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Hi.
before all, excuse my broken english.
I can understand that some of you don't like the idea of EB but you have to understand that we have invested so much money in the project that wen can't afford a fail. EB proved by the past to be an efficient tool. EB put the focus on the project on KS. We need this visibility. So EB are a kind of win to win deal : you contribute to give us visibility and we offer you a discount. It s a way to thank those who give us visibility. Nothing more.
I think people will just have to get over the miniature material aspect of this game and realise it's not for them as I have gotten over the fact it's not the co-op game I'm after so it's not for me and won't be baking it, but I hope it does really well as I love everything about Conan.
I am sure you guys will be very successful with this Fred. I just personally have a strong distaste for early bird pledge levels. People are going to be in on this in droves. You guys have what appears to be a great product and an eager fan base.
Fred Henry wrote: Thx Tre Manor. I m really sorry for those who are angry about EB. I can now understand the reasons. But anyway you can never have everybody happy.
Aint that the truth. You guys have put good money in the right places, in my opinion, and I am excited about the end product. I have not decided whether to back the campaign or to wait for normal retail release, but I will continue to follow Conan news in any case.
You are planning to release the game via retail after the KS project is fullfilled, right? What is your plan for the company as a whole, now I am thinking about it? Are you planning on a Kickstarter business model, and can we expect to see Conan expansions on Kickstarter if this campaign is successful? Do you have plans to develop/publish different games?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/01/03 20:52:54
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Hi Weeble.
Yes, there will be anyway a retailer version of Conan. But, because of the business model it can't be the same version, wich would be to expensive. Actually it will be the basis box without any SG.
If the KS is succesful there will be thematic expansion for Conan (Kush, Hyrkania, ...). But I don't know if we will pass by KS.
Yes we will publish other games. Actually we are currently living from game publishing since many years. I live from my games royalties and my partners from their games compagnie (Bombyx). But we are slow. We can't publish more than a title per year even if we do just that.
Actually I currently not know if we will use KS for the next game because of the extra work KS is.
Fred Henry wrote: Hi Weeble.
Yes, there will be anyway a retailer version of Conan. But, because of the business model it can't be the same version, wich would be to expensive. Actually it will be the basis box without any SG.
If the KS is succesful there will be thematic expansion for Conan (Kush, Hyrkania, ...). But I don't know if we will pass by KS.
Yes we will publish other games. Actually we are currently living from game publishing since many years. I live from my games royalties and my partners from their games compagnie (Bombyx). But we are slow. We can't publish more than a title per year even if we do just that.
Actually I currently not know if we will use KS for the next game because of the extra work KS is.
Just wait till the Kickstarter campaign starts, .
You've got to babysit those things day and night. I'm sure your campaign will do decently. I'd hazard to guess that you will raise at least six figures, probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 300K is my guess. That's a guess without seeing the campaign page, prices, content, or how y'all are running it. But based on the license, the artwork, and the front end marketing y'all have done, I think that's a reasonable guess presuming that the campaign is run competently.
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Fred Henry wrote: I live from my games royalties and my partners from their games compagnie (Bombyx).
Definitely place your partner's game business experience onto the home page. While too many backers treat KS as a store, you'll create more confidence in your first project by including this information, as well as the games your partners produced. Nice to see Takenoko there!
First of all a happy new year to you all, hope you guys had fun! Sorry I haven't been back in a while but as you can imagine things have been pretty hectic here, getting ready for next monday!
Also I see someone let Fred out of his cage. So now you've all met the man behind the magic
Anyways, enough on that, off we go again!
weeble1000 wrote: Tre, what I will say is that much has been oft promised with PVC, and the production results have frequently failed to live up. Dust miniatures are decent, sure, but I am always leery of folks promising something that has consistently failed to deliver.
Not to rub in salt, but others have claimed to be able to offer a lot with a certain production process that didn't deliver as promised. In this market, we know resin has a very good track record, we know white metal has a good track record, and we know that HIPS has had a good track record. Not so with PVC.
Concerns are justified.
