Euro-inspired dungeon crawling sequel to the 2017 smash-hit Gloomhaven
Latest Updates from Our Project:
FINAL DAY!
about 4 years ago
– Fri, May 01, 2020 at 11:27:06 PM
We can do this! It's going to be close, but I believe we can hit that final goal of $12.4 million! I was advised to give you just a short, punchy pitch about how you can help us get there instead of hitting you with another wall of text, so here goes:
1. Increase your pledge by whatever makes sense. This just means paying for add-ons and shipping ahead of time instead of in the pledge manager. Eyeing those metal coins? Or maybe some pins? Or maybe you want to try out the digital version of the game? (It's great!) Or maybe your friend needs a copy of the game too! All you need to do is:
Look at the add-ons.
Look at the shipping tables.
Calculate what to add to your pledge.
Hit the "Manage your pledge" button, then "Change your pledge".
Adjust your pledge amount without changing your pledge level.
And that's it! Any money you pledge now will carry over to the pledge manager, where you can spend it however you'd like. Just as an example, if every backer went in on the digital game, we would easily cross that threshold. Every little bit helps here, so, you know, just think about it.
2. Spread the word! Tweet about it, post on Facebook, Instagram, wherever. Shout it from the rooftops. Like I said, it is going to be very close, and every little bit will help here. This isn't some silly stretch goal that we are guaranteed to reach, and we can just sit back and watch happen. We're going to have to work for it.
And with that said, I will be back later today with the final guest designer(s?) and the results of the threat competition. Just remember that I am eternally grateful to all of you. You have already made this campaign an amazing, unprecedented success. This is just something extra that would be great to see happen - to nab that #1 spot. We've got 7.5 hours left, and we can do it!
And here's something a little extra for motivation (I'm at the end):
Stretch goals! And guest designer Richard Ham!
about 4 years ago
– Fri, May 01, 2020 at 02:54:46 AM
10 MILLION DOLLARS!
This is an absurd amount of money! When we were planning this out, I may have wistfully mentioned that it would be nice to hit $10 million, but it was a pipe dream. And then once the pandemic hit, I thought it for sure wouldn't happen. But we threw the party anyway, and now look where we are! Thanks to everyone for making this pipe dream come true (the game as well as the absurd funding level)!
And we still have about 28 hours left! What other numbers can we reach? Well, I'm going to be perfectly honest with all of you: I want to hit $12.4 million, a number that would make us the #1 most funded board game project of all time.
Being the #1 rated game on Board Game Geek has brought Gloomhaven into so many more homes and allowed it to bring so much more exciting adventure into the world. Being at the top of a list just brings so much more visibility to something, and it I think it would be great to bring that visibility to a game like Frosthaven. Plus you'd get the bragging rights of being a backer on the biggest board game Kickstarter.
Obviously, I don't want to diminish the accomplishment of reaching $10 MILLION, and there'll be more on that in a second, but I think the goal of $12.4 million is achievable. And so, I'm going to do something I said I wouldn't do, and I was not at all planning on doing until I woke up this morning. I'm going to give you a stretch goal.
If we hit $12.4 million, I will add a 17th character class to the game. I have no idea what that character will be, but it will happen, and I will be sure to make it awesome. I really want to emphasize that this will only happen if we hit $12.4, though.
So, how do we hit that number? Well, let's get back to that $10 million achievement, because I want to give you something for that as well (consider it a stretch goal we've already passed). By far, the two most numerous requests we've gotten from backers are for monster minis (which is still outside the scope of this project), and something that we can do for you: components for envelope X.
If you don't know what envelope X is, it is a secret in Gloomhaven that I encourage you not to look up, but discover on your own. Just know that there are many people out there who want proper components for it, and so we will be making them available as an add-on in the pledge manager for $15 (for wave 2 fulfillment).
(And yes, that thing about standees for all summons will apply here as well.)
So, if you want to help hit $12.4 million, and you are interested in envelope X, we encourage you to add $15 to you pledge now. Or if you were planning on getting any other add-ons like the metal coins or the wooden organizer, adding those funds now will also help hit that magic number. All you need to do is just hit the "Manage Your Pledge" button at the top of the page, and then any money you add will carry over to the pledge manager, where you can allocate it to whatever add-ons you want.
And for those curious about the sleeves discussion from yesterday, unfortunately it is going to take more than a day to make a decision and price everything out, so we won't have an update on that before the end of the campaign. I can tell you that we will be doing a sleeve add-on, based on the overwhelming feedback, but I can't give you a price for it yet.
