cawatrooper

Sure. What I'm saying is that I can add money to the pledge manager later... I just wish that my contributions then could still help with the unlocks when the happen. Having everything locked down to this single month seems restrictive (though again, I'm sure there are logistical reasons for it). Glad to hear about Lost Tombs, though.

One thing I don't like about Kickstarter is how it isn't friendly to a budget. I bought in almost entirely in Bones V by the end, but I did so in the Pledge Manager over the months after the campaign ended, having only put in a dollar for my initial pledge. So, even though I heavily supported the project, my contributions did almost nothing for the campaign itself. Especially frustrating is stuff like Tomb of Hakir. I'd love to see an Egypt set... but if it's just gonna be full price for a third of the set, why back for that? I get that there are logistics that rely on this, but the fact remains that not all of us are able to drop hundreds all at once on something like this, especially in today's economy. I hope we see more stuff unlocked soon, because there are definitely some things in Bones 6 I'm still excited for... but man, maybe a different platform would be better for next time? Any thoughts on what could work better?

It's been far too long since I've made an update here, but we're in the endgame now. The heroes have returned to Chult, with support from Candle Keep, various Sword Coast mercenary guilds, and the defenders of Mezro to lay siege to Hisari. As the battle rages, they attempt to sneak into the Tower of Apotheosis on an island in the center of the city. There, the door to the final dungeon awaits. Probably one of our most extra sessions, including a Ren Faire-themed feast of smoked lamb and chicken, soft pretzels, cheesey potatoes, handpies, fresh squeezed lemonade, and home brewed mead.

Fair enough 😅 I'm sure me two years ago would've been right with ya, pitchfork in hand and a torch in the other.

I hope things pick up. I get why maybe things are pretty slow, though. We're still in a weird worldstate, and cash is tight for many people. Plus, shipping can be a nightmare, so people may still be a little cautious about that. And Bones V just came out less than a year ago- personally, I'm way behind on painting. I really have absolutely no need for more minis. That said... I wonder how much longer this will be a viable model? No doubt a lot of us will continue long with the hobby, but so far the Bones kickstarters have coincided with a huge surge in widespread interest in tabletop gaming. At this point, are people tending to get what they needed? I hate to be doom and gloom, but I know that even personally, my purchasing of minis has slowed down to just a fraction of what it once was, as my shelves fill up. Personally, what I'm most excited for are the encounters. Encounters are fun, they bring neat terrain, and they tell a bit of a story. They aren't just another big box of minis that I'll get around to painting in a few years. So, I really do hope things pick up, I love Reaper. But man, maybe the next Kickstarter (if there is one) should re-evaluate its strategy.

I'm still gluing stuff together... Painting this stuff is gonna take me all the way through my 30s 😆 Anyway, a couple minis I've grown to appreciate over my glue sprees the past few days Fantasy Dinos I was sort of excited for these, since they fit in well with the campaign I'm running, but man... they just exude personality when you have them in hand. Somehow, these anthropomorphic dinosaurs just perfectly embody the archetypes they were designed for, in a way that human minis often don't even manage to accomplish. And they're so cool- the wizard triceratops, a rogue raptor, a t-rex knight- all such cool choices! (The daimyo dinos are neat too, but these really just hit it out of the park for me) Arakoth Man, I didn't get the appeal of Arakoth- pretty much just got him to fill out the set. I have a billion spiders at this point, of varying size, shape, and player-inducing arachnaphobia. But Arakoth is the spider. This thing is huge, and at least in my experience, simply seeing it online doesn't do it justice. I think my players would die if I put this guy on the table. Players, not just their characters. Fire Giant Another one I really only got to be a completionist. And he's perhaps not as imposing as the storm giants, but he's just cool. He's a thicc boi, that's for sure. Crocasaurus Such a cool design. The base alone is neat, and the creature is cool, but what I think really does it for me is the swooping sort of pose it's in. Definitely makes me think I should run an underwater campaign sometime.

