Adjusting the Stretch Goals
over 4 years ago – Mon, Nov 11, 2019 at 01:35:22 PM

Greetings Backers,

 We've reached our second stretch goal! 

More importantly, however, we've refined our stretch goal plans to include some stuff we were still researching at launch. Some other things got moved around a bit. Here's the summary.

•  At $60k the Landon and Tenzy pins will be available as add-ons.  
•  At $75k we'll make TWO Planet Mercenary products available. One is an adventure, "Escape from the Friggen Jungle," and the other will be Tiny Planet Mercenary, a version of the Planet Mercenary setting atop the ultra-simple Tiny D6 engine from Gallant Knight games.
• At $90k we'll make spaceships.
•  We'll do a social media stretch goal involving glitter, and live-streaming, and Howard's beard. 

 Did You Say "Spaceships?" 

Yup. We said it to distract you from the beard thing. Let's explore these new goals in order.

Here are the pin designs. The Landon pin will be 2 inches tall and the Tenzy pin will be one inch.
 

Here are thePlanet Mercenary stretch goals

The Planet Mercenary adventure "Escape from the Friggen Jungle" PDF is art-complete, and very nearly layout-complete. We'd been meaning to run this as its own project, but the Five Year Summer crowded a lot of things out of their planned spaces. The adventure is similar in scope to those we've released in the past. Your mission: travel to Downton Dirtgrow, don't die of metal toxicity, and steal some very sparkly bacon. 

Tiny Planet Mercenary will be much like the other Tiny Dungeon setting books. It's a complete setting (in this case, the Planet Mercenary setting) atop Gallant Knight Game's Tiny D6 engine. The book will be available as an add-on to backers of this project, and will also be released to stores through GKG's usual channels.

Tiny Planet Mercenary will be approximately 200 pages long, will feature some new content (possibly new sophont types) and will have a redesigned Mayhem deck to complement it. $25 gets you the 200 page, black and white softcover book and PDF combo, as well as the PDF of the mayhem deck. $15 gets you the 200 page, black and white PDF of the book and PDF of the Mayhem deck. Physical Mayhem decks can be added on for $10.
 

And Now... Spaceships! 

We're partnering with Jeff Zugale to create hand-cast resin models of the Kitesfear. If we hit this goal, the Kitesfear toy will be available as an add-on for $10. 

This is something of an R&D goal. If we reach it, and if the spaceship toys don't prove to be onerous to produce and ship in volume, we will absolutely work with Jeff to make more things like this. 

Something Something "Glitter"

Oh, that's right. FINE. 

If this tweet from  @HowardTayler gets enough retweets or shares between now and Sunday,  we'll photograph, live-stream, (and record for posterity) our friend Meg dressing Howard's beard up with glitter, and maybe beads.  As of this posting photographs of glitter are guaranteed, but if you want to see video help spread the word.

We have more stretch goals defined, and they're listed on the main product page. For now, though, we're focusing on the shiny, shiny things leading up to TOY SPACESHIPS (and glitter, yes.)

Thank you again for your support. 

"Giving away comics for free on the internet" has always seemed like a magical fantasy rather than a business model, right up until folks realize that you are the ones¹ making the magic actually work. 

—Howard and Sandra Tayler

¹ Yes, yes... "The real magic was the friends we made along the way." Now you don't have to put that in the comments.
 

FUNDED!
over 4 years ago – Tue, Nov 05, 2019 at 09:09:41 AM

We Funded! 

Thank you for your enthusiasm and your support. We have an enormous amount of work ahead of us in the next 40 days, and updates like this one will arrive about once a week to keep you apprised of how we're doing. NOT once per day. 

Naturally, if we hit stretch goals we'll post interim updates, because those may result in backers wanting to change their pledge levels. Even so, we'll try to keep the noise to a minimum, and the signal strong. 

Next Steps

Here's a by-the-bullet-points breakdown of how this next week looks for Howard and Sandra. 

• Howard needs to make 3 weeks of comics. The buffer is in pretty sorry shape, and has been every since the dishwasher debacle.
• Sandra needs to install new flooring on the stairs. Once that piece is done the insurance adjuster can give us some money.
• Oh, you were hoping for Kickstarter things. RIGHT. 
• Howard will begin drafting the actual cover art. This will happen LIVE on his Twitch stream. Follow or subscribe at twitch.tv/howardtayler to be notified when that's happening.
• Howard and Sandra need to review artwork for the next stretch goals (stickers and pins.) As that comes ready we'll post it in the body of the project. 
• Howard and Sandra need to make some decisions. We're speaking with a couple of partners about additional stretch goals. Nothing to announce yet, though. DECISIONS
• Sandra will be monitoring Kickstarter comments and messages, answering questions and updating the FAQ as necessary. 

