Loot illustrations complete, Character backgrounds and final graphic design remain!
over 2 years ago – Mon, Jan 24, 2022 at 10:33:57 PM

Happy Monday! 

Got lots of fun content to share, but before we get into that, we wanted to remind anyone who hasn't completed their pledge survey to please make sure that you've done so. We're going to keep the pledge manager open as long as possible, but we really really want to be able to get you all your games. 

We have 217 backers that haven't completed their surveys, and just sent out a reminder email, so please check your email :)  

Now on to the fun stuff! 

Loot Illustrations Complete!

Extremely pleased to share with you the last 14 Loot illustrations from the talented Lilia Sitailo! This makes 37 unique illustrations for the loot card deck! Do you have a favorite?

Gar Tinkerbeak

Remaining Artwork

We've got Stained Karbon, Sita, and Lilia working on the remaining character background illustrations. 

Nara Lasersnood's background is almost complete just final details remain

Stained Karbon is currently working on the background for Valkyr Thunderfoot 

Lilia Sitailo is currently working on the background for Phyrra Mistwing 

Once those are complete...

Lilia is scheduled to work on Quaeth Surebill and Lyrah Lorekin

and 

Stained Karbon is scheduled to work on Pewter Irontail and Bozret Lotusthief

That will conclude the remaining illustrations for the game. 

Jovial Graphic & Games is concurrently working on the remaining graphic design and preparing the files to be print ready. We're working on cleaning up the layouts of the champion tiles, adding some color indicators on the character standees, a race indicator system on the champion tiles, reverse side of the frame tile lore sections, updating the score track, updating the sea tile numbering for the map tile system,  and of course final work on the box. 

We're aiming to have this completed by end of February, but mid March may be more realistic. If we are able to start manufacturing by May we could see games arrive for fulfillment as early as mid August considering 60 days to manufacture and 40 days for ocean freight transit. 

Last but not least, our weekly play test is this Wednesday at 8:30pm ET, come join discord to sign up and play! 

Thanks for reading and let us know if you have any questions!

Eric & Shannon Geller

Production on Track! New Art and News!
over 2 years ago – Tue, Jan 18, 2022 at 10:48:52 AM

Production is on track!

Delighted to inform everyone that production is on track. We have the remaining artwork/graphic design commissioned, in process, and schedule is looking good to have files ready to send to manufacturing by end of February. 

We're looking at tentative locking of pledges and closing the pledge manager end of March right now. We'll announce a final notice when we send print ready files in. 

New Artwork

Lilia finished another 6 loot illustrations and is working on the final 14 now!

Character Stories

Weekly Play Testing

 We've had a chance to do some solid play testing on the backer created loot cards and so far they feel well balanced! We've also adjusted the Quest card deck and Pewter Irontail's ability to good effect. We're confident we're bringing you a well balanced game that you'll want to keep bringing back to the table! :D
 

 Our next play test is this Thursday at 8:30pm ET and we'd love your input and feedback. Come hop on discord for more details!

 
Future Plans

We're looking out to the horizon for what's next after we get Quests & Cannons to your tables. While we'd love to immediately move into producing the follow up expansion, The Cosmic Cipher, it may not be in the cards. We're currently evaluating some creative paths forward to ensure we can continue producing great content for you all. One path we've identified is to make D&D 5E compatible content such as one shot adventures, Q&C character class and race templates, and related miniatures. This would allow us to continue world building behind Quests & Cannons as well as establish some revenue streams that would help make producing board games more sustainable for us. 

Let us know in the comments if this is something you'd be interested in

Thank you all for your support!

Eric & Shannon Geller

Short Hop Games

Art Update and Scheduled play testing
over 2 years ago – Wed, Dec 29, 2021 at 07:22:35 AM

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Thank you for your patience between updates! 

At this points we've been working to schedule out the remaining artwork for Quests & Cannons and we're  on good track to have that work completed for getting files over to manufacturing at some point in the second half of Q1 2022. 

We've had some questions about how long the pledge manager will be staying open for, and to answer that here, we're planning on keeping the pledge manager open for as long as possible which means it will be closing about a month before we finalize with manufacturing. We'll provide an update here and on social media with that announcement, but expect sometime around end of February or mid March 2022. 

Loot Illustrations:

Lilia Sitailo has finished the first round of 6 loot illustrations as we wrap this artwork up. We're super happy to share these with you all here! 

Backer created Loot cards being added to Q&C:

Smuggler's Cache: Discard this card and roll your traveler's die

1-2: gain 5 coins

3-5: gain one of lumber, canvas, or metal

6: gain two resources of your choice 

Swindler's Coat(equipment 2 coins): While equipped, loot and map clues you trade for cost 2 less coins. 

