I just wanted to let y'all know that surveys have started going out via smoke test - this means that 5% of you will get your survey today, and after 48 hours, assuming nothing breaks, surveys will then go out to everyone else!
Remember, shipping is not due at this time, but it will charge your card if you add on anything you missed at the time of the campaign closing.
Thanks again, and let me know if you have any questions! Otherwise, you should all be seeing your surveys by Wednesday!
Apologies for the late update - I got tied up with a recent new kidney disease diagnosis for one of my cats, so I lost a full day earlier last week. Thankfully, we're getting her on a kidney-supportive prescription diet and she should hopefully still live a long life with us (she's not even 3 years old yet!).
Anyway, on to good news - I should be getting the printed proof of the zine in a few days from the printer, and I'll be sending out the digital copies via the survey tool as soon as I have BackerKit do some tweaks on their end.
For this campaign I'll be charging shipping closer to when the game is closer to actually shipping due to the volatility of shipping rates and freight and tariffs and everything else, and that's a feature I need BK to do on their end.
So surveys should be coming out in the next few days - meaning that you can pay for addons and upgrades and stuff now, and then shipping will be charged in a few months when I've got rates locked down. I'll do a smoke test (which goes out to about 5% of backers to make sure everything is kosher), and then the surveys will go out to everyone.
Anyway, here's a preview of the cover of the Zine, which looks nice and fleshy and visceral (IMHO) which is just what I was hoping for. It is a little less goth that I thought it would be, but I ended up going with this direction as it felt more like a grimoire bound in human flesh and teeth. While most of the exterior and interior covers are more photo-collaged heavy, most of the interior pages are text and illustration heavy, like this spread: Anyway, I'm pretty excited to get this out to you, but in the meantime thanks again for your patience with this as I make my way through the custom portraits and printing and all the other product production,
Oh yeah, here's the enamel pin photo I promised!
Thanks again, hope you're having a good start to the week, and I'll talk to you soon!
Hello esteemed members of the Order of the Dark Wheel.
My name is Rick (different from the Rick you know), I'm the doorman for the order compound, and volunteer once a month doing digital marketing, and High Priest Rick has asked me to update all of you on how the progress of the game is going. Gotta say, it's better than picking up trash around the compound in this heat. Hope you're all staying cool!
Custom Cultists Apparently Rick (the one you know) has been trying to wrangle all the art and photos and everything around the cultist cards. Some of you who want to be in the game haven't responded to his email asking you to fill out a google form. You know who you are (apparently).
But if you don't know who you are, please be on the lookout for an email titled "Cult Crafter -> Become a Cultist - it's your turn to pick!" If you pledged to be a cultist and haven't seen this land yet, blame the folks ahead of you, not Rick! He'll get to you soon!
Printing update Otherwise, I've been told to tell you that the Order has found some promising sourcing partners, so even with tariff wildness up in the air, we'll get this game printed and mailed out to you. Worst-case scenario, it might have to be classified as an unbound book for shipping purposes (don't laugh, the other Rick got an unbound book into an art showcase for book arts once), but we'll get the game to you for sure.
Lore Zine Apparently the zine is coming along nicely, and (fingers crossed), we should be able to get the digital version out to everyone in the next week or so. That's cool.
Membership pins You have no idea how long I've been waiting for a membership pin. I honestly do all of this as a volunteer for the Order, it's not like they pay me or anything, and I've been promised a pin for years, but finally now that all of you have helped Rick make this game, NOW he's finally getting the pins made.
Anyway, they should be landing soon, and he'll likely make me take photos to share with you next update.
Surveys I'm supposed to apologize that surveys haven't gone out. He's hoping to get to that ASAP, but if you're mad about it, feel free to yell at him, but wait until tomorrow when he doesn't have any volunteers - we have nothing to do with his lateness.
Thanks again! Okay, thank you! The Order appreciates your support, and the next update will likely be brought to you by High Priest Rick (not the doorman Rick writing this update).
Thanks for your patience with me here! I've been busy working on the lore zine and doing more manufacturing research. Phew! That said, you're much overdue for an update, so here we go!
Tariff Update tl;dr - don't worry, you'll get your game! I've been keeping busy waiting for better international trade policy news, and it seems like we're in the middle of a 90-day reprieve of 30% tariffs.
This is still super uncertain, and even if I was ready to pull the trigger (see below), everyone else has been frantically trying to get overseas manufacturing done and from what I've heard, transportations costs are still super crazy.
So I'm weighing the costs of either producing in the US (where each game will cost as much as funds the campaign as raised), or trying to find a producer in another country whose tariffs aren't likely to jump up to some ridiculous cost.
Either way, I've got multiple contingency plans that means you'll be getting your game without any increase in cost to you. At least until tariffs get raised on every country, but we'll get to that when we come to it.
Surveys So the good news is that I'm going to move forward with getting the surveys out to you as soon as possible. That said, since the game is still technically unfinished, as there's a lot of art assets to replace since I'm making so many folks into cultists, I'll leave the surveys unlocked (meaning you can change your info) until we get closer to ship out.
Become a Cultist Backers I thought the best way of getting everyone's info who pledged to be part of the game would be by the pledge manager, but I think it makes sense to email folks individually, so if you pledged, look out for an email from me soon. It'll come from "[email protected]" so please make sure to keep an eye out for that.
TableTop Simulator (TTS) So for PC, there exists a game on Steam called Tabletop Simulator (TTS). It's about $30, and it's what I've been using to do some playtesting before getting a one-off game printed.
If you've got TTS already, or really, really want to play Cult Crafter as soon as possible and are willing to buy it, I can provide you with the temp cards (still layout tweaks that I'm working on as well as placeholder art for the cultists) and you can get playing.
If this is of interest to you, email me (See above) and I'll send you the files you need to upload to TTS and get going!
So as you likely have heard from so many other crowdfunding campaigns (maybe even my other enamel pin campaign) - the tariffs on China are now 145%. Yeah, that's wild.
Sooooo, what does this mean? I budged for tariffs of 30%, but basically doubling the cost of production and shipping has completely turned this project on it's head. And yes, for anyone asking - I did inquire about domestic production - and the quote was roughly 4x the other overseas manufacturers.
I'm currently exploring options with the factory I was in talks with for production, and am now reaching out to see if there are other producers in other, less-tariffed countries. I'd like to say I've been working hard on the lore zine and production of all the other things, but trying to figure out how to actually make this game has been taking up all my time and energy.
Thanks again for your patience, and I hope to have better news and more updates soon.