A Thing You Can Do

We love it when people get enthusiastic and increase their pledges to help us hit goals, but everyone is better served if the audience is bigger. Is there a friend to whom you have not yet introduced Schlock Mercenary? Every new reader is a potential backer, and while this particular project only runs for another 27 days, we're willing to be patient. 

We've found that the best place to start new readers is NOT at the beginning (and we have the bounce rate stats to prove it.¹) Start your friends here: January 1st of 2013, at the beginning of BROKEN WIND. If they love it, they'll find their way to the early strips on their own. 

We're Just Happy You're Here

Thank you again for your support. The previous pair of paragraphs answer a question we get a lot. Please don't feel obligated or pressured to spread Schlock Mercenary to your friends. We're just happy you're here, and look forward to delivering some shiny new books and slipcases (and other goodies!) to all our backers. 

—Howard & Sandra 

 ¹We said we had stats, so... footnote time! Of new Schlock Mercenary readers who begin with the 1st strip, less than 30% read more than about a week of strips. Almost 75% of new readers plow through several months of comics when they start at the beginning of a later book.

The Five-Year Summer
over 4 years ago – Sat, Nov 02, 2019 at 06:25:40 PM

Thank you! 

We'll get to story time in a moment, but first, THANK YOU! For your enthusiasm, and your quick pledging, for your kind words and your continuing support... it has been heartwarming and more than a little reassuring to us. Especially after the summer we've had. 

We intended to launch this project back in May, or perhaps June, and that's why a story of our "five-year summer" is a relevant update for this October-launched project. 

TL;DR  

Out of respect of your time, here's the summer's summary: It was very expensive and disrupted, and the disruptions continued clear into this month. There were medical issues, an emergency room visit, major home repairs, and much, much more, and those things crowded out the activities that would have resulted in a more polished, timely project launch. The good news: everyone is okay, and we like this new flooring much more than what the sewage ruined. 

Story Time

This Will Run Long...

The excitement began in late May when we switched Howard's meds around. A genetic test revealed that one of his medications was what had been driving his blood pressure up, but the replacement medication changed his sleep schedule, and he began spending upwards of eleven hours each day unconscious. Put another way, compared to his schedule a year earlier, he was losing an entire work week of productive time each work week. 

One morning, while Howard was still asleep, Sandra came downstairs and discovered a note on the studio-adjacent bathroom's toilet. It was from Keliana and her boyfriend Tyler (who is now, as of this writing, her fiancé Tyler, huzzah!) saying it was clogged, and that they'd turned off the water, but there was still more water coming from somewhere. Our plumber, Lee, who is awesome, replaced the old toilet, but said that only fixed about half the problem, because some of the water had come UP from places where water oughtn't be up-and-coming from. He suggested we call a someone to send a camera through the whole line. We did, and we subsequently learned the phrase "soft blockage causing fixture overflow." 

We also learned that the sewer line connecting our house to the city's outbound effluvia needed to be replaced entirely.

The disaster recovery team arrived, and we learned the phrase "category three black water damage," which is code for "poo has touched things that are not porcelain." It affected three rooms: the bathroom, the family room, and the studio shared by Howard and Keliana. All three rooms needed new flooring, and the studio and bathroom had to be flood cut, which means the complete removal of the lowest 24 inches of drywall. 

Replacing the sewer line meant jack hammering a hole in the floor of Sandra's office. There was a moment of joy involved here when we saw that the work would be performed by a jackhammer PIRATE named Val. Howard took a picture, then drew a caricature, because when life gives him lemons Howard draws pictures of lemonade.

Between the jackhammering and the flood-cutting we need to relocate all three people who work from home to other places in our home, and we ran out of good places immediately. Howard's studio moved to the front room, Keliana's studio took over half the kitchen, and Sandra's office moved to a couch and a laptop. Our kitchen furniture (along with much of what was in the studio) moved to a storage pod in the driveway. 

It's difficult to describe the noise of jackhammer-punctuated industrial-grade dehumidifier fans, or hydraulic winches dragging 100 feet of sewer pipe through your home. Let's just say "loud," and look at a nice picture of a temporary office.

