If you haven’t noticed, I’m using some Hunters Hunted II art as the Featured Art in these notes. That’s because we went live with the Deluxe V20 Hunters Hunted II Kickstarter last Thursday and it hit the funding goal in about two days- which is awesome! Now we’re going for additional info about the classic WoD hunter organizations like The Inquisition as Stretch Goals, so check it out and help us add that section to the book. And to be clear, for folks who might have heard the word hunter too many times- this isn’t for Hunter: The Reckoning, or Hunter: The Vigil (although you could use the info in it for those game lines), this is a reimagining of the very first mortal hunters book we did in the first year or so of Vampire the Masquerade. It was in that book that the mortal side of the predator/prey matrix was first really brought, ahem, into the light.
So, that means that Eddy and I talked a fair bit about Kickstarter as well as Indie-agogo, another crowd funding site that our good friend and EX3 Art Director Maria Cabardo is using for fundraising for her Indy documentary on the life of the seminal fantasy artist Jeff Catherine Jones http://www.indiegogo.com/BetterThings. We constantly throw around theories of why the crowd funding sites work, what could be done better, etc- as I’ve said before, it’s all experimental from our point of view.
Before we even got talking, I was Skype assaulted by Teemu and BillB as they leaned into Eddy’s camera and then made Eddy talk to them for ten minutes (or maybe 45 seconds, I lost count).
Because we had big releases drift into 2013 and other projects hold closer to their release dates, there has been a ton of beautiful art rolling through the CCP Approval Board and so far, things have rolled along really smoothly (jinx, jinx!), which is a large part of what we tend to talk about business-wise.
I let Eddy know that he should join Onyx Path on Thursday anytime from 11-4 as we do our first AskMeAnything on Reddit. We’ll be posting more info as it gets closer, but if you ever wanted to literally ask any of the Onyx Path creative dynamos or myself anything at all, this is the place to do it. I haven’t done one of them before but it sounds like fun and I’m looking forward to it.
Here’s some stuff we’re doing:
– God Machine Chronicle (nWoD) is in Layout and some art is being CCP Approved.
– Strix Chronicle Fiction Anthology (VtR) Strix is into Editing.
– Mummy the Curse did not get into PDF this last week as there were far more Page XX’s to put page numbers onto than previously imagined. But it should be ready soon as will links for the PDF Rewards we offered with the Mummy Kickstarter. Ace Developer CA Suleiman is currently re-blocking out the MtC release schedule in order to add in all the cool Rewards from the Kickstarter.
– Exalted 3rd Edition: I’m working with my old friend Maria Cabardo, one of the most talented designers and art directors in the business (or any creative business actually-Google her) on integrating the Devs ideas with a bunch of brilliant artists that she works with as well as on a new Exalted logo and map. Our intention is to have some smashing new pieces ready for the EX3 Kickstarter in early February.
– V20 Hunters Hunted 2 layout is going into for CCP Approval. The Kickstarter for the Deluxe edition has already done wonderfully well, and we’re excited to see what additional Stretch Goals will be revealed.
– V20 Anarchs Unbound is in post writing Development. I think Justin has been posting some things, on the WWBlogs.
– Deluxe Werewolf 20th Anniversary Edition Kickstarter Classic PDFs went out to backers of the Kickstarter. Mike Lee is half-way through his novel. W20 to the indexer. Aileen is working on the Storyteller Screen and Wallpaper. Bill is preparing the W20 Anthology outline for prospective writers. Putting the W20 KS Stretch Goal projects into the schedule.
–Deluxe Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition has been confirmed for September-ish 2013 and Phil Brucato has started assigning writers and has started writing his part.
– W20 Changing Breeds is also in Art Direction and Editing.
– W20 Rage Across the World is in Art Direction, Mike just had an artist have to drop their piece because of a scheduling demand from their day job- check out the W20 CB blog notes: http://whitewolfblogs.com/w20/
– Guildhalls of the Deathless (MtC) is being written.
– Conventionbook: Progenitors (cMtA) is in Editing and done in Art Direction.
– Mage Translation Guide has begun being written.
– W20 Book of the Wyrm is being written and red-lined.
Reason for Drinking: It can’t really be the end of January, can it?
I’m always thrilled to see that the Kickstarter model seems to be working out for you guys, even when I’m not personally fascinated by the products. always hoping you stay sustainable! (and bring Greg Stolze back for Demon 2.0! =D)
Thanks- appreciate your positive vibes!
First an over-buff Kitsune, and now an artist has to drop out of a book due to scheduling? Can the art-problems get weirder? (The answer to that, of course, is ‘yes, yes it can’.)
