Has anyone been taking a look at the upcoming warband/Skirmish level game "Rivenstone" coming from Broken Anvil Games. Broken Anvil Games was mainly and STL company but have acquired a number of individuals from other companies to develop this game and design and produce the models
This isn't meant to be a negative or a positive but that game's assets really look like the bastard child of warmachine and any recent FF Mini game which I guess makes since considering the designers.
From the cards (Which if someone posted these as a leak for an unannounced PP game it would be believable)
Monkeysloth wrote: This isn't meant to be a negative or a positive but that game's assets really look like the bastard child of warmachine and any recent FF Mini game which I guess makes since considering the designers.
I dont disagree with your points. But i hope that a company that has the ability to produce tight, scenario driven game AND good models will be able to make a great go of it. Especially given that PP is flapping in the wind. Will it break through in that crowded market when you already have Malifaux, Infinity, GW skirmish games etc already in this space remains to be seen. But if it makes it to UK stores i'll defo be giving it a good look.
Measuring sticks I don't mind too much (SOBAH does it just fine), but depending on how they're used they can be annoying. Definitely not a fan of custom dice. At all. Especially with that many different symbols on them.
It seems fine, but kind of forgettable. The art style really has that late 2000's Warcraft knockoff vibe like DnD 4th or Rune Wars. I haven't seen a gameplay gimmick that seems like it would stand out from the crowd either.
That said, the sculpts they've shown have some potentially interesting characters to rally behind and they've certainly poached some quality staff. It also looks to be a 16ish figure game so its pretty reasonable to jump into.
As it currently stands its likely a game I won't push to play but would likely pick up if one of my friends really wanted to give it a try.
This looks like it would have done fantastically well if it was released 20 years ago. In todays market it is, as LunarSol said, wholly forgettable in appearance, theme, and design. I expect the game will manage some penetration into the market on pedigree as Will Hungerford has his fanbase from the Privateer Press/Warmachine era, and PP/WMH is stagnant enough that peeling away a(nother) segment of its playerbase shouldn't be too difficult (certainly not moreso than how easy it seems to be to peel away Privateer Press design staff). The real question will be whether or not thematically, mechanically, and aestheticallyait has the staying power to survive and thrive in a crowded market.se
The game now has its own site, kickstarter coming in April and there will be doing demos at Adepticon and giving away free miniatures on the day as well
Looking over all the revealed rules so far, this is reading like a sibling to PP's Warcaster, which figures. They actually have some rules I like better.
I think they're leaning into the crowd that might like the WoW aesthetic, but I'm not sure there is a market for that right now in the miniature wargames scene. This might go over better as a boardgame with a lot of wargame aspects for that crowd.
$100 bucks for 9 dwarf models? Excluding the terrain models.
It's nice that you are exceeding your goal already, but that's too expensive for me. If I want to buy two boxes to play against, that's $180 without shipping.
Yeah... GW box sets are a better deal for the value I seek. Which is something I'd never thought I'd say.
I'll look this product up in a few years if you sell just the models in cheaper boxes.
Really liking the Orrix, It's about damn time somebody released actual physical WoW style orcs and not just STL files. Game looks merely OK, but not good enough to buy in the KS. If it hits retail/online store, I'll be picking up some random figs to paint
Game seems pretty cool actually. It's hitting a lot of the boxes of solid modern game design. Scenario and objective driven, built in come back mechanics, alternating activation, variable turn timer. No double turn/alpha strike/tabling NPE nonsense. It has a cool push and pull feel with resource management and harvesting the stones, like do you over extend on harvesting to later become more powerful to flip your dude and buy more attacks, or would you rather gain ground and VPs in the interim at risk of being under powered in the late game. I'm backing it
The rules look neat. Lot to like here. I'm not keen on any of the models currently ,but I do think a fairy faction in this art style would be superb so I'm not ruling anything out yet. As is there's several things I like, but I can wait to see what it looks like once its been out a few months before deciding to buy in.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I think what's most odd to me is that knights are so over the top cartoony and the orcs feel less cartoony than the rest by a fair amount. I'm not an undead guy and the Dwarves are about right but not my top pick. I do like the Wild, Id' like the Wild.
I was pretty excited about this, I love the style and the different approach to humans. But the price tag for a single faction will probably keep me from backing. Do game companies set low goals to ride the buzz of hitting it? 100k seems low for a whole game release. At 220k now but I wonder what their "real" goal is.
There's no "real" goal here. This stuff is effectively already in production. They're making it in house with Silocast, the rules are done, the models are sculpted, they're just doing this to get an idea of how much to print and to give the game some hype for launch.
I suspect that their "real" target is in the $500k range. Obviously shooting for more, but their goals aren't aggressive at all and I'd be surprised if these prices are much less than MSRP if any less (there's no advertised discount). It's just serving as a direct sale distribution channel since normal distribution isn't really a thing anymore.
I was definitely getting the WarmaHordes vibes both in rules and aesthetics (the humans are basically Menoth with black trim instead of gold), and then I played the video, saw Hungerford there and it all made sense.
I'm always wary of these US Kickstarters, because unless there's exclusives offered the incentive to commit is close to 0 when shipping costs eliminate any kind of saving (and in some cases actually lose you money these days). Plus there's no guarantee anyone else in your area is going to play anything but 40k anyway, even if you take it on yourself to be a 'rep' and bring along all the models ("yeah the game's fun but my hobby budget is going on that new Primaris model they showed.")
It looks fun, they're committed to the Warcrafty aesthetic, the rules seem strong and I really hope this succeeds, but I can't really see a point to risking having £100+ worth of models gathering dust like so many other systems.
Right now it's sat at about half of what the first Warcaster Kickstarter made. Be interesting to see how it does over the next month. I only heard about it post-launch because of GlassHalfDead and it does seem they're banking on the influencers doing a lot of their marketing for them.
Arbitrator wrote: I was definitely getting the WarmaHordes vibes both in rules and aesthetics (the humans are basically Menoth with black trim instead of gold), and then I played the video, saw Hungerford there and it all made sense.
He also recruited over Faye who did the excellent update to Warmachine last fall that gave the game the most life its seen in years.
I did finally cave and back it. A bunch of people in my group are really excited about it and... sure, I'll give it a try. Good people working on it and I don't really feel the need to go in too far beyond the starter box. The $225 pledge seems like its way too much redundancy.
I have been really impressed with how they have launched the game and the fact they have got many hobby youtube channels and content producers to paint and show their work.
The KS funded twice over and is unlocking lots of its stretch goals. Personally I dont use or do KS but if it gets to the shelves in the UK I will pick up some models at least for painting.
Broken Anvil was sold to a new company. Most of the staff and designers for the game, including Hungerford and Faye that had jumped over from Privateer have been let go. Siocast isn't working and they're moving to 3D prints. Whoever is left is insisting the game is a priority but I cannot imagine it will see any real support beyond what's already been produced if the KS gets fulfilled at all.
LunarSol wrote: Broken Anvil was sold to a new company. Most of the staff and designers for the game, including Hungerford and Faye that had jumped over from Privateer have been let go. Siocast isn't working and they're moving to 3D prints. Whoever is left is insisting the game is a priority but I cannot imagine it will see any real support beyond what's already been produced if the KS gets fulfilled at all.
Not that I don't believe you (having just looked around on their website, Facebook, etc., it seems it's gone quiet since like May, so...) but source?
Edit: Did happen to look up Hungerford on Linked In (since I actually had him as a contact from way back, though I'm on LI super rarely), and yeah, shows he left Broken Anvil back in May.
LunarSol wrote: Broken Anvil was sold to a new company. Most of the staff and designers for the game, including Hungerford and Faye that had jumped over from Privateer have been let go. Siocast isn't working and they're moving to 3D prints. Whoever is left is insisting the game is a priority but I cannot imagine it will see any real support beyond what's already been produced if the KS gets fulfilled at all.
Not that I don't believe you (having just looked around on their website, Facebook, etc., it seems it's gone quiet since like May, so...) but source?
Edit: Did happen to look up Hungerford on Linked In (since I actually had him as a contact from way back, though I'm on LI super rarely), and yeah, shows he left Broken Anvil back in May.
Doesn't bode well for this KS ever delivering.
Most of this you can find on the KS updates. They've been more transparent than most.:
LunarSol wrote: Broken Anvil was sold to a new company. Most of the staff and designers for the game, including Hungerford and Faye that had jumped over from Privateer have been let go. Siocast isn't working and they're moving to 3D prints. Whoever is left is insisting the game is a priority but I cannot imagine it will see any real support beyond what's already been produced if the KS gets fulfilled at all.
