Gaming Ballistic - GURPS Content Posts

[DouglasCole]

The weekly report out on what's up with GB for the week ending Feb 12

Also, the annual financial report out for 2020. Which sucked.

[DouglasCole]

I was on the Talking Crit livestream with Erik Tenkar and “Bad Mike” last night. The overall topic was “the state of gaming and lessons learned on Kickstarter.” We covered a lot more than that.

Talking Crit Livestream YouTube Recording

• My old Firing Squad interviews, and transcripts of video streams
• COVID shots and the return to in-person gaming; especially the North Texas RPG Con
• The conversation turns to GURPS at about 17:30 in: “I’m really glad to see GURPS getting some attention. It is a great game that seems marginalized by the community.”
• Mission X comes up around 18:30
• The benefits of focused rules and setting around 23-24 minutes
• The importance of shared expectations in game play and game writing at 24-26 minutes
• The depth and quality of GURPS sourcebooks at 28 minutes (interview with Ken Hite mentioned); goes through 40 minutes
• Taking inspiration from reality not having to make sense when writing fantasy histories at 30-33 minutes
• Erik shows off Dark Lord’s Doom and David’s other solos at 40:30; conversation turns to TFT
• Erik likes the counters in my books at 41 minutes
• Why RPG books are a sensually tactile experience: paper choices and weights in print books 42-48min
• Erik brings up the Character Collections Kickstarter at 48 minutes
• At 55-60 minutes we talk about converting the Character Collections book to 5e and Swords & Wizardry
• My daughter makes an appearance and shows off her drawing skills at 59-1:01
• Why “backer count” instead of “dollars” for stretch goals on the CC Kickstarter? 1:01 through 1:08
• “Boolean humor” makes its second appearance
• GameOn Tabletop as an alternate? 1:04-1:06
• New to TFT Pledge Level at 1:08
• I show off the TFT Legacy Box at 1:10; it stays on camera for the next hour
• Kickstarter Link in the edition: 1:11
• Viking Shields, at least briefly: 1:10:30 to 1:13 or so
• Dragon Heresy stretch goals and print runs 1:13 to 1:14
• Starting at 1:16 we talk about Kickstarter, trends in the industry, common mistakes, paying folks, art team, and more
• Shipping and common KS mistakes discussed at 1:26
• The importance of audience size at 1:34 to 1:38 – projects viable at 500 vs 1000 vs 1500 backers
• The Pit of Despair that is shipping and international shipping and charging shipping in Backerkit 1:39 to 1:42
• How much done before you launch a Kickstarter: 1:42
• Kickstarter as venture capital vs pre-orders; why no long tail; Darwinian future of the industry 1:42-1:50
• Hard lessons about starting out: 1:50 – 1:53

We roll on for another 15 minutes or so after that, but the key bits are above.

In the Character Collections project, I’ve been asked a few times about the backer-count driven stretch goals; I’ve bolded the two sections where I talk to that, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. But if you’re curious as to why I’m trying “backers” instead of “dollars,” you can find some answers there!

If you’re looking for other conversations with me:

• I was on Nerdarchy’s Live Chat Revivified #215 right before the project launched
• Look for me on RPG Ramblings with Jeffrey Jones this weekend. Looks like his latest was with my friend Tim Shorts. Go listen to that.

[DouglasCole]

Ballistic's Report for the week ending Feb 26

[DouglasCole]

Each week Gaming Ballistic publishes the Ballistic's Report, discussing progress and setbacks in the life of a fledgling game company.

Here's the report for the week ending March 5.

[DouglasCole]

Ballistic's Reports...


...for the week ending March 12


...for the week ending March 19

Week in review from Gaming Ballistic.

• More Perilous Journeys is truly complete
• Character Collections should proceed to the Backerkit phase in the next 1-2 days
• Great progress on CE Mark/EN71 testing using STC labs in NJ and China
• Testing of Delvers to Grow went very well last week
• Excellent conversation about ease of use from the creator side on shipping with Backerkit

[DouglasCole]

This weekend is the SJGames online convention FnordCon3.

Gaming Ballistic (that's me) will be on with Steve at 3:30pm on Saturday. We'll be talking GURPS and TFT.

I'll be on intermittently for the rest of the convention. I have my own Dealer Room where I'll be hanging out a lot (Channel: #gaming-ballistic)

Various of my products will be on sale for the duration of the convention on Saturday and Sunday. Friday is just social. There will be coupon codes that you can see there active during the convention.

Come by, hang out, listen to the panels and interact on Saturday, and play games on Sunday.

