Crowdfunding News – M20 Technocracy Reloaded, D&D Online Summer Camp!, and more

The number of RPG and RPG-related crowdfunding projects that end by May 28th are up from last week. Despite the increase, many of these show a good level of funding as RPG crowdfunding projects continue to exceed their goals during the pandemic. The increased number of projects lets me spotlight seven projects and include Kicktraq charts to show how they’re performing.

M20 Technocracy Reloaded by Onyx Path Publishing

• END DATE: Thu, May 28 2020 2:00 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition
• PROJECT TYPE: Sourcebook
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $75 + S/H for the PDF, POD, and deluxe hardcover of the book
• NOTE: Try before you buy with the free Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition Quickstart

“Help us to create a beautiful Deluxe Edition of Technocracy Reloaded, a supplement for Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition. Technocracy Reloaded brings the final playable faction of the Ascension War into Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition. The Technocratic Union has historically been presented in various ways. Its members have been shown as the villains of the Ascension War, misguided willworkers seeking to keep humanity safe through control and manipulation, shadowy masters of modern reality, and as heroes forming the only line of defense against unspeakable horrors that seek to destroy all that is. Each of these perspectives is true, from a certain point of view. Technocracy Reloaded peels back the curtain and examines the role of the Technocracy in Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition. The various future fates presented in Mage 20 are examined, and this book introduces a few of its own. Technocracy Reloaded gives the Storyteller all the tools needed to explore these viewpoints and more while incorporating the Technocratic Union into their Mage 20 game. Technocracy Reloaded provides tools and resources to equip and portray the Technocratic Union as antagonists in a Mage 20 game, or to allow the players to step into the role of Technocrats, with the full support of the Union and its immeasurable resources at their fingertips.”

Ekphrastic Beasts by Janaka Stucky

• END DATE: Thu, May 28 2020 3:00 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition
• PROJECT TYPE: Sourcebook
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $35 + $8 for the PDF and print versions of the book

“A New Kind of RPG Compendium. Ekphrastic writing is the vivid, often dramatic description of visual art. Our project is a full-color fantasy art book, which leads with spectacular artwork from 4 of today's most exciting weird illustrators, that also functions as an artist-created compendium of creatures for the 5th edition of the world's most popular role-playing game! Rather than revisit known fantasy tropes, we begin with four established illustrators each creating striking, startling, original artworks straight from the abyssal depths of the subconscious. Each piece is then given to our author to reverse engineer creature names, back-stories, and stats for them all! The result: an artist-created compendium of stunningly illustrated creatures, spirits, and demons which have never seen the light of day or dark of dungeon before! 100+ pages, booklet-sized (6" x 9"), over 40 entirely original AND PLAY-TESTED monsters, complete with backstories and stats compatible with 5th Edition of the world's most popular role-playing game!”

Academy of Adventures: D&D Online Summer Camp! by Richard Malena-Webber

• END DATE: Tue, May 26 2020 12:00 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): Dungeons & Dragons
• PROJECT TYPE: Adventure module and an RPG class
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $15 for the PDF adventure

“Five days of fun as kids learn to play D&D, build exciting characters, and begin their heroic adventures! The Academy of Adventures is a five-day online summer camp for kids ages 11 to 15 to learn how to play one of the world's greatest roleplaying games! By backing this Kickstarter, you reserve one space at an online table of five young heroes as they learn the basics of roleplaying from longtime teacher, game designer, camp counselor and director Richard Malena-Webber. Together, these heroes will spend one week learning how to create outstanding characters, working with others as part of a dynamic team, and achieving their fantastic adventuring goals!”

