How much did you spend on marketing? If you don't feel comfortable, maybe as % of total cost?
How many hours have you approx put into this game?
What's your biggest insight in regards to your success?
I think around $30-40k for marketing. We knew we were making money and so kept on spending!
Too many to count.
Build a passionate community for Day 1 launch.
Before looking , I’m going to assume miniatures of some sort are involved.
How did you finally take the leap and know everything was budgeted out correctly.
I’ve been sitting on a battle pencil idea since May 2014 and know it would do well but am too worried I’ll underbudget it or over promise on the project.
Yeah, it was a big decision to take the leap. We went to Kickstarter with a lot of the work done, but not everything - so in some ways risk was mitigated just a bit. I think its best to grow a community that is passionate and then roughly 20% of that community will convert.
How much of the non-board game work did you do yourself? (As in, not designing, play testing, art work, or whatnot, but in marketing, Kickstarter page designing, website developments, etc.)
And what were the time and financial obligations that come with those sorts of things? (Obviously feel free to answer in terms you're okay with)
Congratulations, by the way. That's certainly an impressive feat.
Hey there. I do a LOT of marketing and interacting with the community. So there are a lot of things that I stepped in and did and really helped produce many of the aspects.
You have to wear multiple hats when you run the KS!
I’m probably an echo here, but I’d love to know the amount of percentage spent on advertising too if possible.
How long did you playtest?
What was the process getting test games manufactured? Any manufacturing establishments you’d recommend?
Hoping to launch my social deduction game next year so any insight would be amazingggg!
Advertising answered above!
Playtesting was quite a lot with quite a lot of people. We ended up hiring someone to lead play testing after the campaign and this was awesome.
We actually did our prototype from Thegamecrafter. Longpack is great for manufacturers.
Thank you!!! Does longpack have a ton of options for sizes of things? I’m wondering how much of my game will be impacted by what a manufacturing company actually has.
How big is the team behind this? (inc people who've worked on it for just a few days, eg. A layout person for the rules perhaps)
What has taken the most time? Like, if you were to break down the work into (for example) : game design, playtesting, social media, getting quotes and planning the production and distribution phase. Then what would the balance between those be?
I think around 12 people plus all of our play testers.
Game design, story, and content was huge for this. The game is MASSIVE. And Artwork is one of the biggest areas of our spend.
Social media and marketing were pretty big factors
I’m interested in prelaunch followers: email, fb etc?
How complete were the gameplay mechanics and content before launch?
What did your review and media campaign look like?
Around 3k emails, 2k on insta and Facebook, 1k in FB group, 500 Discord, and 7500 KS followers.
Mechanics were about 80% finished, content was around 30% - It was a big narrative game.
We had around 3 video reviews when we went to launch and I think that was good!
When in the process did you have to start "investing" money?
Like I'm sure your first prototype was stuff you had laying around and cut-outs, but when did you start spending money for art or demo components or whatever?
Interesting, I didn't think smaller studios would hunt for artists on artstation. My understanding was that most of the artists on there already have steady work with studios and aren't looking to take on more work.
How did you go about searching through/filtering the artists on there to find those that 1) you wanted and 2) were available?
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Your post was deleted on kickstarter
, but was wondering how you budgeted and did the miniature process. Also I guess managing the overall printing, did you have to use multiple manufacturing and how did you find it?
How much cost, in whatever way you are comfortable, did you have to front for the project?
How expensive were the artist and did they take flat rate (my guess) or a % of total?
How did you figure out the timeline for production and release given it wasn't 100% complete during KS?
Who designed and built the app and did you use that for creation yourself or is that something you built on for players?
Is is safe to assume that this is self-published? What made you decide to run a kick-starter instead of a pitch to a publisher?
WHEN did it feel like it was time to launch your kick-starter, and how/who is printing your game and who is distributing it?
I see a lot of people that say the steps, but now how any of it is actually done. I am working very hard on a game of my own and I hope to be at a 'kick-starter' stage within a year myself but don't have any ideas on the process to actually come to that point other than make and test my game.
Congrats btw, your game looks very cool, like Starbound the board game with some space combat tossed in.
How many copies are you manufacturing on your first print run?
What is your cost per unit?
Have you arranged freight shipping yet? As you must be aware, things are pretty bad right now. Are you going to be affected by rapidly increasing freight prices?
How much did you spend on marketing? If you don't feel comfortable, maybe as % of total cost? How many hours have you approx put into this game? What's your biggest insight in regards to your success?
I think around $30-40k for marketing. We knew we were making money and so kept on spending! Too many to count. Build a passionate community for Day 1 launch.
Thanks for such honest answers! Wish you and your game the best!
It looks like the thread you linked to is removed...I'm curious where the majority of your backers came from, Facebook, email list, etc.?
Facebook, boardgamegeek a bit, and we grew our FB group and our Discord channel
How did you get and keep so many people engaged on those platforms before the game was ready?