You can count me among the Hunters (well, “Camouflaged Hunter” to be precise) on that first day. 😀 I just happened to check in at work and saw the V20 ST screen available through it and knew I had to jump on it. 🙂
Although the timelines for the W20 stuff seems to be slipping, I’m just hoping that that means more time is being able to be put into making them that much better (crossing Is, dotting Ts… oh, wait…) and maybe giving you guys some time to come up with and solidify the KS stretch goals ahead of time too. 🙂
Also, I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve made some graphics for folks to use to help spread the word about HH2 (a shock, right?) I’m guessing that those graphics on the KS aren’t the final ones, but I used it as a basis and went from there. 🙂
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=72150
With all of the KS projects on top of the normal list of projects, it must feel like OPP is growing by leaps and bounds into something much more substantial. Did you anticipate, or even think that you’d have such a full production schedule a year after OPP began, or is this all still a bit of a surprise? How long before OPP becomes the #1 publisher of TT games? 😉
With W20 sliding through the months, the next books are still being worked on- we just can’t put them out until W20 gets out there. As for KS Goals- they have been listed and solid as “possible” with every KS- the trick is that you need to place them at the right amount vs the speed of pledges- and be sure that there is someone on the Dev side who can/will take ownership. I won’t put up a stretch Goal until I absolutely know we can commit to it and create it.
I’ll let you know how Onyx Path is doing once I hear from the CPA on what we owe for taxes…
1. Hunters
I apologize. I’ll have to skip this one. Not out of lack of interest, but because I plan to pledge the hell out of Changing Breed 🙂 I’d love to be pictured as one of them if possible and its in the stretch goals. I guess I look more like a Corax, but I’m really hoping for Ananasi, Rokea, Mokole or Nagah.
2. Books propositions
In regards to the “proposing books conversation” we had here a while ago, has the method changed? I’ve sent one to the listed email nearly two months ago, made sure to respect the requirements and received no response since. I’m fine with waiting, but I’d just like to know confirm if it reached its destination. There were conditions for which it was said propositions wouldn’t be read, and I’m under the impression that I fulfilled the requirements to avoid this. But if I failed to do so, I’d very much appreciate being told in wait way so I can fix this.
3. Delaying Mummy
I’m with Richt on this. I think it was the right call. I don’t mind waiting on my book and PDF. I’d rather read it when its ready.
Thanks,
Y- I got your submission. How this works is that I take submissions and if I think they fit into our current plans for a line, then I pass it on to the Dev for a thorough review. This could take many months and if we gave out in-depth analysis of every submission received we’d never have time to work on the books, so figure that it is sitting as a possibility until you hear back. Right now, the W20 projects we had planned and the KS stretch goal additional projects really have W20 pretty filled up, so we probably won’t look again for a while. Thanks-
Thank you for the honest answer. That makes sense and I understand perfectly. 🙂 I’ll wait out however long it takes now that I know it has reached its destination. Hope I didn’t bug you too much 🙂
Yiodan: Alas, being used in an image for W20CB was a part of the W20 KS ($300 Fostern “Adept Stalker”.) You might be able to do similar for W20 Book of the Wyrm, but with the artwork all-but finalized for W20CB, and coming in for RAtW, perhaps one of the KS-stretch-goal-created projects might offer a chance.
That’s a very valid point Torakhan. I just figured that Changing Breed would need pledge levels too and I figuerd that was one that made sense. But, now that you mention it, you’re right: The book is past that phase. I’ll just have to wait and see what the pledges are.
Well, there could always be room for a tainted Corax too… 😉
Oh! I’m down with that 🙂
Hoping to see Mummy pdf released this week. Its my christmas gift to myself that still has not arrived, but I know when it does it will be awesome and worth the wait!
Yes it will be!
Oh, and may I add that since V20 is such a powerhouse of KS awesomeness wouldnt it be even sweeter to see Dark Ages V20 released for 2014? Wow!!
Dark Ages 2014? Hell yeah, I support that! There’s a lot of lore, disciplines and roads/paths to collected, and a lot of Vampire: the Dark Ages books in DriveThruRPG lack decent scanned copies.
Yes it would be!
Well, it would be great (either) if you guys could update most of the DTRPG Vampire: the Dark Ages books (yeah, V:tDA, not DA: V).
Any more specific update on EX3? Its had the same status the last 3 weeks or so. Is everything still on for post HH2?
It was mentioned on Reddit that more play testers would be needed for Exalted 3E. I think my group and I would be suitable for this. How can we get involved?
John’s got a thread calling for volunteers on the White Wolf forum
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=72378
Just wanted to drop by and say thanks for the AMA event. I missed it (didn’t know until after it was done) but I very much enjoyed readin it.
So, I will say this again: Thank you for being so open with us fans.
I’m sure it’s not always easy not to say too much or dealing with us when we get overly eager (I’ve sure had my share of arguments with Ethan over lupus characters). This level of exposition also opens you guys up to more criticism and I’m sure you get more than the share you’d like to have. But, even so, you’re doing it. You keep at it. You keep us in the loop and allow us to feel a little involved in worlds we really love. So, thanks to all of you.
I do hope we get the pdf this month… the plan is to start up the W20 campaign March 2, as we are now having the last session of V20.
I know you are indexing, and that is an arduous process… Hope its ready to be sent to backer emails with the drivethru link after that.