Not that I don't believe you (having just looked around on their website, Facebook, etc., it seems it's gone quiet since like May, so...) but source?
Edit: Did happen to look up Hungerford on Linked In (since I actually had him as a contact from way back, though I'm on LI super rarely), and yeah, shows he left Broken Anvil back in May.
Doesn't bode well for this KS ever delivering.
Most of this you can find on the KS updates. They've been more transparent than most.:
Popped in to say Faye was let go before Christmas of last year and Will has started a great new job at a video game studio. All staff is gone other than some production folks, the company is totally dead.
You know what the sucky thing is? They had a really solid Patreon set up and were putting out nice sets of models consistently- and then stopped completely, despite the 3D printing hobby being the reason they got to the point they were at. All this time later, and it still irritates me.
I know they mentioned concerns over piracy being a major contributing factor and the move towards only doing physical models instead was a big part of their decision, but it was just so abrupt. I know I told them my feelings at the time, as did many others, that it all seemed a bit premature to quite the STL business completely. I want to say all this went down prior to their Forged campaign.
A shame they didn't scale things down at the time rather than just stop completely cold turkey on the STLs as it could have been some steady income coming in, which in turn might have helped keep them off this path. They were doing this model of the month lootcrate thing for a while but that seemed to have completely fizzled out a while back.
I hope something positive can still come from this.
It's also yet another company that seems to have gotten burned by Siocast rather than have it be the revolutionary material many claimed it was.
it may well be the difference between running one of these STL things as a one man band and as a multi staff company
what can be a decent living via patreon etc for one person can look a lot less attractive when its being used to pay salaries/benefits/taxes for several members of staff
Its a shame this went belly up. They had a really interesting concept.
A number of game companies that are trying to move to other production methods are struggling right now. The only one that seems to be having any success is PP with their 3d printing. But whether that is a viable strategy for that company, given where they are, we shall see.
GW could do 3d printing (im convinced they do to some extent). But that would cut into the financial bottom line and GW doesn’t do that.
Aside from ASOIF, does anyone know of a miniatures game (not boardgame) that has been successfully marketed to retail that was originally funded on KS?
I can think of many that tanked before they even shipped, and many more that died right after they shipped. But for the life of me can’t recall any that were a success at retail after the KS.
I didn’t back Rivenstone due to a lack of any of the factions resonating and I generally only back board games on KS for the above reasons.
Ghool wrote: Aside from ASOIF, does anyone know of a miniatures game (not boardgame) that has been successfully marketed to retail that was originally funded on KS?
I can think of many that tanked before they even shipped, and many more that died right after they shipped. But for the life of me can’t recall any that were a success at retail after the KS. I didn’t back Rivenstone due to a lack of any of the factions resonating and I generally only back board games on KS for the above reasons.
Dropfleet Commander maybe?
I would like to peak into a world where Covid didn't happen to see how Warcaster ended up.
Ghool wrote: Aside from ASOIF, does anyone know of a miniatures game (not boardgame) that has been successfully marketed to retail that was originally funded on KS?
I can think of many that tanked before they even shipped, and many more that died right after they shipped. But for the life of me can’t recall any that were a success at retail after the KS.
I didn’t back Rivenstone due to a lack of any of the factions resonating and I generally only back board games on KS for the above reasons.
Wild West Exodus was successful-ish for a while after their initial KS. It lagged a bit then saw a pick-up (again, for a while) when Outlaw sold the IP to Warcradle, but it's been kinda stagnant as Warcradle focuses more on Dystopian Wars currently.
Off hand, I can't think of any non-boardgame miniatures games that have been longer term successful. Shadows of Brimstone is very successful after their several KS, but again that is a "miniatures boardgame," not a "traditional" miniatures wargame. I think that part of the problem with this style of game succeeding in retail is that it needs a constant stream of new stuff for people to grab. When so much is available via a Kickstarter, but trickles out to retail over a much longer period of time, I think that a lot of folks that were interested in the game already have that stuff from the KS, so new players buying in after retail release is not as common, and this leads to "failing" retail sales, which leads to less steady income for the company, which leads to issues maintaining continuing production, etc.
Edit: Oh, duh. Moonstone. They've had a few Kickstarters, all of which were pretty successful, and it's continuing to grow and get more and more interest and continuing releases. Also, it's a great game and fantastic models. Its biggest problem is that it's a small shop in the UK, and distribution outside of the UK is tricksy, but they are improving there, too.
I can't think of any that have been a big splash the two main ones i can think of are
Wrath of Kings was doing ok until CMON fumbled the non KS second edition (no new releases or restocks for a year or so, with the old minis available being the stuff that hadn't sold through well)
Dropfleet stumbled during KS fulfilment, and while TTCombat took it over from Hawk wargames it's never really managed to live up to peoples expectations (partly due to in not being the game of purely deep space battles that many wanted it to be)
Three smaller games that are still going after KSing are Counterblast from Bombshell miniatures, and Arcworld from Warploque (now Warp) miniatures and Darklands from Mierce
but then again the only new games that i can think of that have really hit big in the age of KS (without KS) are AoS (& Horus Heresy 1.0) which you've have expected anyway and Frosthaven
and maybe Saga, although i think although it launched after KS, people hadn't started thinking of putting games on there yet
Interesting. I know of a few of these but couldn’t recall the names, nor if they really succeeded in retail after the KS.
I think the above posts pretty much nailed why minis games don’t do great post-KS.
They just don’t seem well-suited for the platform, whereas board games seem to be tailor made for KS.
Ghool wrote: Aside from ASOIF, does anyone know of a miniatures game (not boardgame) that has been successfully marketed to retail that was originally funded on KS?
I can think of many that tanked before they even shipped, and many more that died right after they shipped. But for the life of me can’t recall any that were a success at retail after the KS.
I didn’t back Rivenstone due to a lack of any of the factions resonating and I generally only back board games on KS for the above reasons.
Relicblade doesn’t really have a retail presence, but seems to be doing well.
Not 100% what you are asking for, but Battletech is a game that was basically on life support before their first Kickstarter. There were two stores in my metro (that has 15-20 game stores) that carried anything Battletech at all. Now it is sold at every one I can think of it. One that I go to regularly the staff told me it outsells 40k (not all GW combined mind you, but 40k alone is really impressive).
That said I think you are generally right, miniature games that go to Kickstarter tend not to do very well, or are very small indie games by nature.
Shadowseas/Deepwars has been a KS exclusive game but still running new campaigns at least once a year. They do STL campaigns now with options for 3d printed stuff and sometimes darksword makes their minis for them.
They've been in retail before but not there anymore as far as I know-- but the line has done good for what it is.
Arena Rex is still making stuff as well but I don't think they've ever tried to be in retail sticking to being a boutique brand.
I think mini games struggle more post kickstarter as people expect regular releases and there's high expectations for them to be seen being played at stores to be successful while boardgames can be considered completely done once a campaign delivers and they're expected to be played at your house so no one cares if you don't see them at a store. So, write or wrong, there's stricter criteria what a successful miniatures game is vs boardgame.
fwiw, I don't remember Frostgrave rules being crowdfunded, but Northstar Figures has a periodic Nickstarter to crowdfund new mini's and other 'Grave rulesets.
I guess you can divide miniature games into large scale (eg. CMON, FFG's Runewhatevers) and small scale (eg. most others). Mantic Games used to have miniature lines on KS until about 2017 with Vanguard, but seem to put out more boardgame and terrain-only content. Mantic's Walking Dead, funded on KS 2016, was pretty successful retail, afaik, until the license wasn't renewed because the tv show was ending or something like that.
I think, with miniature lines being lifestyle games, it's more that the market can only support few of these games that you don't see them on KS? You *almost* never see CCG's on KS, either, although I know of exceptions, like Vampire the Masquerade and Doomtown.
Monkeysloth wrote: Shadowseas/Deepwars has been a KS exclusive game but still running new campaigns at least once a year. They do STL campaigns now with options for 3d printed stuff and sometimes darksword makes their minis for them.
They've been in retail before but not there anymore as far as I know-- but the line has done good for what it is.
Arena Rex is still making stuff as well but I don't think they've ever tried to be in retail sticking to being a boutique brand.
I think mini games struggle more post kickstarter as people expect regular releases and there's high expectations for them to be seen being played at stores to be successful while boardgames can be considered completely done once a campaign delivers and they're expected to be played at your house so no one cares if you don't see them at a store. So, write or wrong, there's stricter criteria what a successful miniatures game is vs boardgame.
