Tell your overdue Kickstarter story

I tried to enter the "Kickstarter Gold: Table Titans Fallen Veil Adventure Set" as my most disappointing Kickstarter in the survey (but my answers to the survey might not have submitted because I did not login to Google). Estimated delivery for the "completed" project? February 2018.

I met the principal creator, Scott Kurtz, at a convention in Texas. I met his dad, too. I introduced my youngest boy, who was in middle school at the time. This was just after Scott split from Acquisitions Incorporated (which--itself--was not too long after his falling out with Wil Wheaton). Still! I was happy to chat and was eager to support Scott at the convention and then this project.

I hoped to have this "Kickstarter Gold" project in the hands of my boy for him to run his middle school crew through it. Now? My youngest is completing his 4th year at college, and both meeting Scott and enjoying Table Titans are distant memories.

This will forever be the last of my support for Scott's work. Sadly. He is crazy talented. But this project has felt like a taste of being on the receiving end of Scott burning a relationship.

reidonly said:

I tried to enter the "Kickstarter Gold: Table Titans Fallen Veil Adventure Set" as my most disappointing Kickstarter in the survey (but my answers to the survey might not have submitted because I did not login to Google). Estimated delivery for the "completed" project? February 2018.

I met the principal creator, Scott Kurtz, at a convention in Texas. I met his dad, too. I introduced my youngest boy, who was in middle school at the time. This was just after Scott split from Acquisitions Incorporated (which--itself--was not too long after his falling out with Wil Wheaton). Still! I was happy to chat and was eager to support Scott at the convention and then this project.

I hoped to have this "Kickstarter Gold" project in the hands of my boy for him to run his middle school crew through it. Now? My youngest is completing his 4th year at college, and both meeting Scott and enjoying Table Titans are distant memories.

This will forever be the last of my support for Scott's work. Sadly. He is crazy talented. But this project has felt like a taste of being on the receiving end of Scott burning a relationship.

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Did he ever explain himself or respond to messages?

reidonly said:

I tried to enter the "Kickstarter Gold: Table Titans Fallen Veil Adventure Set" as my most disappointing Kickstarter in the survey (but my answers to the survey might not have submitted because I did not login to Google). Estimated delivery for the "completed" project? February 2018.

I met the principal creator, Scott Kurtz, at a convention in Texas. I met his dad, too. I introduced my youngest boy, who was in middle school at the time. This was just after Scott split from Acquisitions Incorporated (which--itself--was not too long after his falling out with Wil Wheaton). Still! I was happy to chat and was eager to support Scott at the convention and then this project.

I hoped to have this "Kickstarter Gold" project in the hands of my boy for him to run his middle school crew through it. Now? My youngest is completing his 4th year at college, and both meeting Scott and enjoying Table Titans are distant memories.

This will forever be the last of my support for Scott's work. Sadly. He is crazy talented. But this project has felt like a taste of being on the receiving end of Scott burning a relationship.

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I backed an Adventure Journal in 2020 that had artwork and design by Scott. There were a few murmurings from concerned backers about Scott's involvement but the folks running the KS were very transparent about his involvement and that he was doing the art only. There were a few changes to be made before the first print run (printer said they should add more artwork) and Scott pumped out the art pretty quickly and the journals are pretty damned nice. But yeah his input was only the art and none of the production.

Lexallion said:

Did he ever explain himself or respond to messages?

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Somewhat.

Through blog posts to his two comic sites (PvP Online and Table Titans), Scott let us know he was impacted by COVID, needing to care for his father after his dad suffered back-to-back strokes, and a break-in at his studio.

He updated the project again in September 2020 taking sole responsibility for the lateness of the project and letting everyone know that a printer was located and it was just down to finishing touches on the files.

Nothing since.

Kickstarter comments show a few folks have tried reaching out to him through Patreon and other venues. These folks do not report being warmly received.

I am sure the heat Scott has received from frustrated backers has been a massive turn-off (as it has for many creators of projects in this thread). And I have tremendous sympathy for him and his dad (especially after meeting his father and enjoying our brief interaction).

Again, Scott is crazy talented. It's just this has been my most disappointing Kickstarter, beating out the only other of my 40-odd backed Kickstarter projects that did not deliver: Dungeons & Dragons - A Documentary. At least for the D&D doc, I did receive my two signed books, a digital copy of the competing documentary that entangled the D&D doc in a legal quagmire, and a couple of interview clips that would have made it into the documentary that I thought were great (specifically, the bit about M.A.R. Barker's Empire of the Petal Throne).

reidonly said:

I met the principal creator, Scott Kurtz, at a convention in Texas

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reidonly said:

Kickstarter comments show a few folks have tried reaching out to him through Patreon and other venues. These folks do not report being warmly received.

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I apologize for being off topic.

A long time ago, Aaron Williams and Scott Kurtz came to my local gaming store. We went with our friends, another couple. I was a big fan of Nodwick and PvP Online. Aaron Williams didn't disappoint. Lots of fun! Drew some fun little things for us and we picked up a Nodwick mini.

I stopped reading PvP after that day.

We tried to give Scott the benefit of the doubt. We figured it was a bad day, a travel day, or something. He was rude-ish, snippy, and annoyed at meeting us, it seemed. One of us asked for an extra drawing from Scott, we were early and there was no line yet, so we thought maybe that was it. We even stayed around to see if we needed to apologize for our behavior. We didn't. He was that way with everyone. My friend is an extravert and talked to many and no one had a good impression of Scott that day.

No one deserves COVID and I'm terribly sorry for what his dad is going through. Scott lost a fan that day.

Thanks for the discussion.

I got a positive one. Sort of.

I late pledged to the DC Heroes Kickstarter. It’s a couple months late already. But there’s a lot to it and the longer it takes the more likely the tariffs in the USA will go away.

So I’m glad it’s late and don’t mind just waiting. I’d rather wait than pay the cost of the Kickstarter and shipping again just for tariffs.

overgeeked said:

I late pledged to the DC Heroes Kickstarter. It’s a couple months late already. But there’s a lot to it and the longer it takes the more likely the tariffs in the USA will go away.

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It's also showing progress on the regular.

JD Maxwell of Grimwild has gone missing, and no one else has the legal standing to take up the mantle on delivery.


Backerkit has declared it abandoned - the first time I've seen that done. It is assumed that his other project is in a worse state - at least the digital files for Grimwild were released. It's a really strange situation.

You do really have to wonder in a few cases when a one-man-band creator completely ghosts if its possible they have, well, died. If they have no other contacts in the hobby to speak of, how would you even know?

Thomas Shey said:

You do really have to wonder in a few cases when a one-man-band creator completely ghosts if its possible they have, well, died. If they have no other contacts in the hobby to speak of, how would you even know?

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That's what people are wondering. He had the print run lined up and the product done. Everything was on the path to fulfillment.

I've been holding off on saying this, but he offered me a free upgrade when I said I didn't have the money to go non-digital at the time and wanted to get a hard copy and asked him about upgrading. He said the project running well financially, the upcoming holiday season and the fact that it was almost done had him in a good mood.

Someone dodging responsibilities doesn't do this in my experience. I did back his next project which is unlikely to be fulfilled so am out of more money, but I'm more concerned if he is OK.