Concerns are indeed always justified, despite what I may say you are more then right to have doubts. I will say one thing however. You talk about "this market" and that's something you have to be very concious of when taking material into account. This is a board game, not a miniatures game, as such certain things are required of it. These restraints are what have made us turn away from Metal and resin.
I'm not even going to go into the subject about the complexity of managing multiple pledges or managing factory print runs but to put it simply: Metal would make the box far too heavy and resin is too fragile, the replacement we would have to ship out would be a nightmare. Also we are talking about a product that is meant for a general audience, not experienced modelists, they need to be able to take the models out the box and slap them on the table, no questions asked.
Sorry if it seems like I've gone off the beaten track there but it leads back to this: We are determined to do the best we can with the constraints placed upon us by the industry. We have always wanted high quality models in our game and so we have taken the necessary steps to make it a reality.
I say all that but you can still have doubts
weeble1000 wrote: As for the Conan rules, thanks for the in depth reply Jamie. At the end of the day, no game designer is going to make everyone happy, and in my view frank, candid discussion about design philosophy is a good thing, so I appreciate your willingness to discuss the game mechanics.
I will say, however, that stamina is a resource that is used to track many game states. If the heroes did not have separate limits on how much stamina could be dedicated to certain actions, then it would be simpler, and I expect play would be faster. But as you mentioned, this lets heroes dominate by, say, Conan throwing 8 stamina into attacks and 3 into rerolls for those attacks.
You've got to run down problems where you find them, but there is a trade off. It seems that weight was also a layer of complexity added to solve fundamental problems arising from core mechanics and scenario design.
Fair enough, but weight is a piece of annoying bookkeeping. Some players hate that, as the post above indicates. And it is a fair criticism in my opinion. The more you make your players count, add, etc. the more mental effort it takes to play the game.
Without stamina limits on actions, for example, you don't need to count, literally. You just move gems around until they are gone. With stamina limits, you've added lots of counting. It seems small, right? And I hear this response a lot when I talk about game design. Who can't count to 2, or 3? That's not the point though. The point is the mental operation you have to perform over and over and over again. It adds up. Why else do you think you see a potential player writing off the game just on the basis of adding up equipment weight?
Zombicide, for example (it is a good point of comparison as lots of people know the rules and have gameplay experience), requires very little counting. Mostly you count when adding exp, right? And I daresay lots of players would say that moving those sliders is the least enjoyable part of the game. You can glance at your character card and see that it is less than full of cards. A wound card eats up an item slot...fantastic design element as it sits right on your card and doesn't require you to go through a mental calculation. Those things add up.
I like the core mechanics of stamina. It seems fun, fluid, and fairly simple. From what you described, it looks like y'all have had to add a few layers in order to keep the core mechanic balanced and functional in both the short and long term.
How deep is the design process into character and scenario design? Has the system been stress-tested over a wide range of different scenarios, heroes, and equipment? I'm hearing a lot of this Pict Village scenario, and problems that popped up in playing through that scenario. I'm sure lots of work has gone into the system, but I am curious about how robust you have found it.
I think you nailed it with your first sentence there. You can never make everyone happy. So what we've done is stayed true to our principles and tried to design a game that makes us happy and others too. Sure there may be a few things that could of been done in some other way but in the end the mechanics do what we want them to, infusing a healthy dose of immersion, fun and action with a boat load of Conan. So far, it seems people (yourself included, I think) are happy with it so we can chalk it up as a success
It's normal that you hear a LOT about the pict village, its been our demo scenario since we started showing the game around. What a lot of people don't realise is that it contains a lot of very important mechanics and design philosophies inherent to the game and is therefore a very good scenario to get feedback on as this can then be applied to the majority of other scenarios.
We of course have loads of other scenarios which are mostly untested by the public (the exception to this is the swamp village scenario that has been made into a 3D board and shown at a few other events in France). These however have undergone intensive in house testing by many different players so we are confident in their solidity.
Yodhrin wrote: Can I ask, will your models be pre-undercoated ala Dust, or just bare plastic? Honestly I'd prefer the latter, as if the models do end up being really good quality I'd want to paint them properly, using my own preferred techniques, so I'd just end up having to strip them anyway.
