Finally...the Ruby Wyrmling!
over 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 20, 2019 at 12:59:06 AM

So, when we unlocked the Colvillain pledge level, I felt strongly that folks pledging that kind of money should get a little something-something apart from just the 15% discount.

At the same time a ton of people have asked, and keep asking, if they can get the Gemstone Dragons from the first kickstarter . But those sculpts were exclusive to that  KS. No reason we couldn't do different sculpts or the same dragons at different ages though!

Lars pointed out the most popular mini from the first KS was the Topaz Wyrmling (presumably because he's cheap and adorable) and so Jason figured, hell that's no problem!

Presenting; the Ruby Wyrmling!

She's so CUTE!!! Let's check out the turnaround.

I think Jason killed it with this sculpt.

This little critter, who you can find stats for in Strongholds & Followers, will be $12, you get her free if you pledge at the Colvillian level, or you can add her to your pledge in the Pledge Manager when it launches a couple of weeks after the Kickstarter closes. And you'll be able to buy her like a normal product in our regular store once everything ships in 2021!

And I predict we'll get some fiction in Kingdoms & Warfare where you'll get to meet this little beastie.

Update #4: Relg
over 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 13, 2019 at 06:11:36 PM

Thanks to thousands of people believing in and supporting the product, we just hit a million dollars raised, which means we've unlocked RELG!

Art thanks to Mike Franchina and Jason Hasenauer. This mini is SUPER expensive but about the same price as minis of similar scale and form. He's basically a giant chunk of solid resin. If you do the math, the discount on the Colvillian level is basically the cost of Relg, so it's like you're getting a free Relg! Everyone loves Relg, that's why they call him 'Relg!'

He'll be statted out in K&W using the Action Oriented design we talked about in the last Running the Game episode. And sometime...probably next year, he will make an appearance in the Chain of Acheron campaign. :D 

We're working hard on more sculpts for the minis we've already unlocked and maybe something small and fun we can throw in before the campaign ends. But even after the campaign is done, you'll see sculpts and prototypes for everything as we go.

Lots to do!

It's hard to express how excited I am about all this, I really feel like, with this kind of support, MCDM can do anything. Just...you know, not all at once. :D

Thanks for your support. We are working hard not to let you down.

New T-Shirt Pledge Levels! The Colvillian is Unlocked!
over 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 13, 2019 at 11:02:10 AM

Hey folks! Welcome to the second MCDM Kickstarter! Things are going AMAZINGLY well thanks to your support. The hugely positive response to the Kickstarter just means we’re all just working REALLY hard right now. More backers means more pressure to make sure you’re all happy with the final product.

The outpouring of support and interest in the book and the minis is unbelievable and everyone here suddenly feels very strongly that what we’re doing is what folks want.

Book + T-shirt Pledge Levels

The question we get the MOST is; hey why isn’t there a pledge level for “book and shirt?” I felt like fewer pledge levels was better, it’s less confusing, it’s easier to figure out which one you want. And I thought “Well, they can just add the shirt in the pledge manager.”

But we have a LOT of backers who’ve never backed a Kickstarter before and they aren’t familiar with the relationship between Kickstarter and a Pledge Manager because it is, indeed, obscure.

So since it’s our #1 request, we’re adding two more pledge levels for this; the Book + Shirt level and the Kickstarter Exclusive Book + Shirt level.

You can always just add the shirt to your pledge later in the pledge manager, but if you already know this is what you want, it may make your life a little easier.

And we have another new pledge level!

The Colvillian

So here’s the deal. Each of these Kickstarters we have a level called “The Colvillian” (I don’t remember where this name came from, the community came up with it) which is the “I want it all” level.

It includes the limited edition book, signed, the PDF, the T-shirt, and all the minis. But since it’s “all the minis” we usually wait until we’ve unlocked all the stretch goals before we make the Colvillian pledge level available.