I'm still assembling stuff (and likely will be for a while!) but I'm really starting to like all the undead in these boxes. I'm running a lot of undead in my current campaign so I have a ton of them painted, but I just love the villager undead in core and dwarves from the crypt expansion. Seems like most undead are just armored human zombies/skeletons, so having more civilian-seeming undead and dwarves really helps give scope to my hordes, making them feel like part of a bigger world.

I can definitely see where you two are coming from, @veoviscool12 and @YronimosW! I feel like Dungeon Dwellers was, for lack of a better word, the least "shiny" of the expansions by a longshot. It contains a lot of stuff creatures and archetypes that many collectors (especially DM and GMs) will already have in spades. But there's just something really nice and classic about the contents here. Like, today I glued some stuff together, including the massive mamlord- way bigger than I expected! But realistically, I'll probably use him in game once or twice tops. And while I realize that's far from the true value a mini holds, I think there's a lot to say for how Dungeon Dwellers combines utility with its artful representations.

Just because I wanted "MOAR" but wasn't feeling creative enough to actually come up with examples the other day: A bit of natural terrain like trees and rocks would be great. As would campsites. The Yeti temple was neat, but a similar and more generic cave entrance would be a lot more versatile. Festival tents and market stalls/troughs. Farm stuff- fencing, hay bales, maybe even some rows of crop. Town square fare- sign posts, job boards, town crier platforms or stages (in fact, an encounter with a traveling theater troupe would be fantastic!) A smaller wooden bridge. Statues and fountains. Hear me out- city walls. Now, I do have my own that I've made, but Reaper could make a pretty fantastic wall/gate/tower set.

After Bones V, I'd love to see Reaper branch out even more into terrain. They make great stuff!

Definitely agreed about the terrain for Shadows of Ravenhome and Brinewind Extras. Really, all the terrain in general. As someone who's just stuck his feet into crafting some rough larger scale terrain (city walls, barricades, big blocks for a configurable tower, etc), having these smaller accent pieces will really up my game. @YronimosW Dungeon Dwellers was pretty neat! I may definitely had a big smile on my face when I pulled out that owlbear (even though I already have the Wizkids one and three 3D printed ones).

Having just gotten my box recently, I've noticed there are a lot of minis that I wasn't particularly excited about in the Pledge Manager that really make an impression in person. I'm still working on the odyssey of assembling/gluing so I haven't seen half of the stuff yet anyway, but I've already noticed some minis that really stick out to me. Numbered for simplicity, but in no particular order: 1. Valfuryx I got all the dragons, but was easily most excited for Shav (and am impressed with her as well!). But Valfuryx was one I really just got to complete the set- but on seeing it in person, it's my second favorite right behind Shav! Love just how big and chunky this dragon is- definitely not quite how I had pictured it, but in a good way! 2. Yog Sothoth I'm a big Cosmic Horror/Lovecraft fan, but I figured Yog would be more of an underwhelming mini along the lines of Kaiju Chaos (probably just because of how close they were in the PM). Happy to see this wasn't the case at all! Yog Sothoth is much more imposing than I expected, and will make for a great final encounter in my current 5E campaign as the villain attempts his apotheosis to "godhood". 3. Ape Temple I was really excited for all the terrain, but I had assumed this temple would be kind of a flimsy facade. Turns out, it's a solid, thick hunk of plastic! Obviously it's still a facade (I assume it would be... difficult... to sculpt an entire dungeon out of a single piece of plastic 😆) but it will make for a great set piece for an encounter before entering a jungle or mountain dungeon. I'm sure I'll add to this as I continue to glue (didn't have much time this weekend as I was moving into our new house and building a fence) but I'd also love to know what your sleeper hits are! What stuff did you end up liking far more than anticipated?

