[unofficial weekender] Fogouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu…. *cough* *cough*

[sundancer 42985xp 2]

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First time visitor to OTT? Then please introduce yourself in the New Member Thread and look around in the Project System. Then come back and read on…

Introduce yourselves (New member thread)

https://www.beastsofwar.com/project/

Read all of this before you start as it will save you any trouble later.

First thing you must do is make your “pledge”. It can be anything gaming related, big or small, and you don’t even have to finish it. No, in here, happiness is the road. Have fun doing whatever it is, but it is not a race. Accompany your work with pictures or we might think you are do something sinister and just using us for cover.

You are also presented with a few questions. It is to get the conversation started. Try and keep your answers ‘conversational’, no text speak, and certainly no “basically”. This is how we all get to know each other better. While you are here feel free to tell us a story, show a picture, joke, tales of love or woe, or just add your own little bit. This is the whole point…in here it is just us.

If you have never taken part before we may bark and bite, but we also like a cuddle! It is all done in the best possible taste and it is character building. feel free to give as good as you get.

A few other things to note: NO RELIGION & NO POLITICS! Glasgow pub rules are in effect. If you need to make a better point then it is fine, but don’t take the piss. And always keep it civil.

Play plenty of music to go with your work. Loud and through proper speakers. Write us a playlist of things we might not have heard before.

Now, after all of that there is only one ‘real’ rule in here and it cannot be broken: NO DICKS! (Exceptions may be made for little fighting men with little plastic/resin/metal wieners)

And don’t forget the highlights of the weekend: The Weekender on Friday and XLBS on Sunday. And the little show that is the unofficial Hobby Hangout over at twitch.tv

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Questions:

• Future of crowdfunding for miniatures – will Kickstarter eat the competition or do specialized platforms like Gamefound have a real chance of growth?
• Should big companies do “in house crowd funding” portals like Hasbro pulse?
• What event (excluding C-19) had the biggest impact (positive or negative) on your crowdfunding spending habits?

And now back to the show.

[sundancer 42985xp 2]

Pledge: Paint more Bot War. Need to get them done at some point.

• Hard to tell. The term “Kickstarter” is almost synonymous with crowdfunding at this point. But if sites like Gamefound do a really good job and maybe don’t take as big as a cut like KS does…
• No. I mean they can but they don’t need to. Big companies shouldn’t to crowdfunding for main stream products in the first place. I can see it for collectible things like a 2000$ 1:8 version of Megatron that’s limited to 200 pieces or something. But main stream things (LIKE HERO QUEST WAS) shouldn’t
• Definitely Brexit. For each KS that come directly from the UK I need to pay an extra 11 – 12 GBP on taxes and import fees. (50% taxes, 50% handling and collecting fee) Latest example (and hence the title) was my Fogou Kickstarter. 17GBP pledge became a 28 GBP hobby item over all.

It’s 6:50am, already 19°C. I’m going back to the shadows. (Aka in my sub terrain office)

[demonsub 12746xp 2]

Happy Friday.

My pledge is to clean up, assemble and base my new goblins from Artizan Designs.

Future of crowdfunding for miniatures – will Kickstarter eat the competition or do specialized platforms like Gamefound have a real chance of growth?

I think Kickstarter will continue to be strong, but who knows.

Should big companies do “in house crowd funding” portals like Hasbro pulse?

No, I think they can afford to take the risk.

What event (excluding C-19) had the biggest impact (positive or negative) on your crowdfunding spending habits?

For me it’s the high postage costs and uncertainty over customs charges that have really stopped me from buying outside of the UK. So mainly Brexit, but throw in C-19 and the Ukrainian invasion, the US post costs and everything else that’s gone sour in the last 5 or so years. International shipping is a mess.

Im in a whimsical mood so here’s my favourite track and song from the film Legend.

 

[limburger 21709xp 0]

1. Future of crowdfunding for miniatures – will Kickstarter eat the competition or do specialized platforms like Gamefound have a real chance of growth?

   Gamefound has grown a lot and based on what I’ve seen a lot of tabletop related crowdfunding projects are moving over there.  I suspect that there’s stuff that Kickstarter is doing that is allowing competing platforms to be a viable alternative.

   There are rumours (not yet confirmed) that Kickstarter may start to do something bitcoin related, which for me would kill the concept.
   The only ‘good’ change that Kickstarter recently has started to enforce is that it won’t allow companies to start a new campaign before shipping the active one, but there are loopholes that still would allow CoolMiniOrNot to ignore that …

2. Should big companies do “in house crowd funding” portals like Hasbro pulse?
   What Hasbro does is not crowdfunding.
   It is a pre-order portal disguised as a crowdfunding platform in order to exploit FOMO.
   I hate pre-orders and I’d argue that they should be made illegal. I see no need to own things on day 0 of release.
   I want to be able to buy stuff when I am ready to do so.
   At least with crowdfunding I can feel like I am helping the little guys achieve their dream projects.
   Hasbro & co don’t need my help and they’ve shown that they simply don’t give a damn about their product once it is released either.
3. What event (excluding C-19) had the biggest impact (positive or negative) on your crowdfunding spending habits?

