July 8, 2018: A New Adventure For The Dungeon Fantasy RPG On Kickstarter Now!

[RoboAdmin]

July 8, 2018: A New Adventure For The Dungeon Fantasy RPG On Kickstarter Now!

Read this article on the Illuminator.

[Tom H.]

I approve of this use of the Daily Illuminator. :-)

[DouglasCole]

I agree!

Let's see . . . what can I tell you that's new?

Oh:

• 20 pages of "Town"
• 12 pages of overland journey, random encounters, an wilderness survival
• 6 pages of a ruin filled with undead, plus information about the Hall
• 18-20 pages for the primary adventure itself
• 7 pages of two norðalf warrens; mini-dungeons that are filled with small, angry alfar
• 30-32 pages of bestiary with 30 creatures
• 15 pre-gen characters suitable for most DFRPG games
• 4-5 pages of Fantastic Dungeon Grappling

I think this thing is going to wind up hitting 112-128 pages, as space will be needed for art and to break up text flow.

[Rasputin]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

I agree!

Let's see . . . what can I tell you that's new?

Well, his Daily Illuminator has been a long time coming. But thanks, Doug, that addresses the question I had upon reading it ("Wow! It's now over a hundred pages! What else did he throw in there?"), and sounds totally sweet.

Still hoping for at least 470 print backers, 'cuz I want that nice binding.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Rasputin

Well, his Daily Illuminator has been a long time coming. But thanks, Doug, that addresses the question I had upon reading it ("Wow! It's now over a hundred pages! What else did he throw in there?"), and sounds totally sweet.

Still hoping for at least 470 print backers, 'cuz I want that nice binding.

Yeah. Gotta double the print backer count in a week to get there, though.

Right now, we're looking at my ordering about 350 books to fill 235 pledges (ish). Financially, that puts us on the early end of the UK-based short-run digital print, softcover, not sewn, but using 140gsm paper (about 93# stock).

If things shift around, I'll keep backers posted, including once I have a final page count for layout. But as someone once said to me about a different project, "you might get there, but it's a big lift."

[Rasputin]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Yeah. Gotta double the print backer count in a week to get there, though.

Right now, we're looking at my ordering about 350 books to fill 235 pledges (ish). Financially, that puts us on the early end of the UK-based short-run digital print, softcover, not sewn, but using 140gsm paper (about 93# stock).

My estimate, based on the DH Kickstarter, is that you'll get about $19k, with 600 backers. Using DFRPG, I get a bit under $18k and 500 backers. (Both of these are based on the partial data for today. The DFRPG Kickstarter didn't do all that hot in the last three days.) About 2/3rds of your backers choose print, so that means between 335 to 400 are your expected print orders for backers. You have a chance, though not a great one.

[DouglasCole]

Hall of Judgment Final Week


We're in the final week for Hall of Judgment, and there's been a lot of movement on the Kickstarter! We passed $12,000 and that puts us on track to more-or-less equal Dragon Heresy unless we see something, as Mr. Furious would say, "either very good or very bad."

Layout: Block and Tackle
I've been working really hard to pull things together, and the efforts are paying off. In quick-point format:

• Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch, GURPS Line Editor and author of the DFRPG, will be contributing the Foreword to Hall of Judgment! I made the offer to SJG, Steve pronounced it virtuous (his word!), and I'm very excited to have that going in there.
• John Adamus, editor extraordinaire, turned around my manuscript in*twelve hours, and caught enough detailed points that it was clear he got both content and copy. If you're in the market for an editor:*hire this man.
• I've got the first full layout pour of the document in place. So there's a page for just about everything that needs to go there. Title page, Kickstarter Backer credits, Table of Contents, Crazy Norse Words pronunciation glossary, Town, Journey, Dungeons, the Hall itself, Grappling, Pre-gens, Bestiary, and a bit of modified backstory for those that care.
• The PDF as-is, no maps, no art, no orphan text fixes, is 116 pages. So my delivery target for a print book will be 128 interior pages; likely the PDF will be 131 or 132 for spacing and facing for the cover.
• The maps are still being worked, but there's lots of time for that. Each is a page in size, so they're easy to plan for in layout. No delays expected there.
• The pre-gens are coming along nicely. The eight promised with the book are done. I think I have 2-3 of the backer-submitted ones in hand already, if not fully laid out.
• The monsters are also coming along; perhaps half done. The core 16 that originally came with Lost Hall of Tyr are finished, and the 14-15 more that are added with Hall of Judgment are next on the list.
• Fantastic Dungeon Grappling got another small revision and is looking solid.

