WE DID IT! 195k+ raised for Starlight Arcana!
about 2 years ago
– Mon, Oct 03, 2022 at 04:58:46 AM
WE DID IT! We managed to do so much more than we ever expected!
For this SUPER SPECIAL occasion, I was able to get Alya to say a few words...
Hello there!
My dear friends... WE MADE IT!
Starlight Arcana is not only funded but with your help, we reached almost two hundred thousand euro for making the book!
Kelfecil asked me to tell you a personal thank you and say what wonderful human beings all of you are for your amazings support and lovely feedback!
We will continue to keep you updated with everything that is to come from now on with at least one update every one or two weeks.
Development process updates, sneak peeks for the content being prepared and so much more!
Once again, thank you my dear friends. We really DID reach the stars, together.
Thank you. Thank you so much.
~Alya
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Thank you so much once again and I am honestly sorry but I cannot stop saying thank you after all of this. It is surreal how a small creator like myself was able to find an audience and be able to reach all of you to show you all of the hard work that I have been putting together along with my close collaborators.
You can expect from here onwards:
- Updates on the Pledge Manager stage that is to come later
- Updates on the development process and sneak peeks every one or two weeks
- Other important news that may be relevant to Starlight Arcana!
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May Starlight guide your way now and forever more my friends...
~Kelf
165k+ Reached! + Pledge Manager Info!
about 2 years ago
– Sun, Oct 02, 2022 at 09:33:43 AM
Hey star catchers!
We reached 165k+ and we only have 2 days left before the end of the campaign! There is so much to talk about, so let's go through everything one by one.
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Live Q&A video!
The Live Q&A event on Twitch was super fun and I would like to say thank you once again to everyone that was able to make it and for all of your fantastic questions. I absolutely love hanging out sometimes with people that love TTRPGs as much as I do and just talking about things and the Live Q&A was exactly that.
If you missed the stream, then you can watch the past broadcast here:
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160k Stretch Goal - Minor Arcana UNLOCKED!
We heard you loud and clear from the very first day of the campaign, you wanted to have Minor Arcana in the tarot deck and so we decided to add them after all!
With this stretch goal unlocked, x56 Minor Arcana cards will be added to every Tarot deck without any extra cost for backers! That means that if you have the Tarot Deck as part of your pledge tier rewards or if you have added as an add-on, it has no been upgraded to contain the Minor Arcana cards as well.
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Shipping Estimates - Cheaper?!
This is something that we weren't too sure about sharing too early in the campaign because we didn't want people to be confused. This feels like a good moment to share it though and actually ease your mind a bit in regards to shipping costs.
The estimates that you see on the shipping table on the campaign's page are simply just that; estimates. For example, the shipping costs for Europe could be much higher than how much it shipping will cost for you if you are in Poland or Germany which are some of the more "central" countries.
The reason why the estimates are higher than what shipping will be for most places is because we needed to make safe estimates and that meant taking into account also some of the more "extreme" cases with countries that are much farther than the rest.
We know that a lot of other creators go as far as to indicate more specific prices for shipping in various smaller areas (such as Europe 1, Europe 2, etc.) but for our project, since it is our very first one, we wanted to be as safe as possible by providing an estimate to begin with and no sudden higher cost surprises later.
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Pledge Manager Stage - Some Early Information
If you have pledged for any tier whatsoever during the Kickstarter campaign, then you will have access to the pledge manager in a few months when we are ready to open it. This could be earlier than January actually and it will remain open for a few of months before we finalize everything and start fulfilling orders.
The main thing that you need to know is that when the Pledge Manager opens, you will be able to finalize your order without being charged for shipping yet.
This is a new feature that BackerKit has introduced for their Pledge Manager and it helps us prepare the fulfillment stage that will come later on when we reinvite you to finalize your payments and pay for shipping.
So to sum it up, this is how it will go:
- January or a bit earlier, Pledge Manager will open.
- You will be able to purchase add-ons and finalize your final order.
- Pledge Manager will stay open for a couple of months.
- You will NOT be charged for shipping yet.
- You will be asked to pay for shipping later when fulfillment is ready to start.
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Pre-Order Store
If you missed your chance to back Starlight Arcana during the Kickstarter campaign, then you will still have a chance to pre-order the book on our Pre-Order website right after the campaign ends!