FnordCon 3 This Weekend

[DouglasCole]

Ballistic's Report: Week Ending April 30

This week was finishing up production on Character Collections and blitzing the Kickstarter page for the next project...Delvers to Grow.

• All backers but two on Character Collections manually moved to “finished” or cancelled. Still two with credit balances that are headed for a cancel and refund if they don’t respond.
• Delvers to Grow is advancing from a manuscript perspective.
• The Delvers to Grow main cover is essentially complete.
• Still tracking down missing international packages from More Perilous Journeys; one Character Collections books-only package arrived a bit damaged.
• Most of the counters are on my dining room table; the rest should arrive soon. Then it’s some pre-work to pack them in boxes
• Both cards and counters are in the process of CE Mark testing in NJ and Dongguan, respectively. I’ve asked for a timing update.
• Card manufacturing is underway. All decks have been printed and coated (I think), now they have to be banded and packed into boxes. Then I can pick them up.
• I spent a lot of time this week getting the new Delvers to Grow Kickstarter page finished. But I did get it finished, approved, and the follow-the-campaign page link sent out.

Also, I discussed gaming stuff on Pocket Jacks Comics live show last week.

[DouglasCole]

The Ballistic's Report for the week ending May 14 is out!



Delvers is getting frisky with media, and I wanted to give a list of all the places we talk about the offerings here, so that backers can point people to their favorite ones. PLEASE...point people to your favorite ones!

Did I miss any? I'll add them!

Podcasts and Interviews

• SJGames Live: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1021421988
• Pocket Jacks Comics: https://youtu.be/T4FXNK7nRIg (video)
• Roleplay Rescue: https://anchor.fm/rpgrescue/episodes...-Bonus-e10moob (audio)
• RollMongers/Attack of Opportunity: https://youtu.be/2RJlEp1TC-8 (video)
• Gathering of Ages: https://share.transistor.fm/s/cc7aa239
• Michael Bonet: https://ninjavspirates.libsyn.com/wh...with-doug-cole

Forum Threads

• Reddit (r/rpg): https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comment...e_sub250point/
• Reddit (r/gurps): https://www.reddit.com/r/gurps/comme...e_sub250point/
• ENWorld: https://www.enworld.org/threads/delv...rps-df.680036/
• SJGames GURPS Forum: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=173201
• SJGames Dungeon Fantasy RPG Forum: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=173229
• RPG.net: https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?thre...r-less.881303/
• RPGGeek: https://rpggeek.com/thread/2658775/d...haracter-gener
• BoardGameGeek: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/265...neration-dfrpg

Twitter and FB Threads

• The Hard Sell on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GMingBallistic/s...73432094740484
• Facebook/Gaming Ballistic: https://www.facebook.com/GamingBalli...60399034729439

[DouglasCole]

Ballistic’s Report for Week Ending May 28

This week’s report was delayed by Memorial Day weekend, as I journeyed up north with my family to a lovely lake that I call The Land that Bandwidth Forgot. As a result, this update may be terse.

• Delvers to Grow funded, ended, and wound up with 451 backers (of which 446 have confirmed payments) and just over $31,000 in funding. This was an excellent average pledge, but the low backer count has a significant impact on future projects, and not for the better.
• I have received all of the materials I need to complete the Character Collections shipments, including a reprint of Dragon Hunt! and all of the missing and damaged counters. I’ll be boxing up the remaining USA and the Canadian shipments and sending them out ideally tomorrow. I’m waiting for three bids from some international shipping vendors, one of which looks really “good,” so much as any such can be good.
• The re-ships (grumble grumble gripe) for the More Perilous Journeys packages that did not arrive from Kixto and were not tracked (never again) will follow the same pathway as the International Character collections, and I’ll hopefully take care of everything this coming week.
• I am in the final stages of completing my entry for the 2021 PDF Challenge.

[DouglasCole]

Ballistic's Report for Week Ending June 11

On time this week! The past seven days saw the KS money come in to my account and major progress finalizing the Delvers to Grow project.

· The Character Collections international orders arrived at customs in Europe, and we’re getting a bit of flak about some of the CE certification. So I’m glad I did it, but there are still details that are getting things held up. Hopefully resolve in a few hours.

· Crypt of Krysuvik is now officially 40 pages, and while there’s still more work to do, it’s moving forward handily. Maps are nearly done. Art is progressing. Only have a few things left to edit and revise.

· The last item of pending business for Delvers are the character books. Those are still being worked, but the art for the three covers is in progress; the art informs the work, so having those in hand should help move things.

· Backerkit is so very painful. Everything that would be sensible to automate is manual.