I've got 22 days left until the deadline set by "we plan to release the product in August" promise I made in the April 1 announcement, and the PDF will be ready by then.

Printing
That leaves us with the print question. At this point, we've got 275 (ish) print backers. That's more than enough to get us out of POD, but not enough to drive to a full offset print run.

Wild and crazy things can happen, and I hope they do. What does this mean? It means unless we see a wild uptick, I'll be using a short-run printer in the UK to deliver 140gsm interior pages (that's about 93# paper; typical DriveThru is 70#/105gsm).

Because the printing is in the UK and the fulfillment partner I'll be using is also in the UK, I expect to be working hard on the shipping side of things. I'll probably know more in two weeks on that score.

Ask Me Anything
I'm working on a "final week Ask Me Anything" session, probably a few hours long, sometime this week. Not sure what that will look like, but I want to do it and take questions about the process, the adventure, and anything gaming-related. Or viking related.

Campaign Close Process
That brings us to the finishing touches.

The campaign closes July 14, which is this coming Saturday. I would deeply appreciate re-shares on social media, and talking about the project in general. The better we do, the more likely SJG is to want to do this again.

When the campaign closes, I'll ready and fire up the Backerkit phase, which will have a short survey to get your pledges allocated to product. For those not getting add-ons, is all you'll do with the "survey" is:

• Validate you're getting the product you want
• Pay for shipping
• Select any add-ons you'd like
• Answer a few questions about the product, and what you'd like to see next

It is pretty important to be prompt on this one, and the survey period will be short: Probably 7-10 working days.

Note that Backerkit does not set the pace for*digital*reward delivery. As long as the funds settle and there's no weirdness with payment (this happens every campaign; it's depressingly normal) you'll get your PDF on August 1.

So that's it! This is the home stretch, and while there's still work to be done, that work is pretty well defined at this point.

Grab your axe and shield, board your longship and let's finish strong. Glory awaits.

[DouglasCole]

48 Hours to go!

The Hall of Judgment Kickstarter is the first 3rd-party license for the Dungeon Fantasy RPG, and one of the rare 3rd-party licenses that Steve Jackson Games has issued. It's over 400 backers and 400% funding and climbing.

What's in it for you?

• A Foreword by Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch, GURPS Line Editor, that should make everyone that's wanted to publish for GURPS sit up and take notice
• 20 pages of viking-inspired town, with festivals, culture, and adventure seeds
• Three micro-dungeons to explore: a ruins and two underground warrens.
• Five maps by MonkeyBlood Design (Glynn Seal), ENnie-nominated cartographer. These things are unbelievably cool.
• The main adventure, featuring a non-linear evolution in encounters, not-just-combat challenges, and more
• Over a dozen sample characters; five or six are backer submitted at the Thegn of Your Own tier!
• More than 30 creatures ready to play with a new open layout for easy digestion.

This book is VERY different, and quite frankly, better in almost every way than Lost Hall of Tyr, from which it sprung. 128 pages (rather than 64), full color, awesome art, and layered and hyperlinked for ease of use. The print copies will be 93#/140gsm interior paper; fulfillment is from the UK so international shipping should be pretty affordable.

Finally: let's not beat around the bush: let me quote from the aforementioned foreword: "...it bodes well for Dungeon FantasyRoleplaying Game fans and fans of SJ Games products in general. We now have evidence that licensing third-party publishers to crowdfund content for our games pays off. That isn’t a guarantee we’ll agree to every proposal—our standards remain exacting, and we still prefer
people we know and trust—but it means we’ll listen. Intently." -Sean Punch

Please support the Hall of Judgment Kickstarter. 48 hours to go.