The simple fact that I had to get external storage space just to store the stuff I had acquired through crowdfunding …
I’m trying to get myself to focus on as few games as possible, because the cold hard reality is that I can’t possibly play everything I like to collect.

I’m not quite sure how to do that as I have never been obsessed with a single theme.
Even my videogame collection ranges from platform games to rpg’s to simulators to strategy games …
My taste in music is equally wide (my pre-Spotify CD collection is almost a thousand … )

So for the moment I’ve told myself that I will do two things :
(1) Firefight / Deadzone as my main focus
(2) to not buy or retrieve from storage anything that isn’t related to that until it is done

I did *eh* ‘forget’ *ahem* that when I ordered a few bits and bobs from that new fangled moon game that everyone keeps talking about. I think that will be my secondary project so I can do something a bit different.

At some point in time I will have to find a way to organise my storage, because I’ve just dumped everything in boxes and got it to the external storage as fast as possible. Am trying not to think about that because I can already feel new projects wanting my attention (WW 2 desert war & east front … ). Never mind that I’ve got a few kickstarters incoming that may disrupt my plans if I’m not careful.

Anyways …

[horati0nosebl0wer 19649xp 1]

And now for The Noseblower Report

Pledge: not to buy minis this week. I will also paint at least one figure to completion.

I don’t notmally post long responses, but when I do….

• Perhaps OTT can shed more of a spotlight on Gamefound. As a broadcast platform for the industry that’s imo what they’re purpose is. If there’s more hype for the specialized platform then more people will use it. There’s already so much going on with other products that games are probably losing out. On top of that there’re the “Staff Favorites” and Picked by Magic which is a crap way of cultivating interest in what a small set of people might like. Let the masses take note of what’s going on and allow us to decide with our wallets. Its the same kind of unseen hand that moves through Steam (and subsequently triggers those bipolar big sale moments). Considering the back and forth between KS and IndieGoGo it might be a matter of plugging into a better position for greater mindshare (ugh, I feel dirty for bringing up sales/marketing corp speak… I feel more and more like its Shadowrun every day).
• Inhouse crowdfunding might be a food thing. If you’re invested in a thing then you’ll buy a thing. The 500lb gorilla of GW might get direct feedback of their plasticrack cult for interest but that’d be shortlived as an echo chamber of people invested in their company. To not be plugged into their company for news means losing out on developments. For Hasbro and other game makers it’d be the same. It would take outlets like OTT to spread the word which is good for those broadcasters. Indies might flourish as the big companies retreat within their walls of attentive and adoring fans.
• Moving has had the biggest impact on my KS spending. The godawful problem of figuring out where to get things sent has stopped me after the attempt to justify “I really want to fund and I almost have the cash if I just don’t spend money on *insert thing here*”. Nope, I had my headache with the TitanForge Amazon army (which I love and have yet to paint) and I’m still waiting on my second Kingdom Death fulfillment.

[ced1106Participant 6224xp 0]

* With supply chain disruption causing increased shipping and inflation, and a possible recession resulting in less money for luxury items, does crowdfunding have a future?

* Big companies can do what they want. In response, we spend money how we want. Compared to what Hasbro has done to the limited collectibles market, crowdfunding is nothing. I’m pretty sure that Hasbro makes more money from yet another Monopoly game than HeroQuest ever will, so if they weren’t allowed to crowdfund, you’d better enjoy *coughing* Dungeons and Dragons Monopoly.

* Shipping. My shipping budget’s gone up from $24+ to $50+ for a base pledge. I’ve never liked paying shipping, but it’s only going up, even before the pandemic, and regardless of what KS quarter-backers say (although I’m been member of the $1 club since CMON Bloodbourne). I’m pretty sure I spend more money on retail sales, such as Miniature Market, Noble Knight, and Amazon. I’d at least like to pretend I’m backing fewer plasticrack projects as shipping rates have gone up. 😛

[sundancer 42985xp 0]

@limburger Kickstarter isn’t “rumoured” to do something bitcoin related. They literally put out a blog article in December 2021 describing that they want to go to blockchain. https://www.kickstarter.com/articles/the-future-of-crowdfunding-creative-projects And they haven’t changed their views.

At some point in time I will have to find a way to organise my storage

Sure, mate, sure XD 😉 Like we all tell us everyday *g*

@horati0nosebl0wer  IndieGOGO is a no go for me, personally. Simply because you pay up front. Regardless is the project meets its goal, your money is gone. And I don’t have money to loose that easily

Overall it seems like the “shipping and receiving” part is currently the biggest problem with crowdfunding. Which isn’t really a surprise I’d say.

[limburger 21709xp 0]

I only read bout it in one of the kickstarters so I didn’t want to qualify it as fact.
The activism by kickstarter has been annoying the heck out of me.
They should just focus on doing the one thing : a platform for companies to ask for funding of projects.(period)

The problems that they are trying to ‘solve’ are the problems that are inherent in capitalism and human nature : we are lazy and greedy.

The ones that draw the most funding are the ones that find the best exploits in whatever system they are using and they inevitably target the lowest common denominator.
It’s why the Hasbro sells a few dozen different versions of Monopoly and not a single unique property.
One thing is an easy sale with instant gratification and the other requires work and effort.