As far as I'm aware, the models will not be undercoated.
weeble1000 wrote: You are planning to release the game via retail after the KS project is fullfilled, right? What is your plan for the company as a whole, now I am thinking about it? Are you planning on a Kickstarter business model, and can we expect to see Conan expansions on Kickstarter if this campaign is successful? Do you have plans to develop/publish different games?
I'll just add to what Fred said. Monolith's goal is to create immersive games that contain a huge range of models and other materials brought to life by the best, most inspiring industry experts. Conan is the first of these games. If it works out then you can expect to see a lot more big projects like this from us.
Finally, I don't want to flog a dead horse and my personal feelings aside, EB's are just part of the KS system now, the majority of people expect them and, as they always say, your absence is noted more then your presence. As has already be said, our's will only be a question of $10. No exclusive models or anything of the sort.
Finally, to finish on a high note, nobody has posted this yet so I'll leave it here for you all to enjoy
I could care less about EBs. Save $10-20 or paying attention to jump up the que, heck it's almost a game within a game. Limited edition miniatures are what really piss me off... in KS campaigns or with pre-orders. See I can always get more money, but since I lack a time machine I can't get stuff that I wasn't aware of in the past.
I'm on the fence to be quite honest. I'm sure the KS will be worth it, but I have a lot of money sunk in other hobby stuff and might just wait for retail. If I have to wait for a year to play the game, then I can make a lot more than the KS money in that year.
WhelpSlayer wrote: If it works out then you can expect to see a lot more big projects like this from us.
So does this mean you are planning on a Kickstarter business model for Monolith?
That is, are we going to see this Kickstarter project followed by a further Kickstarter project followed by a further Kickstarter project, and so on?
Will each campaign include stretch goals for content not included in the retail releases? Will such content be made available as separately purchasable expansion products?
What discount over MSRP do you plan on providing via Kickstarter campaigns? Are backers going to receive the 'base' retail product at retail cost with the addition of 'free' stretch goals that retail customers will have to purchase separately?
What is your expected Kickstarter delivery date versus expected retail availability? Will Monolith be retailing directly, working through distributors, or both?
At the end of the day, if I want this product, I have to decide, as a consumer, whether I want to buy it via Kickstarter or buy it via subsequent retail release. The Kickstarter campaign will clearly get funded (unless your initial funding goal is 'realistic', but as y'all seem to be following the trends, I expect it will be...$30,000.00), so the factors are:
1: Availability of content 2: Date of Availability 3: Cost
If I will have to wait a year for Kickstarter delivery, and only a few months post KS delivery for retail release, date of availability favors retail release. Unless the product has basically been manufactured, I expect Kickstarter pledge reward delivery will take at least 8-12 months depending on the funding level, complexity of pledge levels, and complexity of stretch goals. In short, why should I tie up $100-$200 of FY 2015 hobby money for 12 months when I can either buy the game off the shelf in 2016 or even ask my wife to get it for me for Christmas. If you can turn around pledge reward delivery within six months, and retail release won't be until Q1 2016, then date of availability could favor backing the campaign.
If the base game clocks in at $90-$100 (which I expect is your plan) and the 'sweet spot' pledge level is ~$100 (which I expect is your plan), then if stretch goals include a bunch of stuff I don't really need (e.g. superfluous extra game tokens), cost favors waiting for retail release, as I would otherwise be getting stuff I probably wouldn't buy anyway. If the stretch goals include attractive expansion content (e.g. map tiles, playable heroes with game tokens, scenarios with lots of printed materials and/or game tokens) then the savings over retail might side in favor of backing the campaign, but any savings have to compete with the wait time to receive the product. Heck, if I kept the $200 in an interest accruing account for 12 months, the interest might offset a meaningful portion of the value of any 'free' stretch goals.
