The Best Supporting Actors Kickstarter funds, and otherwise chugs along, and is roughly halfway done. I get my tax return information. A whole lot of head-down on BSA makes major progress.

• Best Supporting Actors: Adversaries and Allies appeared in the OSE Newsletter published by Necrotic Gnome and a blog post on Tenkar’s Tavern in one day, which saw a big jump in pledges. That resulted in the campaign meeting its funding goal!
• It was selected as a KS “Project We Love,” but hasn’t appeared in a retweet, FB post, or the daily mailing list … so really nothing has come of that yet. The boost that I’ll get if it does appear in those forums I’ve estimated to add something like $5-10K to the total, based on the response to the socials for Necrotic Gnome and Tenkar’s Tavern. So if they choose to promote it, it will be a big deal, likely resulting in the hardcover offset print stretch goal and the custom cover being funded.
• Lots and lots of head-down work has brought me to the point in BSA where a preliminary layout made sense. All 172 characters have good information on them, and I’ve spooled them out. I’ve also decided on the overall organization of the book, which will appear in a few days in a KS update.
• I did my taxes last week and spoke to my accountant, who has processed all the info. My changed business practices after the big oops from 2021 resulted in a nice tax return, meaning that I’m not looking at an unwelcome surprise, which is how I like it.

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: 59 patrons and $440 per month.
• Special Content in March: OSE Kickstarter Preview; Early look at GB 2022 Year in Review, preview of new spells for OSE.
• Coming soon: preview of BSA, likely in a few days.

Currently Manufacturing/Fulfilling/Shipping

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

• The OSE Solos and Nightmare Fuel campaigns are both closed.

Crowdfunding and Product Launches

• The Best Supporting Actors: Adversaries and Allies project launched on March 7.
  • It got off to a slow start, but funded on March 20.
  • Most ways of projecting the funding total seem to come in around $20-23K right now. The biggest current unknown is the number of followers that convert to backers in the last week … that can vary from 20-50% of followers, PLUS the backers who just pledge having never followed.
  • More on that: right now, only 62 backers followed first; the other 145 just showed up and pledged. So we’re currently seeing 2 non-follower pledges per follower pledge. On the low end (probable) 20% of the current 615 followers is 123 folks, ×3 from above, gives 370 final backers. 4× the first-day total also gives 350. Double where we were at halfway is 410. Current pledge average is just over $56 … which brings me back to that $20-23K total.
  • That doesn’t account for any mysterious shares or exposure – much as I hate the word – from other places. Once I get the preliminary book done, maybe I can pepper it out to some reviewers.

Product Announcements

The full Product Catalog is accurate as of Sept 3, 2022 but needs a refresh for new product and a Winter 2023 update. Look for that and dissemination of my new PbG products to all sales channels.

The Nightmare Fuel books and the VTT Module are now available in all intended formats on my shopify store!

• Serpents of Legend
• The Bugstiary
• Garden of Evil
• Nightmare Fuel Foundry VTT Module

In Development

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

Let’s see where we are on other things…

• Let Us Rejoice! Looking at my planned releases and the work required, this is either 2024 or “as time permits” in 2023…and I hope it’s a non-crowdfund release in 2023 and time does
• Delvers to Grow Companion. Some new professions. A whole bunch of new disad packages. Epic Upgrades. Everyman Adventurer modules. Who knows what else will strike me? I know what I want to do with this one. I’m hoping for this one in July 2023.
• Artifacts of Norðlond. Some progress has been made on this one, and I’m liking the direction of development.

• Inns and Taverns; Two Warring Houses, by Douglas Cole. Systemless. 2024 is likely, and I’m probably going to solicit new authors on both.
• Infinite Archipelago is happening. I have the first plan here with the TFT books David is making right now, and big plans for late summer or early fall for bringing Nordlond into the OSE and TFT as part of this line. Heck, I think I even have a logo for it.
• “Gwalathar” TFT Setting by David Pulver. The solo books David wrote for me have an implied setting and there are a minimum of three books – likely more – planned and in writing at this time that blow out that setting as the first example of the Infinite Archipelago concept. This got pushed to May when OSE got delayed, and there have also been some manuscript delays that make May look a lot more certain. I may start building out the KS for this one, as success seems to very much depend on getting that landing page up early.
• Mission X: Still working on contract. This is starting to make me uncomfortable.

I actively encourage prospective authors to drop me proposals having to do with any of the above projects, but bear in mind that there are guidelines and strictures that must be followed to make a sale and move from concept to final.

Friction

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

• Rotator cuff is still causing me issues.
• Still no Mission X contract … but see below.
• While it has funded (see below), I’m still perturbed at my lack of success on the OSE characters book as well as the last Bestiaries volumes. Neither of those are even close to sustainable interest level for me to do this as a job rather than a hobby.
• Still stalled on other project with another author, but that should be looking better over the next week.
• Now that Best Supporting Actors is looking better both from a funding and work progress perspective, I need to start poking around for the TFT manuscripts. Waste not a moment, etc.

Fair Winds

Information about things that move GB forward.

• I got my taxes done and submitted, and my conservative business strategy of basically sending 30% of any profits to the Fed worked out very well.
• Really a lot of progress on BSA, to the point where I should be looking at preliminary book-like layouts. There are 15 days in the campaign, and I suspect that I’ll work like crazy to publish a “spread of the day” example of the book’s contents from early next week through the end.
• I remain cautiously optimistic about the BSA project, and am feeling pretty good about the custom cover. In fact, I’m speaking to my artist right now.
• Speaking of speaking right now…might be some movement on the Mission X contract thanks to a timely FaceBook chat. More next week.
• I played in several Felltower games over the last month with Peter Dell’Orto, a long-time friend and collaborator. I blogged about my introductory delve, and the subsequent Keystone Cops near-disaster. These are marathon sessions, 8 or more hours each…but they’re great fun.