I'm in pre-shipment, with estimated delivery date of Friday. Wave 5, US, with many of the problematic items (not the busts). Shipping email went out at about 10:30 central time.

Man, I gotta say, these past few weeks have not been good for someone with my anxiety. Not to get too personal, but we put in an offer on a house in April and are still waiting. Our original closing date was in June, but things happened and it was moved back to a week ago. That obviously was delayed too, and now it's tomorrow- but it looks like it'll get delayed again (and to top it all off, the bank's communication on these delays has been absolutely abysmal, it's like I'm dealing with three toddlers in a trenchcoat). Between that and this Bones V massive delay... man, I just really could use a win soon. Every day feels like a hidden camera show, where someone will walk out and explain that this has all just been a joke. I get that everyone is doing the best they can in a pretty unprecedented climate, but I really hope good things start happening soon.

Wave 5 for me. I had Shav, rune wights, and dragonfolk. United States, no word yet.

I wonder if the eventual driver of this crate's truck has any idea how highly anticipated his work is today, and how many people will be grateful on a safe and speedy delivery 🤣

We've pretty much returned to normal here. There's some talk about going to a part time work from home situation permanently, but honestly I'm fine with it either way. I do think the mask mandate will and should probably return soon given the variants that have started to pop up (and we have had local cases of those now too), but I honestly kinda hated working from home.

Been busy preparing to move soon, but we've had a few more sessions the past few weeks. Note that these sessions include some heavily adapted takes on the Divine Contention module, so be warned for potential spoilers. The players finished the Tome of Zikran interlude, and have returned to playing as their main characters who were on a boat en route to the sword coast, when they ran into some serpentine entanglements. They luckily made it to Candle Keep, though, where the Arch Magus informed them that the town of Elturel was in danger of being overrun, and that a wizard there was in the process from retrieving an artifact from it. If the Bloody Baron (the barae Dhalmass) were to take the city before the artifact was retrieved, it could spell incalcuable disaster. The players traveled to Elturel and explored the city a bit . They found the wizard, but he was busy preparing for the ritual. So, they took a job looking for the Sarnath Grenade, supposedly to be handed over by gnomes from a village of the same name. This weapon might turn the tide, if the Bloody Baron's undead and Cormyrian mercenaries were indeed on their way to Elturel. The heroes met the gnomes in Dumathoin's Gulch, where this plane's version of the Ulthar Cat actually revealed themselves to be a woman (and in fact this was before Loki aired, though the mechanics of how this is the case aren't quite the same). They fought off some scary undead at the gulch and retrieved the Sarnath grenade. The uneven terrain proved difficult, but the heroes prevailed in the end and saved all three gnomes. (For reference, I keep track of everything in game on a real calendar, and the fight in the gulch happened just a few hours after Sledge and company fought Zikran in the mountains). Upon returning to town, the militia leader Hazz Yorum offered a pittance of a reward for the grenade, so Bravura used some amnesia powder he'd crafted back at the Nyanzaru Port Festival on him and the heroes kept the grenade for themselves. As Gallileo (the wizard in Elturel) still was not ready for them, the heroes planned on heading back down river to Baldur's Gate to petition shipping magnate Ulricio Peppi to send reinforcements to the town, to protect his own business interests.

Possible. Shame, I can't even regret getting that dragon- it's one of the pieces I'm looking most forward to out of the whole thing.

Definitely possible, though it does seem like a ton of stuff isn't shipped yet.

y'all gotta post the waves you're in 😅

Woo, apparently the container should be in Dallas by Saturday. Finally, light at the end of the tunnel!

1. Significantly cut down on my alcohol consumption (almost every night to less than once a week) 2. Started running again 3. Scheduled to close on my first place as a homeowner this month

From this afternoon's update: I'm glad that it sounds like there's a plan, maybe. I do wish we had some idea on an ETA, but can totally understand why at this point it's probably best to avoid underpromising and under-delivering again.

edit: whoops, posted in the wrong thread