOOOOOOO boy was that a pain in the ass) and Borderlands. But I also found that my PNP games tended to languish unplayed. I guess it's a viable option for some, but to be quite honest when I see PNP and I tend to just walk away. I've had publishers offer me PNP games for review and I've turned them down.
2) When I got my last package from Nate Hadyen, one of the goodies he threw in was a badge that says "Fuck Minis" with a Cthulhu-looking mini crossed out. I couldn't agree more. To qualify that, I do like for games to have pre-painted miniatures and I do like miniatures games. But this current trend of $300 boxes full of miniatures sold alongside some vanity board gmae on Kickstarter has got to stop. Sorry, I'm just not impressed by games packed to the rafters with a bunch of "nicely sculpted" made in China plastic. Like everybody, I used to go goo-goo opening up stuff like the Eagle Games titles and the earlier FFG stuff, but now I just see a big pile of cluttery, over-priced gumball machine figures. Consider alternatives, like cardboard standups or those cool 3D punch-out models. Consider that there are plenty of classic AT games that were not boxes full of miniatures.
So the bottom line here is to not feel pressured into doing miniatures. I really like that hand-drawn artwork/lettering you have on the picture. That looks fresh, unique and appealing. From the looks of the game, it seems like it would be a good 45-60 minute family game and that means it needs a reasonable price. Don't blow it with a bunch of miniatures.
I'll tell you this about the "swagging" too...be aware that it can actually put people OFF from your game. There's PLENTY of people who may not be willing to give you, a relative unknown in the business, $50 for the game. Let alone $100, $150, $200 for it. And there are folks who will see that there is extra CONTENT and GAME MATERIAL that they will be missing if they don't go all-in on it, and they may just say "fuck it" from the beginning. That's honestly how I am- if I see that there's all of this Kickstarter exclusive material in something I pretty much lose all interest in it altogether.
Fuck Barnes. Anyone who hates miniatures is a wanker.
If it's a good game, then miniatures don't matter as much, but that said, if it's a shit game, miniatures alone will sell people on it and they feel it's a better value because they can always repurpose.
50$ for a light game is about right. Well, in "today's world" which is even weirder since oil prices have fallen 1/3 and yet plastics pricing hasn't followed suit.
Cheap-but-awesome route: Get a 3D printer and design yours in a CAD suite, then have them make prototypes. Make a mold, cast them yourself. Uncle Mike's Worldwide just had a huge KS success with Strange Aeons and they homebrew all their shit like that.
After reading the rules, let's get a couple points out there:
1. No dice, not really Ameritrash.
2. Card combat is not really Ameritrash.
3. Victory Point Hunting is not really Ameritrash.
Michael Barnes wrote: I'll tell you this about the "swagging" too...be aware that it can actually put people OFF from your game. There's PLENTY of people who may not be willing to give you, a relative unknown in the business, $50 for the game. Let alone $100, $150, $200 for it. And there are folks who will see that there is extra CONTENT and GAME MATERIAL that they will be missing if they don't go all-in on it, and they may just say "fuck it" from the beginning. That's honestly how I am- if I see that there's all of this Kickstarter exclusive material in something I pretty much lose all interest in it altogether.
It depends on his goal for the project. Conan is proving again that a $150 price tag is not a showstopper by any means. It's ludicrous, but it's reality.
By the way, damn near nobody is buying Conan's base level. 2000 purchasers to date, 46 at base level. As best I can tell $200 may not be a significant barrier to revenues. Just absurd.
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