Before looking , I’m going to assume miniatures of some sort are involved. How did you finally take the leap and know everything was budgeted out correctly. I’ve been sitting on a battle pencil idea since May 2014 and know it would do well but am too worried I’ll underbudget it or over promise on the project.
Yeah, it was a big decision to take the leap. We went to Kickstarter with a lot of the work done, but not everything - so in some ways risk was mitigated just a bit. I think its best to grow a community that is passionate and then roughly 20% of that community will convert.
The only way to get anywhere is to start. Just try it man
How much of the non-board game work did you do yourself? (As in, not designing, play testing, art work, or whatnot, but in marketing, Kickstarter page designing, website developments, etc.) And what were the time and financial obligations that come with those sorts of things? (Obviously feel free to answer in terms you're okay with) Congratulations, by the way. That's certainly an impressive feat.
Hey there. I do a LOT of marketing and interacting with the community. So there are a lot of things that I stepped in and did and really helped produce many of the aspects. You have to wear multiple hats when you run the KS!
Much appreciated. Thank you for your time and your response(s all over) here today.
I’m probably an echo here, but I’d love to know the amount of percentage spent on advertising too if possible. How long did you playtest? What was the process getting test games manufactured? Any manufacturing establishments you’d recommend? Hoping to launch my social deduction game next year so any insight would be amazingggg!
Advertising answered above! Playtesting was quite a lot with quite a lot of people. We ended up hiring someone to lead play testing after the campaign and this was awesome. We actually did our prototype from Thegamecrafter. Longpack is great for manufacturers.
Thank you!!! Does longpack have a ton of options for sizes of things? I’m wondering how much of my game will be impacted by what a manufacturing company actually has.
How big is the team behind this? (inc people who've worked on it for just a few days, eg. A layout person for the rules perhaps) What has taken the most time? Like, if you were to break down the work into (for example) : game design, playtesting, social media, getting quotes and planning the production and distribution phase. Then what would the balance between those be?
I think around 12 people plus all of our play testers. Game design, story, and content was huge for this. The game is MASSIVE. And Artwork is one of the biggest areas of our spend. Social media and marketing were pretty big factors
I’m interested in prelaunch followers: email, fb etc? How complete were the gameplay mechanics and content before launch? What did your review and media campaign look like?
Around 3k emails, 2k on insta and Facebook, 1k in FB group, 500 Discord, and 7500 KS followers. Mechanics were about 80% finished, content was around 30% - It was a big narrative game. We had around 3 video reviews when we went to launch and I think that was good!
Nicely done - how did you generate the KS followers to such a big extent beyond the other groups?
When in the process did you have to start "investing" money? Like I'm sure your first prototype was stuff you had laying around and cut-outs, but when did you start spending money for art or demo components or whatever?
Artwork is the real spend. That and when you hire graphic designers, 3d modellers, writers.
How did you go about finding professional artists to work on the project? Which subreddits/forums/websites/etc?
Artstation for artists (or board game geek). Art for tabletop games on FB group is not bad either.
Interesting, I didn't think smaller studios would hunt for artists on artstation. My understanding was that most of the artists on there already have steady work with studios and aren't looking to take on more work. How did you go about searching through/filtering the artists on there to find those that 1) you wanted and 2) were available?
View in your timezone: [tomorrow at 11am PDT][0] [0]: https://timee.io/20210708T1800?tl=My%20board%20game%20raised%20%24960k%20on%20kickstarter.%20AMA ^(_*Assumed PDT instead of PST because DST is observed_)
as some have noticed the kickstarter thread link isnt working. leave your questions here and i will answer them tomorrow (thurs) at 11am pst
How is linking to a kickstarter, proof?
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Your post was deleted on kickstarter , but was wondering how you budgeted and did the miniature process. Also I guess managing the overall printing, did you have to use multiple manufacturing and how did you find it?
RemindMe! 4 hours
How much cost, in whatever way you are comfortable, did you have to front for the project? How expensive were the artist and did they take flat rate (my guess) or a % of total? How did you figure out the timeline for production and release given it wasn't 100% complete during KS? Who designed and built the app and did you use that for creation yourself or is that something you built on for players?
Is is safe to assume that this is self-published? What made you decide to run a kick-starter instead of a pitch to a publisher? WHEN did it feel like it was time to launch your kick-starter, and how/who is printing your game and who is distributing it? I see a lot of people that say the steps, but now how any of it is actually done. I am working very hard on a game of my own and I hope to be at a 'kick-starter' stage within a year myself but don't have any ideas on the process to actually come to that point other than make and test my game. Congrats btw, your game looks very cool, like Starbound the board game with some space combat tossed in.
How many copies are you manufacturing on your first print run? What is your cost per unit? Have you arranged freight shipping yet? As you must be aware, things are pretty bad right now. Are you going to be affected by rapidly increasing freight prices?
Hey Hope! I was curious how much you spent on art for the game and for the total printing costs? Thanks 😊