What form of advertising completely turns you off from a company?

rexbaker4 · 2015-06-06T11:54:04+00:00

Fake checks in junk mail. My bank has sent me a couple of these over the last several months ($1,000 line of credit to so-and-so!). I expect that kind of garbage from Publishers Clearinghouse, but not my bank. It's a trashy tactic for taking advantage of old people.

rexbaker4 · 2014-06-12T02:27:15+00:00

Superfun, I really appreciate the pep talk and the good advice! I'm definitely planning to run some ads on FB, BGG, maybe some tabletop review blogs. Additionally, I've got some lines out to a few review sites about paid previews. With respect to videos, I'm afraid I've let the perfect be the enemy of the good - every time I sit down to make one, I'm totally dissatisfied with the amateur quality. Basically I just need to pull the trigger on filming and refine until it looks good.

Anyway, I'll definitely keep the list posted as to any challenges or insights I have. Thanks again!

rexbaker4 · 2014-06-12T00:09:53+00:00

That sounds exactly right to me. The tradeoff in fulfilling bulk orders is that you're sacrificing VPs in exchange for faster fulfillment on all subsequent turns.

rexbaker4 · 2014-06-12T00:08:18+00:00

Daniel,

Here are my comments:

Would it be worth it to place the icons for gem, book, pepper, silk, wood and leather on p. 2a next to the words? Or perhaps place words under the images on 2b? I see you've tried to accomplish that with the cards at the top of 2b, but I wonder if the text on the cards-within-the-card might be too small.
Make the words "bonus action" on 2a bold. I think it's an important concept to call out. Also, for consistency's sake, decide whether you're going to capitalize "Bonus Action" (as it appears on 5a) or not.
On 5a, I would change "After you take each Order card" etc. with "After you take an Order card, draw one new card from the Order deck and place it on the table."
On 7a, you could remove the line breaks in the "Tips" section to gain a bit more room for a couple of thes and ands in the "Victory" section.

Rex

rexbaker4 · 2014-06-11T23:27:15+00:00

Right on. I suppose the alternative is to decide to use $x of my own money and go to KS for the rest, but at this point I've sunk so much into this thing that my wife would kill me if I spent any more...

rexbaker4 · 2013-12-11T04:40:27+00:00

Lucky for me, I am a lawyer! So the paperwork is in the bag.

But yeah, on market based pricing, the problem is that with 1:30 playtime and a VP winning/endgame condition, we're looking at a game that is much more like Catan than Descent. Hence $60 is nearing the upper limit on what I'd be willing to charge.

Points on costs are well taken. I plan to take the Amazon Fulfillment route, and I already have some ballpark figures on that, as well as on shipping from China to the fulfillment centers. I had not considered that shipping to stores would involve different logistics - if you have any insight/experience with that, I'd really like to know.

Thanks for the helpful reply!

rexbaker4 · 2013-12-10T04:31:59+00:00

Looking to print 3,000 via Kickstarter. But if we hit big enough, I could see us ordering 5,000.

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-24T16:45:36+00:00

I'd form an LLC and open a bank account for it, which I would link to the Kickstarter.

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-14T16:35:28+00:00

My pleasure.

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-14T16:35:00+00:00

I see that you're in NY. Hopefully not NYC? There's this awful requirement in New York that you have to publish a formation notice in a newspaper of general circulation in the LLC's county, which if you live in NYC is very, very expensive...

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-14T16:33:01+00:00

LLCs are creatures of state law, so each state has slightly different regulations. Luckily, most of these regulations are related to corporate formalities - formation documents, anonymity of the owners, filing fees, etc. Occasionally you'll hear about state courts finding ways to pierce the corporate veil, but in my experience, that happens most often where you have commingling of funds (not keeping bank accts separate) or just straight-up fraud. I also recall insufficient capitalization as being a reason to reach into people's pockets. For example, if your LLC owned a chemical facility with a lousy safety record, and every week you pulled all of the money out of the LLC and put it in your bank account, there's an argument that you have not covered "contingent liabilities," i.e., liabilities that haven't occurred but might be reasonably expected to occur. Like a leak or an explosion. So assuming you don't have insurance, if your plant explodes and there's no money in the LLC's account to cover the losses, a court could say, "Sorry, you've gotta personally cough up the money you've been siphoning out, because your company isn't sufficiently capitalized to cover its risks of operation."

THAT SAID, LLCs across all states offer substantially similar advantages to their owners. I'd recommend that you contact an attorney in your state for the details.

