5 Printed Item Card Decks for 5e of Unique Oddities. This product is in active development. Shipping will be charged separately closer to the game's delivery to reflect live shipping rates.
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
Greetings All!
Back with some updates and all around news.
That's right! finally, the Digital Deck Rewards are complete and now available through Backerkit.
What does that mean? It means that a majority of you (Physical and Digital backers) are now able to receive the following.
Printable Deck PDFs 1-5
These 5 Decks are optimized for home print and play options for DIY assemblers. They come in two distinct formats. The following page counts include Cover, Reference Page, and Legal.
Space Saver. (28 Pages per Deck)
These are crafted for Letter (8.5x11in) printing with 2 cards per page. These are sized to 5.35x3.26in to optimize on space and page count without overflowing on your printer.
Full Size. (53 Pages per Deck)
Again optimized for Letter (8.5ix11in) with 1 card per page. This delivers the cards at true size, but with the hefty paper count associated. This adds about 7% in overall size at the cost of double the paper, so choose wisely!
Digital Booklet - Deck 1-5
These PDFs are the quick reference guide resource assembled in the same style used for the initial KS Sampler. These Booklets feature all items contained within their associated deck and reference numbers for the cards built in, all delivered in a page flipping format or for screen scrolling.
I’m so happy to be sharing these, and, as always, if you have any comments or catches on these digital documents, you can use the previous form to submit your notes. It’s been updated specifically for this and can be Found Here!
Shard
This is completed. It is getting a quality check and will be available with the goal of being out this week.
Roll20
For personal reasons, my ingestor had to take a short break, putting it a few weeks behind the others. They are now shooting for the next week as their completion date. After a quality check, this should be available in its entirety by Mid to Late March.
Foundry
Since this is a bigger project with more involved in its systems, my ingestor is still on schedule to close this out by Late March. The sheer scope of things involved in this is a larger undertaking. After some double checking and testing, the goal is to be out and available between Mid to the End of March.
Free Content VTT: Alchemy!
This was the reward that waffled back and forth due to the OGL fiasco and was ingested in house by the Alchemy team. As a special thanks for your patience, Decks 1-3 are available for free to Backers.
There will be a follow up email with live links for Backers with the details.
This will be processing. The PNGs and Tokens for Digital Asset Tiers and above are getting the final touch-ups, followed by the small number of Tokens, Creature Pack, and Mini-Adventures.
We are in full swing with Production. I will let you know as soon as I have an updated timeline of completion as well as giving you step by step of the shipping stages. This will largely be the focus of the next update as I receive information to share.
Shipping:
This will not be charged until the final numbers are clarified and approved. There are currently 3 fulfillment centers reviewing, and there was a small shift in finalizing costs over a change in the size of the Map Tube and an addition to the Tome Box.
When the final numbers are locked in, you get over two weeks of warning before processing. This is planned to happen within a month of the official shipping for them to arrive to you.
This will be charged to the same account that the Backerkit previously charged after locking and processing (AKA the charges for Sales Tax, VAT, or additional addons).
Continuing to make strides. So happy to get a portion of deliverables into your hands. Onwards!
Be Safe, and Keep Playing!
Coming in with a Mini Update to let you know that I will be processing the first phase of backerkit Tomorrow, with the second to in Two Weeks. This was originally going through mid week but the OGL Things came to ahead. More on that as well:
Why 2 Charges?
Nord Fulfillment has stepped back from the shipping end of business and I am working with their replacement as my US distributor to get the best possible shipping rates for you. This is taking some time (as we have the samples now). And on top of everything else happening this week, I don’t want to mess it up.
The next update will have these details, but I feel comfortable telling you that it's a good thing. It's going smoothly. I do not want to rush and charge this without a proper heads up.
There will be a full update with this and the pricing breakdown before the charges. This is important for people to know what to expect before any charges are made.
This has been an elephant in the room for a while. If you haven’t heard about it, there are several wonderful videos and people able to catch you up far better than I am capable of doing. What I can say is that I have been lucky enough to be welcomed into circles of peers and be part of conversations well beyond my station. It's been a lot.
The way I summarize it: For a year it's been a caution, for six months it's been a flashing warning, and for a month it's been a knife fight. It's not my place to bring information forward. Just know that it has been something that countless people have been part of. Many of them have risked a lot by trying to bring this forward. Thank you all for the support.
I don't want to undersell this. Its been exhausting for many creators, including myself. It means utterly everything to me to have been supported in this.
Due to this support of the community, we enacted change this week. I am cautiously optimistic, but this isn’t done until we see the new License and have protections in place.
I also will repeat here what I’ve shared on Twitter: My friends are WotC Staff, they are creators, and genuinely some of my favorite people. Our issue stands with policy & practices at WotC and Hasbro, not employees and fellow creators.
What that means for me and for us:
This Kickstarter is safe, and the published items I have already released to Instagram and Patreon should theoretically be as well.
Polish Edit Pass: Even with everything going on, this was fully completed and admittedly the small changes helped and they look stunning. I’m incredibly happy to have gotten an additional design touches and input in this downtime.
Samples: Recieved! I will have pictures in the next update. I received new samples and have been discussing them with Longpack this week. There are more on the way, but the bulk is here and getting feverish notes.
Surprise for Backers: With the recent OGL news, I feel much more comfortable with this, as it was a stressful situation for a moment there. This will be included in the next update as a little celebration (possibly in a Mini-Update of its own).
