Kobold plushies inspired by fantasy tabletop gaming.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Less than $1000 to the next stretch goal, don't forget to make suggestions!
about 2 years ago
– Sat, Apr 16, 2022 at 06:07:25 PM
In this update:
Update on stretch goal unlocks
Links to polls and suggestion boxes
How is the campaign doing and what are we doing to make sure we hit our key stretch goals?
Question on new reward types (leave us a comment on this post or in the project comments!)
A new project we love!
Update on stretch goal unlocks
After unlocking VTT tokens yesterday, we've added more options to that VTT pack! What do we mean by level 5 forms though? Well we've always wanted to add more depth to the races that aren't fully humanoid in appearance. Young humans look different than middle-aged humans who look different than old humans, right? Shouldn't other races get the same variety in depictions?
So we had artists come up with different looks to represent different levels of experience for the kobolds. As they level up, their look gets more rugged and their gear changes! Our little plushie adventurers have just come of age and are at the start of their careers, and as your campaign progresses you can update their looks to reflect their progress!
Links to polls and suggestion boxes
We have two active posts up soliciting your feedback!
$16000 stretch goal poll - This poll is private for backers only, so the link goes to Update 1 where we posted the actual link to the poll. Don't forget to vote on which kobold you want to unlock when we reach this stretch goal, which is less than $1000 away!!! All the options are pretty close—less than 10 votes separates the top vote getter from the bottom right now. So vote! Get your friends to vote—they only need to pledge $1 to vote!
Suggest a pet for the early bird freebie - You can drop a comment in Update #5 or in the project comments about what sort of creature you want to be the early bird freebie pet. We'll be compiling suggestions in 4 hours at 10pm Eastern (UTC-4) and putting the finalists up in freebie poll #2!
Campaign health check
Right now we have a lot of folks who signed up to be notified about the campaign or are watching the campaign who haven't actually backed. We would love for them to pledge sooner than later because our campaign is still trending toward barely unlocking all six kobold designs, and we're hoping to barrel past that goal to start designing accessory packs!
But we have a lot of good news in that regard. First, looking at the charts on Kicktraq, you'll notice the campaign has been holding steady at about $1,000 of new pledges a day. While we wish the number was higher, this is actually excellent performance because Kickstarters usually start strong on day 1, drop sharply on day 2, drop even more sharply on day 3, and see very few new backers on day 4. Then it goes into a lull where people slowly come in. Wehave avoided a lull so far! That means we're still steadily trucking along, and the more backers and pledges we get in the beginning, the more people who check the campaign later will be willing to jump on board.
Every pledge counts, even $1! If folks pledge $1, they'll get a bunch of digital freebies like our VTT tokens, which will not be free once the Kickstarter ends. They'll also get access to the current Kickstarter pricing in BackerKit when the campaign ends, whereas late pledges and other purchases will see higher prices.
And we have a bunch of big initiatives still to kick off! We're signing up with Jellop next week, which is a highly recommended ad agency that's had a lot of experience helping campaigns reach new backers so we can bring in more plushie fans! Their pricing model is such that if we don't get at least 2.5x the ad spend back in pledges each day, the campaign pauses, so there's no danger of us getting into a financial bind.
There's also an entire new tier of rewards/add-ons we'll be announcing next week that fans of our YouTube channel may be very interested in...
Feedback on new reward types
We are looking at adding some new add-ons that should be cheap and easy for us to fulfill. We wouldn't create new pledge tiers for them—they'd be available solely as add-ons. Pleaseleave us a comment if you'd be interested in picking up the following add-ons:
A rainbow kobold patch set using the same designs as our kobold pin set but with embroidered patches instead. You'd get all six together--no option to buy individually as that adds a lot of overhead to fulfillment.
Sticker sheets featuring all our various kobold designs and possibly some new sticker artwork as well!
Projects we love!
We love cute, cuddly pets, and we love TTRPG adventures, so you better believe this family-friendly PG-rated campaign caught our eye...
You might be wondering, Where's Disaster Hamsters 1? It's on Dungeon Masters Guild. We've bought it. It's fantastic.
The DMs Guild adventure, which serves as a proof of concept for the Kickstarter adventure, comes with hamster versions of all the major 5e classes and rules for playing tiny creatures. It's got great art and fun maps, creative and memorable enemies, roleplaying and tactical advice for running creatures (which is something every adventure needs more of), and even a variant ending! All these little touches suggest a lot of attention to detail and player experience that are the hallmarks of great tabletop designers, and we even recognize some members of the project team as respected creators and folks we've worked with on anthologies!
