Final Stretch Goal: The Miniseries Campaign!
over 4 years ago – Fri, May 27, 2022 at 10:06:33 PM

Hello! We're heading into the final weekend of the Brindlewood Bay campaign! Let's do some updates...

Deluxe Pledge Tiers Available

We have added the final 100 spots for The Invitation pledge tier. If you had your eye on that one and missed out before, don't hesitate to go grab one of these new spots! 

We have also added one more Midwives spot, which comes with all the standard rewards plus Brindlewood Bay creator Jason Cordova will run 2 online game sessions for you and 3 friends. 

We still have 1 spot available at the Deep Reaver tier. In addition to standard rewards, that spot comes with a Deep Reaver Con tote bag and David LaFreniere will run the Deep Reaver Con miniseries for you and 3 friends. 

Finally, the Fragrant Void tier is still available. This is the ultimate tier: in addition to all the standard rewards, Brindlewood Bay creator Jason Cordova will run an entire campaign for you and 3 friends!

Last Chance for the Cookbook

The Brindlewood Bay Community Cookbook is a Kickstarter exclusive. It is only a physical reward (there's no PDF) and your chance to get that physical reward ends as soon as this campaign does. You can add the Cookbook to any pledge for $30 USD, but we recommend getting the Murder Mavens tier, which is the best value. 

Final Stretch Goals

We have two remaining stretch goals to unlock. The first is Suspect Portraits. We'll commission Cecilia Ferri to draw portraits of every Suspect in the game if we can hit $400K. We talked about this one in more detail in the last update. 

We have just announced the last stretch goal: The Miniseries Campaign! Let's go over it in some detail...

The Miniseries Campaign is a whole new way to play Brindlewood Bay. We're working with Jonah Knight from Roll to Meddle to create the "Miniseries" structure for the game. The way it works is each Miniseries has an Arc Mystery, which is the overall story for that Miniseries. The Arc Mystery involves some kind of activity or event that is affecting everyone in the town of Brindlewood Bay. Within each Arc Mystery are Chapters. The Chapters include two things: a Murder/Sweeps Week Mystery and a set of Questions. The Murder/Sweeps Week Mystery is one of the published mysteries, and the Questions, when answered, connect those mysteries to each other and to the bigger Arc Mystery. After each Chapter is finished, and all Questions have been answered, you have the Finale, during which the Mavens confront the villains of the story (usually the Midwives of the Fragrant Void, but others are possible). 

A Miniseries can be played as a short, standalone campaign, or can be played one after the other to create a bigger, more dramatic story. It is meant to be an alternative to the Dark Conspiracy campaign. If we can hit $450K and unlock this stretch goal, we will create 4 Miniseries inspired by the calendar seasons: The Holiday Play, Spring Awakening, The Hurricane, and The Old House. 

Help Spread the Word

Hitting these last two stretch goals is going to be tough, but together we can do it! Please tell everyone you know about this campaign, and always share the link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gauntlet/brindlewood-bay-cozy-murder-mystery-rpg

Hit up RPG and other hobby forums, tell folks in your Facebook groups, and post the link on social media. When you're talking about the campaign, be sure to mention:

• The game is Murder, She Wrote meets Lovecraftian horror. 
• The game is easy to play and run, even for people new to roleplaying games.
• We have unlocked tons of stretch goals, and are up to 28 mysteries! 

As always, thanks so much for your support! We're going to leave you with a brand-new illustration from Cecilia, this time for Lies & Dolls, or A Very Brief Tenure. 

-the Brindlewood Bay team

The Roll20 Companion for Brindlewood Bay!
over 4 years ago – Thu, May 19, 2022 at 04:09:37 AM

Hello! Now that we have hit some major milestones in the campaign, we're ready to reveal...

The Roll20 Companion!

We are working directly with the Roll20 team to bring you the Roll20 Companion. The Roll20 Companion will allow you run every mystery from Brindlewood Bay and Nephews in Peril in the Roll20 Virtual Tabletop. It will include character sheets, a campaign tracker, a shared murder board, and more! If we can unlock the $400K stretch goal (more on that below) it will also include portraits for every Suspect from every mystery in the game!

The Roll20 Companion is FREE at the Murder Mavens pledge tier and higher! If you've already pledged at one of those tiers, you don't have to do anything to get it. It can be added to any other pledge tier for a Kickstarter-exclusive price of just $10 USD (regular price: $20 USD)!

The Roll20 Companion will be delivered early next year. Check out our mock-up below to get a sense of how the murder board feature will work.