The Pre-Order store will have most of the things that are available in the pledge tiers (with the exception of the GM screen and the Art Prints) at a slightly higher price. This increased price is still cheaper than what the actual cost of each product is but more expensive than the prices available during the live Kickstarter campaign because we want our Kickstarter backers to really get the best deal possible for supporting our project while it is live.
There will be a link posted for the Pre-Order store once the campaign is finished and you will also be able to find it quite easily since we will have links leading to it in various places.
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A New Add-On
During the Pledge Manager stage, you will be able to purchase the Designer's Commentary for only 5 EUR!
I decided to make this after all just because I thought it would be a really special and fun addition. For a very small price, you will have access to a write-up and a few accompanying videos that I will personally create. The commentary will basically be explanations of the inspirations, the though process, and a lot of other things that went into making Starlight Arcana.
I honestly cannot wait to make this and I hope you will enjoy it going through it as much as I will enjoy creating it!
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Final Stretch Goal?
We were thinking about adding just one more Stretch Goal, but we would love to hear your feedback about what that could be. We have a few ideas ourselves, but we thought it'd be best if we ask you first!
We don't know if we will be able to reach it, but it would be a pity not to add something extra at this point.
If we hit 200k we will unlock... LEAVE A COMMENT WITH A SUGGESTION!
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Kickstarter Friends
When I first started as a creator, I honestly knew very few people in the field, and considering how over-saturated the field already was, it was super difficult (and still is) to really get your name out there.
Tom Cartos, one of the veteran creators in the field, was one of the very few people who despite not even knowing me that well, actually posted about me on his Patreon a couple of times over the last year. I am very honored today to finally be able to return that favor and actually tell people about his upcoming Kickstarter project.
Tom Cartos is soon launching his very first Kickstarter, ‘Into the Wilds Battlemap Books’!
Into the Wilds is a collection of 6 fully customisable, biome and region themed battlemap books for your favourite TTRPG. They are ideal for pre-set or random encounters out in the wilderness, so you can be fully prepared no matter which direction your players choose to head in.
The Kickstarter will include a ton of maps with a lot of fantastic little things that make this project one that you should definitely follow and check out once it's live.
You can follow the Kickstarter campaign here!
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That's it for today! I will definitely publish one more update before the end of the campaign and a lot more after the campaign is finished. I still want to reveal some more content and there is a good chance I will be running more streams since the last one was so much fun!
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Till the next update...
May Starlight guide your way my friends!
~Kelf
We are LIVE on Twitch for the Q&A!
about 2 years ago
– Thu, Sep 29, 2022 at 07:40:45 PM
Hey everyone!
We are now live and will be for the next 2 hours, answering all of your questions about Starlight Arcana and anything else you might want to ask. Come join us or just pass by to say hi!
The stream will last about 2 hours and we will also upload it on YouTube for everyone who missed it.
See you there!
~Kelf
145k + Live Q&A + New Unlocks!
about 2 years ago
– Thu, Sep 29, 2022 at 02:52:00 AM
Hey star prospectors!
145k and not stopping! We unlocked quite a few things over the past week, so I wanted to wait a little bit and publish an update that would have everything all together. I also took a bit of time to relax but have been trying my best to stay as active as possible, answering all of your questions as soon as I possibly could!
Before we move on to Stretch Goals and Social Stretch Goal Unlocks, I got a little bit of a bonus for you.
(Click on the image to download it!)
The researchers of the Cosmo Observatorium have been hard at work investigating various incidents that have been happening lately with the stars. Things have gone awfully wrong though and the ambitious researchers are now in trouble.
For this one, we had the beautiful maps of Natwuns (who is also helping us with shipping & fulfillment on the project!) and the amazing monster artwork of Printable Heroes. There is also a void monster in there made by our very own Dusky Cat.
This is the 5th (and last one) in the line of free promotional adventures we have released to celebrate the Starlight Arcana campaign. Check out the rest here.
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Live Q&A tomorrow!
You have all been absolutely lovely and fully engaged with our project and since so many of you have been asking so many awesome questions, I figured it would be cool if we hosted a LIVE Q&A over on my Twitch channel!
Event: LIVE Q&A with Kelfecil
When: Thursday 29th of September - 20:00 CEST / 14:00 EDT
Where: On Kelfecil's Twitch Channel
How long: 1 to 2 hours long
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So, let's talk about unlocks now!