Skull Diggers by Liberi Gothica Games

• END DATE: Mon, May 25 2020 12:59 AM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): An original system
• PROJECT TYPE: Core rulebook
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $20 for all of the PDFs

“A tabletop horror RPG where you must defend your village from eldritch invaders while also protecting yourself from your village. Skull Diggers is a tabletop horror RPG designed by Jacob Randolph, built around the horror of dungeon diving as a profession. Inspirations include Darkest Dungeon, X-Com, Phoenix Point, Rogue Legacy, Hollow Knight, Silent Hill, and various other horror settings and rogue-like games. Skull Diggers has three core premises. 1: You are not heroes. You are outcasts, doing your best to survive in a cruel world. Your village does not love you and barely tolerates you. You have little choice but to turn to adventuring to survive. 2: You are not invaders or tomb robbers, pillaging the homes of goblins or orcs. No, the dungeons of Skull Diggers are invading your home instead. The Bones, as they are called, they come from below the earth. They rise up suddenly, without warning, and monsters spill out from their bloody wounds. The blood reshapes the world around the Bone into a terrible, eldritch reality different from our own. Monstrous, terrible Things live in these changed places, destroying remnants of our reality as they find them. Unless someone goes in to stop the bleeding, they will overwhelm and destroy everything nearby. Which includes your village, and you. 3: You are not defined solely by how you fight, as you are in dungeons and dragons. No, your character has three Roles. One as a Citizen, defining how they work with their village and interact with society. One as an Explorer, informing the way you search and travel, the way you find treasure and haul goods, the way you avoid trouble on the path. And one as a Warrior, explaining how you survive the brief, brutal, violent encounters with the Things that patrol the Bones.”

Wickedness by M Veselak

• END DATE: Fri, May 22 2020 11:59 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): An original system
• PROJECT TYPE: RPG zines
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $22 + S/H for three PDFs and three print zines

“A coven of three struggle to hold the worlds (and one another) together in this narrative RPG. Welcome to Wickedness, a fantasy RPG by M Veselak about the resilience and power of queer community. Form a coven between three mystical archetypes (the innocent and gentle Pure Heart, the volatile, revelrous Wild Spirit, and the uptight, scholarly Old Soul) and try to keep your world of magic and mystery in balance with the mundane world, in spite of its ignorance, poverty and violence.

Wickedness is a peculiar tabletop game written for exactly three players and one tarot deck, with no dice and no GM. It uses a bespoke tarot-drawing system loosely inspired by Jay Dragon’s Sleepaway, but is itself a departure from the Belonging Outside Belonging framework developed by Avery Alder and Benjamin Rosenbaum. The game is played in three acts: in the first, players discover their coven, the sanctuary they call home, a mundane fantasy nation, and the treacherous underworld lurking beneath it. In the second chapter, the cards point to a series of challenges detailed in the games’ interpretation Guide, and the players respond: the coven can fall prey to their archetype-specific follies in order to collect cards, spend the cards to solve challenges with wisdom, or use the vast and terrible magic powers at their fingertips-- which is miraculous, but costs the user a piece of their essential nature, striking out and maybe even blackening and replacing a truth on their character sheet. The final chapter tempts the coven to go their separate ways, but also offers them opportunities to learn from their past mistakes and heal, and finally they'll face their ultimate fates, determining the future of the kingdom, the underworld, and the art of magic itself.”

Charlie Foxtrot: A Battlelords Sourcebook by 23rd Century Productions, LLC (23C)

• END DATE: Sun, May 24 2020 2:00 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): Battlelords of the 23rd Century
• PROJECT TYPE: Adventure modules
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $40 + S/H outside the US for the PDF and print versions of the game
• NOTE: Try before you buy with the free Battlelords of the 23rd Century QUICK-START RULES (Kickstarter Edition)

“A book of one-shot adventures and short fiction for the Battlelords of the 23rd Century tabletop roleplaying game. This Kickstarter is for the Battlelords supplement, Charlie Foxtrot. Charlie Foxtrot will contain five one-shot adventures for Battlelords, including pre-generated characters. In addition, there are several short fiction stories to help flesh out the Battlelords' universe. It will also include a small planetary atlas detailing the worlds and locations where these adventures and stories take place. As a whole, Charlie Foxtrot fleshes out this little corner of the Battlelord's universe, creating a sandbox for you to play in... before you blow it up with your shenanigans. Battlelords of the 23rd Century (aka Battlelords) is a military science-fiction tabletop roleplaying game, with a 30 year history in the game industry. Set in a galaxy of war, an alliance of 15 different alien species desperately attempts to repel the Aknar-Ryn (aka The Arachnids) invasion and root out the nanoswarms of the Atlanteans hiding within their ranks. Play as corporate mercenaries, soldiers, spies, pirates, or any other occupation you can think of in this expansive setting.”

