Eight hours to go and another stretch goal hit...

I upped to retailer + one set for myself today.  More than I can afford this month.  I wish there was a retailer level on the companion.  Oh well, it show up on the distributor pre-order list and I'll get it then.  That's got a big influence on SJG's decision process too.

I wish there was a better retailer level for Mutant Chronicles Siege of the Citadel eight copies is just too much.

Quote from: David Johansen;921500Disc World has a pretty huge fan base as these things go.  Maybe Mars Attacks does too.  Maybe enough fans who are just happy to get some kind of outside media support.  Though I know there are big, full color guide books to the Disc World available at the book store so that's a niche that's already filled.

Personally, a generic fantasy all in one book would have been the best solution.  Setting, rules, and all.  But Disc World is a slap stick comedy.  The stories are fun but I'm not sure I could stand more than a session or two.

Dungeon Fantasy is okay I guess.  I'd have preferred something else.  Oh well, it's an experiment.  An experiment with too many variables to clearly prove anything but there you go.

I worry that they'll say, "Well, it didn't bring in a million dollars, obviously print rpgs are dead."  I don't know where SJG's benchmarks or expectations are.  I can tell you they weren't willing to even produce this if it didn't bring in 100k.  Oh, I'm sure a pdf would have turned up eventually because the writing work was already done.

I have the Discworld book from 3rd edition and I'll be getting the 4th edition book but I don't think I'll ever run it. I like it on the shelf because I'm a fan of the novels and if I ever had a chance to do a one shot, it might be kind of fun.

Quote from: refplace;921799Well hopefully the three items all do well enough to show theres a string desire for printed product and new material.
But its silly to expect them to reprint old books if they cant be sure to sell enough of them to justify print runs.

Sure, but I'd like to see sales back to where they could.

What we've shown is that there are 1587 people who are willing to pay an average of $111.18 for a new GURPS Dungeon Fantasy product.  I'm not sure where their expectations are but I'll bet Munchkin has a customer base of at least ten times that.  It's hard to know what this means to them.  I'm pretty sure they didn't structure the kickstarter to shoot up to a million dollars.  If they had they'd have had the space opera and supers boxes as stretch goals.  So I'm not sure what their expectations were.  I would guess they were fairly sure they could get the $100000 or they wouldn't have had it written in the first place.

So, that makes me wonder how successful it really was.  I think the telling thing will be retailer pre-orders.  Which is tricky when the retailers might balk at something that came off of kickstarter or have ordered it on kickstarter.  I think the thing for us fans to do will be make a lot of Dungeon Fantasy noise as the shipping date approaches.  It's fine to do it now but it would be better of the excitement to come as the product is about to be released.

Quote from: David Johansen;922836Sure, but I'd like to see sales back to where they could.

What we've shown is that there are 1587 people who are willing to pay an average of $111.18 for a new GURPS Dungeon Fantasy product.  I'm not sure where their expectations are but I'll bet Munchkin has a customer base of at least ten times that.  It's hard to know what this means to them.  I'm pretty sure they didn't structure the kickstarter to shoot up to a million dollars.  If they had they'd have had the space opera and supers boxes as stretch goals.  So I'm not sure what their expectations were.  I would guess they were fairly sure they could get the $100000 or they wouldn't have had it written in the first place.

So, that makes me wonder how successful it really was.  I think the telling thing will be retailer pre-orders.  Which is tricky when the retailers might balk at something that came off of kickstarter or have ordered it on kickstarter.  I think the thing for us fans to do will be make a lot of Dungeon Fantasy noise as the shipping date approaches.  It's fine to do it now but it would be better of the excitement to come as the product is about to be released.

Also if the retail sales of Discworld and Mars Attacks are good or not will likely influence preorders on the boxed set.
I agree, they likely had high confidence or why have Sean write it in the first place. But confidence can be wrong so it was a gamble I hope they won.

Quote from: refplace;922839Also if the retail sales of Discworld and Mars Attacks are good or not will likely influence preorders on the boxed set.
I agree, they likely had high confidence or why have Sean write it in the first place. But confidence can be wrong so it was a gamble I hope they won.

