US Surveys are being sent through Backerkit
about 4 years ago – Tue, Mar 31, 2020 at 10:39:12 PM

TL:DR, US Backers, fill out your Backerkit surveys ASAP!

Survey Time!

Today we are sending out Backerkit surveys for US backers to get their shipping address and any add-ons (such as additional copies of Chiseled) sorted. International backers' surveys will be sent when we've coordinated final shipping costs, in order to ensure the best rates for you. This means US backers will be the only ones getting an email for at least a couple weeks. (It is also the majority of you). 

What will you need to do?

ANSWER ALL SURVEY QUESTIONS ACCURATELY AND PROMPTLY!!!

This piece is the most important (following funding) to getting you your rewards later this year! You will have until August to fill out the information on Backerkit, but I hope you do it as soon as you see it in your inbox. If you DON'T see it in your inbox, contact Backerkit or Copper Frog Games (and check your spam filter!). Ensuring that your address is accurate is crucial to getting you your games. If you think you might move in the next 6 months or so, fill out the survey with your current address in case we ship early! As well, you can go back in and change the address information until around late August, when we'll be closing the pledge manager surveys for backers.

SHARE THE PREORDER PAGE

We will be offering pre-orders of Chiseled through Backerkit, with slightly-less-subsidized shipping for new orders (though still cheaper than it'll be when we are selling post-fulfillment). As backers, you are getting the best deal for supporting us early! Be sure to share the Backerkit shop link with friends who may have missed the campaign, but still want to sculpt their decks.

Once we get most of the Chiseled, Pigment, and Deluxe Meeple surveys in, we can start shipping the Pigment & Meeple packages for you to enjoy. Backers who did not select this level can still order Pigment on our website, copperfroggames.com, but the deluxe meeple sets won't be included there.

Looking forward to sending out some Pigment to tide you over! Another update on Chiseled progress will be coming soon.

-Michael Epstein

Backerkit, Funds, and What Remains to be Done
about 4 years ago – Wed, Mar 11, 2020 at 07:26:12 PM

We're thrilled to have funded, and now that my voice is generally back and my health is returning post-PAX, here's an update on how things are going! Plus, check these photos from PAX East; I played a few solo games while waiting on demos to fill up, and had a lot of fun with Chiseled. 

Backerkit

We are going with Backerkit as a post-campaign pledge manager and presale platform. Everyone who pledged for the initial campaign for at least a dollar will have access to the pledge manager at the same shipping rates as during the campaign. We're working on setting up the surveys for US backers now to get their addresses and any add-ons in, (especially backers who are getting Pigment and the Deluxe Meeples ahead of Chiseled), so stay tuned for those. Again, international shipping will be charged through Backerkit closer to the Fall fulfillment period.

Funds

We are still waiting for the funds from the Kickstarter to be released to Copper Frog Games. Several backers' credit cards were declined, and I have reached out to you (yes, YOU!) via Kickstarter message to ensure that you add a new card to your accounts so that you can get your chosen rewards. Check your messages, check your cards, and let's get this cleared up before the weekend!

The State of the Sculpture

Here's where the money is going, and what needs to be done:

Graphic Design. We are working on getting the rulebook layout finalized, and ensuring readability and strong diagrams are provided for you. The game is a bit odd, so I feel diagrams are important for illustrating the game's nuances. As well, we need to get the box back completed, and the player mats polished and more professional. PAX showed us that some iconography needs tweaking, too, so we'll show those updated ones when we get it in.

Manufacturing. We have quotes for the game's actual printing, but until we get the actual money from the Kickstarter, we won't make a decision on how many to print. From there, we'll work out shipping to our various fulfillment centers and warehouses. This part will ideally be completed in 3 months following our final file submissions, however the COVID-19 Coronavirus has hit factories and shippers very hard. I expect there to be some delays, though we should still be delivering in the Fall.

Fulfillment. We are working to nail down details of shipping the games from warehouses to you, both in the US and internationally. In positive news, we don't foresee USPS costs going up dramatically this summer.

Marketing. We're going to be going big this year at PAX Unplugged with Chiseled, The Meeple Machine, and more; a small subset of the Kickstarter funds will be devoted to expanding our booth space for this show, which has quickly become one of my favorites in my schedule. Copper Frog Games will NOT be at Origins or Gen Con this year due to Coronavirus concerns and wanting to focus on Chiseled fulfillment, so come see us in December at PAX!

Next Update?

For now, things are going to be moving fairly quietly until surveys are completed. Once those are sent out, expect another update; that should be (hopefully) by early April, at which point I'll start sending out Pigment and Meeple sets for backers of that tier. We'll also be showing assets from the final game to get backer feedback.

Thank you for your patience, and be sure to get your cards updated on Kickstarter!

Michael Epstein

At PAX East!
about 4 years ago – Thu, Feb 27, 2020 at 03:05:43 PM

We are funded, we are at PAX! Stretch goals? 

Come visit Michael and play Chiseled in tabletop free play from 10am each day, and at Knight Moves' indie games booth from 1:30-4:30pm on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday! They're great for hosting us, so go check it out! (There's also very limited copies of our microgame MeepFrog for sale!). 

Today we're at Block A, Row 3 by the Eureka Puzzles and Battleground Arena booths!

See you there! Let's keep working on getting backers to reach our stretch goal!

Backerkit 

We are going to use Backerkit for our post-campaign pledge manager, and for collecting addresses and international shipping. International shipping rates are looking fairly steady, currently, so there's a good chance we can get a better deal for you when that time comes! 

Until next update, come visit! 