Fantasy City Sites and Scenes II, for use with Fantasy RPGs by Philip Reed Games

• END DATE: Fri, May 22 2020 5:08 PM EDT.
• SYSTEM(S): System neutral
• PROJECT TYPE: RPG zine
• MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $1 for the PDF

“A guide for gamemasters. Includes sixteen different fantasy city locations, each ready to drop into your campaign. Fantasy City Sites and Scenes II is a 48-page (plus cover, inside covers, and back cover) 8.5" x 11" book for gamemasters who are in need of inspiration. The book details sixteen different city locations and offers up a selection of encounter ideas, all of which can be used on their own or added to the content described in the original Fantasy City Sites and Scenes book. City Sites. The sixteen locations described in the book (each a two-page spread) presents new buildings that may be dropped into your campaign . . . and along with it, the characters and events detailed alongside the building. You won't find a dry collection of statistics and facts in this book. Each entry was written to spark the gamemaster's imagination and provide GMs with just enough to take the idea and make it their own! City Scenes. Pages 36 through 48 (plus the inside back cover of the printed book!) are packed with new day and night encounters. These encounters do not duplicate any found in the original Fantasy City Sites and Scenes book, meaning that this section greatly expands the gamemaster's number of choices when it comes time to randomly select a city encounter.”

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RPG Quick Hits

Savage Kingdoms RPG Core Rulebook by Mike Yow

• END DATE: Sat, May 23 2020
• NOTE: This crowdfunding campaign is running on IndieGoGo. Unfortunately, Kicktraq does not track crowdfunding projects on IndieGoGo as of this writing
• “Funding needed for the art and graphic design of the Savage Kingdoms 3rd edition core rulebook.”

Ancestry Awakened: New and Reworked Ancestries for 5e by Pirate Gonzalez Games

• END DATE: Thu, May 28 2020 8:59 AM EDT.
• NOTE: Link to this project’s Kicktraq information (here)
• “Brand new ancestry options for 5e, including a new system for creating and designing ancestries!”

The Expanse: A 5e suburban fantasy setting by Jesse Day

• END DATE: Sat, May 23 2020 12:08 AM EDT.
• NOTE: Link to this project’s Kicktraq information (here)
• “A 5e suburban fantasy setting.”

Into The Witchelm: 5e Module and STL 3D Terrain by Autumn

• END DATE: Wed, May 27 2020 9:00 PM EDT.
• NOTE: Link to this project’s Kicktraq information (here)
• “3 sets of detailed 3D printable terrain and our 5e module; Into The Witchelm.”

RPG Accessories

Polyhedral Dice Advent-ure Calendars 2-4 by Black Oak Workshop

• END DATE: Sun, May 24 2020 8:00 PM EDT.
• NOTE: Link to this project’s Kicktraq information (here)
• “Satisfy your sense of adventure and love of dice with one of our fun countdown calendars! Over 70 all new custom polyhedral dice await!”

Anubis Dice and Dice Holder - Carry Your D&D Dice In Style by NatOne Tabletop Games

• END DATE: Fri, May 22 2020 6:07 AM EDT.
• NOTE: Link to this project’s Kicktraq information (here)
• “An Anubis Dice Holder and affordable dice sets that will make you roll 20s in style. Bring it to your next Dungeons and Dragons game!”

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[philreed]

Ekphrastic Beasts is one I missed. Backed! Always have room in my heart for more monsters.

 

[Egg Embry]

Ekphrastic Beasts is one I missed. Backed! Always have room in my heart for more monsters.

Everyone has room in their heart for more monsters! ;-)

 

[Longspeak]

You had to do it again...

 

[RSIxidor]

Skull Diggers is exactly my kind of weird and quirky. Doesn't hurt that I already like some of the author's other work.