New Stretch Goal: Suspect Portraits!

To coincide with the new Roll20 add-on, we're also announcing our $400K stretch goal: Suspect Portraits! If we can hit this goal, we will commission a portrait for every Suspect in the game. These portraits will be included in the print-n-play files for each mystery so the Keeper can print them out ahead of time to use at the table. They will also be included in the Roll20 Companion. 

$400K is a BIG stretch goal, and we're going to need everyone's help to reach it. Please tell all your friends about this campaign. If you've been thinking about upgrading to the Murder Mavens tier, perhaps the Roll20 Companion will be what convinces you to take the plunge? 

The Final Stretch Goal

We have one final stretch goal that will be announced on May 27th, a few days before the campaign ends. Be sure to check the page on that day to learn all about it—it's a literal game changer!

As always, thanks so much for your support! We'll leave you with another never-before-seen piece of artwork, this time for Lies and Dolls, or A Very Brief Tenure.

-The Brindlewood Bay team

New Pledge Tiers Available!
over 4 years ago – Tue, May 17, 2022 at 07:48:30 PM

We have just crossed the $300K threshold! That means The Darkened Threshold podcast will become a reality. Thanks so much for helping us achieve this terrific milestone.

But we're not slowing down! Some updates...

New Pledge Tiers

We have opened up 100 new spots at The Invitation level and 1 new spot at the Midwives level. If you had your eye on one of those deluxe pledge tiers but missed out, now is your chance!

We have also opened a brand-new pledge tier: Deep Reaver! At this level, in addition to all the physical rewards, David LaFreniere from Gauntlet Publishing will run the Deep Reaver Con mini-series for you and 3 friends! You'll also get a Deep Reaver Con tote bag! 

New Stretch Goal: A Throng of Vice and Liars

If we hit $315K, Alexi Sargent from Cloven Pine Games will write A Throng of Vice and Liars, a new mystery to be included in Nephews in Peril. The description: "Herb L.L. Paxton has written some of the most well-loved books in fantasy:  A Tome of Bones, A Crash of Crowns, The Scourge of Scorn, The Beast of Brass, and The Glance of Gryphons. His next book, The Augurs of Autumn, has been in the works for a decade now, prompting speculation and impatience in his dedicated base of readers. When the author is slain backstage at a book-signing with a replica of the dire-sword from his series, the Mavens spring into action to find the killer—and a missing manuscript?!"

Creator Spotlight: Actual Plays!

There are lots of places to watch actual plays of Brindlewood Bay. We wanted to highlight a few recent ones in this update:

• The folks at Critical Failsafe recently invited BBay creator Jason Cordova to run a 1-shot on their stream. Critical Failsafe runs a regular stream of The Between, Jason's other game. Both actual plays are excellent. 
• Theatre of the Mind Players has a new actual play of Brindlewood Bay going up later today. You can find it here when it goes live.
• Trials of the Apocalypse is a 1-shot actual play podcast that covers Powered by the Apocalypse games. Their play of Brindlewood Bay is here.

As always, thanks so much for your ongoing support! We'll leave you with a brand-new, never-before-seen piece of artwork from Cecilia, this time for the mystery Carnival Carnage.

-The Brindlewood Bay team

The Darkened Threshold
over 4 years ago – Sat, May 07, 2022 at 10:18:58 PM

We have just unlocked the Deep Reaver Con stretch goal, so it's a good time for an update! 

The Darkened Threshold

Our $300K stretch goal is The Darkened Threshold, a new podcast by The Gauntlet's award-winning podcast team. This stretch goal is important to us on a personal level, but also points to the future of Brindlewood Bay, so let's talk about it a bit...

The Gauntlet has been making podcasts since 2015. Many consider our shows essential listening when it comes to independent tabletop roleplaying games. We have the ability to not only expand the conversation about these games but to also build community around them. Brindlewood Bay creator Jason Cordova was a co-host of Discern Realities, which was a foundational Dungeon World discussion podcast. He currently co-hosts Fear of a Black Dragon, an ENnie-winning podcast about old school dungeon modules that has had a major impact on how such modules are designed and played. And our podcast episodes focused on the Trophy RPG were critical to helping people go deeper in their understanding of that game. 

Basically, podcasts are in our blood. With your support, we're going to make a podcast called The Darkened Threshold. The show will focus on games derived from Brindlewood Bay, such as our own game, The Between, but also the many mystery horror games that are coming out of this design space. We think Brindlewood Bay's mystery system is very special, and we consider this Kickstarter campaign to be the beginning of Brindlewood Bay, not the end. 