Michael Epstein

100%! To PAX! Plus, more Tools!
about 4 years ago – Tue, Feb 25, 2020 at 10:40:26 AM

PAX East 2020 is coming up this Thursday, and we're very excited to have REACHED OUR FUNDING GOAL before then! Thank you to all who have backed and shared so far; let’s keep up the buzz as we enter our last week to ensure we hit our 500-backer stretch goal of improved cardstock!

At PAX East, I (Michael) will be hanging out in Tabletop with the newest prototype copies of Chiseled, including demoing during specific slots in the Knight Moves Cafe Indie Conglomerate of Awesomeness (not its official name, but look for them on your map under Knight Moves). I'll be gathering emails for a final mailing list blast on Sunday evening (the day before the campaign ends), and will be happy to show off the game, talk about the design process, and hopefully get us some more backers towards our stretch goal! Plus, it's always wonderful meeting current or past Kickstarter backers, along with other tabletop industry friends-- check out Solis Games Studio, where our friends Chris Solis and Breeze Grigas (aka The Technofuturist) will be showing and selling their games, including a preview of this summer's AEGIS Combining Robots season 2 material. I put in a bit of design input on some of the new mechanics and robots, so I'm pumped to see them in the wild.

Polishing Off the Goal

The Polishing Stone and Polishing Rag are some of the most thematic of the tools in Chiseled from their secondary effect. Both tools are intended for "late-sculpting polish", and the Critics take notice of that fact: there is a higher likelihood of drawing 3 or more Sculpt Cards when you use these tools, since they force you to draw more cards for your next hand.

The Polishing Rag offers a soft touch, allowing you to trash one card (or none) from your hand. However, no matter what card you trash, you must draw an additional card, which has a likelihood of bringing the game to a close faster.

The Polishing Stone is a tool with some decent "take that" potential. It lets you trash cards from any number of draw piles, allowing you to interfere with your opponents or remove additional cards from your own deck, but for each Sculpt card trashed, you'll be drawing additional cards for your next hand! As well, you can accidentally help your opponents remove Scrap, so think hard before using it… or just go for it and try to scrub some details off your opponents' work!

Tell your game stores to get Chiseled!

The campaign has a week left, and we're pushing hard to get the word out on social media and to game stores. If you have a local game store you want us to talk to, post a comment on this update, and we can try to reach out to them (or vice versa) about backing Chiseled. I work in a game store, and understand not wanting to tie up money in a Kickstarter, but with our planned fulfillment schedule, we will be getting it out and onto their shelves as fast as possible with a fairly minimal deposit. Chiseled is truly unique, so we're confident in its success in retail. With free shipping on full cases for game stores that back during the Kickstarter, it’s a win-win!

Thank you to everyone for helping us get this far-- without you it's not possible nor worth it to make these types of interesting games. I believe in Kickstarter as a platform for unique and niche ideas to come to life, and you've all made me so happy today proving that there's an audience for mine.

Sincerely,

Michael Epstein

Copper Frog Games LLC

Solo and Multiplayer Videos Added, Solo-Focused Review
about 4 years ago – Tue, Feb 25, 2020 at 09:14:00 AM

We're at 85% of our funding goal going into our second full week, and there's a bunch of media coming in about Chiseled! Mike Kelley at One Stop Co-Op Shop did a video playthrough of a quick solo game of Chiseled, and discussed the flexibility in the Tools, Critics, and different play options such as Waxed Marble and the Solo Challenges. Here is his review focused on the solo mode; we've got the full playthrough video on our campaign's front page. TL;DR, he liked it as a unique deck-destruction game! 

To address the value question for purely solo gamers (of which I know there are many), admittedly you're getting 3 extra decks that you don't need to play by yourself, but on the other hand, that gives you a more long-lasting game since you won't be shuffling the same deck over and over again. As well, that $35 cost DOES include the subsidized shipping added on to the price of the game, and we're working hard to reduce the overall shipping costs for international backers.

"I love the theme, and how it ties into the gameplay so well... Thinning out your deck to utilize it in a way that equals victory points is novel."

-Bob Crowell, One Board Family

Earlier this week, One Board Family played a 3-player game on live stream, and that is posted on our front page as well for your viewing pleasure! They liked it a lot as well, and had a very close game. They noticed that being very efficient at removing Scrap from your deck is good, but means that you're going to have the Critics at your doorstep before your sculpture is ready!

A Tale of Two Critics

Chiseled has 8 Critic cards that each want certain elements removed or accentuated in your sculpture. All of the Critics are based on real people, who have worked on Copper Frog Games titles. For today's update, I wanted to focus on two of them: The Renaissance Patron, and The Ancient Muse.

These Critics are very similar in their desired sculptures (at least 5 Silver removed, or at least 5 Gold removed from your final sculpture to score a bonus), and that's by design; The Renaissance Patron is based on me, Michael Epstein, and The Ancient Muse is based on my sister, Wendy Epstein, who did a lot of the graphic design on Chiseled, including card backgrounds, iconography, layouts for the Tool and Critic Cards, and more. 

Wendy has been a huge influence on me as a creative person for my whole life, having been an artist since she could pick up a crayon, and she's always inspired me to try new mediums and new themes in my art and games. Wendy has loved Greek mythology for decades, so making her a Muse was a natural choice. She currently works in the toy industry in Tokyo, so getting to work with her on this game was a great thing to bring us closer together even though she's thousands of miles away.

As for me, my first major game, Pigment, is a Renaissance painting-themed game. Becoming a Renaissance lord was a lot of fun, and artist Ali Swei really added a lot of flair to the illustration. Wendy calls the portrait "Pompous von Pompington" jokingly. 

Until next time, keep sharing the campaign on social media and in your gaming groups! We're slowly but surely getting funded!

Sincerely,