If attractive content is exclusive to the campaign, the amount and quality of exclusives dictates whether it sides in favor of backing the campaign. Too many attractive, gameplay necessary exclusives will kill my interest in the campaign (e.g. Heroes with associated game tokens, scenarios with associated printed gameplay materials such as tiles, cards, etc.). A few gameplay optional exclusives could pique interest in the campaign (e.g. Alternate game tokens for Heroes, luxury component upgrades). Gameplay unrelated exclusives would tend to favor backing the campaign (e.g. exclusive designer notes/diaries, cool swag, art prints, etc.)
This message was edited 6 times. Last update was at 2015/01/06 18:00:40
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Getting quite stoked for this now, ready to crush some foes with some mighty thews, and panther like reflexes while treading softly through the jungle as if a tiger!
I just read this in a post by Frederic Henry in a BGG thread:
If we are losing potential backers just for 10 bucks that's not a big deal neither. We are not beguing for money, we are selling a game that we have been working on for more than two years. Nothing vital for people. We are just speaking about a game.
With respect, Fred, [Edit: I got upset when reading your post].
Attitudes like that really piss me off. Companies that don't want my money don't get my money.
It would be one thing to say something like, "Our goal is to make this campaign as successful as possible so that we can get as many copies of Conan and as much content into the hands of gamers as possible. EB's seem to have been helpful to campaigns in the past and we are going to offer EB pledge levels. I understand that there different opinions about EBs and that some people dislike them. We are going to stick with our plan as is and launch with EB pledges, for better or worse. At the end of the day, we have a fantastic product that I am very excited about putting into the hands of gamers around the world. I would love for everyone to help us bring the project to life and, EB's notwithstanding, I think you will be very excited about what the campaign has to offer!"
That would be a fine thing to say. That would be a positive message. I really hate a 'don't like it, don't buy it' attitude. Same thing with the game mechanics discussion that I have been getting a bit of from Jamie. Just because you can't make everyone happy doesn't mean people should feth off if they don't like your game rules. Why not say 'Try it. I think you'll like it. I think it will surprise you. It is what it is, we made choices we felt were good on the whole, it isn't going to change at this point, but I love it and I think you will too if you give it a try'.
Again, that's a positive message. A designer needs to be internally aware that you can't please everybody, because your game will be a fething unplayable mess that nobody likes if you try to make everybody happy. But you don't tell people that you are writing them off.
At least I can ignore the campaign now.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2015/01/06 19:04:16
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Might be worth noting that there could be some cultural/linguistic barriers here Weeble. Think forum communication is always difficult enough as it is (so much depends on the way in which something is read), and you have to multiply that several times when you are communicating across languages.
Certainly, I'm not getting anything dismissive, or anything other than a great enthusiasm for the product information they have posted so far, and they've actually gone to some lengths to try and answer your questions and comments.
As a fan of R E Howard's writing and the resultant Conan mythos I'm excited to see what the game contents will be and what pricepoint will be the sweetspot for this KS.
I don't mind the boardgame plastic minis, the sculpts that have been shown so far make me optimistic about the final product. If there's an appealing pledge level my hobby budget can afford I'd be happy to get a fun game with minis that would paint up nice but that I don't have to feel compelled to paint. I already have plenty of fantasy miniatures in my painting que and others that are already painted that I can use to augment the game if I want.
I don't understand the EB hate. I thought the goal of kickstarter is get projects funded and if EBs help creators reach their funding goals then they're worth doing. There are various types of EBs that will engender different opinions and levels of appeal but that's a creative choice. If I see a project that I want to back I don't care if they offer EBs or what kind of EBs they offer I just want the project to fund so I get the stuff I want. I don't see EBs as anything more than another pledge level but I'm a fairly laid back guy.
Pacific wrote: Might be worth noting that there could be some cultural/linguistic barriers here Weeble. Think forum communication is always difficult enough as it is (so much depends on the way in which something is read), and you have to multiply that several times when you are communicating across languages.
Certainly, I'm not getting anything dismissive, or anything other than a great enthusiasm for the product information they have posted so far, and they've actually gone to some lengths to try and answer your questions and comments.
I got the same impression several times previously, and wrote it off. I'm not jumping to a conclusion based on one post. Later in the BGG thread Fred does explain that there might have been a cultural misunderstanding/language barrier issue with the way that statement of his was interpreted by readers other than myself.
