Ideas for Ogre Designers Edition Expansions.

[smathers]

I think most of the Ogre fans here would agree that ODE was an incredible bargain and one of the best deals ever to be seen on Kickstarter. It became so big that lot of Kickstarter sponsors would have backed out because they didn't have the funding or manpower to complete it, but SJ Games persevered and delivered a first class product. It was a gift for the faithful and a chance for Evil Stevie to work on one of his first (and favorite?) games.

The Kickstarter also showed that there was still a lot of life left in Ogre and did a lot to revitalize it. Based on comments from SJ Games staff, I think it was much bigger than they expected and I think that additional Kickstarters for expansions to ODE are worth considering.

What I'm suggesting here is that SJ Games price these Kickstarters to make money. The idea is that the Kickstarter would prepay the development costs and then SJ Games could decide how many extra copies to print for retail sales. We, the fans of Ogre, would vote with our Kickstarter support on whether it is worth doing.

Each Kickstarter should be relatively small. Maybe two to four counter sheets with a pamphlet of rules and scenarios. This keeps things manageable and prevents them from disrupting other product lines.

It would take the risk out of the deal for SJ Games because they should be able to estimate how many copies they need to print based on Kickstarter participation and a percentage of the numbers of ODE sets that sold at retail.

And, if a Kickstarter fails because we don't meet the minimum, then it is a clear demonstration to ODE fans that we just don't have enough interest to justify additional resources from SJ Games.

I would suggest that any stretch goals be very cost effective so that no matter how many copies sell in the Kickstarter, it doesn't substantially change the profit margin. Maybe extra scenarios or other additions that don't substantially change the materials cost.

I'm not a game designer and I've never worked in "the industry", so I could be missing something here, but this seems like a win-win. A chance for ODE fans to get more Ogre without much risk to SJ Games. I'm sure that SJ Games staff are already considering a number of options and expansions and I'm confident that there are good things in store no matter what though. I am looking forward to hearing more about them when the stars are right.