Does your inbox fill up every Tuesday with Kickstarter emails? Well, mine does - so I decided to start writing my thoughts on new tabletop gaming Kickstarters every Wednesday. Keep in mind, most of these are based on initial impressions and looking at the Kickstarter video.

The dice are mightier than the sword (and the pen), more wooden birds for your Wingspan, and I have no explanation for the last one on this list. It's time to dive into some crowdfunding!

Zòku

This campaign is certainly unique. The game referenced by the title, Zoku, is described in just one paragraph and a video. Apparently it is a simple card game where you are a type of clique in school and you want to gather others in your clique and push out the rest. But, the rest of the campaign page is devoted to all the other games that this designer has put out. Instead of being a campaign for getting one game produced, it comes off as the designer just trying to get enough interest in all of his games to get another wave of them produced.

But this isn't the designer's first time around the block, either. All of those other games were campaigns on Kickstarter. The designer has had a total of 41 campaigns fund on Kickstarter. So clearly this tactic is working. With a delivery of June 2022, that makes it an exceptionally fast turnaround as well. I'd call BS, but as I mentioned, he's done this before. Very likely, these games are print on demand, so easy for them to get them sent out quickly. I love the artwork of these games, but having so many games in such a short time period makes me wonder how much effort is put into each individual game.

25 Painted Bird Meeples from Around the World, for Wingspan!

When I saw the title and picture for this campaign, my first thought was "But why would I get those, when I already have the awesome Meeple Source ones?" Then I realized this *was* Meeple Source, with a campaign to bring in 25 new bird species to their lineup. My wife and I have a ton of these meeples. Wingspan is one of our favorite games to play together, and I think the tokens are probably a good reason why that is the case. So of course I had to feature their campaign here.

One nit pick that I have is the way they are going about running the rewards for their campaign. Now, I have no experience with running a Kickstarter, but I've definitely filled out my share of pledge managers. Meeple Source is avoiding using a pledge manager, instead having you fill out what you want through addons. Or, you can pay $248 to go all in and get everything. Which is probably the benefit of this campaign. With this many options though, it just seems like a logistical nightmare not using some kind of tool to keep track of what people want and how many to create of what options. The plus side is that these are expected for August 2022, so if that happens it won't be long before you get to use these in your Wingspan games. Personally, I might wait and see if they have some of these at Gen Con this year…

Thunderstone Quest Deepwood Defenders from AEG

Not only can you file this game in the "I'm getting emails from all my friends backing it" category, but you could also put this in what I'm calling the "Washington Post" category. In order words, if you get it - you get it (the Post's tagline is 'if you don't get it, you don't get it). More than likely, if you are going to get this expansion for this game, you've already backed this game. You don't even need to read the text or watch the video to know if you want it, just the fact that there's an expansion for Thunderstone Quest is probably enough of a selling point.

I've never played Thunderstone Quest, so clearly this campaign is not for me. Although apparently, I could jump into the game if I wanted to by buying the Starter Set for $50. That is what I would expect a game like this to cost. Yet, I'm not going to back a game like this on Kickstarter when I can so easily go and try it out from someone first to see if I like it. Actually, I was kind of surprised that they were still even making expansions for this game - someone message me and let me know what about this game keeps you buying expansions.

Cutting Words: Literary Inspired Sharp Edge 14pc Dice Sets

The concept of this one really got me curious - what are dice that are "literary inspired" look like? No video to show off the dice, but there are plenty of pictures. Apparently the "literary inspired" means that the name of the dice are based off of classic novels. Then, the colors used in the dice are taken from the themes of those books. That is slightly disappointing, but the dice look GORGEOUS!

However, I see a few warning signs with this campaign. This is the first campaign for this creator, which I usually take to mean that their estimated delivery is out to lunch. Here, they have a date of December 2023, so that's probably realistic enough. Also, they talk about how the dice are coming in "display boxes", but I think the display boxes look so very cheap. They look like cheap cardboard boxes with a clear plastic screen in the front. If I am paying $60+ for high quality looking dice, the last thing I want to do is show them off in this shoddy looking box. I've seen far better looking cases from other companies that have dice at around the same price point.

Blackthorn Faeries - STL

What the heck? I'm going to get the one good thing I have to say about this campaign out of the way - its cheap? Imagine my surprise when I'm scrolling down the page on Kickstarter and I see nude fairies staring at me. I had to explain to my family in the living room why they were on my laptop screen. There isn't a picture with the name of the campaign on it because I couldn't find a good shot that didn't include fairy boobs in it.

It's advertised for being used in board games, but these are poses and busts (literally) that I couldn't see being used in any actual game. This also isn't something based in an established gaming property, like "the art of blah blah blah". So why the heck is this in the tabletop gaming section? The weird part is that when you scroll down to the designer's other works, there are some more models that seem more "appropriate" for board games. To me, it seems like the designer went "yeah but I'd really like to see them without clothes on…" If you like your naked ladies a little bit more magical, cool whatever. Just don't try and convince me this is for "gaming".

Note: I generally assume I know nothing. So if I've missed something, let me know in the comments. Or let me know on Twitter or Facebook. If you like these types of posts, consider subscribing to our patreon.