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Didn't see anything about this Kickstarter that just went live today, after a few month wait:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jameystegmaier/scythe

Designed by Jamey Stegmaier (Viticulture & Euphoria) and based on the art and worldbuilding of Jakub Rozalski, Scythe is a 4x game (explore, expand, exploit, exterminate) set in an alternate-history, 1920s Eastern Europe. Scythe tells the stories of 5 factions competing over an unclaimed patch of land surrounding the mysterious Factory.

During Scythe's 750+ blind playtests, the playtesters consistently said they most enjoyed:

the dual benefits of the upgrade system (increase an action benefit and decrease a cost)
the distinctly different faction and mech abilities
the thematic choices presented by the encounter cards
the asymmetry and variability created by random pairings of faction and player mats
the twist to area control due to all resources being kept on the board

Check out the Scythe rules and playtest print-and-play files to see how Scythe blends an engine-building system inspired by Terra Mystica with a deterministic combat system influenced by Kemet. Renders of the 25 miniatures in Scythe are below the "What's in the Box?" image

I have been following the project for a while, as I have liked the artist for some time, and the people making it already have made some pretty successful games before, and this looks like an interesting game and setting.

Image of miniatures:


Mechs:


Board:





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Also, some of the artists work, as this is what really makes this project unique to me:

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/1920-scythe

Yeah i follow the artist on facebook. mini's look nice but what size is it? Like the setting.

Made a thread about it a while ago
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/625313.page

Will be backing this, the price is really good and the higher tiers don't offer anything worthwhile, which is great.

This looks nice and you don't miss out on anything important if you don't invest another hundreds of dollars in add-ons.

Like it alot

Compelling setting. Reasonable pledge levels with no overtly obnoxious "nudging" to take the higher levels. Lots of emphasis on preparation.


Justified success ($ 600.000,- in a day for a nearly no-miniatures "classic" board game with no licensed IP, wow!)

Pledged via a friend of mine for the 99$ version (although i want the book )

This looks very cool, absolutely love some of that artwork as well its very evocative.

Reasonably priced and the number of positive comments/reviews about the gaming system sells it pretty well.

I need to stop looking at new Kickstarter threads on Dakka, its costing me far too much money

Stunning artwork - will check it out.

So I've got this one on my "Starred" list.

The insane amount of funding so far has surprised me a bit, but it seems the designer is fairly well thought of?

Need to watch some of the vids to see if it's a game that could see the table at my house.

Yeah I think his previous games have been very good, I've heard of Viticulture at least. Also they have VERY high production values on their games. The 4X concept appeals to me and I'm pretty sure both my wife, friends and family at home would appreciate this game.

Just goes to show how big the boardgame market is!

If you think this has shot past Warpath and that was a Kickstarter that a lot of wargamers have been waiting for for some years.

Game looked great at SPIEL and gameplay was quite fine. You can even print out the whole game for testing. That´s a KS to my liking.

 Pacific wrote:
Just goes to show how big the boardgame market is!

If you think this has shot past Warpath and that was a Kickstarter that a lot of wargamers have been waiting for for some years.

I don't think this is a fair comparison.

This is probably one of the biggest board game kickstarters ever, if you take out the Zombicide/CONAN-style Miniature-board games.

There is the 7th Continent and Mare Nostrum. Both shy of 700.000, which this might beat. There is also Tokaido and Ogre, both of which had a pre-existing following.

It'll still be a while till a classic board game goes Reaper Bone or Conan -levels.

It's just that Mantic's kitchen-sink Warpath Kickstarter wasn't a top contender in its "category" (if you count it with the hybrid-miniatures-board games, which it also wasn't, I suppose).

 Mymearan wrote:
Yeah I think his previous games have been very good, I've heard of Viticulture at least. Also they have VERY high production values on their games. The 4X concept appeals to me and I'm pretty sure both my wife, friends and family at home would appreciate this game.

Same here with Viticulture; I've also heard solid things about it.

Do you know a lot about the 4x concept? I don't, but am curious (and BGG is work blocked )


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Wonderwolf wrote:


There is the 7th Continent

I thought about creating a thread on 7th Continent, but it isn't really a Dakka sorta game. Definitely no miniatures only pledge there

Man, that game looks cool.

One of the things Stonemaier has going for it is communication. Lots of it. Backers are really kept in the loop the entire time, something of a rarity with Kickstarters sometimes.

I've been in the mood for a good 4x game. Only games of that type I own are the Tiny Epic games from Gamelyn, but they tend to run fairly quickly and are over before you know it.

That art book for this one is going to be hard to resist.

 cincydooley wrote:

 Mymearan wrote:
Yeah I think his previous games have been very good, I've heard of Viticulture at least. Also they have VERY high production values on their games. The 4X concept appeals to me and I'm pretty sure both my wife, friends and family at home would appreciate this game.

Same here with Viticulture; I've also heard solid things about it.

Do you know a lot about the 4x concept? I don't, but am curious (and BGG is work blocked )

I mostly know it from video games, but it sort of explains itself: You create an empire through Exploration (of the map), Expansion (building your empire outwards), Exploitation (taking advantage of available and found resources) and Extermination (combat). Combat seems like the least important part in this game from what I've read. Someone called it a 3.5X game, although I find that a bit nitpicky :-)

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
One of the things Stonemaier has going for it is communication. Lots of it. Backers are really kept in the loop the entire time, something of a rarity with Kickstarters sometimes.