I don't think there is. I read his explanation, and it did not alter my impression. Fred's explanation was that what he really meant was that he did not want to stick a customer with a product the customer would not be happy with. To me, that explanation isn't any better.
From that explanation, Fred is saying that he doesn't want my business if I am going to be unhappy with the product. What in the heck does that mean? How can Fred pre-judge whether I will be the 'right' customer for the product? How about making the best product that you can, communicating honestly about it, and letting the customer decide.
It's sour grapes. If a customer wasn't going to buy the product because the discount wasn't good enough, we didn't want that customer anyway. Forget that.
First, forget it because it is a bad attitude to have towards customers, and an even worse attitude to have towards potential customers considering the purchase of a product that does not yet exist. It is an even worse attitude to have when you are about to hold out your hand and beg for money. Because that's what Kickstarter is, begging for money, as much as Fred want's to say that's not what Monolith is doing. If the company wasn't begging for my money, it wouldn't need to be using Kickstarter.
Second, forget about it because Monolith is engaging in a Kickstarter formula designed to produce a blockbuster campaign on the back of thickly layered marketing schill. And From what Jamie has said, that's the Monolith business plan. It isn't even just about this one product. That's the way the company intends to operate, because that's where the big money seems to be. You don't put all this effort into a campaign like this without your sights set on replicating a Zombicide Season 3, Relic Knights, or Shadows of Brimstone.
If all Monolith really wanted was tight group of dedicated customers that were 'right' for the product, we wouldn't be looking at a Kickstarter formula aimed at acquiring a couple million dollars from ten thousand backers. Monolith's representatives are behaving in an inconsistent and disingenuous way, which I don't appreciate. How hard is it to be honest about what you are doing?
Maybe this is a problem with Kickstarter. You can get sucked into this notion that you A) have to use Kickstarter in the first place, and then B) have to do all of these things you aren't comfortable with in order to make the campaign successful. I've heard that story from several project creators. You're invested, you're locked in, it's go big or go home.
How are we going to be big? Well, what did CMoN do? What did Flying Frog do? What did Soda Pop do? We have to do that, right? We have to pour money into marketing. We have to do early bird pledge levels. We have to offer exclusive content. We have to do this thing and that thing and on and on so we can have a huge campaign and make a million dollars. Wait...holy crap. How did we get so far from where we started, back when all we wanted to do was get this awesome game into the hands of people that might love it?
In the subtext of Monolith's communications I am reading frustration, annoyance, stress, and fear, and the fething campaign hasn't even launched yet. Can you imagine what might be happening in the Kickstarter comments this month? Kickstarter comments...the fifth circle of Internet Hell. At the very least, that does not inspire confidence in the company or the product.
Don't forget that these guys have said that because they have already invested so heavily into the product, the Kickstarter has to be successful. I'm not pulling this stuff out of nowhere. Stop complaining...we didn't want your business anyway...we have to do this to make the Kickstarter successful...we can't put out the product we want without Kickstarter...
And personally, I don't care if Monolith thinks Kickstarter is a Devil's deal or not, I'm not going to be part of it. There's a list of companies as long as my arm all run by dedicated, hard-working enthusiasts putting out fantastic products that deserve my support. Putting money into Conan would mean taking money out of their pockets, and I'm not willing to do that if I don't think the folks putting out a product deserve my support, regardless of how good the product may be.
This message was edited 6 times. Last update was at 2015/01/06 20:57:54
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Alpharius wrote: Yeah, same here - I don't think they're seriously thumbing their noses at anyone.
I concur.
It strikes me that a well prepared KS project needs to developed to the point that it will be ready to go into production once the campaign ends and that requires the creators to be at a point with the game/miniature line/whatever that is past the point where they are looking for much feedback. If a development team has an idea, builds on it, works through however many iterations of rules they need to create a final ruleset they like, designs and prototypes game pieces/minis, playtests it enough to smooth out any gameplay issues then they can present it to people and have them take it or leave it. They're presenting a product that they believe is awesome and hope that enough people share that opinion so it gets funded.