By mid July the pipe was in place, the fans were removed, and the physical holes were filled. The financial hole was unfilled, however, and it was a five-figure hole.  Our homeowner's insurance covered lots of things, but a five-figure hole remained, because most of the pipe replacement took place between the house and the street, and that's not covered. This would have been a GREAT time to have already run a book launch, but now the financial hole was flush up against a productivity hole. Think of it as a perfect storm made of effluvia. 

Howard struggled to work through the hottest month of the year while sharing a room with our southwest-facing front door, which let in the heat every time it was opened. It was about this time, in an effort to keep a dead bird out of the mouth of the neighbor's dog, that he managed to pirouette face-first into a utility panel on the side of the house. The tab he snapped from the box missed his left eye by about an inch. This post is already too long, so we'll spare you the picture of the scar. 

Sandra, meanwhile, set aside all business projects, including preparatory work for this Kickstarter project, and became a general contractor. The fastest way to begin filling the five-figure hole was for us to do the work ourselves. 

Fortunately, Sandra is really, really good at learning to do new things, and then buckling down and doing the hell out of them. In the sequence below, the bottom four images (everything after the flood cut walls) are 100% Sandra's work. 

See that lower corner? Consider the artistry of the repaired walls and new flooring with Howard's picture of a jackhammer pirate, and ask yourself whose skill set REALLY keeps the Tayler family living indoors and eating from refrigerators.

You're Still Here?

When we said this would run long, we weren't kidding.

August arrived. All we needed to do was attend GenCon, then prepare three kids for school (two of whom were starting college), all while rebuilding a bathroom and a studio. We also needed to rid ourselves of the emptied storage pod, which would have been easier if the pod rental folks had been both competent and honest. We'll spare you that saga. Suffice it to say we did not require the services of an attorney, but it was a close thing. August was long, and hot, and not nearly so productive as we would have liked. We switched Howard's meds again, and he began to sleep more like a normal person, which in turn allowed him to work more like he's used to.

And then in September, just before Howard and Sandra departed for the Writing Excuses Retreat, the dishwasher failed. It had been trying to melt its way through the floor into the basement, and although Keliana and Tyler caught it before it made its escape, they couldn't save it from itself. We found ourselves again cursing the invention of indoor plumbing. Also, we told our kids they'd be doing the dishes by hand while we were out of the country for two weeks.

That went about as well as could be expected. 

The new dishwasher arrived in October, and then, after just one day of operation, its hose came loose and ran 20 gallons of hot water over the hardwood floors of the kitchen. The cursing of indoor plumbing gave way to what can best be described as resigned worship at the altar of Murphy. 

There were more dehumidifier fans. They weren't accompanied by jackhammers, nor by pipe-bursting hydraulics, but they were right in the center of the most important room in the house. Fortunately, Howard and Sandra could hide from the noise in their offices, and finally, FINALLY begin the work required to launch this Kickstarter project. 

 Of course, Sandra ALSO needed to replace the flooring in the family room, because until that was done the insurance company wouldn't give us the money they'd promised us. So, yeah... this was our house two weeks ago. 

On Saturday, October 19th, Sandra declared that ready-or-not we had to launch the Kickstarter. Insurance claims don't actually pay the bills, and the things that DO pay the bills hadn't been happening since sometime around late May. 

So here we are. There's still no stretch goal graphic, and the book's cover is incomplete, but the dishes are clean, and all of the poo created by the six Taylers flows AWAY from the house. Indoor plumbing can be problematic, but modern sanitation is a miracle we'll sing praises for (provided it miraculously retains that outbound vector.) 

Our next update will be MUCH shorter, and will contain about 1000% more details about the project itself. Thank you for your support! 

—Howard & Sandra

Planning for Pins
over 4 years ago – Sat, Nov 02, 2019 at 08:25:53 AM

Greetings Backers,

First of all, thank you so much for your support. It has been a huge encouragement to us. We're so grateful that we get to make this book and potentially some other cool things as well.

We've been heads-down working the past few days. Howard has been mostly making comics so the daily update of Schlock Mercenary is uninterrupted. However he did manage to knock out a couple of preliminary pin designs. We plan to do four pins once we hit the next stretch goal. Two of them will be Landon and Tenzy. These images are rough, we'll have to see what the pin company makes of them and potentially do a couple of rounds of readjustment. 

We're excited to get more designs done so that we can show them to you all.  As of this writing we're only about $5000 shy of hitting the goal to unlock these pins. Spread the word and help us make pins.

Thank you again for all your support.