Ballistic’s Report for Week Ending July 31

Missed the July 23 update, so this one is again two weeks, covering July 17 through 31.

A bunch got done, but it was mostly incremental. They were good increments, though.

• All files from Delvers to Grow were finalized, printed, and distributed on DriveThruRPG. There are still a few stragglers that need a file or two, and nearly all of those were caused by weirdness in how Kickstarter interfaces with Backerkit on addons.
• I got all of the DtG core books from Mixam. They’re currently awaiting the other books, which are on schedule to arrive Aug 4.
• I dug into international shipping and it was more or less a mess, as per usual. Costs are going to run about twice what I collected. I don’t say this to ask for more money (I’m not) or make you feel sad for me (you shouldn’t), but the challenges involved will change the strategy going forward for international books.
• The Omnibus edition was successfully edited down to 96 pages, and is pretty nifty. That’s arriving Aug 4 as well.
• I didn’t exactly announce it, but the next TFT project is going to be David Pulver’s Tower of the Moon, and I’ve already got it in layout, working on art.
• I’ve made substantial progress on a new Dragon Heresy item as well.

Gaming Ballistic Patreon

To help with ongoing funding of art and speed eventual time to delivery, Gaming Ballistic started a Patreon in January 2021. Here’s the weekly update on Patreon status.

• Membership status: 50 patrons and $345 per month.
• Special Content: Surveyed Patrons and let them weigh in on what GB will do next in my various market segments. This also revealed several new products by intent. The pre-art layout of Tower of the Moon, along with some cover images. Patreon members got the PDF of the 96-page Delvers to Grow Omnibus as well. I also showed the results of some of my new sword-making process. That’s harder to give away by PDF, tho.

Gained a few patrons since last time!

Currently Manufacturing/Fulfilling/Shipping

Project where hardcopies and PDFs are going out or scheduled to do so.

• Delvers to Grow: Core, Fast, Smart, Strong, Omnibus, and Krusuvik delivered via DriveThrRPG.
• Delvers to Grow: Core Book in the house; all other books schedule to arrive Aug 4. Shipping will commence immediately following.

Crowdfunding

Delvers to Grow (Launched Friday May 7 at 10am Central Time, Ended May 25 at 9pm Central)

• DtG is down to two physical orders who still need to fill out surveys. Once I get to the end of fulfillment, I will refund those orders and that’s that.
• All five books are in backers’ hands in PDF format.

Product Announcements

The full Product Catalog got revised a bit. I also developed an order form, which is available upon request and was sent to a lot of retailers.

In Development

Writing and content creation for announced projects. Some of this may be cryptic.

• Tower of the Moon, by David Pulver with maps by Thomas Denmark, is in an advanced state of production. Layout is done. Art is underway. Maps are underway. Not sure what vector will be used to deliver this one … I have some alternative to Kickstarter in mind here.

• I made significant progress on laying out a new Dragon Heresy book, this one containing 20 backgrounds for the setting. I don’t think that is going to come out on its own. I have other things I want to pull together for more Dragon Heresy support.
• This isn’t precisely RPGs…but I did some work on developing my sword-making skills in terms of hickory training swords for HEMA. They consist of two types
  • All-wood trainers that usually weigh about a pound, and
  • Weighted trainers that have metal in their core to reproduce the balance and weight real swords.
  • The results of both development efforts have been very successful. My latest all-wood training sword can be seen in the image to the right, and It’s a joy to handle. And look at. Even if I say so myself. You can see how far I’ve come. A sword like that will sell for $100, with shipping anywhere in the USA running about $20.
  • The weighted trainers bring a different feel to the weapon, one more akin to steel. You can’t duplicate the resonance and feel of steel, really … but these are getting close. I’ve made two for paying clients, and thus far they love them. One was 27.5” blade, 1.65 lbs, balance at 6” from the crossguard. The other was 31” blade, 1.85 lbs, balance at 6.5” from the crossguard. I’ve also made one with a 29.25” blade, 6.5” balance, 2.45 lbs based off of the Anglo-Saxon sword from Arms and Armor (they’re such a good resource!).

Friction

Bits of news and items that put a monkey in the wrench.

• The international order pricing was a mess. While I covered the details in this Kickstarter Update, the short version is that things were more expensive than I thought, and while I might print some books in the UK for shipment within those borders (and maybe the EU), the mix for Canada and Australia was such that it was not feasible to try that process there. No price breaks either, as shipping is currently estimated to be as much as 2× what was charged.
• This tweet by Nolan Nasser on July 28 is indicative of what’s going on. Over the last year, prices for 40-foot containers from China have risen from $2,000 or $3,000 for a full container to $21,000. Not only is it expensive, but the actual containers are hard to find (this impacted my wife’s work, and she’s involved in biogas remediation from cow poop … they can’t find containers to ship purchased equipment) Granted, Gaming Ballistic isn’t in that boat (so to speak) because my scale is smaller than that, and I print in Europe if I ever get orders that large (I have, twice, in the past). But there are paper shortages, supply chain faults, etc. All of this has driven up costs “below the waterline” in ways that are impossible to predict. As Korg said, “the only thing that makes sense … is that nothing makes sense.” Words of wisdom from perishable rock.
• The something from fair winds last time didn’t pan out. This is why one doesn’t mention these things.

Fair Winds

Information about things that move GB forward.

• There’s something else in the works that seems more likely. Can’t say.
• I spoke with at least two authors about products in the future. One of them is likely something we can do this year, while the next is probably 2022.