Progress Report - June 2022
almost 4 years ago – Fri, Jun 10, 2022 at 01:06:25 AM

Hello SlugFans!

We are back from the UK Game Expo (where Dungeon Decorator's won an award!) and it's time to share how Tales development has been going!

We have been working through updating the game components from cards to maps to books with final artwork and layout. We are deep into drafting the authoritative version of the rule documents you'll need to play the game. Since the last update we have finished the illustration layout work for all of the cards, and have been updating the final text of the cards. We have also been reviewing new prototype miniatures and dice from the manufacturer.

In case you missed it, we uploaded pictures of prototypes for all of the game's miniatures into two albums on Google Photos. One album contains only miniatures from stuff available in the first chapter of the game. The second album contains miniatures from later in the campaign that you may consider to be spoilers for the game's story. You can check out either or both albums at the following links:

• Take me to the spoiler FREE album.
• Take me to the SPOILER album.

But that's all old stuff, how about the new prototypes? We received some roughs for the dice that will be included in the game. These samples are used to primarily establish which die faces go where and how big they should be. What you'll see in the following image are printed versions of the dice that have been painted, hence why you'll see some color bleed and chipping. The actual dice will be made from different colors of plastic with only the recessed symbols inked.

We really like the size and feel of the dice and hope you will enjoy all the fun of blasting your foes for massive damage!

Speaking of adventures, we have also been hard at work creating finished versions of all the scenario book entries. Scenarios will be detailed in full, with entries rich with reminders about common game mechanics while diving into features that make each scenario unique. You will also get some helpful advice from Wizgille, who will be popping in from time to time when a particularly tricky bit of the scenario needs some extra 'splaining.

The project is deep into a whole bunch of fine tuning work now, and we haven't even mentioned the glossary and support documents! We'll keep watching the comments for your questions, and we'd love to have you over at our Discord where you can chat and play our games, but for now it's time we get back to finishing the game!

Until next time, happy adventuring!

Progress Report - April 2022
about 4 years ago – Wed, Apr 20, 2022 at 02:23:46 AM

Hello SlugFans!

We’re here to touch base and let you know where we are on development. So without further ado let’s dive in!

There are still 11% of you who have not completed your survey. Please find your invite email from Backerkit.com and go enter your information so we can send you your games when it’s time to ship! If you are unsure of whether or not you have completed your survey, please just skip on over to Backerkit.com and log in.

A number of you have been asking when Backerkit orders and shipping will be processed. We are still on track for Q3 this year. When we go forward with locking and charging orders we will let you all know weeks in advance so you won’t be surprised by a sudden charge.

Tales is digitally art complete! That means we have all of the art assets for assembling maps, cards, minis, etc. So now we’re up to our armpits in layout work, assembling pretty scenario books and maps.

That also means it’s time to start working with our manufacturer on the finer details of fiddly components like the dice and figures! For the dice, that meant sending vector graphics for all of the icons so they can start digitally carving them out. Basically, we choose a pantone color and lay out the icons at the size and spacing we want, and then they render a model of the result. Eventually, we’ll get some physical prototypes before they tool (as in carve into) a metal mold for casting the dice at production scale.

Most exciting of all, the real-world prototypes for the miniatures! The following photos are of the sample minis, and are meant for testing for things like the size of Pooky’s base and relative scale between all the figures. If everything checks out, then they too will get tooled into metal molds for production.

If you are interested in seeing them all in greater detail, you can head over to this album on Google Photos and see them in all their glory. We have two version of the album, the spoiler free one that only shows you the figures from the start of Chapter 1, and a spoiler full album of all the minis.

• Take me to the spoiler free album.
  
• Take me to the spoiler album.

And that wraps the update! We are thrilled about the progress so far. If you have any further questions for us comment here or head on over to our Discord server and join the community. Enjoy these swanky snapshots and we'll catch up with you again soon!

Progress Report - Feb. 2022
over 4 years ago – Wed, Feb 02, 2022 at 07:52:54 PM

Hello SlugFans!

With the Holidays firmly behind us (happy Lunar New Year!), it’s time to dive back in. This is your progress report on what’s happening with Tales!

We talked about the launch of the campaign’s pledge manager in our last update in 2021. As of this update, 87% of you have completed the survey. This is fantastic as those surveys are critically important in making sure you get your rewards. We have sent reminder emails to the remaining 13% of you who have not yet filled out your survey. Please make sure that you have whitelisted backerkit.com in your mailbox so you receive these updates!

Remember, your invitation to BackerKit email is your golden ticket for your rewards! Do not delete your BackerKit email. This email is your number one way to update your mailing address and to order add-ons.

We have a long road ahead of us. We are nowhere near locking down shipping information or sending rewards out to backers yet. While we work on finishing the final details of the game, please make sure that you keep your shipping information up to date via BackerKit.

If you are interested in joining our playtest crew you can find a survey link on our Discord server in the #sign-up-to-playtest channel. This week we are releasing a new update to the playtest mod for Tales.

The critically important step at this stage of playtest is checking for consistency between game mechanics across the various ability cards, maps, scenario books, and rules. Basically, when two cards tell you to do the same thing they should be worded the same way! We try our best to make sure we catch every instance of a game mechanic mentioned throughout the game, but could always use more eyeballs on the project.

We are also doing final balancing and difficulty testing, and would love your feedback here too! The more folks we get playing the game the more opportunities we get to catch a problem.

In addition to how the game plays, we are also working on how the game looks and feels. As of now we have a lot of the game’s artwork already in the pocket. We only have a few things left to tinker with:

• 20 out of 25 Maps have been illustrated.
• 12 out of 18 Miniatures have been sculpted.