Thank you again for all your support! We'll check in with you again tonight when we launch freebie poll #2!
Theo & Grady - The Gallant Goblin
Early Bird Freebie Poll #1 RESULTS + Suggest entries for Poll #2
about 2 years ago
– Sat, Apr 16, 2022 at 05:45:56 AM
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
VTT Tokens, Early Bird Polls, and Social Media Icons, oh my!
about 2 years ago
– Fri, Apr 15, 2022 at 11:08:23 PM
Table of Contents
In this update we'll talk about:
our free kobold-themed 5e one-shots that you can download now
a surprise new VTT stretch goal that we're on the verge of hitting
an update on the free accessory poll
a way to help spread some kobold joy as well as show your support for the specific kobold you want to be unlocked next as we close in on that $16k goal!
Did you know we're releasing free low level one shots? Called Bonfire Bites, the premise is our kobolds meet up at a campsite along the road and tell stories to each other. You can play through them as the kobolds or your existing characters, drop them into your existing campaigns, or use them as standalone games. Treat them as actual events or make them wild tall tales from an unreliable narrator!
Our first one shot is online on our website and called There was an Old Dragon who Swallowed a Gnome! Aglioso is an ancient copper dragon who wakes up with a toothache. He calls over his best friend, Voira the gnome, to extract the tooth, but like most folks he's scared of the dentist. He begins hiccupping out of anxiety and accidentally inhales his friend! Can your adventuring party save Voira before she gets digested?
Virtual tabletop assets (free for Kickstarter backers only!)
Once the Kickstarter ends, we're planning to port our one shots to virtual table tops and release content packs to support them. As the campaign progresses, we'll add some of the content packs to all existing pledge tiers for free! They'll be available for purchase on various marketplaces, but you'll get codes to redeem them for free! So here's what you get at various stretch goals:
The first VTT content pack is a token pack! This pack is going to consist of portraits and frames. You'll get head portraits and full body portraits of all six of our kobolds in their cute level 1 forms. We'll add color swaps to them as well to reflect the fact that you can swap their classes in real life!
At $15,000 we'll add in their more geared-up level 5 forms.
But what's that? You prefer top-down tokens? Well then...
Our plan is to focus on Foundry as our primary VTT, but we'd love to hear your preferences in the comments!
What other VTT platform would you like to see us support for our adventures?
What other types of VTT content based on our kobolds would you like to see?
Early bird freebie Poll #1 closing soon!
We will close our first early bird freebie poll at 10pm Eastern tonight (that's in about 3.5 hours from this update's posting). It's been surprisingly close—we were expecting one option to run away with it but it was full on tied for several hours last night!
When the poll closes we will make a backer only update showing the results and the comments will be open for you to suggest the type of worn item, handheld item, or pet (depending on which wins) that you want to see included in the next poll. We'll take the most popular suggestions (add a +1 reply to a comment you like or make your own and we'll aggregate similar comments) and turn them into our next poll tomorrow night—same bat time, same bat channel!
Share your love with avatar icons!
Meanwhile it's a fierce fight for which kobold gets unlocked (very soon!) when we reach the $16000 funding stretch goal. Rep your favorite kobold on Kickstarter, Discord, forums, and more by using one of our social media avatars and signature graphics.
Surprise! Vote on your Early Bird Freebie!
about 2 years ago
– Fri, Apr 15, 2022 at 02:04:04 AM
Design an Early-Bird Freebie
Greetings, little goblins! If you've been around the Kickstarter block a few times like I have, you know that getting off to a strong launch is imperative! We have quite a lot of folks sitting on the fence with our campaign, and we want to bring them into the family so we can start letting these little kobolds (and Pickles!) out of their cage!
To that end, we're going to provide a free accessory for anyone who backs for at least one kobold plushie by the end of the first week of the campaign! That's by Tuesday the 19th at noon EDT! And since we value your opinions and think polls are fun, we're going to let you all pick what the free accessory is going to be! We'll have a series of polls over the next few days to narrow down the choice and we're going to ask you to leave suggestions in the comments section here with your own ideas! Your first choice:
Are you going to get a worn item (e.g., cape, jacket, hood, armor piece), handhelditem (e.g., axe, war hammer, potion bottle, banjo), or a new little pet the size of Pickles the hedgehog.
Click this link here to cast your vote! Tomorrow we'll reveal the results and create the next poll based on the winning result to further narrow it down. Remember to leave us suggestions on what specific accessories you might like to seein the comments section—we'll probably be picking some from the winning category for a future poll! And those future polls will be backer only, so be sure to back if you want a say in your free accessory!
