The Final Sprint! (Plus: Ordering Multiple Copies)
over 7 years ago – Sat, Oct 27, 2018 at 09:10:38 AM

I am delighted to announce we have unlocked Catherine Ramen's "Kingsport" stretch goal!  Soon you will soon be able to add a dose of Lovecraftian horror to your Monsterhearts 2 campaigns. 

We still have two more stretch goals to unlock. Fraser SImons's "Snow Falling on Chrome," a campaign starter for The Veil inspired by Blade Runner, will be unlocked at $25,000. If we hit $30,000, Lauren McManamon and myself will write The Mercy Falls Campaign, inspired by The Gauntlet's popular actual play series. We're getting close to Fraser's stretch goal, but the last one will be tough. That said, I know we can do it. Just keep spreading the word wherever you can. 

Finally, some folks have asked about getting multiple copies of the book. That's pretty easy: just bump up your pledge by $50 USD for each extra book you want (plan for an increase in shipping costs). 

This campaign has been an incredible journey so far, and it's nearly over. Thank you all so much for your support! 

Jason 

The Final Push!
over 7 years ago – Fri, Oct 26, 2018 at 11:47:02 PM

Hi everyone. As of the moment I am writing this update, we have just crossed over the $21,000 threshold, meaning we will be getting Lovecraftesque: The Light of Other Stars,  Josh Fox and Becky Annison's first major expansion for Lovecraftesque. Provided that holds up throughout the day, we can say that stretch goal is unlocked! 

I want to remind everyone we are in the final days of the campaign. We still have three fantastic stretch goals to unlock, but we will have to push pretty hard to get there. 

Please share the campaign link with your friends on social media. If you can say why the project is particularly important or exciting to you, all the better. Here is a list of fantastic places to share the campaign:

Google Plus

RPG groups on Facebook

Twitter

RPG.net

Reddit (particularly the RPG subreddit)

Your RPG instances on Mastodon

Your favorite RPG Discord servers

If there is anything you need from me that would make sharing the campaign easier, please let me know. I'm happy to go anywhere needed to talk about the book. 

As always, thanks for your support of this project!

Jason 

New Stretch Goal (Lovecraftesque: The Light of Other Stars) plus New Pledge Rewards
over 7 years ago – Tue, Oct 23, 2018 at 12:15:00 AM

I am excited to announce we have unlocked the Night Witches: Koldunya stretch goal! But we have lots more to share in today's update, so let's get started!

New Digital Stretch Goal: Lovecraftesque: The Light of Other Stars

If we can hit $21,000, Josh Fox will write the first major expansion for the award-winning game, Lovecraftesque! This stretch goal will bring campaign play to the Lovecraftesque formula. Josh will write guidelines for linking multiple scenarios so you can change what was previously a one-shot game into a game that can be played over multiple sessions. This stretch goal will also include a series of three cyberpunk scenarios, each of which can be used individually or linked-up using the campaign guidelines. 

Here is Josh's description for Lovecraftesque: The Light of Other Stars:

The Light of Other Stars is the first ever Lovecraftesque campaign pack. The Light will bring eldritch horror to a cyberpunk setting. It will contain three scenarios that can be played standalone or as a sequence of stories, gradually escalating the threat. Uncover the inhuman forces beneath the skin of cyberpunk. It will also include guidelines for creating a campaign pack. 

Media Appearances

We are getting close to unlocking Calamity Raccoon's Good Time Pizza Farm. I wrote a special blog post to give people more background about the origin and development of this stretch goal. It can be found right here. 

The gang over at Misdirected Mark talked about the Codex KS on their most recent episode at the 1 hour, 25 minute mark.

New Pledge Rewards

We have a few fantastic new pledge rewards. Right now, along with your copy of the book, you can get a session of Cartel run for you and 3 friends by none other than Mark Diaz Truman. You can also pledge to get a session of The Election of the Wine Queen with Gerrit Reininghaus. 

Thanks so much for your support and please keep spreading the word about this campaign! I'm going to close, as always, with a Codex celebration dance, this time by Luiz! 

Jason 

Final Stretch Goals and Backer Rewards!
over 7 years ago – Tue, Oct 23, 2018 at 12:14:41 AM

I am delighted to announce we have unlocked the Calamity Raccoon's Good Time Pizza Farm digital stretch goal!

We are entering the final 10 days of the campaign, so I'm going to go ahead and reveal all the remaining stretch goals and pledge rewards. Here we go...

Digital Stretch Goal #5: Catherine Ramen's "Kingsport"

If we can hit $23,000, Catherine Ramen will write a deluxe Monsterhearts 2 town for her Lovecraftian Kingsport setting. Cat has been running Kingsport games on Gauntlet Hangouts for a good while now, with each new series exploring the town in a different time period (such as Kingsport '76 and Kingsport 1692). If we hit this stretch goal, she's going to give you the tools to explore your own time-hopping version of Kingsport. From Cat: 

Kingsport is a small port town in Massachusetts, nestled between the Miskatonic River and Arkham. Home to Deep One dynasties, 300-year old ghosts, and one of the nicest Friendly's Ice Cream Parlours on the Eastern Seaboard, Kingsport is Lovecraft-tinged Monsterhearts with a growing and evolving storyline. This scenario will detail a never before seen period of the town's deeply weird history—a Red Scare-infected 1952—as well as give guidance on exploring other time periods. 