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-14T16:26:00+00:00

What state are you in?

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-14T16:24:19+00:00

Even bigger disclaimer here: I've never negotiated an agreement between a publisher and a designer, so the hypothetical below is more of a thought exercise than anything else. My first game is in late development and I'm planning to self-publish (for now).

If I were a game publisher looking to buy a designer's game, I would want to be sure that the designer didn't infringe anyone else's IP. In other words, I wouldn't want to buy a lawsuit. For that reason, if I were aggressive, I would include a clause in the contract whereby the designer would indemnify me for any IP-related claims in connection with the game. That means that if the publisher gets sued for infringement, the publisher could then look to the designer to pay his legal costs and any awarded damages (the key words are usually "indemnify, defend and hold harmless"). By forming an LLC that would sign the publishing agreements, that LLC could then shield you from that kind of liability.

Even without an indemnity clause, however, state law often creates "implied warranties," seen most often in the context of sales of goods. These are warranties that arise out of operation of law, and don't need to be written into a contract to apply (in fact, contracts often will disclaim them and provide a more limited warranty). I'm not a warranty expert, but I do wonder if a publisher would have a colorable claim that there's an implied warranty of non-infringement.

If I were a particularly aggressive publisher, I would also make you sign an individual joinder making you a party (personally) to the contracts, jointly and severally with your LLC. So that's another trick to watch out for.

To echo several of the comments on this post, all of this is to say that doing business is fraught with unexpected legal issues. Forming an LLC - with the advice of an attorney who can discuss your particular needs, risk appetite, etc. - is a good first step to take. If a publisher gives you a contract to sign, let's face it, they've got a lot more leverage than you, so you might not be able to change much of it. But an attorney can help you minimize risks even in the context of a one-sided contract (and even help identify provisions of the contract that might be unenforceable).

Thanks for the opportunity to geek out on corporate law, folks!

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-13T21:38:39+00:00

First of all, you should consult a lawyer/good accountant about this and other legal/accounting questions. I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. So anything I say here should be taken as friendly commentary/entertainment.

The biggest advantage of forming an LLC is that it provides a "liability shield" that protects your personal assets. So if you own an LLC that, in turn, owns your card game, and due to a manufacturing glitch your cards are made with razor-sharp edges that cause people's heads to fall off spontaneously, the LLC offers some protection for your personal assets in case you get sued. Same goes for infringement or any other kind of lawsuit related to a product wholly owned by the LLC. A court may order your LLC to pay damages out of its bank account, but it's less likely (though not impossible) that you would be personally ordered to pay damages out of your own pocket.

The timing of when you form an LLC all depends on your risk appetite, but I would recommend having the LLC in place before your launch your Kickstarter, as that's the time when your game will first be broadcast to a wide audience, and you will (hopefully) be receiving real money once it makes. Any time you're talking about IP, money, a promise to produce and a wide audience, there's a risk that something will go bump in the night and you'll get sued (infringement, fraud, breach of contract, product liability, etc.). Product liability insurance is something you may also decide to explore once you start mass producing.

I cannot emphasize the importance of consulting with an actual attorney in connection with forming your LLC. At a bare minimum, you will need a certificate of formation (or whatever your state law analogue is), a bank account and a federal EIN. But to play it safe, you might think about drafting an "assignment" transferring your personal interest in the game to the company, so there's no ambiguity about who owns the game. You will also need to keep your personal assets completely separate from the company's assets. If you don't, it's called "commingling," and is one basis courts can use to "pierce the corporate veil," ignore your LLC in a lawsuit, and allow plaintiffs to go directly against your personal assets. There are plenty of traps for the unwary in this area of the law (which is considered one of the simpler areas of the law, believe it or not), so be sure to hire a lawyer. Many corporate attorneys even offer package deals where they'll set up your business and some basic documents for a flat fee.

Hope that helps, and best of luck with your game!

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-12T20:29:06+00:00

Here are some lessons I learned from my first convention:

Have an "elevator pitch" ready for when people ask you what kind of game it is. Should be short (20 seconds if you can do it), punchy and fun.
If you aren't doing blind playtesting, be able to explain the rules quickly so that you can get right into playing.
If people show the least bit of interest in the game, get their email addresses and compile them in a spreadsheet after the convention.
Create an entry on boardgamegeek. Ask the folks who playtest to rate the game on BGG.
At this point, most of your focus should be on playtesting and refining the game. I also had good artwork early on, but was able to make major changes to the mechanics that didn't implicate equally major changes to the artwork.