Pre-pandemic, Shadowsea/Deep Wars had a booth at Gencon one year (maybe two, a bit fuzzy). I don't think I saw a single person at the booth the entire weekend, it was kind of sad. I don't know that the game has had anything more than the bare minimum of a following.
Monkeysloth wrote: Shadowseas/Deepwars has been a KS exclusive game but still running new campaigns at least once a year. They do STL campaigns now with options for 3d printed stuff and sometimes darksword makes their minis for them.
They've been in retail before but not there anymore as far as I know-- but the line has done good for what it is.
Arena Rex is still making stuff as well but I don't think they've ever tried to be in retail sticking to being a boutique brand.
I think mini games struggle more post kickstarter as people expect regular releases and there's high expectations for them to be seen being played at stores to be successful while boardgames can be considered completely done once a campaign delivers and they're expected to be played at your house so no one cares if you don't see them at a store. So, write or wrong, there's stricter criteria what a successful miniatures game is vs boardgame.
Pre-pandemic, Shadowsea/Deep Wars had a booth at Gencon one year (maybe two, a bit fuzzy). I don't think I saw a single person at the booth the entire weekend, it was kind of sad. I don't know that the game has had anything more than the bare minimum of a following.
We actually picked up some Deep Wars stuff at that GenCon, so I can say that there were at least 4 people at that booth one time, even if it was just us.
Wouldn't most of Mantic's early games qualify as starting on kickstarter and segueing into retail from there?
Was Kings of War originally kickstarted? I know a variety of models were, and the 2nd edition of the rules were as well.
Deadzone definitely was.
I've seen both at retail off and on over the years. I know there was a bit of a retailer backlash towards Mantic relentlessly kickstarting things in years past. Not sure if that's as much of a thing these days.
Quick little update - anyone talking about Chris (one of the owners) being a liar, asking questions about their merger, where the KS money went, the layoffs, are now all being purged from the KS projects. Anyone see "canceling" their pledge is just being removed manually by him.
Looks like the rumors about how he treats customers (and apparently employees) are true. Scumbags gunna scumbag!
Automatically Appended Next Post:
They have also now locked their discord. I've never seen someone run away with that much money in real time, quite a sight to see!!
Surprised nobody mentioned Guildball as a KS to retail success. It died a pretty ignominious death, but there for a while was one of the most popular wargames around
Kalamadea wrote: Surprised nobody mentioned Guildball as a KS to retail success. It died a pretty ignominious death, but there for a while was one of the most popular wargames around
Guess you could add Godtear as well since that's the GB replacement from the same company and I see it in all the online stores. Don't think it's anywhere near as big as Guildball ever was but Guildball is also a symptom of part of our hobby that the really competitive crowd doesn't like to stick with a game for very long so if you don't manage to build up a more causal scene your game will only last so long. Privateer was/is having these same issues. Even with out all the missteps by them around the MK3 launch it was happening to Warmahordes as well.
Or I guess you could say it's amazing that GW manages to stay popular as all the other games seam to be much less resilient.
As for Broken Anvil, that looks pretty damning
It does. Especially for all the people that just backed the paints but they should be able to do chargebacks at least. Wasn't the owner someone that's been in the collectible figure/toy industry for a while with a pretty good reputation? Seams like he got enough from the sale to just not care anymore? Is this the new company causing all these problems as they're wanting to shed lower margin products? Or is the merger just a bunch of smoke and mirrors to try and get out of a situation that's clearly not gone the way they wanted with money raised in the KS campaigns?
Pre-pandemic, Shadowsea/Deep Wars had a booth at Gencon one year (maybe two, a bit fuzzy). I don't think I saw a single person at the booth the entire weekend, it was kind of sad. I don't know that the game has had anything more than the bare minimum of a following.
Several of the KS campaigns always seams to be a lot of the same people but they keep putting stuff out -- even planning on an RPG this year. Even just did a collab for a really sweat modular sea-lab terrain set as well. But ya, it's not super popular by any means but it's still pretty good quality stuff. Some great monster STLs even if you don't care for the game.
Chris and Hanna were and are the owners of Level52 Studios, a failed statue company. Anytime someone brought this info up on their Broken Anvil discord they were quickly banned. A quick Google shows they have multiple undelivered products from years ago, an undelivered KS and their Facebook presence is pretty damning.
I would assume no one in their right mind would ever invest in either company, seeing as how they'd have to foot the bill to produce these kickstarters.
Seemingly a no good scamming couple piggybacking off of real industry professionals, which had surely happened before in the hobby, just a shame to taint so many customers! (Especially running off with the paint kickstarter funds)
As if a few weeks ago Chris was on their discord showing pictures from a hotel in Vegas where he was "working" for a new company, his linkedin profile also said he was the new director for Pointeast, some kind of factory in China. When this was brought up on their Discord the dude who discovered the info got banned and Chris privated his LinkedIn.
legionaires wrote: How difficult is it to cancel a KS pledge or is it too late in this case?
If Kickstarter has already collected pledges (usually within a few days of the campaign ending), then you have to contact the project runners and hope they will let you and send you a refund. Most likely, you're SOL.
I backed the paint KS. After the pledge manager I got a random £25 charge from Level52, asked them about it and they said it was indeed them. I assumed it was shipping for the kickstarter but they said it wasn’t, and never explained what the charge was for.
Strange all around.
Anyway. After reading this thread I posted it on the paint Ks to ask what’s going on. Will update if I get removed 😅
Ghool wrote: Interesting. I know of a few of these but couldn’t recall the names, nor if they really succeeded in retail after the KS.
I think the above posts pretty much nailed why minis games don’t do great post-KS.
They just don’t seem well-suited for the platform, whereas board games seem to be tailor made for KS.
KS are essentially a way to fund a print run. This is fine for board games because board games regularly go out of stock. If it does well enough to justify a second printing great, but there's no obligation to do so. It just doesn't produce content well suited to a monthly release to retail that a minis game tends to thrive on.
Former Broken Anvil employee here to clarify some stuff.
Obviously this is a throwaway account and you can't trust an anonymous source, so believe me if you want or not.
There's been some discussion about Level 52 and Broken Anvil being separate. They aren't. They're the same thing with the same people working on both companies projects. Level 52 is the original company that makes statues and Broken Anvil is just a DBA under a different name.
Rivenstone was successfully funded and we had every expectation of fulfilling the KS but due to the success the company grew too big and was hemorrhaging money. Same goes for the Patreon. We had like 4 sculptors working on the patreon and three engineers. They did pay decent so at the end of the day the patreon was barely breaking even. I don't agree with the change in direction it went but that's the decision that was made to try and save money. Due to the company losing money, Rivenstone money was diverted to other projects to try and make more money that way. That's where Forged came in. The genius of Chris thought Forged would be a giant success (like reaper bones) and we'd have so much money that we could fulfill Rivenstone and Forged easily. That didn't happen obviously. Forged started funding twice on Backerkit and didn't take off as quickly as Chris hoped so he went to KS. It funded but didn't make nearly enough to even fund it's own production. I can tell you for a fact that absolutely nothing has been done with that product since the campaign ended, besides the STLs, but those were already made since they were all Patreon rewards already. That money is gone and spent and it is never being made.
The paints were actually super great and everyone in the office was real excited about them. They are some of the best paints I've ever used to be honest. I was super hopeful that these would actually be made because all of the work was done beforehand and all Chris needed to do to fulfill the KS was to email the company in China and tell them to make the product and send it to us. We had enough from the KS to make them but again, Chris used that money to delay the inevitable bankruptcy of his company so I don't think they're ever getting made which is a real shame.
Me and almost everyone else there was laid off in May. For months before then there had been exactly zero work done on any projects except for new ones that would bring in new money. I was told directly that Rivenstone was on the backburner and didn't matter. Those infographics on the KS showing progress are completely made up. Some of the molds were done but they didn't produce the minis for them. Now that everyone is gone there's zero way to produce the minis in siocast so that's why he's asking backers if 3D printed minis is okay because it's easier for him to pump out subpar 3D printed minis than properly make the minis. Super ironic considering he kept bashing PP for going to 3D printed minis. Dude's just a giant hypocrite.
