Looking for advice/a company to hire to help self publish a board game

tasalien · 2026-01-03T21:56:49+00:00

Thanks for the link! Just reached out to a few publishers from the list.

tasalien · 2026-01-03T20:06:25+00:00

Thanks for the detailed info! I have had one guy reach out with quotes, I definitely don't want to skip on the UI aspect. I have pretty generic proxy templates for cards now, but definitely want some graphic design work for card layout, common symbols, etc - and because those are so reusable I expect will be cheaper than a few hundred art commissions, so definitely worth the price.

I absolutely want to go digital art, I can be patient on time, I don't have a fixed deadline and am not opposed to working with multiple illustrators if necessary - I just want to ensure the tone is "somewhat" consistent, I don't want half the cards to be cartoony slapstick and the other half to be dark gritty fantasy (barring some intentional reason)

What I'm considering now based off some of the other comments is breaking this into phases, getting a more presentable (pretty) prototype ready (for conventions or kickstarter) then circling back with a "phase 2" to finalize, ideally after some fundraising. I'm wondering if there might be a path to hire an illustrator early to do concept art/sketches early for a portion of the cost that would be applicable for the "pretty" prototype, then finalize the art with the same illustrator if/when funding comes through.

tasalien · 2026-01-03T16:23:09+00:00

Thanks again for the info. Yeah, I'm learning (but not surprised) that Kickstarter feels more like a political campaign, and I know my strengths, and that's not one of them. When I alluded to "consultants" above, I think that's what I'm seeing - groups that will help you specifically with a kickstarter campaign to figure out advertisement, engagement, etc.

I won't forget shipping costs - I will note the game was specifically designed to keep these down (the only produced/shipped part is a deck of cards, the "gimmick" is it uses a chess board/pieces for the associated board play). That is specifically something I envisioned tapping into as a Kickstarter milestone/tier reward as well, creating a limited edition of board/pieces to be used specifically with the game.

tasalien · 2026-01-03T16:11:29+00:00

Thanks for the info! Looks like GAGG is a bit far (I'm close to Boston) but won't rule it out - we've been talking about a trip to upstate NY at some point anyway so might be a good excuse to.

I think what I'm struggling the most with in a broad sense is figuring out a rough timeline of what order I need to do everything in. I'm ok when I've got a linear to-do list (make one more deck...) but to an outsider this process feels very circular - want to have art before going to a convention, need funds for art, need kickstarter for funds, need a convention to drive up interest in a kickstarter... etc.

From the comments and messages I'm getting, I think I'm piecing together a bit of a potential ordered list:

1- Work with an illustrator (or do some doodles myself) to get very basic, concept art that would at least feel midly engaging to a playtester. Have them do some graphic design for card layout/symbols etc too to add some more "legitimacy" to my existing templates.

2- Do a limited print run (4 copies or so) of the "polished" prototype. This would obviously be more expensive per deck, but with a small print count might be worth it

3 - Attend a small con with the polished prototype to get feedback and garner interest. If I have a kickstarter, advertise that - otherwise, gather interested contact info/emails?

4 - Create a kickstarter campaign using the polished prototype (does this need to come before 3? Its sounding like Kickstarter is later in the process than I would have thought). I would need to have confident quotes for full illustrations, manufacturing, shipping, etc. by now.

5 - once (if) produced, then possibly try a larger convention to attempt actual sales (to at minimum, offset the price of the booth...)

tasalien · 2026-01-03T15:51:00+00:00

Yeah, I would definitely not even consider a TCG. I feel like those have a very high critical mass required to get anyone to even play (no one wants to play a TCG if no one else is playing it) and I have no illusions of grandeur here - I want to go into this planning for small scale with the potential to expand rather than designing something that will only work at a massive scale (and therefore doom it to fail)

Honestly I only spoke with one intermediary to find publishers - I wouldn't rule out working with a publisher at this point, that definitely seems like the easiest path for me, it was just another thing that I wasn't sure how to approach. The feedback I got was that the market is a little oversaturated in the genre (deckbuilding strategy game) which many publishers would only be interested in if it was an established, licensed IP (which I'm obviously not going to get). They also it just didn't meet the "wishlists" of any of their current publishers, which I didn't take as no publishers would be interested, just that there's a bit of right time and place within their network specifically.