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And with all this excitement, we still need to talk about our newest esteemed guest designer, Richard Ham! Richard was one of the first big proponents of Gloomhaven back in the day. On his Youtube play through channel, Rahdo Runs Through, he was very passionate with his praise of the game during the original Kickstarter and no doubt helped significantly to launch it into the success it has since seen. In fact, I wouldn't even be making games at all if Richard hadn't thrown such massive praise on my first game, Forge War, during its Kickstarter.
Richard has played Gloomhaven more than any other game in his collection, and it is one of his top games of all time. And if that isn't enough qualification for making awesome Gloomhaven content, before he ran a Youtube channel, he was also a prolific video game designer, working on the Siphon Filter and Fable series. I'm looking forward to working with him on Frosthaven!
#TeamUnfettered creeps farther ahead in the competition. It was a hard-fought battle yesterday, with massive points going to #TeamAlgox for Reddit user VirtuallyJason's 3D rendering of an Algox Archer, but the Unfettered launched salvo after salvo with InfinityOverPi's Spirit Island crossover and Trevor Leitner's Pathfinder monster stats. And, in the end, what really put them over was that I stole BGG user Beyoken's superior puzzle solution again, and he has pledged allegiance to the Unfettered.
But it is not over! I will be announcing the final results tomorrow, so keep on fighting!
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So here is the Mindthief puzzle solution, stolen from Beyoken, who kept everyone alive for four rounds (Mindthief, monsters, and the rat swarm).
And now onto the FINAL PUZZLE! We end with the Brute, naturally. He got a long rest after having to stand in for all the Frosthaven characters, but we need him once again to bring us home in style. I wanted to do something special and different with this puzzle, so I hope you like it!
Guest designer Vlaada Chvatil and some card sleeve questions
about 4 years ago
– Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 02:28:18 AM
Hello! Things are getting exciting as we approach the end of the campaign, and I don't think I could personally be more excited to announce our next guest designer, VLAADA CHVATIL!
You may already know this, but Vlaada is my hero. His ability to create varied, engaging, and thematic game designs is unmatched, in my opinion. The fact that games like Mage Knight, Through the Ages, Galaxy Trucker, and Codenames all came from the same designer just blows my mind. Not only that, but he is an incredibly humble and down-to-earth guy, despite his massive success.
And I was absolutely floored when he approached me at Essen last year and told me how much he was enjoying playing Gloomhaven with his family. The fact that I could give some joy back to someone who has given me so much joy over the years, it's just... yeah, there aren't really words for it.
And then he also agreed to guest design a scenario! Vlaada could give me a used napkin with scribbles on it, and I'd be happy, but I am sure he'll do something much, much more awesome than that!
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Al right, now I'm going to talk about card sleeves to calm down a bit. We've been talking to a manufacturer about making a batch of card sleeves for Frosthaven for those interested in that kind of thing. Basically, the idea here is convenience. If you want to sleeve your cards, we want to add into the pledge manager some options to do that that should be at a lower cost (relative to the quality) and just allow you to not have to math it out and purchase them from another source.
So this is just a preliminary discussion right now - something we are exploring for the pledge manager. And I really wanted your feedback on some aspects of this.
First of all, I just wanted to gauge interest in the idea and whether you'd be interested in getting sleeves directly from us.
Second, would you want enough sleeves to go with every card in the game or just the cards that are shuffled/handled often? Note that we don't have a set-in-stone card count at this point, but we'll have a pretty good approximation. So we'll let you know around how many sleeves you will be getting, use that to price it out, and then make sure you get the correct number when things are finalized.
Third, would you be interested in just basic sleeves, or sleeves with some sort of non-invasive "frosty" design that would run a little more expensive?
So let me know, and we'll talk more about it once we've gotten a little farther along. Keep in mind we will probably only have this option available for Frosthaven and not Gloomhaven, as the timing wouldn't work out on that.
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And #TeamUnfettered once again surges ahead! There was about equal activity on the Kickstarter page, but #TeamUnfettered was doing more interesting things elsewhere, including making an STL file for the boltshooter. Plus they're getting more gains in the polls! (Maybe they have...bots?)
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Here is a puzzle solution for the Scoundrel. We're closing in on the end of the puzzles, but remember that you can find all of them in this Google drive if you missed any or want to revisit them.
Second to last, we've got a puzzle for the Mindthief. She's missing her most powerful attack card, so her best hope is just to use her other augments to survive as long as she can.