As for the acquisition, or merger, or whatever Chris wants to call it, it's been dead for months now but he's been talking about it like it's in the process of happening as a way to delay. As you know PointEast was in talks to acquire Level 52. Chris would become their sales guy (like some of you saw on his Linkedin before he made his profile private) and they'd gut the company and use it for it's contracts and business partnerships with companies to produce statues. They didn't want Broken Anvil but Chris was pushing for them to keep it alive. PointEast is a smart company so when doing their due diligence when in talks with buying L52 they discovered all the sady business practices Chris and Hanna were up to and they saw the financials and just how much we were losing money. They backed out quick after that and I don't blame them at all. Since then there have been two people working at the company and one of them is just part time. Chris hasn't been in the office in weeks and Hanna has been working for family in another state. The company is dead and everyone's money is long gone but Chris is too narcissistic to rip off the bandaid and tell everyone it's all over. We had so much wasted talent there and it kills all of us who loved working on minis and games because we could have had something great but it was killed by leadership who don't know the first thing about business or the minis industry. I love everyone I worked with there, besides Chris and Hanna obviously, and we are as heartbroken about it all as much as everyone else. The only solace I get from this experience is knowing that Chris and Hanna's reputations are ruined and they'll hopefully never be able to scam anyone in this industry and hobby again.
Well huh, I am quite glad I have avoided this Kickstarter. My local group thought it looked good, but VERY happy we came to the conclusion of waiting for a completed product before even considering it.
Unlike the Battletech: Mercenaries Kickstarter, where I really don't expect to not get what I paid for.... Been too many Kickstarter disasters before and after Rivenstone to make me even consider backing a new game from a new company.
Broke_Anvil wrote: Former Broken Anvil employee here to clarify some stuff.
You left out the part about running off on paying companies threatening to sue them for not filling orders (Skybound Ent.), or ignoring their overseas employees and not paying them for months after they stopped working there. (Even though they were salary) The amount of insanity from Chris is truly a once in a life time experience.
Chris has responded to this thread on their now locked discord admitting he's been lying about the merger - even though he doesn't mention they FIRED him TWICE (he just mentions they backed out of the merger) and is claiming Hanna is "fire fighting in orgeon" (shes working at a desk) and blames the companies failure on keeping employees on board - not him lying, gaslighting and running off every client they've ever had. Forged + Paint KS are not in development and he can only work on Rivenstone - he also confirmed only 1 full-time employee and 1 part-time employee currently remain.
The biggest crock of gak he's saying is how they never took paychecks. Chris is one of the most wasteful spenders I have ever met in my life. Doordash 3 meals or more a day. Every new video game, every DLC, played once. Random boardgame purchases he would never play, miniatures he would never paint. When the company was failing before the layoff, he was bragging about wanting to buy a new car - as they WENT ON VACATION. He is truly a huge POS and I hope bankruptcy forces him to stop pretending to be a millionaire with what he told us he had all the time - "adult money".
Mod edit - please do not attach or upload non-wargaming images to your post. Off-site hosting and linking is permitted.
All this is giving me Defiance Games flashbacks with Tony Reidy scamming everyone around him while running the company into the ground. Was the talk of the town here on Dakka for many years. Just checked, and the Hardsuit KS was only $46K and 686 backers, only a fraction of the dollar amount and backers that Broken Anvil has between Rivenstone, Forged and Studio Paints KS. Kinda surprised this isn't getting more attention.
I guess we now know why the Rivenstone models suddenly "weren't suitable for Siocast casting". Didn't make sense earlier, but it does make sense if you have no employees left that know how to make Siocast molds.
Really sucks for all the former employees, I've seen dream companies run into the ground by bad owners before and it's gut wrenching watching it happen from the inside, knowing you can't do anything to stop it. Broken Anvil has some really great mini designs, sad to see them go this way
Really sucks for all the former employees, I've seen dream companies run into the ground by bad owners before and it's gut wrenching watching it happen from the inside, knowing you can't do anything to stop it. Broken Anvil has some really great mini designs, sad to see them go this way
The best part about all of us former employees is that we will continue to take our love for the hobby elsewhere everyone is onto new projects, just sucks to have been working for such a scammer. Took a while for us to realize the truth, but when we did, it was all hands on deck making sure they couldn't screw over any new customers.
[...] but when we did, it was all hands on deck making sure they couldn't screw over any new customers.
What did you do?
The list is pretty long, but ranges from warning potential new clients to not prepay for anything, tell him to his face he was openly planning to commit fraud (our production manager quit over that actually) and tied up all loose ends on projects so all he had to do was pay for production. It was always a sense of making sure to stop him from screwing over random people all the time to keep a failing business open for no reason, ending with everyone getting laid off a few days after he told us all we were family and that he had plenty of money to continue paying payroll. We knew it was bad when he fired all of our artists and started using Midjourney to design products, but didn't pay the sculptors for the work, while bragging to our community about a "brand new produciton pipeline" he was implementing. It's just a never ending list of insanity. After he laid off half the company before Christmas, he forgot to stop paying for the laid off folks' insurance, then contacted them months later threatening them saying they owed him money for his own mistake.....
So, I feel like I am the one who started the spiral on the Forged mini collection. I was kicked out for asking questions about the production, people actually messaged me after I was removed and banned from the discord about what I said because they were looking for refunds. The moment Chris wouldn't answer questions is when I knew this campaign was dead. If all you do is tell people we have no "news" about fixing the poses on minis that says a lot.
Anyway this was the post that got me banned and there obviously is a reason:
Here are some questions that I would like addressed. When do you expect your merger to go through? What happens to these projects if the merger doesn't complete? When did you start laying people off and why didn't you inform people about that when the kickstarter began? Why didn't you tell us about them when you informed Rivenstone about them? Why did you start 2 extra kickstarters if the first one already had issues? What is your plan to reconcile the KS if the merger/money doesn't happen, are you just gonna throw STL files at us and say good enough? Will there be an option to get the STL files and refund the difference? Where in the manufacturing stage are you; are you still fixing the models or have molds been made or still redwax models? What percent of the issues are fixed currently?
Anyway, have a good one folks and I am sorry to those that didn't get out in time.
darzin wrote: So, I feel like I am the one who started the spiral on the Forged mini collection. I was kicked out for asking questions about the production, people actually messaged me after I was removed and banned from the discord about what I said because they were looking for refunds. The moment Chris wouldn't answer questions is when I knew this campaign was dead. If all you do is tell people we have no "news" about fixing the poses on minis that says a lot.
Anyway this was the post that got me banned and there obviously is a reason:
Here are some questions that I would like addressed. When do you expect your merger to go through? What happens to these projects if the merger doesn't complete? When did you start laying people off and why didn't you inform people about that when the kickstarter began? Why didn't you tell us about them when you informed Rivenstone about them? Why did you start 2 extra kickstarters if the first one already had issues? What is your plan to reconcile the KS if the merger/money doesn't happen, are you just gonna throw STL files at us and say good enough? Will there be an option to get the STL files and refund the difference? Where in the manufacturing stage are you; are you still fixing the models or have molds been made or still redwax models? What percent of the issues are fixed currently?
Anyway, have a good one folks and I am sorry to those that didn't get out in time.
I'm right there with you... Forced refund for +1 your posts and linking this DAKKA thread. Anyone who links this thread gets instant refunded. Makes me sad as I can't figure out how to contact people still on those projects to 'come here and read this'. If people linking this thread gets people refunds, then that is a net gain IMHO for making some people whole. Otherwise it will give people exposure and closure to the real situation at a minimum.
I'm right there with you... Forced refund for +1 your posts and linking this DAKKA thread. Anyone who links this thread gets instant refunded. Makes me sad as I can't figure out how to contact people still on those projects to 'come here and read this'. If people linking this thread gets people refunds, then that is a net gain IMHO for making some people whole. Otherwise it will give people exposure and closure to the real situation at a minimum.
I think if people asking questions about a project forces someone to refund them instead of... I don't know -- answering? That says a lot about the company and the project. This thing was dead in the water before it launched. The biggest issue is overpromising addons. Blacklist Games did it on a larger scale.
Should be an official response to the truth coming out today - unless he's too busy playing video games again. I'd bet $50 that the reply is - "well, most of what was said isn't true, but I did mess up, I'm not good at business, but I cared about people too much, I swear I'm not a bad guy." I wonder if he cared too much when he stopped buying everyone toilet paper, soap and hand towels for the bathroom?
I backed the campaign with a Chase card. I reached out to their chargeback department and was told that they’d be issuing a credit to me to the backed amount and billing the recipient of the money from the campaign.
They then clarified that the recipient, Broken Anvil, would be allowed to dispute my claim but in order to do so would have to:
(1) Prove they shipped the game.
(2) Provide tracking info for my order.
I mentioned this thread specifically and emphasized that the money paid to Broken Anvil was for a physical good that was not delivered.
For anyone reading this, Washington state where Broken Anvil is located, has a very proactive Attorney General named Bob Ferguson. He has previously taken fraudulent Kickstarter's to court on behalf of consumers.