Hah!

The part i'm usually the least concerned with.

I understand the want for it, but I'll admit I don't really want updates more than monthly/Something went well/something went wrong.

I'll keep it starred for now!

 Jehan-reznor wrote:
Yeah i follow the artist on facebook. mini's look nice but what size is it? Like the setting.

Made a thread about it a while ago
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/625313.page

Under the picture:

Each character miniature has a 25mm base and a height of 36-58mm

So they sound a little tall probably, but I think they said somewhere they would work with 28-30mm (I think it was in the early comments)

Friend on face book nailed it " Yeah, two-thirds of a million bucks for four promo cards must be the stingiest stretch goal of all time."

 Jehan-reznor wrote:
Friend on face book nailed it " Yeah, two-thirds of a million bucks for four promo cards must be the stingiest stretch goal of all time."

Nailed it -- Eurogamers, at least on BGG, HATE KS exclusives. Promos are tolerated because they show up on the BGG store. If he wants his man-dolly plasticrack or Exclusives to resell on eBay, he can buy all the overpriced CMON man-dollies he wants.

Stonemaier Games has KS nailed to a Euroscience. Everything's an upgrade to keep shipping costs down. And his audience wants to play Euro games, not KS games.

I don't know if they have it nailed down, people in the comments are raging over the weird stretch goal structure that basically punishes people for backing early.

It is not 100% clear to me but the impression I get is that each day's stretch goal will definitely unlock so they are not really really stretch goals, more just an added extra or upgrade being added each day so the actual funding amount doesn't come into it at all.

Well they are making the amount needed for the stretch goals be current amount+$X, which means they aren't guaranteed. And the longer the campaign goes on, the less chance they are fulfilled.

Myself, I don't think Eurogamers are as interested in Ameritrash gamers to unlock stretch goals. They want a good game, possibly premium, right at the start and none of this KS cheerleading mumbo-jumbo business. BGG'ers have *lots* of complaints about the tricks and gimmicks of KS, and even a geeklist of customer service complaints dedicated to one particular KS publisher.

AFAIK, 6K of backers on Day 1 of a Eurogame is a pretty good turnout. Anyone else who's been following Eurogame KS have numbers from other Eurogames as a comparison? I don't play Euros, so haven't followed closely. TIA.

No Eurogame-Kickstarter of this size before.

Tokaido was is in the 600K region, but with fewer backers shelling out more money for a collectors/premium edition of an existing game.

7th Continent is in the 600K region, but has a few miniatures. Nothing Zombicide-like, but a few.

Scythe is definitely the most successful Eurogame on Kickstarter to date.


That said, "sliding" (or even fake) Stretchgoals are hardly new. Mantic changed stretchgoal levels nilly-willy during Warpath to keep things "unlocking" every day, though mostly in the other direction. All Bones Kickstarters had stretchgoals on a exponential scale, with larger and larger sums needed for each stretchgoal towards the end, as more backers are in it and the sums added for each add-on get larger.

Though admittedly nobody thus far broke the illusion of stretchgoals being a financial thing, not a "keep backers entertained"-things this blatantly before.


I also remember Posthuman, another successful board game kickstarter "ran out" of stretchgoals in their campaign. They had some 20 or so stretchgoals (and were honestly going to do all of them as expansions, funding or not). When that Kickstarter went through the roof, they came out and said "we haven't prepared any more. We didn't expect that kind of money. We can't just create/include (genuinely) new stuff, because there would be no time to design it, playtest it, produce it, and still keep the deadlines).

Wonderwolf wrote:

I also remember Posthuman, another successful board game kickstarter "ran out" of stretchgoals in their campaign. They had some 20 or so stretchgoals (and were honestly going to do all of them as expansions, funding or not). When that Kickstarter went through the roof, they came out and said "we haven't prepared any more. We didn't expect that kind of money. We can't just create/include (genuinely) new stuff, because there would be no time to design it, playtest it, produce it, and still keep the deadlines).

Had never heard of Posthuman (had to Google it up) but that's the honorable/right thing to do. Respect to the creators, a very responsible attitude and promoting the general KS idea.

On topic now, this game seems very interesting and genuine.

Looks like this has moved to a more traditional stretch goal system as he has slipped some extra ones under the current total so they instantly unlock and is no longer revealing each day but as they are reached.

SG-addicts on Scythe are a very small group, but sadly very vocal.

I like the approach: "That's what you get and how much it costs, everything else just improves upon the existing stuff."

It allows for a far better budgeting and keeps the mountains of unpainted and unplayed stuff down. It is also fair for other KS since people can budget for several KS. With the CMON approach everybody else can forget about kickstarting if some of the big ones in business run their KS. And CMON is doing it monthly right now.

KS rright no is quite toxic in the games-area for smaller companies and I applaude everyone bringing it back to normal levels.

Btw, his book about KSing is a must for everyone planning a KS and explains the financial and psychological side in a very understandable way.


Scythe is the best eurogames/ameritrash-hybrid by now and even in the seperate categories it is top dog in eurogames and a top one in ameritrash.

All goals will be met, the math is adjusted for it, but it is a nice way to make people come back every day to check which goal is revealed.

Love the art style. Really happy to back these uncomplicated Kickstarters without crazy addons and pledge managing that makes my head spin just thinking about them.

I think this might actually be delivered in time as well.

Wow the KS is at $990,731