[Kickstarter] Forgotten World - Fireforge's new fantasy range

[Cubs]

There's still something fishy going on with the total sum. It was over 133,000 €, and then somebody withdrew 2,000 €, and the backer sum stayed level. I hope there's not too much that kind of push-up money 'invested' into this project.

What does that mean? Is that like shill bidding - someone trying to get the KS launched putting in a false investment to help it reach the target to encourage other investors, then withdrawing when they think it's safe so they don't actually have to pay?

[Daeothar]

To my (admittedly limited) understanding of the Kickstarter funding process, it's only at the end of the funding period that the total amount is compared to the goal to see whether or not a project is funded or not.

Once it's funded, pledges will be collected, but I also believe that there still is a short time in which peoeple can withdraw their pledge and get refunded, even after the end of the campaign.

So yeah; I believe it's (theoretically at least) possible to pledge a large amount, pulling a project over the threshold and then withdrawing the pledge after it's funded...

...I was pretty certain at the end of last week this Kickstarter wasn't going to make it, it was on £102,000 with about £1000 being invested each day. Then in the last two days its gone from about £103,000 to £115,000. That's a massive jump...

Usually, a campaign gains more momentum when it nears the deadline; a steep increase in funding during the last couple of days, or even hours, is not unheard of.

[Anselm van Helsing]

What does that mean? Is that like shill bidding - someone trying to get the KS launched putting in a false investment to help it reach the target to encourage other investors, then withdrawing when they think it's safe so they don't actually have to pay?

Well, I don't know what that means. I just was there, looking at the total, and it suddenly went down in two steps of exactly 1,000 €, within minutes, but the number of backers didn't change. Previously, I've seen it go similarly up 3,000 €, but the number of backers didn't change. So an existing backer upped the pledge total by 3,000 €. Why, it could really be a retailer who goes big. But why then go down big?

It was actually someone else on the KS comment section, about a week ago, who talked about these kind push-up pledges. Perhaps they've been seen earlier, in other KS, too. One thing Kickstarter has specially prohibited is project owners funding their own KS. There wouldn't be a prohibition if it didn't happen earlier. The Kickstarter forum even has a couple of discussions on this, whether it's immoral - or actually a good strategy to guarantee that the pledged monies really get invested and to make backers happy. Hard to say really. I'm always very happy to see a project I backed actually fund!

Mostly, big changes upward have seen a new retailer join in, so I believe that money is really pledged and stays pledged. I'm not worried about the destiny of this KS. It's just something that caught my eye.

[Cubs]

Ah right. No-one likes to feel they've been hoodwinked by a shady practice, but in fairness if people know what they're buying and they get what they paid for, I don't really see the issue from a moral standpoint.

[mcfonz]

I've backed this one.

However, from the start I have been a little concerned with how they have approached it and I have been tempted to pull my pledge.

They were putting out pledge goals that were unrealistically high and offered things that I felt would actually undermine the campaign. So, for example, the new races. You always run the risk when you put in totally new factions in a KS like this that you will get people pledge in the hope that those goals are met for those factions. And then, when they look unlikely to be met they drop their pledges.

The starter set is also too much. £122 is a fair amount for a starter set for a wargame, especially when you are going to be competing with the likes of GW that are cheaper than that. They'd have been better off reducing the number of miniatures a bit and having a more affordable starter set IMHO.

The abundance of extra torso's in their kits are also a bit questionable.

[Brummie]

I agree with you on the other races point Fonzy. I like the look of their other fantasy races and having more fantasy humans can be only a good thing for conversions etc, but I think advertising them now was a risk, either for the same reason you mention or because it holds people back UNTIL those options become available (similarly how a lot of people said they wouldn't back the KS until the peasants came available).

I think all should be well and there may be amendments made going forward as it's still early days.

[Lord Ekard]

What does that mean? Is that like shill bidding - someone trying to get the KS launched putting in a false investment to help it reach the target to encourage other investors, then withdrawing when they think it's safe so they don't actually have to pay?

They were simply retailer pledges added or modified from distributors who never backed a project before

As told previously, fireforge has not money to spend on that project, this is why many good suggestions done during the campaign were not made

[mcfonz]

It funded. Probably not as much over the goal as they would have liked. Now the wait.

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

I'm glad they got funded.  I had a quick look at the Alpha version of their rules.  Nothing terribly new here at this stage.  Buckets of dice with multiple rolls needed for combat (combat roll, to hit, to wound).  Seems like this has been used before!