(geekwire.com/2014/attorney-general-asylum-playing-cards-crowdfunded-project/)
For those interested, you can submit a complaint about a business in Washington state to fortress.wa.gov/atg/formhandler/ago/ComplaintForm.aspx
Considering that Broken Anvil and by extension Chris has stolen and mismanaged over 600k in consumer funds, I'm pretty sure this will get his offices attention if many people choose to file.
Hey Kickstarter backers! Glad you're all reading this! Please understand Chris has intentionally committed fraud, while lying to you, his employees, anyone who would listen. Please complain through the link above, it's the only chance anyone has for holding him (AND HANNA since she got the KS deposit from the paint KS). They took the money and ran.
Oh no, this really sucks. The art style and concept of the game and the minis really did it for me and I went deep on the backerkit preorder :( wanted to get a little bit of everything to play it with friends.
Super sad to hear about the internal drama and overall state of affairs. Will try to get a refund
I love how this guys is like "We are gonna make this right, also we have no money!" Then instead of asking questions is keeping the discord locked and ran away from the kickstarter. Way to build trust!
I'm going to repeat something I put on the discord, for what it's worth:
Things that need to happen for the promised product to be delivered:
BAM's skeleton crew finish making models
Have someone print rulebooks and deliver them to BAM
Have someone produce dice and deliver them to BAM
Have someone produce cardboard widgets + tokens and deliver them to BAM
Have someone produce acrylic widgets + tokens and deliver them to BAM
Have someone produce battle mats and deliver them to BAM
Probably some other stuff I've forgotten. Dice bags, maybe?
Have someone produce Rivenstone-branded cardboard boxes and deliver them to BAM
BAM buys a whole bunch of regular cardboard boxes and packing peanuts
BAM puts all the bits into their respective boxes
BAM puts all the boxes into people's respective orders
BAM ships it to us
Chris has shared more photos of completed castings, since this dakka thread accusations were made, but I haven't seen any of the other things. And I don't see all of that happening if there is no money left.
Some of those things could be already paid for, and BAM is just waiting for delivery, for all I know.
Some of those things could have their production delayed (eg battlemats), or cheapen-ified (eg instead of Riven-branded boxes you could have a plain box with a hand-scrawled label).
But still.
If it were me, and it were at all possible, I would focus on getting the starter kits completed and shipped. Get people playing so their patience to wait for the "extras" will increase and, more importantly, maybe the game won't wither on the vine. God knows, maybe if people were playing it in stores you'd be able to get freshblood buying their own starter kits, and then there would be "bandwidth" to come back and finish the extras.
If it were me, and it were at all possible, I would focus on getting the starter kits completed and shipped. Get people playing so their patience to wait for the "extras" will increase and, more importantly, maybe the game won't wither on the vine. God knows, maybe if people were playing it in stores you'd be able to get freshblood buying their own starter kits, and then there would be "bandwidth" to come back and finish the extras.
Hes shared the same photos of minis from different angles like 5 times, they stopped producing minis months ago. Since he wants to 3d print the big minis like Corum and the Rivenstone deposits, you're looking at 6 months at least of printing 24/7. It ain't happening
If they were trying to fulfill this at the lowest cost possible (as a means to guarantee product delivery), the "Rivenstone-branded cardboard boxes" bit isn't really necessary. You can utilize generic cardboard boxes with a sticker instead. Won't necessarily go over well with retail level backers, but it fulfills the obligation.
Certainly sounds that way. Just pointing out that there are certain things that are "nice to haves" but not "necessities".
I can't speak for others, but if I had to choose between getting "something" and getting "nothing" at this point, I would settle for taking miniatures in generic brown boxes. Things like dice (assuming that Rivenstone didn't require proprietary dice to play), dice bags, widgets (assuming they aren't anything non-standard and are just player aids). etc. I can all live without - I would be pissed that I paid for them and didn't receive them, but most of the value is in the minis and rulebook.
Now that Chris has the eyes of the world on him and is afraid of the WA state AG - he's posted on Discord updates on ordering paint, producing things for Rivenstone etc. As a former employee I will comment on what he has said.
First off- Rivenstone
Books, dice, tokens and measuring sticks are being ordered this week for Rivenstone.
Dice will likely take a few weeks for manufacturing, tokens a few weeks and books about a week. I will need to see what type of palletization they will all be but i imagine we will need to ocean freight all of it. Which tracks on about a month for shipping.
Dice have been sitting in a box in the office for over a year.
During that time we are also beginning Full printing on the parts that we cannot make in Siocast. Currently i have 1 employee who is doing final cuts and engineering on remaining parts left to be engineered and another employee doing QC. As for the remaining parts to be made in Siocast, I will likely have to farm out of the mold production for those so i will begin doing that as well.
All of the Rivenstone models were engineered for mold making, he has already paid for another company (I wont involve them because they are a real legit business) to make the molds for a faction already. I assume this is Chris' way of showing molds being made outside of the office, but just like the dice, the work has already been done before the layoffs. Typical, lying, delaying, Chris.
We found a place to move to and should get in there October 1st which will really help with the rent bleed.
He always said it would be his garage, so it's his garage.
Studio paints- We are making the deposit for production this week to the manufacturer. When i do, i will also post a work order etc from them as proof. It’s around a 45k$ deposit. They told me it takes around 2 weeks to 3 weeks for full production, plus bottling and labeling. Bottles are almost ready to ship to them, i will air freight them when ready as to mitigate any further delay for manufacturing.
I thought we would have to wait a bit longer for the paint, Happy to report we won’t.
Theres no deposit needed - it's a purchase order. That number tracks, however the bottles literally cost less than $2000 so you are all well aware hes been full of it using bottles as an excuse. (They order off Alibaba) Each final bottle was somewhere around $1.50 to $1.65 to produce, never heard a final number from the people working on that project so you can do the math.
Forged- this will still take the time quoted in the post. But i am hoping that we can start showing progress within the next 45 days.
At the time of laying everyone off with no intention of brining us back - there was no factory working on Forged - no progress at all - he is starting at 0%. I wouldn't be shocked if he airbrushed a 3d print the color of wax and faked progress that way. It will also cost around $80-100k to make the molds for that project. Between the $45k from the paint, there's not enough left spending another $14k in September on rent etc for that money from the paint KS to cover Forged.
(Section about releasing STLs)
We are considering releasing early, as a way for people to play right now. This obviously comes with risk which is why we have not done it. However if we couldn’t deliver Rivenstone then yes you better believe we would make them public. We would have no intention of trying to hold onto this ip, we know how this industry works we would not want to keep it to try to sell it again, that’s insane.
Chris 100% was trying to sell the IP to another game company. On top of that, he told multiple team members that is exactly what he would do, as well as sell the siocast machines etc if the company fell apart.
Historically any time Chris has been faced with legal consiquences he folds. This happened with employees he didn't pay, companies he screwed over (he's in insane legal trouble with Skybound) so I'm not shocked people filing with the AG has him moving at a speed faster than his fingers on the Doordash app.
One thing we haven't mentioned was Chris' intention to crowdfund the cardgame we all completed "Prowl" on KS a month or so after the paint KS. All of these projects were supposed to impress Pointeast that BAM could make plenty of money since they didn't want to invest. I recall Hanna telling all of us that they were showing Pointeast how Rivenstone could make a million a year or some insane number once the KS was delivered.
Because there are things I cannot share. Period. And if/when I can I will be screaming from the rooftops. But some developments I do not have the privilege of sharing.
A lot of this did kind of happen over the weekend. I was working, sorting our budgets and income from other revenue and figuring out how we can allocate.
The only outside revenue would be work from Level52 - but at the time of everyone getting canned they didn't have new work coming in other than potential minis / statues for Dimension20 that they didn't even ask for. Beyond that, Chris has told us multiple times that he would file bankruptcy in case of an emergency because he already fraudulenty forged recycling documents on our 3d printers and siocast machines to show that he has no assets. This is also why, you may notice, that Hanna's name is listed on the paint KS and Chris is on the others.
When you launch a KS project, the name tied to it is the name on the bank account that gets the deposit. Chris files for bankruptcy on the past debt and projects, Hanna's bank is their safety net. Another potential "funding" area is Hanna's parents. During one of our final "trust us we love you we are family" meetings, Hanna mentioned they were begging her parent's to get a second mortgage on their house to fund production on the debt. The house is very expensive. Since we were all laid off a few days later, our take was that obviously that didn't come through. Maybe it did this time because Hanna is now legally tied into the fraud. IF Chris somehow has found his elusive spine we have all been searching for, and somehow starts to finalize these projects somehow with hundreds of thousands of dollars, cool!
We still all hate his guts and he has to live with himself knowing people finally found out the truth about it.
