{"id":1189,"date":"2021-01-29T21:30:39","date_gmt":"2021-01-30T03:30:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/?p=1189"},"modified":"2021-01-29T14:30:51","modified_gmt":"2021-01-29T20:30:51","slug":"to-deluxe-or-not-to-deluxe-is-that-a-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/2021\/01\/29\/to-deluxe-or-not-to-deluxe-is-that-a-question\/","title":{"rendered":"To Deluxe Or Not To Deluxe, Is That A Question?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maybe the title of this post should have been, “Too Deluxe Or Not Too Deluxe?” \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n

I purchased two games recently. One cost close to $200 because I sprang for the super deluxe aka “Legendary Edition.” On the other I spent under $40, despite the existence of a $100 upgraded version. Why did I spend so much on one game and not on the other? It wasn’t because of budget. It was about consistency. <\/p>\n

This is the tale of two recent Kickstarter campaigns: Dwellings of Eldervale<\/a> and Honey Buzz<\/a>. First, a bit of a disclosure note: I have not played either of these games as I write this. This post is more about the decision process of whether to buy a game, and if so, which version. Spoiler alert: I bought both, but different “trim levels” and for different reasons.<\/p>\n

\"Dwellings
Dwellings of Eldervale<\/figcaption><\/figure> I will start with Dwellings of Eldervale<\/em>. This game was successful…they raised over half a million dollars during their campaign due to contributions from over 5,000 backers. If I do some quick math…<\/p>\n

$542,794 \/ 5,541 = $97.95<\/p>\n

So on average a backer pledged roughly $100 for this game. As it turns out, there were (conveniently) three different pledge levels: Standard, Deluxe, and Legendary. Oooh, “Legendary” sounds interesting! we’ll get there in a minute. Let’s start at the bottom and work our way up.<\/p>\n

At the $69 Standard pledge level you got a board game that came with cardboard tokens, custom wooden meeples for the various player factions, and cardboard standees to represent the monsters. Each player faction was to be stored in their own tray (custom formed by Game Trayz, who is becoming a bit of a fixture in Kickstarter games these days). The game came with thick cardboard tiles and several decks of cards. Not bad!<\/p>\n

At the $99 Deluxe pledge level you received a few upgrades. In addition to cardboard coins you got metal coins (I love metal coins in my games). In addition to of cardboard resource tokens you got wooden ones. But perhaps the most interesting upgrade was plastic miniatures for the monsters, replacing the cardboard standees. We spent $30 extra for this level. Metal coins are frequently a costly upgrade so it’s easy to see where some of those funds went. That alone made it attractive to upgrade to the Deluxe level in my opinion. But the real star of the show was the set of monsters. Each monster had a unique sculpt, and they were treated with a dark toned wash to make the details stand out. I believe (from what I have read) this was the most popular pledge level for this campaign, and I can see why. This is probably where I would have gone, had I participated.<\/p>\n

Fortunately for me, I was too late. I didn’t find out about the game until people started getting their copies and posting about how much fun it was. This game had a theme (fantasy) that was right in my wheelhouse, and the mechanics were compared to Scythe<\/em>, another game I really like. When I started looking for a copy I had the benefit of seeing folks say things like, “I sure which I had upgraded to the Legendary edition.” <\/p>\n

What were they missing? Was was different about the $139 Legendary pledge level? For an additional $40 over the Deluxe version you got an additional terrain tile along with 9 different monsters. And *drum roll* the monsters came with Sound FX Bases! Woo! Now your monsters would make noises as they marched across the board.<\/p>\n

I can see where people felt that this was a gimmick, something not worth the extra funds. But it appears that during the Kickstarter people focused on the sound bases and ignored the content provided by the additional monsters. Each monster had a unique set of abilities and challenges, which would greatly expand (well, double) the variety of opponents that you might face. The Sound FX bases obscured this. Now there are people looking for the extra monsters, with or without the sound bases, and it seems that the game company is trying to figure out how to make that happen.<\/p>\n

By waiting until the game was released, I was able to read, consider, and ultimately decide that I was going to buy the Legendary edition of the game when it became available, and I did. I didn’t mind spending the extra funds because I had a clear understanding and appreciation for what I got.<\/p>\n

I did not make the same decision for the next game in this post. <\/p>\n

\"Honey
Honey Buzz<\/figcaption><\/figure> Honey Buzz<\/em> is another game that caught my attention recently. It, too, was a Kickstarter game, and it, too, offered different pledge levels. There was a $39 standard pledge level, a $59 deluxe level, and a $20 add-on for wooden coins. Let’s do the math:<\/p>\n

$132,019 \/ 2,666 = $49.52<\/p>\n

Obviously I don’t have access to the pledge financial report. \ud83d\ude42 Since the calculated average of $49 is smack dab in the middle of $39 and $59 I am going to assume that an even distribution between the two pledge levels. Half of the customers pledged for the standard, and half pledged for the deluxe.<\/p>\n

This is another Kickstarter that I found out about after the game was already released. There are websites that will pre-order Kickstarter packages and resell them to folks such as myself who missed out though, and I found one where I could buy the entire Deluxe package with the wooden coin upgrade for roughly $100. That wasn’t a big markup over the Kickstarter cost. I typically like the deluxe versions of things, so it would seem to be a no-brainer for me to jump at the opportunity, right?<\/p>\n

I didn’t. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

To understand why, let’s review the different components available. In the base game you get cardboard tiles to build your hive. You get cardboard tiles for nectar for your bees to collect. There are squishy plastic honey tokens and plastic pollen tokens. The various additional game tokens (first player, coins) are cardboard, and the worker bees (Beeples!) are made of wood. It’s a good quality game, and well worth the $39 price point.<\/p>\n

What are the upgrades? You get a different box cover, acrylic nectar tiles (an upgrade from cardboard), a wooden first player marker (upgrade from cardboard), wooden fan tokens (upgrade from cardboard) and custom resin pollen tokens. There is also a custom plastic tray insert.<\/p>\n

For $100 I could get the deluxe version of the game, a mini expansion and the wooden coins. Or for $35 (discounted at an online game store) I could buy the standard game. <\/p>\n

I bought the $35 version. It wasn’t about the money; I could afford the more expensive version. It was that unlike Dwellings of Eldervale<\/em> I didn’t see the value. I could not put my finger on it initially, but after watching a few videos to learn how to play the game I figured it out. The mash-up of cardboard hive tokens and acrylic nectar tokens bothered me. It should have been either all cardboard (which is what’s in the base game) or all acrylic. I didn’t like the mix. And while wooden coins fit the theme (woodland creatures are not likely to be working metal) I decided that I didn’t need to spend the extra as it didn’t change the game experience.<\/p>\n

I like to use my Sharpie pens to color the edges of my tokens. I like to make my own foam-core inserts. I am buying the lower cost version of this game and going to give it the Sharpie Treatment<\/a> and I think my game is going to look great, but more important for me in this case, it’s going to have a consistent feel.<\/p>\n

What about you? Do you automatically assume more expensive means better? How do you go about picking a pledge level and balance the “Fear of Missing Out” with the hit to your bank account?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Maybe the title of this post should have been, “Too Deluxe Or Not Too Deluxe?” \ud83d\ude00 I purchased two games recently. One cost close to $200 because I sprang for the super deluxe aka “Legendary Edition.” On the other I spent under $40, despite the existence of a $100 upgraded version. Why did I spend … Continue reading “To Deluxe Or Not To Deluxe, Is That A Question?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[130,131],"class_list":["post-1189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-dwellings-of-eldervale","tag-honey-buzz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1189"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1194,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions\/1194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}