Thanks to our Production Manager, Sabrina, we have a good possibly-final draft of the 10 x 20 neoprene playmat. The red around the edge will be other colors in the 5-extra-mat pack. How does this look to you?

– Steve Jackson

Wow. Just wow. I do not BELIEVE that number, and it's not over. We had to do calculations last night on the question "can we even fit all those boxes into the warehouse before we start shipping?" The answer is no, but if we use the office as well, it probably becomes yes. Just barely.

Please see my comments on the excellent playmat suggestions in the last update. That was a bad sentence. "My comments are in the suggestions which backers have posted to the last update." That's a little better.

I'm thinking about Lessons Learned from this campaign. Some of them are things we already knew and apparently needed to be reminded of. Others are new. Where I'm going with this is: please look at the list and suggest additions . . .

1. Plan more stretch goals in advance than you can POSSIBLY imagine hitting.

2. Communicate constantly, even if the news is only "We are confounded and thinking hard about what to do." Backers get frustrated, and some of them get excited in a bad way, if the updates are not regular enough.

3. You like images and graphics, even preliminary graphics.

4. The backer base (i.e., YOU) represents a huge source of ideas. Some of them, I won't lie, are absolutely terrible, and some of the neatest ones are financially unfeasible, at least within the timeline. But a lot of them are great. "All of us together are smarter than any one of us."

5. Promotion pays off, and the BackerKit staff's assistance with promotion planning was very valuable. We appreciate them.

6. If we announce a stretch goal that a lot of people dislike, it may be better to stay the course, and make the next one better, than to change in the middle. Because the people who LIKED that goal, and didn't say anything, get annoyed if we change it.

What else should we have learned this time? (Or, what did YOU learn?)

– Steve Jackson

It looks very much as though you will hit the million-dollar mark before opening of business Monday, which means that not only will we have to tell you what you added at a million, but also that we should post a $+50,000 goal as well! As the support rate has started to creep up as we enter the last few days, that now looks like a feasible number – not by any means guaranteed, but feasible. As does the nice round figure of 7,000 backers. Can you believe it?

– Steve Jackson

 

Thank you for your patience . . .

The million-dollar goal is the red playmat for every backer, and the other colors will be an add-on set. We'll look for a balance between filling all desires and delaying the project.

And yes, there's one more goal. It was kind of everyone who said "you don't need another one" !  But (a) Some people think we DO, and (b) this lets me get the New Mechanic out there at $1.050,000. It's a Hall of Fame that carries over from game to game. Think of it as "Legacy Lite"!

That really will be the last literal stretch goal, though. If an incredible surge of backing comes in during the last day or two, we'll apply some tiny improvements to various existing components. I have a wish list . . .

You are all awesome. Spread the word! Tell your friends about this set while they can get it, because some of these items will truly by One and Done. And you want to get them now, and not for twice the price on eBay. Yes, this happens.

So it's time to sit back and watch the fun, with just under three more days to go.

– Steve Jackson

PS - I would be remiss if I failed to point out our current CARnage 2 STL project for Car Wars fans, now underway on Some Other Crowdfunding Site. It's not going to be a million-dollar campaign, but it's fun if you like 3D printing! I am being all tasteful and polite and not linking to it here, but I have faith that you can find it.

Based on backer feedback and some useful suggestions about safe packaging, we are honing in on the decision about the million-dollar stretch goal. We don't have the bid yet, but it sure LOOKS like we can afford to give backers (only) a 10" x 20" neoprene play mat to organize their cards, and package it so it has a very good chance of getting there undamaged.

This size is actually a tiny bit bigger than it needs to be to hold a reasonable number of cards. But a little extra space never hurts, because sometimes you have an UNreasonable number of cards, am I right?

If we do this, we will also offer an add-on package of 5 more playmats so you can trick out your home set fully. I don't know if we will be able to put different colors on them or not. The current bid request covers 6,500-7,500 identical mats, and we'll use a red theme and put the Big Box cover image on them. If we order extra sets, that will probably be at least a $100 package (neoprene! expensive! five neoprene! five expensive!) so we won't order a lot of them. If we make enough for, say, 200 sets, that would mean the print run of the other colors would be only 200, and that MIGHT be a problem. Or not. We will find out. There's also a chance that we could hold off printing that particular item until the pledge manager closes, letting us order the exact amount everyone wants. I might be wrong. Don't hit Darryll if I'm wrong. This is just me thinking out loud.

We are all very grateful for the fine feedback you have been giving, and for your patience as we sort out this step in the journey.

The official announcement of the goal probably won't be till Monday because that is when we now expect the bid. But we won't go anywhere if you won't!

– Steve Jackson

PS - This is now the biggest crowdfund we have ever done – this afternoon it passed Ogre Designer's Edition.