Tossing my hat into the " I also hate Chris" Pile.
As someone else who has worked with Chris (and Hanna),
everything so far in this thread tracks with my experiences with them.
I'm happy to see this mess getting exposed.
He should have kept his nose out of an industry he clearly doesn't understand, much less the core character integrity required to run an ethical business.
(Pay your artists and employees)
I hope this thread serves as a warning to anyone dealing with him in the future.
Maybe Hanna's folks will bail him out- but I doubt they want to throw any more money at his raging bonfire of a business model.
It still irks me that through all of this, he refuses to accept full responsibility for his lies and choices. It's always something or someone else's' fault not his.
Chris: Its definitely you.
Chris 100% was trying to sell the IP to another game company. On top of that, he told multiple team members that is exactly what he would do, as well as sell the siocast machines etc if the company fell apart.
In other words he tried to sell the IP unsuccessfully and now is scrambling to find another way out.
All of these projects were supposed to impress Pointeast that BAM could make plenty of money since they didn't want to invest. I recall Hanna telling all of us that they were showing Pointeast how Rivenstone could make a million a year or some insane number once the KS was delivered.
What you're describing sounds a lot like a ponzi scheme. I mean the kickstarter pattern is literally a ponzi scheme, but the behind the scenes investment sounds like the makings of one too. Collecting funds from waves of kickstarter "investors" for what are borderline fictional non-existent products that seemed increasingly unlikely to ever be delivered in order to make the company look more financially successful than it really is in the hopes of luring bigger investors who will throw more money at it or buy the business and its nonexistent product range outright and inherit all the problems while he walks away with the money. Maybe somewhere in there he intended to fulfill his obligations to kickstarter backers, but it doesn't sound like that would be realistically viable without very significant outside investment to stabilize the business and balance the ledger.
When the team from Pointeast came to visit the office, where he bragged about himself and not our abilities, he recorded the entire meeting. Later he told us all how he would use that recording to undercut them and take all their clients if they didn't invest in us. He is just so dim, that he thought they'd bail him out of over 1mil in debt. Skybound alone was over 400k. Not to mention the other projects the bailed on from Level52, such as the Medevil statue etc. He of course told all of us that it was covid shutdowns in China etc, until right before the layoffs telling us that he took the money and started Broken Anvil. He's not an intentional scammer, just so egotistical that he thought he could somehow keep pulling in big clients. With every Level52 client they had, somehow, the client always would "act stupid" and be weird about giving him more work. Of course when you argue with clients and are late on every deadline they bail. He had the chance to make over 1.2mil from a deal with the pokemon company and literally scared them away when they had a check in hand. He didn't stash the money away, we suspect he lost it in crypto, tons of delivery food, toys and payroll. He yelled at us all one time that if you spend enough money on something and grow it fast enough it will be successful because people can't ignore it..... well.... did it work?
I just want people to realize he stopped buying toilet paper and yelled at us when we asked for some.
How did he find 45k dollars for a deposit? Also, high quality miniature paints cost a small fortune to manufacture. At 1.25 which is on the low end, he is going to have to pay 46k alone for 2 tiers of the paint set, not counting boxing, shipping, labels, and bottles. This is bs. I bet he posts a made up "ticket" for costs I bet it will hide all of the actual important information and won't be real. Alternatively, he changed the formulas and he is about to send a ton of "apple barrel" paints to people. Paint manufacturers aren't kmart lay away plans, you either pay or you don't. They aren't taking a deposit, and why would you make a deposit if you can't guarantee the rest of the money?
Please, please, mass report Rivenstone, Forged, and the Paints to Kickstarter it is very clear that Chris has no plan to give any honest updates and this needs to forced. He is in violation of the KS ToS and needs to be held accountable.
You can find the full update on instagram at the link above as well as the link solely to Level52 Studios, LLC instagram to look at any early posts if you would like to. The link for the Level52 Studios instagram was listed in the creator bio for the Kickstarter I had questions about at the bottom of this post.
"We are being acquired by a larger collectibles and statue manufacturer." - Instagram update for Level52 Studios, LLC, May 1st 2023.
Before the campaign for paint was even posted, you commented that a company is acquiring you. Did you have a contract signed or any other concrete evidence from them that offered a legally binding guarantee that this would go through? If not, why was this potential acquisition of your company and all the other delayed business from Level52 Studios, LLC not mentioned in the risks of your Broken Anvil Studio Paints Kickstarter, if there was no legally binding guarantee? Given how important you make it sound in your most current post and your May 1st update on your Level52 Studios, LLC instagram, was it not actually that important to the continued success of your company? If it wasn't that important and would have no serious consequences can we your backers know what your other plans were to see these multiple projects to completion within the time frames and proposed budgets on your Kickstarters? This is assuming the goals on your kickstarter are accounting for budgets you have worked out for your company to see that you can make the deadlines you have picked. Is that what the goal number on your Kickstarter indicates? If this is not the case, what does the goal amount account for? Lastly, if it was as important as you make it sound and you knew about it at least 9 days before posting the Kickstarter why did you not inform us of it in the risks and challenges section?
"This was impacted greatly by covid and the factory we chose for the vast majority of these statues has not been able to come back online as fast as we had hoped. Along with that they prioritize larger runs and ours have constantly been placed in the back of the queues over and over again." - Instagram update for Level52 Studios, LLC, May 1st 2023.
Automatically Appended Next Post: "There are always unknown risks, but we are very confident our experience in product manufacturing will allow us to navigate most issues efficiently." - Broken Anvil Studio Paints Kickstarter, Under risks and Challenges.
“Our team has spent the last 18 months working with a manufacturing partner that has produced high-quality paints for nearly a century in the United Kingdom. We've ironed out all of the details of the manufacturing process down to the bottles, agitators, and labels.” - Broken Anvil Studio Paints Kickstarter, Under risks and challenges.
Your campaign says you are very confident in your experience in product manufacturing. Can I ask what education or experience you have that gives you this confidence? Also, you state in an update on July 7th, 2023 "Unfortunately, as a result of this unbelievably awesome enthusiasm, sourcing the volume of the specific bottles we need for containing our paint has been a larger challenge than expected, and our manufacturing partner now requires a longer manufacturing period to fulfill the volume needed." I am wondering why it took almost two months to figure out that your manufacturing partner would be unable to provide you with the new number of bottles? Can we have a timeline for this discussion with them and how it went about taking this long to come to that conclusion before sharing it with us? Also, why was the risk of a time increase based on the volume of needed bottles not addressed in the risk and challenges section or provided to us as an update, given that you have experience in product manufacturing and that there would need to be a change to shipping if you surpassed a given number of backers based on the increased volume of bottles? In addition why as the number of backers increased would this have not been of growing concern given your plans according to your FAQ to sell them later this year in your store and through retailers? Did you not have any conversations with your manufacturer about the potential to need increased volume if a certain demand level was reached at any point during the 18 months of planning that went into this project with the added intention of selling them in retailers after?
"Yes! We have plans to offer these paints on our website and through retailers later this year, if we meet our funding goal.
Last updated: Wed, May 10 2023 10:39 AM PDT " - Broken Anvil Studio Paints Kickstarter FAQ
Automatically Appended Next Post: "We had to scale back our business a significant amount and made some pretty big layoffs late last year." - Instagram update for Level52 Studios, LLC, May 1st 2023.
In March of 2023 Skybound chose not to continue collaborating on production of their Lee and Clemintine statue with you. "In addition to these challenges, ultimately, the statue has not met our expectations in depicting our Lee and Clementine, and our collaboration with Level52 on this project will not continue." saying earlier in the update, "We have no confidence that we’ll be able to deliver the statue to you in any meaningful time period." before providing refunds to all of the people that had ordered them and additionally stating, "Despite us having fully paid for production on the statue, we are issuing refunds because this is our fault, not yours." Was this news of a partner pulling out of business with you before you ever put up the Broken Anvil Studio Paint Kickstarter taken into consideration when deciding to invest time and effort into putting up a Kickstarter for backers to invest in? In addition, if both your Rivenstone and Forged Kickstarters were already underway how did you fund and mange the 18 month endeavor to set up production for these paints while also continuing to put the required time and money into those Kickstarters as well as all of the other open statue orders you had through Level52 Studios, LLC?
Automatically Appended Next Post: One last thing, a few questions regarding a Kickstarter under the name Level52 Studios.
Which is Level52 Studios, LLC if you follow the link to their website offered in the creator bio it is listed at the bottom of the webpage level52studios.com.
If it was, you can ignore these follow up questions.