Well, at least for the immediate gamble, I think they did.  After the experience with Ogre, they've been ultra-careful with their kickstarters, and I'm sure if the project hadn't funded, that would have been a gamble they would have failed.  (Although I suspect it would have become a pdf set at least, to work on recouping costs.)

I'm excited to see what comes out - personally I backed at $50, with an additional $20 for the printed companion.

https://www.facebook.com/sjgames/videos/10155191345301007/

They posted a video to their FB page of an unboxing of the set. Looks pretty sweet. I love me boxed sets.

Mars Attacks is also now available in PDF for people who prefer that. PK explains part of the reasoning for writing the book here:SJG post

TL;DR - the game concept covers a huge range of power levels and technology levels, making it a great example of the versatility of GURPS

Dungeon crawling is close to the very last thing I'd run GURPS for.

Quote from: RPGPundit;968387Dungeon crawling is close to the very last thing I'd run GURPS for.

GURPS is just like playing a computer RPG, only without the computer. The GM gets to role-play being a computer for the players.

The first edition of GURPS was very obviously designed to compete with D&D, and it did alright. But then they decided to "improve" it by adding things to it and making it more complex, and it eventually became unpopular to play (though still had and has plenty of collectors) as a result.

Much like D&D, really.

I came late to the party. I "discovered" GURPS 2 years ago and after reading the book I was amazed with the rules system, it's coherent, elegant and very adaptable. It can be played as a simple skilled based like BRP or you can go crazy adding stuff you like. Running dungeon crawling & fantasy with it was a piece of cake for me and I read the book once. I definately recommend people to give Dungeon Fantasy book a chance when it comes out.

Quote from: John Scott;968455I came late to the party. I "discovered" GURPS 2 years ago and after reading the book I was amazed with the rules system, it's coherent, elegant and very adaptable. It can be played as a simple skilled based like BRP or you can go crazy adding stuff you like. Running dungeon crawling & fantasy with it was a piece of cake for me and I read the book once. I definately recommend people to give Dungeon Fantasy book a chance when it comes out.

That's good to hear. I'm curious what edition you started with.

As someone who started GURPS at the beginning already having played its ancestor TFT for years, I have no problems running GURPS, though the 4e Basic Set seems overly stuffed full of stuff that's mostly noise to me.

I also think it's actually best at medieval combat and great for fantasy-medieval, though I don't really like many D&D-style monsters or the D&D power curve, so while I welcome Dungeon Fantasy, I would tend to not use the amped-up D&D-like aspects of it and instead continue to use what's usable for closer-to-TFT-model play.

GURPS is a great game system that is also its own worst enemy. It is hard to imagine a better 'generic' rpg engine, but no matter what you ask it to do, you'll find it also does 900 other things that you have to wade through to get what you want. This is why I'd say GURPS is a better fantasy combat and magic 'engine' than TFT when you break them both down to their elementary gears and knobs, but if I'm going to grab a game to play in that genre it is TFT every time. It is worth having some wonky organization and a couple of goofy rules to be able to work from a couple of magazine-sized booklets instead of a library of rules-filled tomes.

Quote from: Skarg;968506That's good to hear. I'm curious what edition you started with.

As someone who started GURPS at the beginning already having played its ancestor TFT for years, I have no problems running GURPS, though the 4e Basic Set seems overly stuffed full of stuff that's mostly noise to me.

I also think it's actually best at medieval combat and great for fantasy-medieval, though I don't really like many D&D-style monsters or the D&D power curve, so while I welcome Dungeon Fantasy, I would tend to not use the amped-up D&D-like aspects of it and instead continue to use what's usable for closer-to-TFT-model play.

I have the latest 4th edition and a friend of mine also bought the 3d edition from ebay. It's our favorite medieval/fantasy game, we really appreciate its flexibility as a rules system, the xp and the advancement rules, the role playing involved in the adv/dis and the dynamic combat. I think that its greatest strength as a system is that you can adapt it to your gaming needs, the options will be always there if you need them. You don't like skills, you can roll attributes for example like original D&D does or you can use a broad skill!, you want combat with options and critical tables or you'd like a simple roll hit/miss, and a ton of other stuff you can add or remove without breaking a sweat. I think that its safe to say that its the closest thing i would have taken with me for my rpg needs if i was a castaway!