Return to Dark Tower

Artist Spotlight: Nastya Lehn
about 4 years ago – Fri, May 15, 2020 at 03:40:41 PM

Another quiet week as engineering and playtesting continues. So I thought I would take the opportunity to introduce you to the work of one of our artists on the project, Nastya Lehn. We brought Nastya on board to do some item pieces. Let's just say that our art director, Jason Taylor, quickly became a fan:

I have my suspicions that Nastya is actually a time traveler. She was able to transform our notes into sketches, and then to finals in a matter of mere hours. We're talking beautiful lighting and thoughtful details in every piece. Yet they still feel very much part of the Return to Dark Tower world.  I'm really excited for people to see what she's done.

She worked so quickly and was putting out such great work, we also enlisted her to do the art for the six dungeon types. And here you go:

Nastya lives in France and has done a good bit of work in both tabletop and video games. In her work on Return To Dark Tower, you can see some of the influence of the latter with a vibrant color palette and dynamic lighting.

For these types of pieces, Nastya uses a Wacom Cintiq 13HD and Adobe Photoshop CC. And each piece takes three to five hours. If you want to check out more of her work, you can visit her website or follow her on twitter, Deviant Art, or ArtStation.

Just Enough Time for a Quick, Cold One
about 4 years ago – Fri, May 08, 2020 at 02:26:23 AM

Nothing exciting to report, which is a good thing right. No news is good news. Manufacturing continues apace. We did get the first printed tower from the manufacturer, which our engineers, Charlie and Tim, are working with to help finalize the design. Hoping to have a more detailed engineering update in the next week or so.

If you haven't completed your survey in BackerKit yet, please do so. If you're having any trouble getting your survey locked down or with payment, please contact BackerKit customer service or send me a direct message.

Since this update was short and sweet, I'd say we have time to pop open a cold one. Here's an update of the six potions available in the game, featuring Garrett Kaida's art and updated names and effects (and even a hint at some updated terminology, e.g., "threat cards"). (Reminder: Everything is still subject to change until we go to print.)

Retailer Update: Timeline, Shipping, and Online Preorders
about 4 years ago – Tue, May 05, 2020 at 05:38:10 PM

This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.

BackerKit Update and 3D Quest Markers
about 4 years ago – Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 11:39:05 PM

Here's where we're at. BackerKit orders for individual backers are now locked down and credit cards have been charged.

If your order has not been locked down, that's likely because you haven't completed your survey. That could either be because you did not enter your shipping address, did not enter your payment information, or didn't click that last green "Place My Order" button. If you feel like you've done all that and still are having an issue, please contact BackerKit customer service. If they are unable to assist you, feel free to message me on Kickstarter.

If you had an issue with your payment, don't worry. It doesn't cancel your pledge or anything. BackerKit will automatically retry charging you if you update your payment information. If you fixed the issue but did not need to update your information, you can contact BackerKit customer service to run your card manually, or me via message if that doesn't work out.

Some of you have already contacted me about additional charges you were not expecting. You can always go back into your BackerKit order to review it. The most common discrepancies are folks who had to pay additional funds for shipping or forgot they added stuff one. But there were also some folks who inadvertently doubled up there pledge. If you did something like that, again, you can contact BackerKit customer service or me via message to get it sorted out. I will note that refunds are more complicated to process now, so we can no longer offer them except under special circumstances.

It is looking likely that we'll be able to reopen BackerKit a little later this summer. If you had to cancel or pull back on your pledge, that might be an opportunity to get back in. Still nothing to report on non-English editions, but hopefully we'll have more to report on that by the time we would be reopening BackerKit.

Now begins the long wait until the game is ready to ship. You can go into BackerKit and update your shipping address at any time until then. So, if you move, for example, you do not need to contact us. You can just go into your pledge and update the address.

As you all start with the "waiting", we're hoppin' Johnny over here finishing up the design as we head into manufacturing. We're getting lots of playtesting feedback, updating cards, completing illustrations, finalizing engineering, etc., etc. Over the next several months, we'll continue to post updates and give you all a peek behind the scenes at the process.