I hope that sounds great, and I’m letting out a big sigh of relief this weekend before diving back into the trenches. I love this community and can't thank it enough for the support (this includes you!), but I can try.
Wishing you all well, and I can’t wait to get this out the door.
Be Safe, and Keep Playing.
Greetings All!
I’m back at it with one last update for the end of 2022! Let’s start off with the biggest one first.
The orders are going to be locked in the New Year, with charging coming through the following weeks. So what does that mean for us? You’ll want to check the following to ensure they are up to date.
These are Major, so be sure not to miss out! Now for the fun stuff!
New Rarity Markings:
There were several requests for a way to indicate the rarity on the item fronts over the course of the project. This is accomplished through the following colors. For those with a color vision deficiency, the rarities are still clearly stated on the rear in text. This color coding also carries over to the reference card listings.
Card Tracking:
Upon suggestion, as seen in the Reference Card above, all Card Rears now include a reference number for sorting and organization. This will be utilized in the future as well. Below is a close up sample as well as a close up example (you can see all of them under the Proofs below, though the card order was recently changed).
Icons and PNGs:
These also were knocked out during the delays to keep me sane. I am really quite happy with how these turned out. They are a sampling of what will be included with the Digital Assets bundle.
New Proofs for Edits:
If you have popped into the update Proofs from September. You might notice that there are new 250 Card Rears for proofing, updating all 5 Decks! These include the +185 Edits caught by a new pass from editors and backers!
If you catch anything, please feel free to update the Feedback Form.
The Backer Surprise: OGL Delayed.
This was intended to be delivered with this update. However, the recent OGL 1.1 news has spiraled this into a possibility for January. To clarify, I need to see how this is going to shake loose, as it’s hitting some creators harder than others. This month will show whether this is still a viable ‘legal’ option before fulfillment. I won’t get too deep into this now, but this is a massive wrench into a lot of Creator Plans.
January for overseas production means CNY (Chinese New Year), which is one of the major reasons that the initial delay of 2.5 months was so distressing. While that means Physical Production will be halted for that time period, that doesn’t mean the wheels aren’t moving. So here is a game plan for the upcoming Month.
New Samples:
All new samples (including the latest and the stubborn hold out) will finally be delivered next week. So updates and pictures of the physical product will be provided in the near future! I am so excited for this.
Last Round of Edits:
I tend to let my brain get ahead of my fingers. This leads to small spelling errors here and there. As you’ve seen in my writing, I tend to go for flow over function. So an additional set of eyes is always welcomed. This means that during the down time, I will be having an additional fresh editor do a detailed pass over the entire decks. This is another measure taken due to extra time.
A lot is happening in the next few weeks (even with CNY). I’ll be sharing updates as I receive them. January is going to be a big month especially with TTRPG News, especially after the latest updates. I’ll be letting you know how this affects the project as I know!
Truly as always, thank you. Be Safe and Keep Playing.
Greetings All!
This is a Mini Update focusing on production, and a more sizable one will come next week!
The trend continued into a subpar result of deliverables that further clarified that my concerns were valid. The new project manager was out of touch with the project. I don’t know if it was workload or other issues, but it got worse. With this and other snags, such as bringing up completed tasks/unacceptable timelines, I was not content. I am an easy going fellow, but the frustrations and slow communication got out of hand. November was largely the same as October but with the slow realization this wouldn’t get better despite promises.
There was a lot of back and forth until I finally looped in senior members of production to express dissatisfaction. I was able to meet with the head of production and my previous project manager personally at PAXU, and just expressed everything. I even received verbal confirmations that my previous project manager would assist on my project going forward, because we had never fallen out of communication. They are still knowledgeable on the project as a whole and have been kind enough to help alleviate my stress and fears throughout the last trying month.
While this doesn’t make up for the last 2 months of hair pulling (there isn’t much left), it is a massive sigh of relief and a step in the right direction. This also goes out with a massive thanks to Loottavern Publishing (who you might remember helped me assemble this Kickstarter) for bringing me out to PAXU.
It took a week of meetings and emails following the convention to get confirmation, including looping in the entire list of heads of production. After a few late night group calls and continued(???), I have a brand new Project Manager selected by the head of production with my original PM supporting the project to ensure quality and delivery.
I waited to publish this update for an additional week and a half, as I wanted to make sure they held up the promised standard. I drafted the original take of this update in the Philly Airport hoping to fill you in while still elated with promises. After the initial relief faded into the reality of a travel day, I realized how devastated it would be if nothing changed after updating you with promises.
Now 2 Weeks Out: The changes have been immediate. I’ve been in open communication with them daily since the change with quick results and responses. Gone are the two week gaps of frustration, replaced by pings and email updates. My shoulders feel lighter with each item cleared and approved. We have already cleared first stage errors that had been a main roadblock and moved on to new sampling with a clear idea of what to do next.
This leaves me optimistic. Feeling traction again, especially while supported, feels like a breath of fresh air. The good news gave me a lot of feelings.
As mentioned previously, I have a number of announcements to share next week. This will cover all the things that were handled or updated while the communication had broken down on the physical side, including digital assets, card updates, and hopefully the surprise (checking in with them). It gives me even bigger hopes for January.
I will keep you all in the loop on how this shakes loose. I’m excited to share something that is entirely good news next time! Be Safe and Keep Playing. You’ll hear from me soon.