Kickstarter

I know. I just told you you'd not need to hear from me again, and mere minutes later, I'm back. But I don't think you'll mind too much. It's just that I forgot to mention that Octarine PennyGems are now available in my Etsy store. One last gift from me to you: 10% off anything in my store. Just use coupon code THANKSKS1 when you make your purchase. You can share that code with friends, too. However, the code expires when my next Kickstarter campaign launches, so don't wait too long.  

Wow. In my update of June 12, I said that I thought that would have been the last update, but the pile of little odds and ends was bigger than I expected, so it would be the next to last instead. I certainly didn't expect it to take this long to take care of what was left! Just goes to show. 

However, this is, in fact, the Last Update I will be posting. Every single backer in my database has received from me either a shipment of PennyGems or, in a few remaining cases, email messages from me begging for some key bit of information required in order to send them whatever's waiting to go out to them. If there's anybody left who has neither of these, please let me know!

So, what happens next? Well, as always, anything that hasn't already happened is Subject To Change Without Notice, but I think there's a very good chance sometime in the second week of July I'll be launching another Kickstarter project: "PennyGems II: A Pale Imitation" This will be the inaugural launch of the Auxiliary Set, aka "Pastel PennyGems". In the end, as I expected, it just wasn't possible to make all eight colors lighter versions of the existing set. I mean, what does it even mean to talk about pastel white, eh? On the other hand, a fair number of games have gray or brown tokens, so the Auxiliary Set has gray (paired with white), pastel versions of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple, and brown (paired with black). 

PennyGems II will be simpler and shorter. I expect it will be open for just two weeks, and have fewer reward levels. Expect to see rewards along the lines of "2 sheets," "4 sheets," "8 sheets", and then backers will be able to choose how many of which kind they'd like, so somebody selecting "8 sheets" could get two sheets of Auxiliary Gems and six sheets of Primary Gems (the original jeweltone version that y'all have).  

Note: because the Primary Set is also for sale from my web store, and is slightly more expensive there than it was through the Kickstarter project, during this next project, orders that arrive via the web store will be filled first. The Auxiliary Set will not go on sale on the web store until all Kickstarter orders are filled, but somebody ordering the Primary Set will get that order filled right away.  This shouldn't have too much effect on the rate at which Kickstarter orders are filled, but I didn't want anybody surprised by that policy. 

Those of you who said "Yes, put me on your mailing list" to the survey will get an email message just before PennyGems II goes live, so you'll have a chance to be at the front of the line for fulfillment if you like. Those of you who said "no" might be thankful that you'll once again have an Improbable-Objects-free email inbox. If not, just keep an eye on Kickstarter, or the ImpObj.com web site. 

There are now about 75,000 more PennyGems out in the world than there were two months ago. I gotta admit, I think that's pretty darn cool. So, thank you. Thanks for backing my project, thanks for your comments and feedback, for your enthusiasm and encouragement, and for your patience. It's been fun; let's do it again some time. 

—Dave Howell, Art. Eng.

proprietor, 

Curses! My spy network is supposed to be working for me, not against me! I forgot to tell Julia not to share details about one of the things I showed her, and then Aaron goes and puts a big blinking arrow on the wall next to her photograph, and the next thing you know, cats are exiting bags at high velocities.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/1338498/juliaz

So, anyway, yes, it's true. Over a month ago, while the Kickstarter campaign was still running, Mike Monical asked about PennyGems for 18xx-class railroad games. Except that pennies are too big. Yea, and dimes aren't really all that much smaller. Although #10 washers cost a lot more than a penny each, they are about 12mm in diameter, so Mike and I are testing out cute little mini-Gems to see if they'll be the major upgrade from cardboard chits that we're anticipating. 

We're hoping to have a few sets ready for the Portland Oregon West Coast 18xx
Game Convention later this month. He'll certainly have some prototypes. If we're lucky, he'll have a couple of complete sets for people to play with, and if we're really lucky, he might even have some sets for sale. However, many details still need to be worked out, so I definitely can't tell you when they'll go on sale, or how much they'll cost, or nothin' else, yet. For at least the rest of this month, further news about this product will be coming from Mike, not me. 