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130k - Alchemy UNLOCKED!
We reached 130k a couple of days ago and with that, we unlocked the Alchemy VTT integration! That means that Starlight Arcana will be made as a module on the Alchemy platform. We talked about Alchemy quite a bit in the previous update so if you missed that, you should definitely check it out so that you know why being part of the Alchemy family is such a big deal for Kelfecil's Tales.
TL;DR is that Alchemy is the next big thing in playing TTRPGs online and their approach to how TTRPGs can be played online as well as their attention to quality is something that I strongly relate to and that is why I am so happy to be able to start publishing Kelfecil's Tales content on there.
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Next Stretch Goal - 160k - Minor Arcana!
At this point, it's quite certain we will be reaching this goal, so you can all already start rejoicing in the fact that all Tarot Decks will be upgraded to contain both the Major and Minor arcana in them (without any extra costs for backers!)
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I will be mentioning this in tomorrow's Q&A as well if there are any relevant questions but I wanted to explain it in an update as well. I was going to make a poll and see if people are interested in a "Designer's Commentary" add-on that would be sold separately with the book, explaining all of my design thoughts and processes. I decided, however, to make it anyway because I received a few messages from people saying that they loved the idea and that they would really like to read and/or listen to me ramble on with the making of Starlight Arcana thoughts and process.
As I explained in the previous update, this is something that I haven't seen anyone else do (with the exception of Matthew Colville I guess, who explains a bit of his thought process through his occassional streams) so I really wanted to add something extra and a bit different to the whole mix. There are GMs and even aspiring publishers and designers out there who want to take their games and products to a whole new level and if I can help inspire that even in the slightest bit with my own comments on design, I will gladly spend some time to create a designer's commentary.
It will be added as an extra add-on during the Pledge Manager stage after the campaign for a cheap price. I hope it will bring a bit of value and fun to GMs and designers out there.
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Social Stretch Goal Unlocks!
(Link to Social Stretch Goals and Unlocks)
+100 Followers on Instagram - Alya's Portrait
(Artwork by S1lver_Shark)
Alya Starseeker, an astromancer, the protagonist of the Starlight Campaign story and the most curious tiefling you will ever meet! Alya was the very first character I designed for Starlight Arcana, when the idea to make a book was not even fully formed yet!
I always wanted Alya to be quirky, smart and ambitious. I really wanted the story to have a very strong female NPC lead and even though the players are the real protagonists of the campaign story, Alya is there to help the party discover every corner of the galaxy as her curiosity is unending!
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x35 Shares on Facebook - Sea of Stars Lore!
More on this in the next update... because it'll be quite the write-up!
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+10 Patrons - 3 Spells added to the book!
x5 Photos of your favorite Stars/Constellations
We have combined those stretch goals to add x3 HIGH LEVEL STARLIGHT SPELLS!
The following spells will be added to the book:
✦ Empyrean Distortion
Channel the heat of Ukko's sun in such magnitude that reality around you distorts as it burns due to the extreme magical heat produced.
✦ Deform the Cosmos
A spell so powerful that allows you to deform your surroundings into something twisted. Or, alternatively, you could just create a vacuum.
✦ Infinite Warp
Influencing the flow of time is extremely difficult. Infinitely looping it into a twisted version of itself is even more difficult, but not impossible.
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Kickstarter Friends
Out of the many creators that are running projects out there, there were a few that really made an impression on me and one of them was Jason from Earl of Fife games.
Jason talked to me about his project and I was immediately hooked. I am a huge advocate of trying out different TTRPGs because no matter what your favorite system and/or setting may be, playing a different one can always help with inspiring you to make different design and even playing decisions in other games.
Heroes & Hardships is a universal roleplaying game that allows gamemasters to craft any story they desire. Heroes & Hardships contains many options to facilitate diverse styles and genres of play; GMs can easily create standard fantasy, sci-fi, modern, historical, and super hero games. And of course, feel free to readily mix and match all of these genres in any way they see fit.
Jason is launching his project very soon on Kickstarter so definitely give it a quick follow if you wanna be notified when it launches!
The project is launching on the 4th of October!