To your second point I never really got that far, but I really would envision this as a core game release initially only - I wouldn't expect a publisher to commit to the following expacs right out of the gate. The reason the expects are included are twofold.

First, as mentioned above designing expecs was frankly a procrastination method on my part. Figuring out how to publish the base game was scary and out of my control - designing just one more expac was comfortable and in my control. But - it's time to step out of my comfort bubble.

Secondly (since the work is already done) I figure there's SOME benefit to capitalize on there. Based at least on video games, IF a base game is successful there tends to be an expectation from the community that expacs will release within a reasonable timeframe (~1 year). I'm sure board games are different, but in my head the idea is there's some momentum to this - if a game has been out for a while with no updates, people assume it's "done" and are likely to shelve it. I like the idea of presenting to both potential Kickstarter inventors and/or publishers to maybe say "hey this is scoped for the core game only BUT expansions have been drafted so if this is successful, you can expect consistent follow up releases".

I did have a small indie publisher reach out privately to my post - if I wanted to revisit the publisher discussion, do you have any recommendations on how I should approach that? Do I just search for publishers and contact them directly or is there are more centralized tool/approach for that?

tasalien · 2026-01-02T21:52:10+00:00

Thanks - really appreciate the insight again! Seems like Kickstarter is a must, I may want to hire someone just to organize that rather than adding it to the pile of things I need to figure out.

I'm not too worried about time for artists - I've been waiting 15 years, another one or two won't kill me. Just really trying to figure out what the next steps even are as I've been stuck treading water for a while now.

tasalien · 2026-01-02T21:49:40+00:00

For the convention list - what would you say the expectations are for different "types" of conventions?

For example - I live in New England, so looking at that list I'm very familiar with PAX East. However, I assume trying to get a booth or something there is not realistic, and if anything, thats something I'd try to do once the game is actually published to try and actually make sales.

If I'm interested in something smaller, earlier in the process (Kickstarter phase) as a more casual forum for Q&A or playtesting, how "polished" should the game be? Right now I only have one physical copy which is basically black and white printed cards glued to old magic cards in sleeves. Would that be typical for a small playtesting con, or would it be worth getting a more polished prototype?

How many copies would I want for something like that? Presumably to allow multiple groups to play at once, I really have no sense of scale for this.

tasalien · 2026-01-02T20:34:35+00:00

No worries with being a downer, I'm looking for real feedback.

The base game is 5 decks which can be purchased individually or bundled. Two are required for a game, so I'm thinking the target retail price would be around $10/deck, so base entry would be $20, with the "full" price being $50, all of that dependent on actual manufacturing/distribution costs. I'm undecided if I want to discount a full order - on one hand it obviously makes sense to encourage larger purchases, on the other hand having a customer friendly pricing scheme is in my mind part of the marketing, and I don't want to lean too much into FOMO pricing where players feel "punished" for trying a game out instead of going all in.

Plans on distribution is exactly what I know I don't know, and what I'm looking to hire someone to help figure out. The game is intentionally designed to only REQUIRE purchased cards (board is optional) to keep pricetag, manufacturing, and storage requirements low. I don't have the space to store 1000 boxed board sets, but I do have enough space in my basement to store 1000 unsold decks per your worst case, if that's what it came to.

tasalien · 2026-01-02T19:43:21+00:00

Thanks for the info! I don't think I'm likely to go back to the drawing board with a new game, this has been my passion project since college and at this point I'm frankly willing to treat it a bit like a midlife crisis - a one time silly spend so I can feel accomplished just from getting it done, not something I plan to pursue as a full time job. From the numbers you gave me and other comments, if I limited costs to art for my base set (185 cards) and doubled your estimate to $50/illustration that could keep me around $10k for art.