I think it's very likely that this will be the next-to-last update for the PennyGems project. The two-inch stack of crema marble paper packing slips is gone. The stack of octarine PennyGems; almost none are left. I had to buy two more boxes of pennies at the bank today; as can be seen on the main project page, somebody backed me at the "Breakfast at Tiffany's" level on the last day, and, since it's an international backer, that meant shipping 48 rolls of pennies along with a monumental stack of PennyGem sheets. 

I thought this would be the actual last update, but after boxing up the very last 'regular' order, I sat down to work on the problems, glitches, and anomalies, and there are still a fair number of those. I decided that I'd earned a chance to relax, so I'm going to try to take care of the rest of the unfilled orders by the end of the week, instead of in the next day or two. This includes sending email to the people who didn't select a reward; I'd still like to send them a Token of Appreciation, but I have to email them directly for their mailing address, since Kickstarter won't let me survey somebody unless they picked a reward. {shrug}

I've also filled almost all of the post-Kickstarter orders that were placed through my Etsy store.

My other main "To Do" this week is do the necessary photography to be able to place the new PennyGem family products up for sale. Two products are ready to go, a third is pretty close, and a fourth will be out in about a month. The  fifth and sixth ones are further out. (My impatient friend/impromptu focus-group victim Julia didn't get any news about item #6, ha ha.)

So, as already mentioned in a comment, the next item up is going to be Pastel PennyGems (assuming I can find a workable color for 'pastel black'). This companion set of eight variant colors also features icons that are similar but not identical to the icons of their jewel-tone counterparts. While I would never discourage anybody from getting as many as they like, my expectation is that somebody wanting a really all-purpose set of PennyGems would want to get a Full Spectrum of the 'regular' Gems (40 of each color) and Rainbow of the pastels (10 of each color). That ought to cover the overwhelming majority of occasions. 

Some backers have suggested that it would be nice to have some extra-large PennyGems, perhaps just to carry around in your pocket and rub now and then ("worry stones"). A more functional purpose occurred to me, so the second new product is going to be JumboGems. They'll just come in one flavor, so to speak, like the Kickstarter "Sampler" for regular PennyGems: sixteen labels, one each blank and iconic for the eight colors, but sized to fit perfectly onto a quarter. They should make excellent "I am the Green/Purple/Red player" markers. They also sit nicely on 1" fender washers. 

Okay, well, actually, there will probably be two JumboGem packages. Something else I discovered recently is that I can order token blanks from the people who manufacture tokens like those used at some video arcades. Most of the ones I've actually seen out in the wild were brass, but it turns out that it's also possible to get . . . copper-plated zinc tokens! In other words, a flat metal disc that looks like a penny, but the size of a quarter. How perfect is that? So I'm hoping to have JumboGems as "labels only" or "with copper token blanks." Plus the pastel equivalents.

I'll cover the last impending product in the next (and last) Update, along with what my next Kickstarter project will probably be, and my next PennyGem Kickstarter project. 

Anybody who doesn't already have their PennyGems, hasn't gotten an email saying that they've shipped, and doesn't get an email from me in the next two days, should contact me, because next week I expect to be able to focus on finishing up the backers who selected customized PennyGems for their reward, and getting the new products onto my shelves. 

And thank you for making my first Kickstarter project a successful and unexpectedly interesting one. I had no idea that I was going to have a whole line of PennyGem products. 

Percentage of Orders Shipped:79%

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!........ (each step = 10 backers)

Percentage of Sheets Shipped:77%

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!........ (each step = 50 sheets)

This batch was mostly Color of Magic orders, with a lot of them international shipments. I know that USPS has made filling out the customs forms astonishingly streamlined: it's still a pain in the [anonymous body part]. I sent packages to Finland, Denmark, and Norway, as well as Australia, Russia, and Japan. Fun!

420 sheets to go. Printing more tomorrow....