Before I sign off, I thought I would show you all something you haven't seen yet. As you know, there are four potential quests: the monthly ally and adversary quests, the main objective, and the guild quest if you're playing with the Alliances expansion. You also might recall that the Dark Horde add-on includes not only miniatures for all the various foes but also 3D quest markers for all the quests. Here's a nearly finished look at the designs of those pieces from one of our skilled 3D artists, Chad Hoverter. Hope you enjoy.

Lockdown, Alliances, Sleeves, Art Prints, Frosthaven, and Crystals!
about 4 years ago – Fri, Apr 10, 2020 at 03:30:01 AM

So much stuff to cover today, let's get to it.

First and foremost, we are locking down the pledge manager on April 10. 

To clarify a little further, some important information: We are locking down individual pledges and the preorder store. We are not locking down retailer orders yet; that will happen some time in May, and I'll update as soon as we get a firmer date. Also, by "April 10", I mean some time after midnight EST, or more specifically, whenever I wake up on Saturday, April 11. After we lock down the pledges, we will start running the cards within the next 48 hours after that.

If you have not yet completed your survey in BackerKit, please complete it immediately.

If you have not received your survey link for BackerKit, send me a direct message and I will provide you with a direct link.

If you would like to get charged now, please contact either BackerKit customer service or message me directly, and we can do that.

Speaking of lockdown, we hope everyone remains safe and healthy during these difficult times. Everyone on Team Restoration is doing well and working hard on Return to Dark Tower. That said, we know this pandemic is hitting everyone differently, and some of you quite hard, whether that's medically, financially, or personally. If you need to cancel your pledge due to your current circumstances, please message me directly. Additionally, we do not have anything to update with regard to non-English editions as our publishing partners are dealing with the situation. So, I cannot promise but we will make every effort to reopen the pledge manager in a few months to allow for some limited additional orders to try and help out folks whose circumstances turn around or for new language options. I will continue to keep everyone up to date on that possibility.

So, who wants to see some more of the Alliances expansion? Buckle up. I want to put a big caveat on this: Alliances is being tested as we speak, so all of these materials are very much subject to change. These components haven't been through illustration and graphic design. Your really getting a look behind the curtain here. That said, we want to give you a better idea of how the expansion works, so here goes.

At its core, the expansion introduces the four guilds: the Arcane Scouts, the Druids' Circle, the Paladin Order, and the Thieves' Guild. These powerful organizations create challenges at the outset of the game, but you can use a new resource, Influence, to curry favor with them, shifting the effects from negative to positive. Of course, you won't be able to improve all of them. Deciding which guilds will best help you complete the main objective and defeat the adversary requires careful planning and offers a delightfully challenging puzzle for more advanced players.

The expansion comes with:

• 2 new heroes -- the Archwright and the Haunted Recluse -- each with their own figures and hero boards.
• 4 double-sided guild boards
• 4 guild level markers
• 4 guild hall flags to designate guild locations on the board.
• 12 ally cards (3 for each guild)
• 20 treasure cards
• A bunch of influence tokens

If you want to take a look at the playtest version of the rules, you can download the pdf HERE.

And here's a sample of one side of one of the guild boards:

Hopefully, you can see how dramatically the guilds can influence the game. If you have more questions about the expansion, I'm happy to answer them in the comments.

I also wanted to do a quick update that we confirmed the specs for the card sleeves, and they are 100 microns, which is slightly thicker than most standard sleeves, such as NSKN, Mayday, and Fantasy Flight. The samples feel great.

I was blown away at the response to the Art Print survey. Thousands of you voted, and there was a clear winner:

And, if you didn't see the news, our co-designer, Isaac Childres is running a little Kickstarter of his own for Frosthaven. And there's a fun little Easter egg in there for Return to Dark Tower backers. As a big Gloomhaven fan myself, I was super excited for this one, so excited, in fact, that I'll be designing a scenario for the new game. You can check out the announcement HERE.

I know this update is running long, but I can't finish up without offering some new art for you to feast your eyes on. Since Alliances is positioned as a more advanced expansion, we also wanted to introduce some more dynamic treasure abilities like the Crystal "suite":