Now on Kickstarter #3

With Kickstarter continuing its rise as a way of getting independent tabletop games made (and, to be frank, as a way of generating advertising and direct sales for some other games that were going to be made anyway), we present a selection of tabletop gaming projects currently on Kickstarter that, for one reason or another, struck my fancy as something that might be of interest to you (or, at least, seems like it might be interesting to me).

Know of a Kickstarter project that you think should be here but isn’t? Let me know and I’ll take a look and maybe it can get added in.

The 6th Ring – The 6th Ring has been providing live streaming coverage of Legend of the Five Rings tournaments for a few years now (I seem to recall ending up as one of the covered matches during a Kotei last year). Their Kickstarter looks to expand their own equipment, and also develop traveling kits that can be sent out to Tournament Organizers at locations where the 6th Ring crew can’t make it. The 6th Ring’s project funded almost immediately thanks in part to a generous donation of “name a character and card” rewards from AEG. 22 days remain to support the project, and two of those naming rights rewards are still available, plus dice towers, deck boxes, and other goodies.

Star Realms – This deckbuilding game from MTG Hall of Famers Darwin Kastle and Rob Dougherty (who was also part of Ascension) eschews the traditional relatively low-interaction or indirect-interaction deckbuilding standards for direct, TCG-style assaults. The base game only supports two players, but multiple sets can be combined for a lot of TCG/Magic multiplayer variants – two-headed giant, emperor, raid battles, and plain old free-for-all. They’re also planning a digital version of the game. Pledge levels range from $25 (for the base game and a beta key for the digital version) to $60 (for the three sets necessary to play 6-player) to $100 (for lifetime digital everything) to $250 (for the six-player physical set and everything digital and free entry into every non-invitational digital tournament ever) to the usual “pay a small fortune to get your name on a card” (ah, everyone else is so 15 years behind L5R).

 

Golem Arcana – It’s a miniatures game, except you take out all those things that generate constant arguments in most miniatures games – like rules interactions and measurements. The miniatures all have RFID chips, you play on a digital mat, your game is synced with your tablet and you use a digital stylus to activate abilities (e.g., tap on your mini, select power on your tablet screen, select enemy mini, and then the game will tell you the results of the attack). You also have the option to roll your own dice and have all those arguments anyway. With 7 days left, it’s almost $150,000 short of its ambitious $500,000 goal, so check it out now if it sounds interesting.

 

Marrying Mr. Darcy – Yes, it’s a Pride and Prejudice game. Yes, I like Jane Austen. Yes, Pride and Prejudice is my favorite one of her novels (same as everyone else, I suppose). Tired of more and more games about well-muscled men with swords and spells, trains, and/or laser-blasting spaceships? Give this literary theme a try. Also, if you like zombies (and if you know me, you know I don’t), the Kickstarter has even done well enough to unlock the Undead Expansion Pack (presumably inspired by Pride and Prejudice and Zombies). You can get the base game for $30, and the Kickstarter lasts for another nine days.

Bones II – And, not that they need any promotion, but Reaper Miniatures is currently running a sequel to its wildly successful Bones Kickstarter. The basic idea? Pledge $100 or $150 and get a gigantic pile of high-quality (unpainted) miniatures or a somewhat more gigantic pile of high-quality (unpainted) miniatures – mostly of the fantasy sort that one might use in a Pathfinder/D&D setting. I’d try to tell you how many figures you’ll get, but between when I type this and when I hit the “post” button, they’ll probably have hit another two stretch goals and added another dozen figures. Just look at this craziness:

Now if I could just find someone to get me all of these painted!

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