I am a big fan of simple-and-to-the-point systems and Heroes & Hardships felt exactly like that kind of system after giving the preview PDF a quick read. If anything, it felt more like a board game than hardcore math (which we know other systems can end up feeling like sometimes).
I am also a big fan of the fact that the system allows you to play in any kind of setting you want without any limitations. I like not having to overthink certain things when I want to go from a fantasy setting to a sci-fi one.
If you would like to get an early look at what it's going to be like, you can have a look at the preview PDF which Jason has generously allowed us to show!
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Till the next update...
May Starlight guide your way my friends!
~Kelf
New Stretch Goals + Feedback!
about 2 years ago
– Fri, Sep 23, 2022 at 07:05:53 AM
Hey astral crewmates!
120k+ reached and we are not stopping. Absolutely amazing and I am at a loss for words at this point because I feel like I'm just repeating myself.
As Alya would say: "ANYWAY...STARS!"
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Next Stretch Goal - 130k - Alchemy VTT
Alchemy VTTis a VTT that I have had my eyes on ever since it started. From the very first moments I spent looking into it, it felt like the kind of VTT I always wanted as a GM and as a player. Focus on the game and not the number crunching parts of it all.
I reached out to Chris and his team and they were super friendly and helpful with onboarding a new creator to the platform. Unfortunately, due to the fact that it is a new VTT, they were still very busy jumpstarting the whole thing so it was still going to take a while before I would start having Kelfecil's Tales content on there.
When I saw one of my favorite RPGs, Symbaroum, getting ported to Alchemy, I just knew I had to get involved. As luck would have it, Starlight Arcana has been doing so well that it attracted the attention of many people, including that of the people from Alchemy! (A huge thanks to the awesome people of Nord Games for making that connection once again by the way.)
They reached out to me once more and told me that it would be great to have our starlit tome on the platform along with other Kelfecil's Tales content. After a bit of back and forth, we got an agreement and I am now part of the Alchemy family!
What does this mean for Backers?
The Alchemy VTT version of the book will be available at a special discounted price while the Starlight Arcana KS campaign is still running and the same price will be offered during the pledge manager stage as well to all backers.
If you haven't backed the KS campaign and do not have access to the pledge manager, then you will be able to buy the Alchemy VTT module for Starlight Arcana for its normal price later.
We haven't yet finalized the prices yet so you can expect an update on that in a day or two.
What does this mean for Kelfecil's Tales?
You can expect to see a lot of new Kelfecil's Tales content on the Alchemy VTT marketplace and more importantly, you can expect to see a lot of the older content reworked in a way to match the quality that we have right now with Starlight Arcana and also to match the quality that Alchemy VTT is known for.
Having spent more than a year refining the quality of the Kelfecil's Tales products has been amazing but that also means that some of the older adventures for example are not as "good looking" as the ones we are releasing now. We will be reworking some of them in order to put them on the Alchemy VTT marketplace.
The setting content that will be available on Alchemy VTT will not be of the same amount as the interactive website that I mentioned in one of the previous updates but it will contain all of the information, that is within the modules you have purchased, nicely organized into various sections (as it usually is structured on Alchemy VTT).
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Future Stretch Goal - 160k - Minor Arcana!
We heard you loud and clear. You want more Tarot cards, so we will make MORE tarot cards!
Not only that, but anyone who is receiving a tarot deck (either through pledge rewards or as an add-on) will have the minor arcana added to their deck without any extra cost.
I really wanted to add something as a physical bonus for backers of the project, something that would come at no extra cost, but as you can imagine, it is really difficult to do that when you are a small company and you are trying to calculate costs in a way that it would make sense for you to do something like that.
Well, we have been making calculations for this ever since the first time we read a request for adding the minor arcana in there.
Disclaimer on Art
While we would absolutely love to make an original art piece for each and every one of those 56 cards, this is somewhat impossible. I could easily sit down and organize the whole thing in just a couple of days (this is what I do best after all) and have over 20 artists commissioned to have it done in no more than 2 months, but the problem is that we want to have:
- Consistent art style on the entire tarot cards line
- A consistent line of detail on all cards
- A reasonable amount of time to prepare each and everything that we aim to deliver
So with all of these things in mind, we would rather not risk making it look any less good than what we want it to look and also Dusky Cat, our lead illustrator who is making all of the tarot cards artwork, is in no way going to be able to deliver so many illustrations in the amount of time we have set for it.
