Kickstarting

Kickstarting, or crowdfunding, is a major force in gaming now. While you can kickstart all manner of things, I’ve stuck to games so far, and mostly to games or supplies related to role-playing games. The Bones and Dwarven Forge kickstarters have increased the aesthetics of my game session and have increased the amount of clutter my hobby takes up.

The RPG community actually started crowdfunding quite a while before Kickstarter and Indiegogo started up. Wolfgang Baur’s Open Design projects used a patron model, based on an idealization of Renaissance artistic patronage, so he should get credit for preparing the RPG community for the mass acceptance of crowdfunding hobby projects.

Now there are dozens (hundreds?) or RPG Kickstarter projects. Some of these have been remarkable success and others rather infamous failures, where backers have lost their money and will never see the product they funded. I’ve been lucky. I’ve kickstarted 21 projects, and almost all have come through. I’m still waiting on a few, only one has stretched on well past its “delivery date” (The Torment: Tides of Numenera video game stretches on past its due date, but will be fulfilled).

Part of the reason I’ve been lucky is that I’ve been circumspect in what I’ve backed. I have not backed single-author, first time projects, with the exception of Monte Cook’s Numenera. In that case, Cook had over a decade of regularly producing major games and supplements and kickstarter was essentially “start-up funds” for his new company. I already had Ptolus, his massive city setting for D&D, so I wasn’t worried about his track record.

Many of the kickstarters I’ve backed have been minor or mid-level companies (there are only two big companies in RPG/Gaming: WOTC and GW, although I could be wrong about Steve Jackson Games). In most cases these kickstarters have been major pre-order campaigns rather than Kickstarter campaigns. It is possible to criticize the kickstarting movement as a kind of pre-sale service, as opposed to a genuine crowdfunding of new initiatives. I think that's become true of gaming. It seems less so in the case of the arts and design end of kickstarting, but the gaming end of things seems to be allowing mid-level companies become more secure and expand. I think this is a good thing. Games Workshop has generally treated its hobbyists badly, and WotC is able to run an unstoppable game in the form of Magic: The Gathering, but it is also capable of mis-managing D&D. The more mid-range private companies we have, the more the hobby grows and stabilizes. 

One has regrets though: I didn’t kickstart The Horror on theOrient Express Call of Cthulhu reprint, and that was a major missed opportunity. Oh well.

I’ll be tracking some of my kickstarters and reviewing them as they go. Currently I have seven still to come kickstarters due over the next year.

Some bloggers, like the tireless Tenkar’s Tavern have done a good job of noting failed and burned kickstarters, so my goal is to be upbeat and positive about the games I’ve kickstarted. So far, I’ve gotten hundreds of hours of fun out of these games. 

Joesky Tax

Transmuter's Knuckle

Wonderous Item, Rare (or less rare, depending on how many transumters you know)

The trasmuter's knuckle is exactly that, a knuckle taken from a transmuter's fingers. The knuckle must be dried and infused with a combination of snake venom and olive oil. Once prepared, the knuckle can be mixed with a substance to provide the effects of an Enhance Ability spell.

To produce a desired effect, you will need to follow the following recipe: 

Bear's Endurance: Crack the knuckle in two and steep it in mixture of stout beer and animal fur for 10 minutes. Drink the beer and fur. The knuckle is know a mundane item. 

Bull's Strength: You must eat the knuckle whole. Chewing may crack teeth, but you are strong. 

Cat's Grace: Grind the knuckle to a fine powder and snort it up your nose. 

Eagle's Splendor: Grind the knuckle to a fine powder and rub it into your hair. When the spell effect ends, you have ground up knuckle bone in your hair, and suffer disadvantage on Charisma checks until you bath, but no one notices this while the spell is active. 

Fox's Cunning: Crack the knuckle in two. Place on half on your tongue, the other half over one eye and allow them to rest for 5 minutes. Swallow the knuckle on your tongue and burn the knuckle from your eye, inhaling the fumes. 

Owl's Wisdom: Grind the knuckle into a fine powder and mix it with chamomile tea. Drink the tea quickly.