Why was the last official update to this Kickstarter and the people who had chosen to stick with you after the offered refunds, almost 2 years ago on November 29, 2021? And why did you not respond to questions about how production was going so they could have a clear picture of what was happening?
Looks like if it was posted in the comments on the paint KS, it has been removed already.
So if anyone wants a refund, you probably should re-post this whole block in a comment and keep getting forced refund until they can't afford to remove posts.
Appears that KS was banned and refunded. The people in their discord that seem to be okay with the Cult leader essentially silencing anyone asking questions is amazing. I never thought I would see a time where people would willingly give money to someone and say "well gak happens, they should just take some more money!"
darzin wrote: Appears that KS was banned and refunded. The people in their discord that seem to be okay with the Cult leader essentially silencing anyone asking questions is amazing. I never thought I would see a time where people would willingly give money to someone and say "well gak happens, they should just take some more money!"
Clearly you haven’t been following Mythic Games….. 😆
I find it absolutely hilarious that he is refusing to answer questions directly on the kickstarter and instead answering to his bootlickers on discord. Those people are literally willing to keep throwing money at him even after him literally admitting to fraud. It is hilariously sad. I wonder if he is refusing out of culpability? Discord being considered second hand. Well, unless someone from kickstarter or the government decides to just hop on and read all of his statements.
I posted a comment yesterday with resources for concerned backers to file a complaint with the Washington Office of the Attorney General, and later that night I received an email from Kickstarter informing me that my pledge has been refunded. I noticed that Chris hasn't issued refunds to all the other comments asking for one; instead, he's apparently just refunding the "squeakiest wheels" like me. The cynic in me suspects it's more about Chris having the ability to remove comments encouraging others to take action, like a corporation using union-busting tactics against employees trying to organize their fellow coworkers into standing up for themselves.
Chris really wasted his time taking photos of bins that have been there for a year. When everyone got laid off Tor was in production and still isn't done lmao.
Even if the two people that comprise Broken Anvil now somehow manage to complete production on Rivenstone or pack up 1000 shipments of the paint, where are they getting the money to ship all of this? It's not happening. This all ends the same way every Kickstarter that runs out of money ends: with backers being ghosted. Eventually you will just stop hearing from Chris, and he will go on with his life.
I'm cross-posting this here as well to get more eyes on it.
Does anyone more keen-eyed than me want to compare the numbers on the bins from the current updates (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897255,https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897283) to this update from last November (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3655351). I could swear that I spotted some numbers that are the same in both sets of photos (, but don't have time to do the investigative work while I'm at work today. If not, I will spend some time looking over it tomorrow morning but figured getting more eyes on it might be helpful. I am trying to decide how much "progress" has really been made or if these are just photos of work done 8 months ago.
For example in one of the new updates I see 704 written on a bin in the same writing as I see in the old update. Anyways, thought it might be worth digging into because I think it is hard to take things at face value with this campaign anymore.
GumbaFish wrote: I'm cross-posting this here as well to get more eyes on it.
Does anyone more keen-eyed than me want to compare the numbers on the bins from the current updates (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897255,https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897283) to this update from last November (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3655351). I could swear that I spotted some numbers that are the same in both sets of photos (, but don't have time to do the investigative work while I'm at work today. If not, I will spend some time looking over it tomorrow morning but figured getting more eyes on it might be helpful. I am trying to decide how much "progress" has really been made or if these are just photos of work done 8 months ago.
For example in one of the new updates I see 704 written on a bin in the same writing as I see in the old update. Anyways, thought it might be worth digging into because I think it is hard to take things at face value with this campaign anymore.
That is because no other work was done. This is being done to attempt to placate people, just like he said he was making a deposit of 45k to the paints. The 704 is the same as last time. They look nearly as full as well, it doesn't appear that any work was done on these as far as assembly goes.
GumbaFish wrote: I'm cross-posting this here as well to get more eyes on it.
Does anyone more keen-eyed than me want to compare the numbers on the bins from the current updates (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897255,https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3897283) to this update from last November (https://www.kickstarter.com/.../rivenstone.../posts/3655351). I could swear that I spotted some numbers that are the same in both sets of photos (, but don't have time to do the investigative work while I'm at work today. If not, I will spend some time looking over it tomorrow morning but figured getting more eyes on it might be helpful. I am trying to decide how much "progress" has really been made or if these are just photos of work done 8 months ago.
For example in one of the new updates I see 704 written on a bin in the same writing as I see in the old update. Anyways, thought it might be worth digging into because I think it is hard to take things at face value with this campaign anymore.
It could be a case of only 704 people ordered whatever model was in that bin.
That is because no other work was done. This is being done to attempt to placate people, just like he said he was making a deposit of 45k to the paints. The 704 is the same as last time. They look nearly as full as well, it doesn't appear that any work was done on these as far as assembly goes.
afaik the models were never going to be assembled by BAM. That's a weird expectation for you to have.
darzin wrote: How did he find 45k dollars for a deposit? Also, high quality miniature paints cost a small fortune to manufacture. At 1.25 which is on the low end, he is going to have to pay 46k alone for 2 tiers of the paint set, not counting boxing, shipping, labels, and bottles. This is bs. I bet he posts a made up "ticket" for costs I bet it will hide all of the actual important information and won't be real. Alternatively, he changed the formulas and he is about to send a ton of "apple barrel" paints to people. Paint manufacturers aren't kmart lay away plans, you either pay or you don't. They aren't taking a deposit, and why would you make a deposit if you can't guarantee the rest of the money?
Please, please, mass report Rivenstone, Forged, and the Paints to Kickstarter it is very clear that Chris has no plan to give any honest updates and this needs to forced. He is in violation of the KS ToS and needs to be held accountable.
Chris - BAM Team — Yesterday at 1:27 PM We have other streams of revenue. While at the time of closing the KS we were still spending 100k a month on Rent and payroll, we dont have the payroll expenditure of 100k a month any more.
His answer when asked on Discord where the money came from and why it took months to actually pay for the paint.
darzin wrote: How did he find 45k dollars for a deposit? Also, high quality miniature paints cost a small fortune to manufacture. At 1.25 which is on the low end, he is going to have to pay 46k alone for 2 tiers of the paint set, not counting boxing, shipping, labels, and bottles. This is bs. I bet he posts a made up "ticket" for costs I bet it will hide all of the actual important information and won't be real. Alternatively, he changed the formulas and he is about to send a ton of "apple barrel" paints to people. Paint manufacturers aren't kmart lay away plans, you either pay or you don't. They aren't taking a deposit, and why would you make a deposit if you can't guarantee the rest of the money?
Please, please, mass report Rivenstone, Forged, and the Paints to Kickstarter it is very clear that Chris has no plan to give any honest updates and this needs to forced. He is in violation of the KS ToS and needs to be held accountable.
Chris - BAM Team — Yesterday at 1:27 PM We have other streams of revenue. While at the time of closing the KS we were still spending 100k a month on Rent and payroll, we dont have the payroll expenditure of 100k a month any more.
His answer when asked on Discord where the money came from and why it took months to actually pay for the paint.
That's weird. What other "streams of revenue" could they have? Didn't they discontinue their STL site?
I received a response from the office of Bob Ferguson, Attorney General of Washington, containing the response they received from Chris Trout, CEO of Broken Anvil:
To whom it may concern -
This letter should serve as a response to the complaint against Level 52 Studios and its division known as Broken Anvil Miniatures.
Level52 Studios regrets that it has been, at this point, unable to deliver its projects on the timeline detailed in the Kickstarter campaign. This, however, does not mean that these projects have been given up on, or that we are not making progress toward delivery. As owner of Level52, I have been very transparent with the status of the projects, and have attempted to clear the air on the rampant dissatisfaction and hostility.
We accept responsibility for the delays on these projects but disagree with this immense online frenzy of disparagement. An "anonymous" source which we still have not determined is an actual ex employee, nor is this person privy to any actual factual information, made claims which have now fed youtubers capitalizing on shocking conclusions to support their ad-revenue generating videos and It is fueling unbelievable hostility toward me, with people literally wishing death upon me due to them not receiving the fruit of their grassroots pledges in a timely manner. I would also like to note that this frenzy of activity has broken the community guidelines of Kickstarter, namely, no doxing, harassment and cyber bullying. I have been personally attacked relentlessly, despite my ongoing efforts to fulfill these orders and deliver the projects as promised. Amongst these blogs is encouragement to inundate the AG with complaints.