How it is going to work and look
What we did do, however, is organize the work in such a way that we can deliver something a bit simpler but also in line with the look of the major arcana cards' art style. We will be using swords, clubs, pentacles and cups for the minor arcana and they will be illustrated in a way that some of the artworks will be used in multiple copies of the cards with artwork being multiplied (two of swords has two swords, three of swords has the same swords but three of them, etc.). We will, however, most probably use unique artwork for the Aces of each category.
You can be absolutely certain that we will make sure they still look amazing and worthy of playing games with or even displaying.
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Feedback and Polls
After the campaign is over and once we get to the point of developing the artwork for the minor arcana tarot cards, I will be posting updates for all backers to be able to vote on what they prefer in terms of look and design. So make sure you check out the future updates because they will be filled with all sorts of awesome sneak peeks on production and also with polls that will give you the ability to influence the look of the final product.
Feedback so far
I just wanted to say a quick thank you once again for all of your feedback, your questions and everything else you have been sharing with us. It has greatly helped us steer the project in a way that it makes more sense for both our backers and ourselves as creators. Please do not stop sending us any feedback you might have.
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Kickstarter Friends
I already said a few good words about Alchemy VTT so it would be remiss of me not to mention that the good folks over at Alchemy are currently also running their own Kickstarter project right now!
I've mentioned it tons of times before and I will say it once again that if you have been reading any of the updates we have released so far you are well aware of how serious I am about narrative and game design in things I create as well as in things I support and spend time on.
Alchemy has a team of very many talented writers and artists that are creating a very engaging narrative which is delivered in different chapters. This Kickstarter project, Dark Symmetry is one of those chapters in their running story, the Lore of Aetherra.
What is Dark Symmetry?
Dark Symmetry is the next installment in the Lore of Aetherra saga, dedicated to exploring the underwater city of Chrysalea and its technological mystery. A 300+ page campaign setting and adventure, your party can continue the Lore of Aetherra saga or start fresh and uncover the mysteries of Chrysalea on your own.
If you are curious about what about the Lore of Aetherra is then you can access the Novarail adventure for free on the Alchemy VTT marketplace. You get to also experience it on the awesome Alchemy VTT platform so two birds with one stone!
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The attention to detail with Alchemy's content is fantastic and maybe even comparable to that of Starlight Arcana!!!
Silly comments aside, I am really honored to be engaging with various amazing creators in the TTRPG field and it is immensely inspiring to see what talented people are creating. It really pushes myself as a creator to only create even cooler and more groundbreaking content.
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What's Next?
We have only a few Social Stretch Goals left to unlock, so make sure you check those out and help us unlock them if you feel like doing a little bit of sharing for our project!
Other than that, you can expect a lot of updates with more details on what is in the book. Things like various game design elements, concept artwork, narrative design related stuff and other things.
One more stretch goal?
There is one more stretch goal that I am considering adding but that will have to be for when we hit 200k. I value narrative and game design a lot and as a GM I know that I have personally benefitted a lot from reading and listening to other people talking about their design choices and the way they thought of certain things in their design processes.
I was thinking about making a series of exclusive write-ups and/or videos that backers can purchase as an exclusive add-on (for a rather cheap price like 10€ or so) which will basically be Designer's Commentary on everything that is in the book.
I have the benefit of being able to write something like this because, as I mentioned in a previous update too, I am involved in more than 90% of the book's design, writing and delivery. Most companies hire a ton of writers and designers to make sure they can deliver something quick, but I instead opted for something more well thought out that would take a lot more organisation but also a bit more time (which is why I started designing this a year ago). So with all that in mind, I have the benefit of being able to talk about the entire book from a designer's perspective way more in-depth than any other big book publisher could if they were to make something like this. So in my opinion it would result in something even more interesting to read.
I have not seen ANY other TTRPG creator or company do this before and I really wanted to add something different and fresh to the mix, so I am curious what people think about adding something like this. I will make a poll for it in the next update to see how much interest there is in it but until then, feel free to leave a comment in case you'd like to share some feedback on this.
Next Update
We will talk a bit more about the pledge manager and answer some of your questions in regards to various items being available or not during the pledge manager stage.
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Till the next update...
May Starlight guide your way my friends!
~Kelf