You can watch some of Kingsport '76 right here: 

Digital Stretch Goal #6: Fraser Simons's "Snow Falling on Chrome"

If we can hit $25,000, Fraser Simons will write a Blade Runner-inspired scenario for his popular Powered by the Apocalypse cyberpunk game The Veil. The Veil is one of the most popular games within Gauntlet spaces and was recently featured on the smash hit podcast Friends at the Table. From Fraser: 

Weave a cyberpunk tale in a Blade Runner-like world using a starter with plot seeds for select playbooks and pre-made societal and technological aspects that run parallel to the Blade Runner universe, beloved by cyberpunk fans the world over.

Digital Stretch Goal #7: Lauren McManamon and Jason Cordova's The Mercy Falls Campaign

This is the big one. If we can hit $30,000, Lauren McManamon and myself will write The Mercy Falls Campaign. This setting book will include system-agnostic details—including maps, location descriptions, and NPCs—about the town of Mercy Falls, Washington, the location of our popular actual play series on the Pocket-Sized Play podcast. It will also include guidance for using games like Monsterhearts 2, Cthulhu Dark, The Final Girl, and more, to explore different aspects of the town's culture and history. Essentially, we will give you the tools to create your own version of Mercy Falls. Folks have been asking for this for a long time, and if we can hit this stretch goal, Lauren and I will finally be able to deliver it! 

You can listen to the entire Mercy Falls saga in the Pocket-Sized Play feed. 

New Pledge Rewards

We have added the final two pledge rewards to the campaign. The first is a $100 pledge that gets you the basic rewards plus Tom McGrenery will run an online session of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying (1e) using the obscure Castle Drachenfels module for you and 3 friends. The second is a $150 pledge that gets you the basic rewards plus Tyler Lominack will run a 2-session online game of Monster of the Week: All Are Punished for you and 3 friends. All Are Punished is a scenario you can find in Codex - Hell, available for free on our site. 

A reminder that we are still working on unlocking the Lovecraftesque: The Light of Other Stars stretch goal. Please help spread the word wherever you can. In particular, we need help spreading the word to the following places where The Gauntlet has very little presence: 

Facebook

Reddit

RPG.net

Thanks so much for all your support during this campaign! I'm going to close, as always, with a celebratory dance video, this time by Tomer Gurantz. Enjoy!

 Jason 

New Stretch Goal (Calamity Raccoon's) and New Pledge Rewards!
over 7 years ago – Fri, Oct 12, 2018 at 12:02:54 AM

I am very pleased to announce we have unlocked the first Digital Stretch Goal, Becky Annison's "Let Sleeping Bones Lie," and we're getting close to unlocking Night Witches: Koldunya. But we are not slowing down! 

New Stretch Goal - Calamity Raccoon's Good Time Pizza Farm

Calamity Raccoon's Good Time Pizza Farm is a horror gaming supplement I will be writing should we hit the stretch goal. It's inspired by my time working at a Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant and the video game Five Nights at Freddy's. The Calamity's setting first appeared in Codex - Dark as a Lovecraftesque scenario called "Pizza Time!" It's a very popular setting in The Gauntlet, and I'm excited to have the opportunity to expand it. Here is the full, official pitch: 

"Calamity Raccoon’s Good Time Pizza Farm in Hugo, Minnesota is closing its doors. The restaurant, the first in a chain, was originally opened in 1977. A group of Calamity’s enthusiasts have paid to stay overnight in the restaurant to make pizza, play games, and reminisce about their experiences there. But this Calamity’s has a weird and troubling history of children going missing, employee suicides, and animatronic characters who say just the right thing at just the wrong time. It’s a place of urban legends and unanswered questions—and what of Mr. Big Bad, the wolf character that was supposedly mothballed in the early 1980s?

Calamity Raccoon’s Good Time Pizza Farm is a horror gaming supplement that comes in two parts. The first is “Calamity’s Curtain Call,” a one-shot scenario for mystery horror games that tells the story of the final night at the first Calamity Raccoon’s restaurant. It will be written for rules-light systems like Cthulhu Dark, but will contain notes for adapting it to other systems and genres (for example, there will be notes for turning it into a lighter “kids on bikes” mystery).

The second part is a full-on Calamity Raccoon’s setting for folks who want to run multiple sessions (or an entire campaign) inside the restaurant. It will be system-agnostic and will focus on the dozens of fun and creepy details that will make a setting like this come alive, such as the history of the restaurant and its animatronic characters, names of arcade games, a full Calamity’s menu, and much more!" 

New Pledge Rewards 

We have three new pledge rewards for backers to choose from. For $100, you will get the basic rewards plus Epidiah Ravechol will run Swords Without Master for you and three of your friends. There is also a game of Bluebeard's Bride being run by horror aficionado Shane Liebling. Finally, for $150, Patrick Knowles will run a 2-session online game of Monsterhearts 2 in his popular Once Again, We Return setting inspired by The Wicked and the Divine. 

Media Appearances

Both Calamity Raccoon's and Once Again, We Return are discussed in the newest episode of The Gauntlet Podcast. 

As I said above, we are getting close to unlocking Night Witches: Koldunya by Jason Morningstar. Please keep spreading the word about this campaign! 

As always, thanks so much for your support. Here's a new Codex celebratory dance video, this time by Tim Rauche. 

Jason