The stretch goal will commit us to making 20 discussion episodes and 4 actual play episodes. The discussion episodes will focus on good gameplay, Keeper techniques, new "Carved from Brindlewood" games and mysteries, third party features, game design, contests, and more. The actual play episodes will have a focus on showing new Keepers how to run Brindlewood Bay and The Between. 

If you are a fan of this game concept and the mystery system underpinning it (or you just like to hear Jason's beautiful podcasting voice, haha), this show will be for you! 

Creator Spotlight: Alicia Furness and Chris Bissette

This seems like a good time to start highlighting some creators in the Brindlewood Bay scene. For this update, we're going to talk about Alicia Furness and Chris Bissette! Alicia and Chris have created many games in the indie TTRPG scene, including a number of Brindlewood Bay-related projects. They are the creators of Bed, Breakfast, & Beyond, the 2-player version of which was unlocked for this Kickstarter campaign, have created several mysteries in Nephews in Peril, and earlier this year they launched The Unquiet Dark. The Unquiet Dark is a jazz-age prequel to Brindlewood Bay. You can learn more about it and preorder the physical edition here (North America) or here (Europe/UK)

Alicia has also created Paranormal Inc., a GM-less game that uses the Brindlewood Bay mystery system, and several Brindlewood Bay mysteries, all of which can be found on their website.

Chris has created the mystery Best Left Jellied. You can check out that and all their work at their website.

Help Spread the Word This Weekend

This success of this campaign is driven in good part by your passion for this game. You can help us out this weekend by continuing to spread the word. Places that are helpful: TTRPG and other hobby spaces on Facebook; TTRPG forums; and places where people discuss adjacent topics, like mystery books or horror movies. As always, focus on a few key talking points:

• The game combines Murder, She Wrote, Golden Girls, and Lovecraftian horror.
• It's easy to run and play, even for new roleplayers. 
• It has an innovative mystery system where not even the Keeper knows the solution.

And don't forget to give them a link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gauntlet/brindlewood-bay-cozy-murder-mystery-rpg

Thanks so much for your support! We're going to leave you with a never-before-seen piece of artwork from Cecilia, this time for the starter mystery, Dad Overboard.

-The Brindlewood Bay team

Deep Reaver Con!
over 4 years ago – Tue, May 03, 2022 at 03:06:35 AM

Things are chugging along nicely with the campaign. We have unlocked an impressive 13 stretch goals, with 2 more on deck (more on those later). 

Have you considered getting the Brindlewood Bay Community Cookbook? This cookbook/solo mystery game is a Kickstarter exclusive—you will not be able to preorder through BackerKit or purchase it later. It can be added to any pledge for $30, or you can save by getting the Murder Mavens bundle. 

New Interviews

Brindlewood Bay creator Jason Cordova has been doing interviews about the game. Here are some of his most recent appearances:

Third Floor Wars

The Dark Orb

3W6

Boody Disgusting

"Have Yourself a Merry Little Murder" and Deep Reaver Con

We are currently working on two stretch goals. At $230K we'll unlock "Have Yourself a Merry Little Murder," a new holiday mystery by Mads C. Turley, inspired by Hallmark Channel movies. At $265K we'll unlock Deep Reaver Con, a trio of interconnected mysteries that take place at Brindlewood Bay's premier tabletop games convention. A little more about Deep Reaver Con...

We have asked some of our favorite game designers, including Gus L. and Ben Laurence, to create a trio of interconnected mysteries that celebrate our love for tabletop roleplaying games. The mysteries are set at Deep Reaver Con, a tabletop games convention that takes its name from the Deep Reaver whaling ship that was critical to the founding of the town. What happens when the world's best Sorcery: The Convalescence player ends up dead right before the final round of the tournament? How will the Mavens determine which masked suspect stole the prize money for this year's cosplay contest? What will the Mavens do when the live action dungeon crawl starts to get a little too real? Like the old school RPGs that inspired these mysteries, many of the clues will be print & play handouts that Keepers give to players to puzzle over. We think this stretch goal is going to expand the setting of Brindlewood Bay in some  fun ways, while paying homage to the origins of this hobby that we love so much. 

As always, thanks so much for your support. If you haven't yet joined us on Discord, please do so.

We're going to leave you with another brand-new, never-before-seen piece of art from Cecilia Ferri, this time for the classic mystery, "A Murder Most Mucky." 

-The Brindlewood Bay team