I've seen the idea put forth in multiple dakka threads that Kickstarter has changed; that creators have to do more than just present an idea and ask for money to develop it into a viable product. A successful tabletop KS now needs to be more developed with a lot of the prep work and testing done to show backers what they'll be getting and inspire confidence that it will fund and be produced within a reasonable timeframe. If we want creators to present a more finished product then we shouldn't be upset if they're past the point of being able to adjust it to please everyone/anyone that suggests a change.
For example, based on the sculpts we've seen I'd also like to have the option to buy resin casts of them but I'm glad Monolith isn't doing them. Their explanation regarding why they're not going to offer resin casts makes sense, they've set up their business plan to make a board game and they're going to stick to their plans. That's good, I want a development team to be confident in their plan and not make sudden changes especially the type of changes that would add the kind of complexity to a campaign that typically leads to cost overruns and missed deadlines. I don't want to see them shoot themselves in the foot by making a change that they would struggle to fulfill. That's the kind of seat of the pants management that typically leads to angry posts, unhappy backers and frustrated creators.
Communication seems very hit and miss with KS projects. I've been happy with the handful of KS projects I've backed but the communication in each of them has been very different. I'd hate to see something that seems to boil down to word choice and verbiage bring any hostility to this thread. I'm hopeful that this project is successful regardless of whether or not I personally back it because I enjoy the source material too much to want to see it consigned to nothing more than inane movies and mediocre videogames these days.
Alpharius wrote: Yeah, same here - I don't think they're seriously thumbing their noses at anyone.
Spoiler:
I concur.
It strikes me that a well prepared KS project needs to developed to the point that it will be ready to go into production once the campaign ends and that requires the creators to be at a point with the game/miniature line/whatever that is past the point where they are looking for much feedback. If a development team has an idea, builds on it, works through however many iterations of rules they need to create a final ruleset they like, designs and prototypes game pieces/minis, playtests it enough to smooth out any gameplay issues then they can present it to people and have them take it or leave it. They're presenting a product that they believe is awesome and hope that enough people share that opinion so it gets funded.
I've seen the idea put forth in multiple dakka threads that Kickstarter has changed; that creators have to do more than just present an idea and ask for money to develop it into a viable product. A successful tabletop KS now needs to be more developed with a lot of the prep work and testing done to show backers what they'll be getting and inspire confidence that it will fund and be produced within a reasonable timeframe. If we want creators to present a more finished product then we shouldn't be upset if they're past the point of being able to adjust it to please everyone/anyone that suggests a change.
For example, based on the sculpts we've seen I'd also like to have the option to buy resin casts of them but I'm glad Monolith isn't doing them. Their explanation regarding why they're not going to offer resin casts makes sense, they've set up their business plan to make a board game and they're going to stick to their plans. That's good, I want a development team to be confident in their plan and not make sudden changes especially the type of changes that would add the kind of complexity to a campaign that typically leads to cost overruns and missed deadlines. I don't want to see them shoot themselves in the foot by making a change that they would struggle to fulfill. That's the kind of seat of the pants management that typically leads to angry posts, unhappy backers and frustrated creators.
Communication seems very hit and miss with KS projects. I've been happy with the handful of KS projects I've backed but the communication in each of them has been very different. I'd hate to see something that seems to boil down to word choice and verbiage bring any hostility to this thread. I'm hopeful that this project is successful regardless of whether or not I personally back it because I enjoy the source material too much to want to see it consigned to nothing more than inane movies and mediocre videogames these days.
Yea, but Prestor (sorry about the yea but), I wasn't commenting about the nature of the product not being subject to change. I was commenting about the way Monolith's representatives have communicated about the nature of the product.
I provided examples of what I think would have been happy, productive ways to communicate that information. It wasn't communicated like that, and in my mind was communicated in a way that was dismissive, which to me is a big ol' red flag.