Last time, with only 5 minis, the Colvillian was $500. This time we have the Ancient Onyx Dragon, and if we unlock the 19 other minis, the Colvillian will be $1,000 and that includes a 15% discount on everything. In other words, if we unlocked all the minis, and you added them all individually in the pledge manager, it would be more than $1,000, but if you back at the Colvillian level you get a 15% discount.

And even though we haven’t unlocked all the minis, a bunch of people who backed the first kickstarter are asking “Can we just back the Colvillian now?”

Well, that seemed weird at first? Because we had no idea if we would unlock everything? But now it seems pretty clear to us that we will eventually unlock all the stretch goals. So we feel less weird about saying “Ok, sure!”

So that’s the deal. We’re unlocking the Colvillian pledge level now, anyone who wants to can pledge $1,000 and at that level you’ll get everything we unlock. Which, if we unlock everything, includes;

• The Kickstarter Exclusive Signed Hardcover
• The Kickstarter Exclusive T-Shirt
• The Kickstarter Exclusive Ancient Onyx Dragon
• The GM’s Screen
• The Warfare Unit Deck
• A Sticker! :D
• All 18 stretch goal minis (6 Demons from the Court of the Deep, 6 Devils from the Court of Seven Cities, 6 Undead from the Court of Decay)
• And one more BIG mini yet to be revealed.

Which, at a 15% off, is $1,000. Yeah, it’s a ton of money. It seems crazy, but there are folks who just want all the stuff! If you’re on the fence, absolutely wait to see what gets unlocked. And this bundle will be available in the Pledge Manager. In other words, if you back before the Kickstarter ends, at any level, you will be able to upgrade to the Colvillian level and get the discount in the pledge manager.

Speaking of the pledge manager...

How Will The Pledge Manager Work?

A lot of folks have questions, we have a F.A.Q. which you can find here, and a lot of folks are curious how the pledge manager is going to work, you can read about it all here.

STL Files

Folks ask if we’re going to sell the .stl files for the minis so people can print them at home using their 3D printers. We talked about this and decided; this is not part of our business. There are other folks online, on Kickstarter, whose entire business model is making cool mini sculpts and selling the .stl files. Go check them out.

I think that’s it folks! There’s a lot going on behind the scenes here this week that we can’t talk about yet, but keep watching the Unlock Map! :D

The Community
over 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 13, 2019 at 11:01:40 AM

Hey Folks!

We’re SUPER BUSY as you can guess, but I spent some time hanging out in the MCDM discord, reading through the messages in the Kingdoms & Warfare chat and I was struck by how lucky we are to have this direct relationship with all of you. It is hugely exhilarating to get to make this stuff, and not only follow our inspiration, but also get inspired by the community, and I thought you should see how that actually works.

A lot of game development, when you’re working with a publisher who’s paying for everything, they’re always terrified. They’re terrified that any decision, however minor, might prove to be The Wrong One. Anything interesting enough to inspire anyone, is by definition also weird enough to freak someone out and the result is; you iterate on everything until it’s so boring no one cares and it takes forever to implement even the most mundane stuff.

But holy crap that’s not how MCDM works! We talked about this in a recent live chat with Jason, our Art Director. Our process is pretty organic.

The monsters you’ve seen for instance. I started with a list of the new courts we didn’t get to in Strongholds & Followers: Devils, Demons, Undead. I knew each court would have six creatures following roughly the same archetypes. The Tank, The Striker, The Priest, The Wizard, etc….

I came up with broad ideas for them (steel devil, undead cyclops king) and sent these off to our artists.

Now, there are times when I know exactly what I want. Like the illustrations of the organizations can get pretty noodly. Descriptions not only of each character, but their pose and attitude and the setting we find them in, the lighting, the blocking, the ‘camera’ angle.

With the monsters though, I think it just produces a better product to let the artists be inspired. They take this broad idea (My notes: “An Eye Devil. I have no idea what this means. Just...lots of eyes? Maybe he’s an Oracle”) and let the artist go crazy.