We’ve had decentralized systems *before* blockchain.
Anyone writing code has heard of a thing called ‘Git’ … and even without ‘Git’ the concept of ‘standards’ has been a thing since forever as well.

The problem with ‘standards’ is that the non profit organisations that are supposed to maintain quality also tend to become corrupted by various lobbyists that want to promote whatever nets them the most profit.  Part of the problem is that in order for standards to work you need the support of the market leaders or else they are going to ignore (or worse : hijack) your standard and it fails. I’m pretty sure any web developer knows the ‘joy’ of having to account for the odd behaviour that Internet Explorer has …

Kickstarter wants to pretend that they are the only ones who ‘understand’ crowdfunding.

btw :
Indie GoGo has the *option* for projects to take the money even if the ‘goal’ isn’t reached.

//
A lot of kickstarters have goals that are so low that they need to hit stretchgoals in order to be successful. I’ve even seen it mentioned as part of kickstarter strategy … because claiming ‘funded in x minutes’ makes a project appear more successsful than it actually is.

Simple maths can show this :
[average monthly salary] * [people available] * [duration of project in months] = funding goal for projects without physical rewards …

CMON Cyberpunk 2077 :
= timeline : 10 month (shipping starts in 10 months after kickstarter ends according to the info… )
= goal : 100,000$
gives me 10,000$/month
If they pay people 2000$/month (effective pay would be less than 2k due to taxes and other costs) then they can hire 5 people for the duration of the project

My conclusion :
There is no way for any company to sucessfully deliver this kickstarter without cheating.
They need to hit more than a few stretchgoals (probably all of them) to not be self destructive.

[sundancer 42985xp 0]

Indie GoGo has the *option* for projects to take the money even if the ‘goal’ isn’t reached.

It might be an option for the creator but every project I ever looked at over there had it activated.

And yes, many projects use the low goals as a sales pitch. But since I usually stay away from these monster KS with multitude of stretchgoals I never looked into details. I like campaings like Rögnauts or Morgue Miniatures. “You’ll get x minis. that’s it.”

[demonsub 12746xp 1]

I like campaings like Rögnauts or Morgue Miniatures. “You’ll get x minis. that’s it.”

Same. I know companies like Midlam Miniatures and Heresy Miniatures use Kickstarter to raise funds so that they can make the new moulds and order the raw materials.

[limburger 21709xp 0]

oh … I do like campaigns that keep things as simple as possible.
However I do understand why there is this silly need to keep producing content and ‘engage’ with the backers during the campaign. The vocal ones tend to be the most the worst.

I also think that the 1$ pledge levels are stupid.
You either go all in or you don’t.
Attempting to please every possible backer only complicates the logistics and fullfillment.

I think that certain projects would benefit by not having a fixed goal, but that would be a very limited set.

I also think that (especially) new companies could benefit from limiting the amount of backers that can participate, because that prevents a lot of the problems that happen when they need to scale up their inefficient processes. As such I like how the Baron’s war kickstarter limited the availability of certain terrain pieces to 50 odd backers.

[danlee 22443xp 2]

This weeks pledge is… not sure. Paint something I guess.

 

Just finished painting my second kitbash. https://www.beastsofwar.com/project/1706063/

 

 

1. Future of crowdfunding for miniatures – will Kickstarter eat the competition or do specialized platforms like Gamefound have a real chance of growth? – The pessimist in me will thinks they’ll just get bought out.
2. Should big companies do “in house crowd funding” portals like Hasbro pulse? – I don’t know enough about it to comment.
3. What event (excluding C-19) had the biggest impact (positive or negative) on your crowdfunding spending habits? – No event as such – just running out of storage space.

[horati0nosebl0wer 19649xp 0]

@sundancer Funds up front and unable to recoup is a crap proposition. I agree that hobby funds are limited and therefore valuable. I like the lack of cultivation or sway of attention.

There is a freedom that Gamefound might be able to bring in the same way Myminifactory allows for us as builder/painter/player/hobbyists.

@limburger I second your sentiment on KS activism. I like to make up my own mind on things. I like Sloth and Greed, the best of Nurgle’s traits. Now as far as backer limitations in KS that would be great for the larger projects. Kingdom Death is notorious for being overblown and Ive paid for it twice now. I regret not pulling out and placing my funds elsewhere but deal with the luck of the draw.

@danlee Yes, “Paint more minis!” as Miniac would say

[sundancer 42985xp 0]

Painting minis… haven’t done that for too long again. Maybe tonight, when the in-laws are gone and the child is in bed and the heat is down a bit.

Hello Weekend!

[limburger 21709xp 0]

@horationoseblower : exactly. Heck I’ve backed kickstarters *because* they were ‘offensive’ …

Gamefound was created by the team/company behind ‘Awakened Realms’.
It started as their version of a pledgemanager

https://gamefound.com/about-us#/section/history

I suspect them being both European (based in Poland) and producing tabletop games has helped. Ravensburger is apparently involved behind the scenes, which will be interesting to see how/what that will change things in the future.

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