Final 24-hour Stretch for the Chimera
over 4 years ago – Thu, Nov 21, 2019 at 02:25:52 PM

Not an update on Starship III, but a final call for Starship IV: Chimera, our biggest ship to date, but far more than meets the eye! If  you haven't had a chance to check it out, there is plenty in here for returning Starship III backers!

The Chimera is a large ship stock standard, but is incredibly modular:

So far, there are 19 stretch goals, and we are around 500 SEK short of a 20th. That's not including the campaign-exclusive add-ons, some of which you may be interested in.

If the price and such a large ship are a turn off, we have done a variant that is around 40% smaller that nets you just a deep space exploration ship...

But then of course, there are some add-on variants that you may like for your scout or transport.

Plus, if you like the large turret versions of those ships, here are some additional options:

And a new idea, modular starfighters:

There is only a short time left, so check it out before it is gone. You can get on the pledge manager by dropping as little as 10 kr.

I am also livestreaming tonight on twitch, see the campaign page for details!

Starship IV is Here!
over 4 years ago – Thu, Oct 24, 2019 at 12:35:14 AM

We are pleased to introduce Starship IV: Chimera, our next starship! Yes, only one this time, but she's huge!

Returning Backer Upgrade Pledge

If you backed previously for Starship III, we've made a special Upgrade Pledge. This is the same as the All-In pledge, but a little cheaper to thank you for your continued patronage.

The exclusive add-ons will include a new variant each for the scout ship and transport!

I really appreciate the support, it's thanks to you guys that I've been able to continue to create cool stuff as my day job! You guys are awesome!

Starship IV Launches on Wednesday!
over 4 years ago – Mon, Oct 21, 2019 at 11:15:02 PM

We are proud to announce the launch of Starship IV Chimera, our largest and most modular ship to date, which will go live this Wednesday, the 23rd of October, 2019, at 17:00 Central European Time (+2 UTC)!

The ship, fully printed, is an astounding 90 cm (that's three feet) in length! She features three decks stock standard, and holds more internal volume than all three of our previous ships combined!

We are very excited to launch, and you can be sure that this mighty ship (currently unarmed) will have many variant pieces and allow you to lengthen, widen and heighten the ship as much as gravity, and your printer will allow!

As with previous kickstarters, we will be offering you, our past backers first day great prices to thank you for your loyalty. So keep your eyes peeled on this space, or better yet, follow it on Facebook or join our discord.

More soon!

Starship IV Chimera and Commercial License Patreon
over 4 years ago – Wed, Oct 09, 2019 at 02:36:50 AM

Greetings from beyond the stars! It has been quite a while since the last update, but boy have I been busy! There are two exciting things that I have to share today, so let's get down to it!

Starship IV Launches In Two Weeks!

I will be launching Starship IV on Wednesday the 23rd of October at 17:00 +2 GMT, the same day and time of the last three campaigns! Starship IV will feature only a single ship, which will likely be the format going forward, however, it is massive!

The Chimera-Class

For the first time, I have named a class of ship, the Chimera. Why Chimera? Well, in ancient Greek myth, the Chimera was a fire-breathing monster composed of a combination of different creatures. The Chimera is similar in the sense that it is a very modular ship. It can be expanded vertically, length-wise, and after a stretch goal or two, width-wise as well! 

She is massive! Three decks standard, over 90 cm (3 feet) in length, with a large cargo bay, multi-level engine room, bridge and living quarters, it is designed as a baseline for long-range ship types.

The base model is an unarmed civilian model good for cargo hauling, but fear not, we will easily bust through the stretch goals to bring you the deep space exploration and military corvette versions you so desire!

The campaign should run for a month, ending on the 22nd of November.

Patreon for Commercial Licensing

The second part of the news is that we have released a patreon for commercial licensing.

For a long time, I have been struggling with the issue of licensing. A whole 110 of you from the last campaign expressed an interest in commercially printing and selling our ships, which is just amazing, but I have been swamped by work and it's one of those things constantly put on the backburner. A few of you have reached out to arrange royalty-based licenses, but I have been slack on my end about implementing them.

Ian from Dragon's Rest has had success with a patreon-based system, and after speaking to him, I think this method is worth testing out. 

We will of course be honouring all our previous license arrangements, and moving over to the new system will optional, but hopefully less bookkeeping for everyone.

How It Will Work

If you want to print and sell 2nd Dynasty models, you sub to the patreon. The fee will be a flat $25 USD, rather than the 10% royalty we usually set it up for. For each month the patreon is paid, you have an extension to the non-commercial licenses for any 2nd Dynasty products you have purchased to print and sell these items for profit. 

Additionally, each month we will also release a 25% discount code for all our models on My Mini Factory. DriveThru will not officially be supported in the same way due to a lack of backend support for an all-products discount code. Also, Drivethru take a massive 40% of our earnings, whereas MMF only take 10%, which makes a lot more sense for us.

MMF Partnership

Speaking of My Mini Factory, we have agreed to do a partnership with MMF which should hopefully streamline the delivery of Starship IV by eliminating BackerKit from the equation. Although I appreciate BackerKit and it has been a reliable tool, it is designed primarily for the management and delivery of physical rewards. There is a lot of manual processing required, and human error has led at times to backers having delays of the delivery of their files.

Instead of the manual processing, there will still be a post-campaign store, but you will be directly linked to the products. The developers are actually working with us directly in this endeavour and tailoring the service to our needs and those of other content providers in the future. I think it should result in a much smoother delivery in the long run, although there may be kinks to work out along the way.

I know some will groan at this switch from Drivethru delivery, and I am happy to have a discourse about it.

Patreon Link

You can get to Patreon here and start printing as soon as you like.

That's all for now, but expect frequent updates soon!

A long overdue update and Starship IV
over 4 years ago – Mon, Aug 19, 2019 at 08:25:56 PM

I made my last update ages ago it seems. Dealing with death in the family and pre-planned summer holidays has led to a delay in hiring additional staff, which means for the most part I will be going the next campaign alone.

Starship III: What Remains?

The only outstanding items are the second wave of variant miniatures for the variant ships. I was hoping to hire someone to unburden me with these items, and still am searching. General consensus from our discord group has been that people are happy to wait for these, as they were mostly a bonus.

I am hoping that they should be released by the time Starship IV is up and running. Until they are delivered, the backerkit will stay open.

Production Versions

I will be releasing production versions of the scout ship and transport in the coming days both on DriveThruRPG.com, and on MyMiniFactory.com. You may notice that the pricing will be comparable to or slightly below Kickstarter prices for individual ships (although not for pledges with all of them).

A part of this is because of the strong dollar vs. the Swedish crown, but also because the base ships will not include six plus variants of each ship. That will be kickstarter exclusive, although I plan to have upgrade kits as options in the future for around $5 a pop in the future for new ship buyers.

I am hoping a more competitive price will help get more ships into the hands of gamers and modellers.

Starship IV

Save the date, we are looking to launch October 23rd! This should give our American friends a grace period leading up to Thanksgiving and avoid a delay on my part until January like last time around. I am already in production... although prototyping will take some time. Expect both larger and smaller ships in the range, more to come soon!

Anyway, that's all for now.