Then the artist mocks up 3 or 5 different ideas and we pick the bits we like the most, and they create something based on our feedback. So if there’s something in the sketches we think is off, we say so. But the final product is clearly a result of the artist’s inspiration.

That’s one of the reasons the minis we’re making look so...well, to me, interesting. Different from almost everything I’ve seen elsewhere. Because it’s not Decision By Committee.

Once the Kickstarter was live, we saw tons of activity online and in our Discord and someone in there had an idea for what the final unlock might be (no spoilers, it could be anything).

I saw that and thought “That is a good idea.” I mentioned it to Jason and he said “That is a good idea.” And about three hours later, we had a concept ready. I mean, it took about another day of back and forth with the artist to get it ready for prime time, but that initial concept was pretty good!

That’s the power this relationship grants us. If an artist has a good idea, it goes in the book. If the community has a good idea, it goes in the book. We don’t solicit ideas from the community, but we are free to be inspired by good ideas. This is very powerful. We’re still the editors, we still filter everything so it passes not only a certain bar of quality but also fits in line with what we want to do, but within that framework, we can do anything.

But that doesn’t just apply to the art.

Titles

One feature a lot of folks are looking forward to is the rules on Titles for a PC Organization. If we all play Monks, we still need a tank. That’s the Acolyte of Stone. We need a stealthy striker rogue-like character; the Acolyte of Whispers. We need someone who can identify magical effects and items, and someone else who can heal. The Acolytes of Mysteries and the Acolyte of Light respectively.

A title comes with a new special ability, it might be an action, usually restricted to once per day or once per hour, but it can also grant skill proficiencies, or limited access to certain spells, or grant enhanced senses or movement. Feats++

Someone in the knw_general channel in the MCDM discord wondered if there would be titles for things apart from classes. Good question! I think titles for different ancestries make sense. Lady Sariel was a PC from the Orchid Court, one of the noble elf houses in my setting. So Ancestral Titles seems like a good idea to me.

A little while later I looked back in and folks were talking about the idea of an artifact magic item granting its own titles, like a certain magical tarot deck.

And I was like...man the idea of an artifact tarot deck granting its own titles, is AMAZING. I want to do that! The King of Cups, the Queen of Staves, the Fool, The Devil, the Star, the Tower.

Then from that idea I imagined a whole kind of mythology, the idea that people in a campaign setting might embody the cards of a tarot deck. Basically, Last Call but in 5E. That is something I want to do. Not just a sample of different titles the deck can grant, but also advice on how the titles work, how are they awarded, what do they symbolize, which ones might be allied, or enemies, what happens when they meet? So that an intrepid GM might be able to spin a campaign out of it.

That excites the hell out of me and it came right out of the community and it’s exactly the kind of thing I think Titles should be able to do.

Kickstarter is a powerful tool for us, but it’s really just a function of the community. It’s a means to pitch a product and see if people want it, but even more, we can listen to how people intend to use it, what do folks need and then tailor content to meet that need.

Folks ask me what excites me most about all this? THAT excites me most. The power to take inspiration from anywhere, from the artists, from the community, without worrying someone at a publisher is going to frown and say “I don’t get it.”

Thanks for supporting this kind of development, and coming along for the ride. 

Peace, out!

Pharyon Sculpt
over 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 13, 2019 at 10:58:37 AM

Hey folks! I suspect a lot our updates are going to be mini-focused which, if you don't care about minis I realize is not the most exciting subject! But the power of having a full-time art director means while I wrangle writers, Jason is free to crank away on the miniature stuff. 

Like this! This is a near-final sculpt for the Prince of the Court of Seven Cities, the Court of Devil, Pharyon! The Prince of Dis!

Woo! Super happy with how this turned out. Art by Mike Franchina, sculpt by John Gotch. We'll probably have more stuff to show you folks as we get closer to the end of the campaign. Actually, I think we're on the cusp of unlocking the final (?) mini!