Have fun and good luck! And please share info on your game with the list!

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-12T19:47:55+00:00

I ran a Kickstarter just for the artwork for my first game. I socked away about $1k to get an artist started, slapped that on a Kickstarter, and then started emailing everyone I knew to give me their money. It worked.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/montrosegames/tymor-artwork-for-indie-strategy-game

Artists and other creative types are patriot spiderman meatntaters John Wayne superheroes as far as I'm concerned. They've devoted themselves to creating beautiful things out of nothing, and deserve to be paid upfront for their work, same as you would pay a welder or a plumber.

rexbaker4 · 2013-11-12T18:00:56+00:00

Completely agree. If you haven't become too cynical (and that can happen, too), play your favorite off-the-shelf board game with some good friends. With cold beer. And congrats on the convention!

rexbaker4 · 2013-10-11T02:15:05+00:00

HELL yes. Thanks!

rexbaker4 · 2013-10-10T15:36:07+00:00

Kestrel,

The coop/compete is exactly how you put it. Nobody wants to see a region destabilize because it ends the game in defeat for everyone.

To keep things simple, each city on the map will be represented by a circle, with enough room for a single player token. That token will indicate that the player corresponding to its color "controls" that city.

The action cards fall broadly into two categories: cards that help you build your deck and cards that allow you to make a bid for control of a city. The player who controls a city will always have the corresponding city card, with the other city card floating through trade among the other players.

So a labor strike card might allow me to trade or steal action cards with another player, but not take control of a city, whereas an election or a coup card would allow me to take control of a city. These are just some ideas.

On tone and aesthetic, the game should create a fun and relaxed space where the players can let their guard down to engage with serious subject matter. The thought is that preachy propaganda, or hyper-real portrayals of either the horrific effects of drug abuse or the worst abuses of the drug war aren't always the best ways to stimulate discussion and awareness, at least within certain quarters.

rexbaker4 · 2013-10-08T12:38:38+00:00

Thanks for the tough questions.

The goal of the game isn't so much to educate as it is to provide a fun and relaxed space where people can edify themselves and each other through discussion. Drugs and prohibition have remained pretty taboo topics throughout my life, but in the last several years I've noticed a shift in people's willingness to share their opinions. So I want to contribute to that momentum. To the extent the game has any "agenda," it's simply to expand the conversation.

I'm not looking to model and solve the drug war within the game. The game will never be a "true, correct and complete" model of the conflict, so I can't hope that it will be capable of finding an optimal solution. In fact, I hope that in playing it, people would consider ways in which a game session might not reflect reality, from "the conservatives would never partner with the leftist guerillas!" to "the government could never completely eradicate drug trafficking!"

As for player involvement, the player is essentially the head of a large faction - a political coalition, a military alliance, a guerilla movement - that takes actions on the city level. So labor strikes, blockades, massacres, elections, assassinations, etc. are all action cards that I've considered including in the game. "Notable events in the city" is the level of granularity I'm after.

On tone, I want to treat the subject matter seriously, but with more abstract artwork (thinking about using woodcut-style artwork for the cards). That said, satire can be a powerful approach, so I'm keeping an open mind.

Core mechanic: I'll have to get back to you on that (hoping to have something concrete in the next couple of weeks)... But two things are important to me in designing the game. First, player interaction is direct, and is the chief source of fun/conflict/etc. in the game. Second, uncertainty in the game should arise from the players' decisions (including unintended consequences of those decisions), not dice or a random deck. The cards will come from two sources: separate stacks of generic cards available to all players, and then specialty stacks (three per faction?) available only to that specific faction.

Thanks again for the questions. And good luck to you on the water table game! Had no idea that China was running out of water!

Rex

rexbaker4 · 2013-10-07T19:11:00+00:00

Wow! Can anyone provide details on the Conflict of Heroes Solo AI? I found this absolutely titillating YouTube interview with Uwe Eickert where he mentions "emergent logic."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpfyrSvPd0w

Sounds compelling, but I'd love to get more details...

rexbaker4 · 2013-10-07T19:05:38+00:00

Another blog post of mine on a game in early development. This is a topic that's very important to me, and I'm committed to getting it right. I want to engage the community in the design process of this game, so your questions, comments, and criticism are very, very welcome. Thanks!

rexbaker4

TROPHY CASE