MCDM's New Tactical TTRPG Hits $1M Crowdfunding On First Day!

Matt Colville's MCDM is no stranger to crowdfunding, with three million dollar Kickstarters already under its belt. With the launch of The MCDM RPG, that makes four!

This new game is not a D&D variant or a supplement for D&D, which is what MCDM has focussed on so far. This is an all-new game which concentrates on tactical play, with a fulfilment goal of July 2025. It comes in two books--a 400-page 'Heroes' book and a 'Monsters' book which is an adaption of the existing Flee, Mortals!

The MCDM RPG: Draw Steel

Whether you’re a group of local heroes sent to investigate mysterious goings-on in the nearby haunted wood, or famous mercenaries plotting and scheming in the big city, the MCDM RPG makes building adventures and fighting monsters fun.

www.backerkit.com

The game takes aim at traditional d20 fantasy gaming, referring to the burden of 'sacred cows from the 1970s', but point out that it's not a dungeon crawling or exploration game--its core activity is fighting monsters. The system is geared towards tactical combat--you roll 2d6, add an attribute, and do that damage; there's no separate attack roll.

At $40 for the base Heroes PDF and $70 for the hardcover (though there are discounts for both books if you buy them together), it's not a cheap buy-in, but with over 4,000 backers already that's not deterring anybody!

Even more ambitiously, one of the stretch goals is a Virtual Tabletop (VTT). There's already a working prototype of it.

 

[mamba]

When I order any product and I'm told a ship date, I expect it to arrive within that time frame with a very low margin of error.

backing a kickstarter is not ordering a product

 

[Reynard]

backing a kickstarter is not ordering a product

Also, you know, stuff happens. The world is a chaotic mess of a place where small events can ripple out into significant disturbances. I mean, a couple years ago, one captain's bad choice completely disrupted global shipping for weeks (and spawned some awesome memes). If something you KSed was late because of that would you blame the KSers?

People need to learn to accept that disruptive events occur and maybe chill out a little bit.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

backing a kickstarter is not ordering a product

Whilst this is obvious a truism, there's a real "have your cake and eat it" element here. A lot of Kickstarters do very much treat the whole process as if it's just a long-distance order - often the product is essentially finished or close to it, and you can order a ton of already-created stuff from the same company as "add-ons". Hell some Kickstarters or similar are just like "ordering windows" - c.f. the Gloomhaven one that made $5m+. Whilst there was technically a small new product available, given the average order was $146 and that product only cost $15, certainly the majority of orders must necessarily have included Gloomhaven or Frosthaven proper and relatively few must have been just the actual new product.

So as long as that line continually to be intentionally blurred, and in really wild ways, I think blaming people for misperceiving Kickstarter is a bit silly. At this point Kickstarter should honestly have two separate modes, a "new product" mode and a "order window" mode, but it's not going to because people would spend less money.

 

[darjr]

@Ruin Explorer I dunno about crowdfunding amounts vs a game being played. All I know is that I see and hear about it getting played. I’ve done so myself. I get asked questions about it too so I know people are at least considering it or trying.

Edit: I meant to say opaque to folks who don’t already know PBTA. Changed to that.
I will say that the rules are very opaque to anyone that A doesn’t already know RPGs and B don’t already know a little bit about PBTA. Thankfully there are many great YouTube videos that break the game down for folks.

As far as this pertains to MCDM I know of playtest games at several cons from PAX AUS to Gen Con to local cons. And the open invitation playtests online fill almost instantly. And there have been a fair few.

Also as far as con games go, I’ve been thinking about GenCon and looking at their sold ticket numbers and the Ratios do actually seem to reflect real world ones. The VAST majority of games are D&D or close relatives, everything else is a fraction of that.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I will say that the rules are very opaque to anyone that A doesn’t already know RPGs and B already know a little bit about PBTA. Thankfully there are many great YouTube videos that break the game down for folks.

Oh dear, that sounds a tad unfortunate, if you're managing to confuse people who already know PtbA you've probably gone wrong somewhere!

As far as this pertains to MCDM I know of playtest games at several cons from PAX AUS to Gen Con to local cons. And the open invitation playtests online fill almost instantly. And there have been a fair few.

Yeah I noticed that. I avoided signing up for any myself as I don't know if I'd have the time.

Also as far as con games go, I’ve been thinking about GenCon and looking at their sold ticket numbers and the Ratios do actually seem to reflect real world ones. The VAST majority of games are D&D or close relatives, everything else is a fraction of that.

I remember we had some interesting figures from GenCon signups a while back. There's a vanishingly small possibility I might even make it to GenCon this year (which would be for the first time).

 

[Reynard]

it occurs to me that the real "fight" won't be between MCDMRPG and 5E, but MCDMRPG and Daggerheart. (To be clear, by "fight" here I mean who is going to crowd fund for more.)

 

[bedir than]

It is telling that they are looking at the Shadowdark model for making it "open." No SRD. No CC. It tracks with the way MCDM has engaged with the OGL tho.

Can anyone explain what this unlicense means? Because legally it's a trap. Without an explicit license revocation post-use in a new product is quite easy and the default in the US is that copyright is active upon publication.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Can anyone explain what this unlicense means? Because legally it's a trap. Without an explicit license revocation post-use in a new product is quite easy and the default in the US is that copyright is active upon publication.

Am I unable to see someone you're quoting or something?

If you mean the MCDM RPG, what MCDM says is:

We intend to publish this game under an open license, probably something like the Shadowdark license, because we want you, and anyone who wants to, to make, share, publish their own work using these rules and set in this world.

So that's not an "unlicence" or whatever, they just don't have the open licence drawn up yet.

 

[Reynard]

Can anyone explain what this unlicense means? Because legally it's a trap. Without an explicit license revocation post-use in a new product is quite easy and the default in the US is that copyright is active upon publication.

The Shadowdark license is very fuzzy. It is specifically a "compatibility license" tho, not an Open license. I think the part MCDM is looking to emulate is that: they will want people to support the game with new adventures, mosnters, settings, etc. I am not a lawyer and also don't understand legalese so I have no idea how problematic or safe the Shadowdark license is, but I have not seen anything that suggests Kelsey Dionne or Arcane Library are making life difficult for those that publish under it. The opposite, really. They often promote 3PP Shadowdark stuff on their Discord and FB pages.

 

[DarkCrisis]

Kelsey Dionne tackled this recently on, I think, Me, Myself and Die: There's a great value put on innovation, as though that's what people want in a game.

No, most of the ones who intend to play it, versus merely consuming it, want it to be fun.

There are almost no truly "innovative" works of art, of any sort, out there. Everyone is standing on the shoulders of giants, all the way back to whoever painted those longhorn cattle on a cave wall.

If Colville was creating this RPG trying to get a good grade in school, sure, innovation might be a primary consideration. But I think in the real world marketplace, the important questions are "is this fun to play? Is it so much fun that it's worth the price tag? Is this so much fun that people would rather play it instead of the many other things they could occupy their time with?" If the answer to most of those questions is yes, it's a success. And I suspect it will be, for people looking for the kind of experience they seem to be presenting.

What drew me to Shadowdark is that it's simplified. It keeps it simple. Modern RPGs, yes even 5E and MCDM RPG have to much going on (seemingly as Ive only seen the preview stuff).

Sure nothing tops 3rd ed for pure rules bloat but man feats and feats and special powers and race powers and subclass powers and etc etc etc. Ugh.

I taught 4 new players 5E D&D and we've played for years but I swear to Lolth none of them could keep it all straight even with character sheets in front of them. Shadowdark... simple. Never forgot a special power or rule. Bliss from a DM perspective and IMO as a player as well.