Jamie has put a lot of effort into communicating, and I appreciate that. But there's a clear subtext to his and Fred's communications that I absolutely do not like. As I mentioned previously, I noticed it a few times and wrote it off. But it is a pattern exhibited repeatedly by multiple of the company reps. That's bad. You can't pass that off as one person or an isolated instance of miscommunication. It seems to me to be a prevalent attitude in the company. Adrian Smith's awesome artwork puts a nice cover over it, but it's there.
I don't begrudge you having a different opinion though.
Edit: I'll just add this note here. I think Jamie should handle all of the communications for the Conan project. He does a good job of handling touchy, persistent questions in a positive way.
This message was edited 5 times. Last update was at 2015/01/06 21:27:09
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
Respectfully I don't see what they've said as being markedly different from what you would prefer them to say. You're entitled to your opinion and it's as valid as any other opinion but I don't get the same vibe from it that you do. Different strokes for different folks and all that.
I'll wait and see how things look when the KS goes live. Recently, exchange rates and shipping fees make it hard for me to justify backing overseas KS projects but maybe Conan will be too enticing for me to pass up. If it isn't then I'll just go back to waiting for some other Conan-esque board game/skirmish game to pop up so I have something to do with my RBG minis.
Fred Henry wrote: Hi.
before all, excuse my broken english.
I can understand that some of you don't like the idea of EB but you have to understand that we have invested so much money in the project that wen can't afford a fail. EB proved by the past to be an efficient tool. EB put the focus on the project on KS. We need this visibility. So EB are a kind of win to win deal : you contribute to give us visibility and we offer you a discount. It s a way to thank those who give us visibility. Nothing more.
weeble1000 wrote: I just read this in a post by Frederic Henry in a BGG thread:
If we are losing potential backers just for 10 bucks that's not a big deal neither. We are not beguing for money, we are selling a game that we have been working on for more than two years. Nothing vital for people. We are just speaking about a game.
With respect, Fred, [Edit: I got upset when reading your post].
Attitudes like that really piss me off. Companies that don't want my money don't get my money.
It would be one thing to say something like, "Our goal is to make this campaign as successful as possible so that we can get as many copies of Conan and as much content into the hands of gamers as possible. EB's seem to have been helpful to campaigns in the past and we are going to offer EB pledge levels. I understand that there different opinions about EBs and that some people dislike them. We are going to stick with our plan as is and launch with EB pledges, for better or worse. At the end of the day, we have a fantastic product that I am very excited about putting into the hands of gamers around the world. I would love for everyone to help us bring the project to life and, EB's notwithstanding, I think you will be very excited about what the campaign has to offer!"
Prestor Jon wrote: Respectfully I don't see what they've said as being markedly different from what you would prefer them to say.
And what Fred wrote there doesn't sound so great next to what he wrote about not begging for money.
In all fairness, I could be a little extra touchy because I don't like big, splashy KS projects like this and I might be subconsciously looking for a way to talk myself out of backing the project. That's certainly possible.
In re-reading Jamie's posts just now they seem perfectly fine. Fred's posts don't get a pass on a second read-through though, so I will remain stiff-necked there. And I think this stuff about needing to use Kickstarter to get the 'proper' version of the product into people's hands for an affordable price is total bullgack.
Anyone at Monolith want to back that up with some numbers?
Who are you using for the printed materials? What's the MOQ? What is your projected order quantity? Do you already have a spot in the production schedule? Have you already paid deposits? What's your profit margin on the retail release version? How much does your margin drop if you include the content you think should be included? What content is it that you think should be included in the 'proper' product, for that matter? How many stretch goals will it take to get to that amount of content? What's your profit margin on the 'sweet spot' pledge level with those 'free' stretch goals? Have you accounted for that? How does you number/amount of pledges impact your COGS?
Obviously, no one at Monolith is going to discuss the bulk of that, or at least not in any detail. And most likely not after I crapped all over the campaign in a couple of posts. From my own experience, I just don't see how doing a Kickstarter project magically makes it possible to offer the 'proper' product at an 'acceptable' price. How much of your market are you saturating with these 'premium' Kickstarter units, presumably with a COGS way too high for retail release? Yet you maintain a margin over COGS in the Kickstarter itself high enough to pay Kickstarter's percentage, pay Amazon's percentage, pay shipping, cover any unexpected expenses, and pay for a run of those cheaper, less complete, retail release versions.