Guest designer Julie Ahern and a rule book discussion
about 4 years ago
– Wed, Apr 29, 2020 at 03:01:00 AM
Hello! First off, wow! There was a lot of feedback on those class icons, and most of it was not great! Still, I appreciate all of it, and we'll be using it to revisit the art and see if we can't get closer to that abstract geometric style seen more in Gloomhaven. Some time down the road, I'll be sure to share revised versions with you.
What I can share with you now is a new guest designer! Julie Ahern is the VP and COO of Greenbrier Games and also just a really good friend. She even lent me 20 euros after I forgot all my money at home on a trip to Essen. And then we played Tokyo Highway on the floor of the Dublin airport on the way home.
But anyway, that's not important. Julie is also a great writer and one of the creative minds behind Folklore: The Affliction, which is all about immersive storytelling, so I'm really excited to see what she brings to the table for Frosthaven. Also, Folklore's latest Kickstarter still has pre-orders available, so you can check that out if it is of interest.
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I don't have much else to talk about today. In fact, as we approach the end of the Kickstarter, I seem to have largely run out of game elements to discuss (at least those that aren't spoilers), so if you still want me to discuss anything specific, let me know in the comments.
One thing I did want to briefly talk about is the rule book. Obviously we don't have any available rules document for the Kickstarter, largely because the rules are more-or-less the same as Gloomhaven's with new looting and town elements that are highlighted on the Kickstarter page.
All that said, Frosthaven will feature a single rule book with all rules to the game, old and new, presented in a coherent format for players new to the system to pick up and learn. The Gloomhaven rule book is dense, and this book will be as well, but we've got a lot more eyes and experience working on it, so the intent is to provide extra clarity on those rules that many players get confused about.
In addition, if you are already familiar with the Gloomhaven rules, we don't want you to have to read through 50 pages just to figure out what is different, so any aspect of the rules that is new or different from Gloomhaven will be clearly highlighted for easy skimming. Now, you may be curious about what specifically is different in the rules, but all I can say is that that is still in flux. Plus, just because a rule is different in Frosthaven, doesn't mean it is different in Gloomhaven. Frosthaven rules shouldn't change your Gloomhaven experience.
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Also the latest poll for the community-driven campaign is up!
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Ah hahaha, what is going on? Over 4000 points, and you are somehow within 3 points of each other. That's less than 0.1% difference! The big news is that #TeamAlgox did manage to take the lead after I spent some time reviewing the main comments section and the additionalchapters of the Algox stories. They were actually a little farther ahead before some #TeamUnfettered memes popped up on BGG. The Unfettered have become ruthless every time their lead was challenged, so the big question is, what will they do now they've fallen behind?
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Today we have a solution to the Cragheart puzzle, featuring a tiny Cragheart!
And next up on the puzzle docket is the Scoundrel, who just wants to get that Living Doom assassinated, but all her friends are gone and she's on her last legs!
Locked class icons and guest designer Ryan Schoon
about 4 years ago
– Tue, Apr 28, 2020 at 12:10:20 AM
Good day! Once again, I must commend you all for crushing it. I was hoping to reach the $9 million mark right before the 48 hour mark, and we've already breezed past that and are about to become the 8th most funded project on Kickstarter! I think this list will be fun to watch moving through this last week. Thanks for joining me on this journey!
Before we get to the class icons, I want to welcome our newest guest designer, Ryan Schoon. I feel like Ryan knows everyone, so you are probably already friends with him. Seriously, I see him at every convention, and at each one, he's friends with each person there. Ryan contributes on Man vs Meeple, and works full-time on writing and designing RPGs, so I'm pretty sure he can handle a little Frosthaven scenario design.
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All right, some last caveats before the icons. First, these are still a work in progress and might get tweaked a little. Second, and this is the more important one, there may be some information floating out there about the names of what some of these might actually be. The class icons are not spoilers, but the actual names of the classes are, so please be very mindful of that. Wild guesses and nicknames for the symbols are okay, but if you have valid information on a name, please keep it to yourself.
So here they are, in no particular order!
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Just when you think it's getting close, #TeamUnfettered springs from dormancy and pulls out all the stops, making strange puzzle tutorials, music videos, and song lyrics. #TeamAlgox was fighting too, but it is an uphill battle once again.
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And here is your Spellweaver solution video, doing the unheard of thing of intentionally losing Reviving Ether on a short rest. What has the world come to?
And our next puzzle is for everyone's favorite Cragheart. Can you kill the monsters before the monsters kill you? One thing to make note of in this puzzle, which hasn't really come up before, is that killed monsters don't drop loot.
