Reply To: Kickstarter rising costs, the end to big box games What will the future be ?

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KS has a fundamental problem that you commit to funds, during the campaign, before knowing shipping costs, when the pledge manager is opened. As another poster said, that’s fine when prices are stable. Prices aren’t stable. Reaper miniatures said they weren’t even attempting estimates, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that was part of the reason why its last Bones KS made 1/3 as much as their previous ones (I’d say their lackluster variety of sculpts contributed, not that a smaller scope KS is a bad idea nowadays).

Some backers think shipping costs should be paid closer to actual shipping times. Pledge managers don’t seem to have this capability, not that they shouldn’t. But, then, you’ll still have backers upset when one company’s shipping costs are higher than another (because companies don’t tell you nor do they necessarily know how much they will subsidize shipping costs).

> Smaller, more local projects (or pure digital ones) still work out fine.

Especially with Siocast! Juegorama’s switched from China’s injection molding to Siocast, possibly in-house. Metal and resin, of course, is not cast in China, and made locally as well (although both cost more per mini than plastic, and resin has its own problems). I also got a CamelCamelCamel alert that the “ELEGOO 3D Resin Printer” has dropped in price, although China still supplies the resin. 😛 Domestic shipping can still be a pain. I doubt it’s an easy decision to set up another hub for FedEx, and fuel prices affect shipping domestically as well.

With VAT, international backers look to be getting hit the hardest. I didn’t check the location of everyone in the Mythic Anastyr KS who paid high costs for shipping, but I suspect they’re mostly international. In the USA we have free shipping thresholds with online retailers (eg. Amazon, Miniature Market, Noble Knight), but I don’t know what alternatives hobbyists overseas have to KS. I know that imported boardgames there are expensive.

3D printing projects on KS are on the rise, so I guess as 3D printers are becoming better, KS will again improve. Maybe China — or another country — will return to being a source of cheap plastics. Or maybe some other major change will happen that happens to affect KS. I’m looking forward to British police boxes that you can put three room’s of plastic miniatures in, myself. 😛