If the game is, what, $100 retail let's say, and you want a COGS that's no more than 40% of that, then you want to COGS around $40, right? You've got to pay for your tools for the miniatures. That's, errrrmmm...I think that's $6,000 per tool from Dust, but I could be wrong. Your miniatures are probably 4-8 per frame I'm guessing, depending on if any have multiple parts (probably not, right?) and overall size. Then you have to pay whatever amount per shot depending on the order quantity. Those tool costs are fixed, and don't go into your COGS, per se, but if you haven't paid for them already, you'll be using your KS money for that I presume. You've got to pay for the box, the Hero dashboards, cards, custom (albeit simple) dice, rulebook, scenario maps, vacuformed trays (I'm guessing), the stamina gems, that Overlord tray thing, and I'm guessing a couple of punch boards. All of that requires a bunch of setup costs that essentially get amortized over the order quantity, and therefore your COGS goes down when order quantity goes up, correct?
Are the printed materials all being done by the same company, e.g. Panda Game Manufacturing, or will you be using different suppliers for the various components and packing in house? As Dust is doing the miniatures, I assume Monolith is doing the final packing unless you are shipping the miniatures to the printer.
So in all of that, where does Kickstarter give you the ability to sell a certain proportion of your various production runs at a lower margin even though the COGS are actually going to increase as your stretch goals get unlocked, while your pledge dollars per unit remain fixed? This is presuming that your stretch goals unlock content that you weren't going to produce otherwise...or are some of those stretch goals going to be 'putting components back into the box'?
Are you planning to take a portion of the materials produced as stretch goals, include them with the stretch goal eligible pledge rewards, and package the remainder as separate retail products? Are you going to offer them as add-ons?
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2015/01/06 22:12:31
Kirasu: Have we fallen so far that we are excited that GW is giving us the opportunity to spend 58$ for JUST the rules? Surprised it's not "Dataslate: Assault Phase"
AlexHolker: "The power loader is a forklift. The public doesn't complain about a forklift not having frontal armour protecting the crew compartment because the only enemy it is designed to face is the OHSA violation."
AlexHolker: "Allow me to put it this way: Paramount is Skynet, reboots are termination attempts, and your childhood is John Connor."
weeble1000 wrote: How are we going to be big? Well, what did CMoN do? What did Flying Frog do? What did Soda Pop do? We have to do that, right? We have to pour money into marketing. We have to do early bird pledge levels. We have to offer exclusive content. We have to do this thing and that thing and on and on so we can have a huge campaign and make a million dollars. Wait...holy crap. How did we get so far from where we started, back when all we wanted to do was get this awesome game into the hands of people that might love it?
Actually, speaking of these companies...
CMON's nature of exclusives and EB's bit them with their Eurogame, Dogs of War. Eurogamers (ie. BGG) doesn't buy into EB's, exclusives, and involved campaigns -- and probably doesn't like paying additional shipping, either. DoW made 66K, possibly not enough to cover the costs of molds in the campaign. Soda Pop Miniatures partnered with CMON then split off with its own Forgotten Kings KS campaign, which didn't have exclusives or EB's.
Speaking of which, SPM did make over a million dollars and reached its project goals early in its campaign without the need for exclusives or EB's.
FFP had some very negative feedback from BGG with its over-underpriced EB's, specifically the mine carts. They ended up backtracking with the mine carts and offering credit. Very messy. In the end, FFP lost money, cut costs, and produced miniatures with poor details.
Reaper doesn't use EB's. Dwarven Forge doesn't use EB's. MegaMiniatures doesn't use EB's. Stonemaier Games doesn't use EB's. Impact Miniatures doesn't use EB's. Stonehaven Miniatures doesn't use EB's. MegaCon Games does not use EB's. The "KS Best Practices & Lessons Learned" FB group does not endorse EB's.
Every time I ask for studies, research, or proof that EB's work, I never receive anything to back up the statements EB proponents make. It's the Five Monkeys all over again.
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