Spread the Word
You can help us free the locked kobolds and help to get everyone some free cute wallpapers of their favorite kobolds by retweeting our project tweet and/or sharing our Facebook post! And if you know folks who are standing by before getting their pledge in, let them know about the free accessory if they back this week! We're getting close to unlocking our second kobold! Who do you think it's going to be?
Thanks again for your support! We're really eager to get our little kobolds out into the world, and we can't do it without you! Also stay tuned for more surprises tomorrow!
250% funded, let's keep the momentum up!
about 2 years ago
– Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 05:55:21 AM
In this update:
Thank you!
Where we stand on stretch goals
How to spread the word
Projects we love!
Thank you!
We just closed out the first 24 hour period of our Kickstarter and we've broken $10,000—that's 250% funded! This is amazing and all thanks to you! This is an incredible community we're building, and we'd love to hear from you in the comments or via messages about any feedback you have on the current rewards, other rewards you'd like to see, and thoughts about the campaign. There's already been some great ideas about possible add-on accessory packs, but we need to unlock our current stretch goals to do those!
You can also join our Discord server where we have a dedicated channel for the kobold plushies. If you like miniatures or miniature painting, you'll love the community we have there!
Where we stand on stretch goals
Kickstarter veterans may be familiar with third party tracking sites that show a lot of metrics about campaigns and provide charts and projections about where a campaign will go. One of our favorite sites is Kicktraq:
Now note that their projections aren't very accurate early on, but based on our experience watching Kickstarters, our day 1 performance would have us trending toward $55,000. That's enough to unlock all six kobolds but not to do any other stretch goals not currently listed.
But that's not a given. We want to make this campaign as big as possible so that we can offer you as many cool goodies as possible! We have a number of promotions planned that haven't yet launched, which we hope will push our performance up. The first Kickstarter for every company always tends to have a slower start compared to similar projects in the same category, but we feel like we have a solid product on our hands and have minimized the risks associated with the project, so the next four weeks is all about winning people over!
Also don't forget to check the $16,000 stretch goal poll linked in our first update to vote on which kobold you want unlocked next. The votes have gotten closer and at least two kobolds have switched places in popularity since yesterday night, so your choice matters!
How to spread the word!
As we said in our first update, we super appreciate your support. You should never feel obligated to do more. But if you want to help spread the word about our Kickstarter, there's several things you can do:
Our social goals are now active and you can see the list of them under our funding stretch goals on the campaign page! Share our Facebook and Twitter posts and unlock wallpapers of each of our kobolds!
Visit the Kicktraq page and like and share the project from there. They have a hottest projects list on their home page that's based on activity from their users, so interacting with the project there helps increase its ranking. We got as high as #18 yesterday without any coordinated effort, so maybe we can hit the top 10 today!
Postabout the Kickstarter in your communities where you think folks might be interested in the plushies! We're trying to advertise (in a sustainable way) in a lot of places, but the tabletop and plushie worlds are so big there are bound to be places we don't even know about, and they're more likely to trust someone they already know over someone coming in to try to sell a product. Every backer counts!
Projects we love!
April is a busy time for Kickstarters, and we want to share projects that we think are cool or that might be of interest to you! There's two time-sensitive ones we're wanting to highlight today, one that just launched and one that's ending soon.
Ending soon (24 hours as of this update)
Loresmyth is an indie developer based in Europe that's best known for their Remarkable series... Remarkable Shops, Remarkable Cults, and now RemarkableGuilds! These books are system agnostic and provide characters, concepts, maps, quest hooks, items, and more to drop into your campaigns. This book is focused on guilds, helping you flesh out the big organizations you can join. In our home game, the Harpers, the Zhentarim, and the Lords' Alliance are all big factions to be reckoned with, and with this book you can introduce new ones or build your own for any setting!
Sponsorship notice: The Printing Goes Ever On has paid us to produce a video about their Kickstarterwhich will go live in a few days.However, as we statein allour sponsored Kickstarter videos, we don't take on videos unless they're something we like, we think our audience will like, and we think willsuccessfully deliverrewards.
Nejavina is the latest Kickstarter from The Printing Goes Ever On, which has a very successful mini-focused Patreon and has successfully delivered two previous Kickstarters. If you watch our YouTube channel, you know we love our minis!
This time you also get a Slavic 5e setting to go with your 3D printable minis. This campaign has some of the most unique RPG artwork we've seen for a setting, and the sculpts are similarly brimming with personality. It feels both familiar and new, allowing you to either embark on a journey into a unique setting or incorporate elements of it into your traditional fantasy games.
