The Sleeve Vote
over 5 years ago – Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 04:17:09 PM

Hiya Constables,

My how our town has grown! In this update, we'll go over our current stretch goal status, then we have 2 votes you can take, and lastly, Stuart's 17th century story continues as he tells us how the true events of the Salem Witch Trials unfolded.

Stretch Goals

In the last days of the first attempt to get this campaign funded, we weren't sure if we were going to make it or not. It was close. It made me sad when it became clear that even if we funded, we weren't going to reach the stretch goal to put Andrea's art on the box insert. It was one thing that made me more OK with not funding that first time because I knew it would give us another shot at it in the next one. And WOW, here we are with it achieved on day 3! Now not only will the outside of the box and the components look beautiful, the inside will too. Can you picture yourself opening the box that first time? Oooh, it's going to be magical.

And heck, we almost completed the next one too to get another card in the event pack!

Sleeve Vote

We've had quite a few people request some sleeves for this campaign so let's discuss it, shall we? Now there are a lot of cards in this game, so it will require a lot of sleeves. That means it's not something we can just throw in there as a stretch goal, but we could probably come up with an Add On for it if you are interested enough. Please take this poll to give us your thoughts so we know how to proceed. (Note: responses are public)

Most Anticipated Game of 2019

Every year, boardgamegeek.com creates a poll for the most anticipated game of the year and we're excited that New Salem 2nd Edition has made it through the nomination rounds into the final vote for 3 different categories. What an honor! If you’re excited about it and you want to show your love, we could use your vote here! 

A Message from Stuart

Psssst... Psssst! It’s me, Stuart again. Remember how I told you last time about those bewitched young fortune tellers, Betty and Abigail? Well, it’s worse than I thought. When their parents left to attend a Thursday lecture in a neighboring village, a woman named Tituba wanted to try to figure out if they were actually witches. She baked a “witch cake,” which is made from what I’ll just call the “essence” of the two girls, and then it was fed to a dog to see if it exhibited any demonic behavior. 

As you may have expected, evil radiated from that dog. It was barking at shadows. It was running in circles. Thanks to Tituba, our fears were confirmed: we have witches in our town. I just hope we can stop them before it gets any worse. I'll be back as soon as I can with more news. -Stuart

What other questions do you have about the game or the campaign or the meaning of life?

-Brian and Clayton

Recap of the First 24 Hours
over 5 years ago – Wed, Jan 09, 2019 at 06:33:45 PM

Welcome to New Salem 2.0! 

We're just passing the 24 hour mark now so, if you're getting this email, you're a Day 1 backer and we are endlessly thankful that you're here with us right from the start. If you were a part of the previous campaign, your feedback has been incredibly valuable during this re-launch. Thank you so much for your suggestions and helping set us up for a big success this time around. This campaign is gonna be so much fun!

Stretch Goal Status

It took about 12 hours before we were fully funded and we've already whipped through 2 stretch goals since then with another one at our doorstep. Heck, as fast as backers have been streaming through the gates of New Salem, we might have that one achieved before I hit the Send button on this update. But for now, here's where we are:

That art from Andrea on the insert is going to be so incredible to behold each time you open the box!

Event Pack

Our event pack starts with 2 mystery cards and thanks to those first two stretch goals, we're up to 4 cards in the event pack already and there will be more to come later. That pack is going to be exclusive to you for quite a while after we fund. 3-6 months after we fulfill, we'll send them over to the BGG Store so those who missed this campaign can pick them up for $5-$10 or however much BGG wants to sell them for and how many we end up getting in the pack by the end. Of course you're getting them for free.

The reason we have 2 mystery cards in there is that we're not sure which ones we'll end up achieving throughout the campaign stretch goals and we want to leave some room for us to choose the final two cards to make sure it's balanced from a game design perspective. This game is extremely important to us and we want to be sure we aren't compromising the design with stretch goals.

Live Stream on Board Game Exposé

Brian just got done sitting down with Martyn Poole of Board Game Exposé to talk about New Salem, game design, and publishing. You can watch it right here. Martyn actually has a live Kickstarter campaign (Promo Paradise) himself in case you want to take a look through those awesome promos it has available.

Future Campaign Updates

We want to respect your inbox so we won't do crazy amounts of updates for this campaign. We'll do one every few days or when something exceptional happens that we want to share with you. We want to make sure they're worth your time, but you'll find that we are very responsive in the comments so ask away in there if you have any questions.

You'll also notice a section in each update from Stuart, like the one below. Stuart is a character we made up that lives in Salem before our game takes place (spoiler: he will eventually be one of the founders of New Salem). He will guide you through the true history of The Salem Witch Trials as the campaign unfolds to give you a taste of what it was like to have been there during that time. 

The reason we designed this game in the first place was to try to re-create the experience of The Salem Witch Trials so you can re-live them at your table with your friends. It's time to go back in time to late 1691... everyone, meet Stu!

A Message from Stuart 

Oh hi. Yeah, it’s nice to meet you. I prefer being called Stuart rather than Stu, but I suppose either is fine. As you may know, I, like you, call Salem Village my home. I have decided to make it my duty to keep you and the rest of our fellow villagers updated with the latest news from Salem because, to be honest, I am feeling a bit worried about the future of our little Massachusetts town. 

For example, have you heard about those two girls, Betty Parris and Abigail Williams, who have taken up the telling of fortunes? Lately they have fallen ill to a mysterious distemper causing them to have fits and exhibit other… odd behavior. Our physician, William Griggs, examined the girls and he has concluded they are “under an evil hand.” I was there for part of the examination and let me tell you... the words spoken by these girls caused my skin to turn pale and it has yet to recover. I admit, I am scared. I'm sure you are too, but don’t worry, I will bring you more news when I have it.

-Stuart

Back soon,

-Clayton and Brian