Everything else - the items, ability cards, player mats, standees, tokens - is done! If you join our Discord server and do some playtesting you’ll also get to see this new artwork in action in our playtest mod (and help us check for things like image corruption which was a fun headache to solve over the weekend!).

On that note it's time to sign off. Before we go, how about some nice spoiler free shots of minis and a couple of those sweet maps? We hope you look forward to fighting these foes and waging battle at these locations in the future!

As always these images and renders are subject to change between now and production.

Watch Your Mailboxes! Pledge Manager is Live!
over 4 years ago – Fri, Nov 19, 2021 at 11:22:42 PM

Greetings SlugFans!

Today’s update is full of important information! Please read carefully so you are well aware of all the ins and outs.

Our pledge manager, BackerKit, is going live today! This will be where you will fill in your mailing information, pay for shipping, VAT and add-ons. Today we are going to go over everything you need to know about BackerKit.

For those of you who may not know, BackerKit is a tool used by backers to adjust their pledge details. The process is pretty straightforward:

• You will receive an email from BackerKit (remember to whitelist backerkit.com).
• A link in that email will send you to your BackerKit profile for Tales.
• From there you can upgrade your pledge level, pay for shipping, pay for taxes and add optional add-ons to your rewards.
• You will also be asked to provide your mailing address (which you can change at any time until we lock down addresses for shipping).

The emails from BackerKit will roll out over the next few days. BackerKit has a creator-end feature called the Smoke Test, where a random 5% of backers are sent their invite emails first, letting us and BackerKit troubleshoot any problems before the remaining 95% log in to the pledge manager. Basically, we get to run a little quality assurance before the flood gates open.

Furthermore, you will not be receiving a survey from Kickstarter for Tales. The BackerKit pledge manager asks you all the important questions and collects all the necessary information to send you your rewards.

Again, please make sure you have backerkit.com whitelisted in your email settings (and if you didn’t please check your spam folder). If you have not received an email from backerkit.com by Tuesday, November 30th, then send us an email at [email protected] and we will help you into your pledge manager.

Your Email is a Golden Ticket

Do not delete your BackerKit email. Your invite email from BackerKit is your lifeline to your account in case something goes wrong. So star it, flag it, favorite it, print it out and stick it on your wall! This email is your number one way to update your mailing address and order add-ons.

Furthermore, Backers should not click on the “Pre-order Now!” button on the campaign page. That button is for folks who missed the campaign or had a billing issue. If you do click on that button and go through the process, you’ll end up ordering and being charged for an additional copy of the game.

Add-Ons and Extras

Your link to BackerKit will also take you to the Add-on Store, where you can add our other games to your pledge, as well as some sweet stuff just for Tales.

While you are in the Add-On Store, if you are at the Adventurer level you will find a copy of Tales in your cart ready for checkout. This includes your Kickstarter Kit and all the minis! If you add additional copies of Tales to your rewards, these additional copies will also include the Kickstarter Kit and minis.

If you would like extra Kickstarter Kits or Minis, they will also be available as add-ons.

To reiterate, if you are a backer at the Adventurer pledge level you do not need to add anything to your shopping cart to get your rewards. Everything available on BackerKit is there for you if you want extras of something.

Payment Processing and Fees

Much like Kickstarter, you’ll be asked by BackerKit to put in some payment information, but will not be charged until a later date. Even if you do not purchase any add-ons, you will still need to put in a form of payment for shipping and taxes (where applicable). You will be charged in mid-ish 2022 when the game and add-ons are in manufacturing.

In Summary

We know this is a ton of information to take in, but it’s all super important. That said, here is a quick summary of the important bullet points:

• In the next few days you will receive an email from backerkit.com taking you to your personal pledge manager page.
• Your email from backerkit.com is your golden ticket to providing and updating your shipping information, getting add-ons and paying for shipping and taxes.
• Do not click on the “Pre-Order Now!” button on the campaign page. That will take you to an entirely different area on BackerKit and will result in you paying for a completely new order.
• Payments for items in your BackerKit shopping cart, your shipping and your taxes will be charged in Q2 or Q3 of 2022

Thank you everyone for reading through this update. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask. We are thrilled to be making this game for you and want to make sure you actually get it! We’ll be in touch again at the end of the month. For now, have a great holiday and get your info plugged into BackerKit!

Extra Life Stream, New Artwork, Velrock Minis Campaign
over 4 years ago – Sat, Nov 13, 2021 at 06:16:01 AM

Greetings SlugFans!

It’s been a quiet couple of weeks! We would like to invite you to a very important stream we have coming up this Saturday, as well as provide a brief update on the project. We’re also excited to share a Kickstarter run by one of the Tales artists!

We will be raising money for UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals as part of Extra Life this Saturday (November 13th) from noon until 4PM PST. You can catch the stream on our Twitch.tv channel where you’ll be able to participate in the pledge drive as we give away copies of the new promo Bitecoin and raffle off other yet-to-be-revealed prizes.

Like we mentioned earlier, our job over the next few months is all about artwork and layout. That includes things like incorporating your poll feedback as well as adjustments suggested by our Discord channel. Check out some of the stuff our artists have been delivering:

Who are these unfamiliar faces? You’ll have to play the game to find out!

To finish off today’s update, we’d like to share a project we love. The artist responsible for our awesome miniature sculpts is running his very own Kickstarter right now! He’s offering the STLs for some fantastic dragon-folk miniatures. Your $15 pledge gets you the pre-supported 3D print files for 14 different classes of dragon-folk with both male and female variants. He’s also working on some sweet riding drakes and rider sculpts. Velrock’s campaign ends November 16th so go check it out before it’s too late!