Naval Ram(equipment 2 coins): While equipped, you may spend an additional action point to move. If you end your movement in a space with a rival ship that ship takes one damage for every 2 spaces you moved.  

Long Barrel Cannon(equipment 2 coins): While equipped you may fire cannons from 1 space away. Subtract 2 from your total roll when doing damage.

Black Pearl: Discard to move 1 space for each different resource in your cargo

Baby Klucken: Discard when a rival ship enters your space to move two spaces

Wet Powder: Discard this card to reduce a cannon roll against you by 4. You may discard 5 ammo instead of discarding this card. 

**These are the first pass for these card effects and they may change from backer feedback and play testing**

which brings us to our next announcement...

Weekly Play Testing starting this Wednesday!

While we would have liked to start this sooner, life circumstances have made timing challenging; however, we're very pleased to say that we'll be hosting weekly play test sessions starting this Wednesday at 8:30pm organized via discord and played on Tabletop Simulator. Moving forward we'll continue to do this every Wednesday same time unless there is an interest for a different time that works better overall for people. 

 Character Highlight - Kerris Thornfur

Here's the character backstory for Kerris Thornfur, Dwunny Branch Keeper, story by Urias OKeefe

As always let us know if you have any questions! Looking forward to playing this Wednesday! :D

Kind regards,

Eric & Shannon Geller

Short Hop Games

Pledge Manager going out! Loot Card Voting Results, Character Highlight
almost 3 years ago – Wed, Nov 17, 2021 at 12:58:32 AM

Pledge manager going out! 

Thank you for your patience everyone. Excited to announce that the pledge manager will be going out tonight, so please check your emails. If you encounter any issues, please feel free to reach out on here, by email, or any social media. 

Loot Card Voting Results

Here are the top 4:

A.) Smuggler’s Cache: Discard to add resources to your cargo hold, potentially based on a die roll

These 4 tied for 

F.) Baby Kraken: discard to release a mist of ink, letting you escape/cancel a battle

G.) Swindler's Coat(Equipment): While equipped, you gain an extra 2 gold when selling loot, potentially reduce cost of buying loot/map clues.

J.) Naval ram(Equipment): Allows you to perform an attack based on movement when you enter a rival space, potentially every 2 hexes moved is one damage, costs an action point to perform the attack.

These 3 tied for next most popular  

B.) Wet Powder: Discard an ammo die or resource to reduce a cannon roll fired against you

C.) Long Barrel Cannon (Equipment): Cannons can be fired from adjacent spaces possibly limit 2 cannons, has resource cost to use, or 5 pips for one damage.

H.) Black Pearl: discard to freely move 2 hexes

These were the least favorite in order:

E.) Black Powder Thruster(Equipment):  Discard ammo dice to modify movement

D.) Coin Launcher(Equipment): Use coins to do damage, maybe use coins to modify attack rolls, or refresh cannons with coin cost to make multiple attacks.

I.) Powdered Kegs: Discard when attacking, spend any number of spice to add 2 to your attack roll.

Results: 

A: 12 | B: 11 | C: 11 | D: 7 | E: 8 | F: 12 | G: 12 | H: 11 | I: 5 | J: 12 | 

We're going to keep voting open until the end of the month to make sure we give as much time as possible for people to weigh in but also be conscious to keep to our timeline (need to test these and get artwork done)

Social Stretch Goals

Here's the status for the social goals so far! These goals will be extended while we are accepting late pledges so let's get these unlocked! * Click any of the below links to go complete those social goals *

Facebook shares : 61/100 (+3)

Instagram follows : UNLOCKED!

Twitter retweets: 61/100 (+4)

BGG Subscribes : 187/200 (+5)

Discord Members : 228/250 (+5)

We're really close on the BGG subscribes that would eliminate the 4 way tie from the voting, so 13 more people need to subscribe and we'll have unlocked 7 loot cards total.  

Character Highlight (Elwing Songfeather)

We've recently finished the last of the character backstories with each backstory being included on the reverse side of the champion tiles. Here's Elwing Songfeather. Stories by Urias OKeefe. *Art/graphic design not final*

Pledge Manager Smoke Test
almost 3 years ago – Fri, Nov 12, 2021 at 11:04:52 PM

Pledge Manager Update

This one is short and sweet. Some of you may start seeing pledge surveys go out. Before the pledge manager goes live we have to send out surveys to 5% of you to make sure everything is running smoothly. Once we've confirmed it is, pledge surveys will be going out to everyone. So please make sure to check your emails. We'll make another update before we send out all of them. 

If you have any questions, please feel to drop them here or message us :) 

Thank you,

Eric & Shannon Geller