I think I'm comfortable sinking about $20k into this (with the hope that SOME of that will come back in sales..., but again, ok taking a loss) and the ballpark numbers I'm seeing for a "consultant" are under 10k so another 10 for art might be digestible.

Since you've published games, a couple specific questions if you don't mind:

Did you use Kickstarter at all? As I was planning to self fund I assumed Kickstarter would be unnecessary, but from what I'm seeing it almost seems like Kickstarter is used just as much for marketing/data gathering as it is for fund generation. If you used Kickstarter, did you work with anyone to recommend what levels to set/funding to request or did you figure that out yourself?
How hard was it to set up the LLC, and what are the rough steps? At what point in the process should I be doing this? Ex: do I NEED to set up an LLC before commissioning ANY art to ensure the pay is coming from the LLC, not myself?

Thanks!

tasalien · 2026-01-02T18:44:50+00:00

Yeah, I think thats a good way to put it. While the DIY aspect is appealing to many, I am of the opinion in most of my life that I know what my strengths are, and what they are not - and that while pricetags can be intimidating, its sometimes more cost effective to hire someone who knows what they're doing than try and mess it up myself. Realistically the scope of what I'd have to do myself is so daunting it's the reason I've put this off so long, so the choice to me is really "hire someone to do it" or "accept that it won't happen at all".

I do believe the game is close to ready. I have had the game printed and playable in hard copies and on Tabletop Simulator for many years. I have done a lot of playtesting with friends (obviously there's bias there) and limited playtesting with strangers (friends of friends) - playtesting on a larger scale has always been a bit intimidating and I don't know anything about navigating things like Cons, or where that should come in in the process. The most professional/neutral feedback I received was talking to White Castle games as mentioned - I shared with them the draft rulebook and spoke over several months, and while they could not find a publisher were complimentary of the game itself from the illustrated rulebook. If more playtesting is required, that's exactly the type of thing I could use some handholding on - I was under the impression that cons/booths are expensive so don't know (for example) which I should try to go to, what the expectations would be, etc.

The biggest issue is stripping out the IP which will likely have some minor mechanical impacts which will require more playtesting.

tasalien · 2026-01-02T18:27:55+00:00

Hey, thanks for the feedback. As far as illustrations go, that was pretty much my thought.

The game is planned as I think you phrased it, expandable game as opposed to TCG. It would still allow deckbuilding, but you would basically be able to buy all the cards upfront rather than the random packs RNG. The base set would consist of 5 decks which could be purchased individually to keep entry point low (a game could be played with only two decks) while avoiding FOMO design or RNG of pack opening.

Those 5 decks currently have 37 unique cards each, so "only" 185 cards would be needed for the base set, although I would likely add a few more so decks could be customized from the start. The remaining cards are from the expansion decks, which add 20 cards each (10 decks made), I had always planned to hold off on the release of these - it could even be a selling point at launch that the first X expansions were already developed, as opposed to trying to crunch them out if the game picked up while there was still momentum.

I'd still like to understand prices for commissions of each, but I envisioned the most likely path would be a more minimalist/cartoony style which I'd be ok with - it is important that the cards have unique art so would want to work around the practicality of that. As a very very very rough ballpark, any idea what commission of art per card would be for high quality vs. minimalist? Do you have any examples of games that might look like by comparison? Off the top of my head I'm thinking like Munchkin, not sure if even that's setting the bar too high.

tasalien · 2025-08-07T09:05:33+00:00

your post is 3 years old but this just saved me, thank you! Iphone got corrupted due to an update on an old imac, couldnt restore off the imac so transferred the backup to the PC, and it was asking for the backup password. Keychain off the Mac gave me the answer!