To be very clear, there was no fraud committed. Each crowdfunding project has significant work behind it. Rivenstone is a tabletop role playing game, which requires a universe of intellectual property to be created, including rule books, storylines, physical creature design, and production. We are sitting on bins of figurines, molds, and other products, currently around 50% complete in production, with around 3 months of work ahead of us to make it over the finish line. Forged is a similar concept, but piggybacks on existing gaming universes. For this, we also have significant progress in the form of all sculpts being complete, and currently going through an edit process to enable molds to be made. Broken Anvil Paint Studio is currently in physical production, with significant investment($66,000) being paid into the actual production with a third party.
While Level52 has had successes, it has also hit snags. More globally, there were setbacks in the business as a whole. The industry itself, together with production issues, has slumped. There was a collapse of projects in our main revenue cycles. Our staff, which was a critical component to each of our projects, was kept on as long as possible. It is notable that despite the fact the anonymous former employee stated he "hates my guts," he did acknowledge that the pay was decent. In truth, it was well above market. These snags have served to slow down progress on the projects. But, it has not amounted to any level of fraud, nor has it even killed the projects. As openly stated, it has only delayed them.
To also dispel any additional myths, there has been no personal gain from these projects. One doesn't get into this type of industry or line of work for money; it’s creative work combined with a die-hard love of hobby and fantasy gaming. This business began in my garage. I did not profit at the expense of the complainants. I do not live any sort of extravagant lifestyle. My books would reveal that I made no more than any of my employees, and even less during 2023.
I also would like to call out the realities of the Kickstarter platform that the complainants put their money into. Kickstarter is a platform that allows creatives to bring potential projects to the community at large. This platform is inherently risky, since participants are placing money into a product that has not yet been brought to the shelves. The Kickstarter website states it has a success rate with projects of 40%. Each project discloses that there are no refunds, and that there is risk involved. Risks and challenges were discussed.However some of the challenges we have faced we did not know we would be facing, therefore did not make their way into the Risks section. It should come as no surprise that production delays were a risk. As an example of disclosing such risks of delay, we even flagged a prior Kickstarter project of ours that encountered delays. That project, “Dungeon Delvers,” was successfully delivered despite challenges and delays. The magic and fun of Kickstarter is that participants can get involved with new creative projects, prior to them hitting the shelves. The risk of complications is inherent and accepted by participants. Those who can't stomach this risk should be putting their money into established product lines at local retailers - NOT Kickstarter projects.
Complaints I am receiving from the AG show dissatisfaction that we have not issued a refund. As clearly stated in the campaign, the window for refunds closed. Any requests made within the window have been refunded. Also, any refunds would make it even more difficult to finish each project and get them out the door to our clients, only harming those who are willing to patiently wait for the final products - which is the vast majority of participants. Again, this is how Kickstarter works and the complainants should evaluate their risk tolerance prior to paying money into any campaigns.
To summarize, please take these points into account. First, we have considerable and demonstrable progress on each of our projects. We fully intend to fulfill production on each engagement. Second, there was no personal gain or fraud, period. Third, the risk of loss is something inherent with the Kickstarter platform. We are working on these projects and will get them on the shelves.
To those who are upset, I do apologize and will continue to work to get these projects done and out. As I said before, I accept your anger. However, these products will be released and you will love them. We are continuing to push forward and work as hard as we can on these projects.
Sincerely,
Chris Trout C.E.O Level52 and Broken Anvil Miniatures
Automatically Appended Next Post: The AG's office also noted this:
Our office monitors consumer complaints for possible indications of patterns of unfair or deceptive trade practices warranting further attention by our office. [...] We appreciate your bringing this matter to our attention. Your complaint will remain a part of our public record of this business’s practices.
Another message from the Washington Attorney General's office below. I think that additional complaints will spur them to take action on the fraudulent activities of Chris Trout and Level 52 / Broken Anvil Miniatures, so I'd recommend Kickstarter backers file a complaint: https://www.atg.wa.gov/file-complaint
Your detailed consumer complaint may assist us in identifying possible unfair and deceptive business practices which may warrant further attention by our office. We may open a formal investigation or take enforcement action pursuant to the Consumer Protection Act at any time if the facts and circumstances indicate that further action is warranted. It is our policy to neither confirm nor deny the existence of an ongoing investigation. If we file a lawsuit or settle a matter with a business we will announce that to the public through a press release or on our website at http://www.atg.wa.gov.
I pledged $200 to support a project on Kickstarter. While I was very excited about the potential rewards, I am led to believe they will not be delivered. While I understand the risks involved, the projects delays are not why I am reaching out. Based on the information I have received and discovered, I have reason to believe this project was created and launched under dishonest and consumer deceiving circumstances. The projects estimated delivery was August of 2023. And to quote from their own campaign page for FORGED on Kickstarter, "The miniatures featured in the campaign have already been assessed by our trusted factory partner and are ready to enter production as soon as the campaign closes." Clearly this was a dishonest and deceptive statement, as this never took place. Their Kickstarter campaign page also made the following guarantee to its patrons and I quote "Should Broken Anvil Miniatures be unable to deliver a reward item for any reason, backers will receive a full refund for the items value." Again, multiple refund requests have been made and they have not been honored. I have been supportive and patient of this organization. The last update I received from them explicitly informed me of their ongoing struggles, and intent to focus on other failing projects, while stopping any and all forward progress on this campaign, that so many customers have invested money in. I have reason to believe that our funds were not utilized responsibly towards the product we supported and thus were distributed elsewhere. It is only after the passing promised deadline and update eluding to abandonment that I am filing this report and requesting a full refund. This company went forward with yet another fund raising campaign more recently, in lieu of other incomplete and dishonored campaigns, under dishonest pretenses. The campaign to support a new FORGED Paint Line did not tell the consumers or investors of the struggling organization.They did not communicate a possible company merger that came out after the fact. This merger fell apart and should have been disclosed under the project risks. They also did not disclose the loss of a staff majority, which of course also impacts the associated risks of this investment. As a consumer I am now led to believe that their last crowd funding campaign for the Paint Line may have been nothing more than a dishonest and deliberately deceptive sales tactic to raise more funds for which there is no accountability. While Kickstarter's terms make it clear that there are risks and you are not buying a product, and it would generally make sense that refunds could not be given after funds were spent on manufacturing, I have no proof of any kind that a single dollar I invested went towards the project I was investing in. Communication has been incredibly limited and no one I invest in should be without the expectation of accountability. Theoretically, by the verbiage that Broken Anvil Miniatures utilized in their campaign promise, by promising a "full refund of the items value" one could argue that the value of the items ordered greatly exceeded the special pre-order investment amount pledged. Thus if one were to research the physical replacement cost of the exact amount of comparable physical models at my local game store, this number would directly reflect the total amount a patron was entitled to in their refund. I am asking for a refund, for accountability, for transparency, for honestly, and for evidence to shore up my faith in future companies and transactions. In the images I am attaching you will see mention of "the last 4 months", however this project should have begun production 8 months ago if the promise to begin right after closing was true. Also the 4 month window will directly show and corroborate the dishonesty mentioned about the risks and launch of their paint line campaign.
There is some optimism among some of the backers atm because the paints seem to have arrived at Broken Anvil HQ. But tbh, I have more faith in Mythic delivering than BAM atm. At least they are working their way through the backlog.
Just updating this thread here.... Paints were received by BAM in Jan 2024 and backers are still waiting for delivery. BAM has updated discord on the pack out they started on 5/1, but they still aren't finished as of 5/20. So 4+ months and counting to sort paints and put them in boxes. On discord, the excuses are plentiful, but never any hard dates, plans, or follow through. On KS, backers are asking for updates and are being ignored.
Hopefully the paints will be shipped within a month, but if this is the pace of the current BAM team I'm not holding my breath on Rivenstone (no KS updates since Jan 2024). I, unfortunately, backed all three KS projects. I'm just hoping to get to some paints for my 'investments' and then chalk the rest up to a hard lesson learned on KS and BAM.
Not that I am defending Broken Anvil/Level 52, but didn't the first Two Thin Coats campaign take forever to ship out because of some kind of issues with the paints once they arrived from the manufacturer?
'They are just little bottles of paint, how hard can it be?'
Good point, I just looked at the original Two Thin Coats campaign and there were a lot of issues (supply chain 2022) and it drew out close to a year to fulfill to everyone. But there were also a lot of updates, so many updates letting his backers know what was going on. Also, according to the updates, after receiving the paints, they were shipped out in weeks.
I would have jumped on their third wave if I didn't back BAM paints. Hopefully BAM can fulfill. They are at the last mile, they just need to finish.
everyone is onto new projects, just sucks to have been working for such a scammer. Took a while for us to realize the truth, but when we did, it was all hands on deck making sure they couldn't screw over any new customers.