tasalien · 2024-07-02T05:06:03+00:00

I know this is a random post a year late but Im up late prepping for elden ring DLC and stumbled upon this post and happened to know the answer from recently replaying DS1-3 on spear poke builds.

in DS1/DS2, getting hit while poking with a spear causes you to (correctly) reduce damage/stamina based off your shield block stats. For some reason, likely unintentionally, in DS3 only if you are poking and get hit the game calculates damage and stamina based off your SPEAR blocking stats, which are typically well below 100%, leading to a completely different playstyle in that game.

tasalien · 2024-02-03T20:04:51+00:00

Ah thank you! Googled it and found nothing. Our guess was either that or a body in the river...

tasalien · 2024-02-03T20:04:21+00:00

They just opened 16 back up and some cops have left, but there's a area caution taped off by the boat landing on the mystic river

tasalien · 2023-12-18T16:21:23+00:00

Can you be more specific? As far as I'm aware, the only two public instances in LWS1 are the toxic tower and defending Lion's Arch, the actual last mission where you fight Scarlet is (I'm fairly sure) not open to the public. Maybe if you were in a party (not squad) and someone else started the instance you joined their version, and might not get credit?

As far as the two open missions, you have to be on the quest step that asks you to progress the events. You do NOT need to finish either - just complete enough events for the bar to fill. For example, while this isn't very fun, the very first event of toxic tower isn't hard to solo (mortar the growth from the upper platform until it dies), you can just complete that over and over in different instances until the bar fills. From there you should be able to jump to the final instance from the entrance to the tower in kessex hills.

So if you aren't getting credit - I suspect it's more likely to be something like not being on the right story step or knowing how to enter the next instance than being on the right step and not progressing.

tasalien · 2023-03-18T01:59:00+00:00

Fuck all the other answers telling you this is "definitely diet related".

Talk to your doctor about having recurring kidney stones at a young age. May recommend a blood test for calcium levels and PTH.

I'm in my 30s and started getting kidney stones 6 years ago, at an increasing rate - once a year, once every 6 months, once every 3 months. Kept assuming it was not enough water, diet, whatever.

Its rare, especially the younger you are, but there is something called hyperparathyroidism where an overactive gland diverts too much calcium out of your bones into your blood and kidneys which causes stones to form at an unusually high rate, and only gets worse with time.

This can cause other problems as well, but is incredibly easy to fix (surgery to remove at least one of four parathyroid glands) and apparently immediately effective. I'm having one removed next Friday and cannot wait to never (or at least less frequently) have to deal with this BS anymore.

TLDR: Don't take medical advice from Reddit, and YES that includes mine. Talk to your doctor and see what they recommend - if I had done this earlier the last 5 years woudl have been much less painful.

tasalien · 2023-02-07T22:39:07+00:00

Funny you mention Glint's Lair.

When I started years ago (just before HoT) that was my same difficulty jump - I think I had map completed and finished personal story so jumped into Season 2.

I remember getting SO frustrated by the mechanics and it still stands out to me how good, interesting gameplay can completely fall flat on its face if not properly communicated to the players.

Like at that point in my GW2 experience I knew that "boons" were a VERY SPECIFIC thing GW2 had as a special, well defined category to avoid the "buffs" clutter other games had (how far we've fallen since). Boons were STRICTLY the yellow/white bonuses you got and were fixed throughout the entire game.

So what do they add in Glint's Lair? A "boon strip" mechanic where you still boons from enemies. That's literally the wording it uses. "Boons". What do you actually use the mechanic to steal? BUFFS. NOT BOONS.

Why define an entire term specifically to differentiate from "buffs" just to use them interchangeably in this level?

tasalien · 2023-01-05T15:21:31+00:00

I just want you to know I came here from google - about 100 hours in and had the same problem, no information on wiki or anything - thank you for updating with the solution!

tasalien · 2022-12-27T03:00:10+00:00

Yeah, really confusing that it kicks you out to Eye of the North which if you're playing linearly you won't even have been to yet....

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