[Pinnacle] Update: Savage Rifts® Player's Guide is Going BIG—and EU Friendly!
We have an exciting
new Stretch Goal for you! Actually, several.
After considering all the requests to print Stretch Goal PDFs like playing
D-Bees and Dog Boys and Dragons (yes Dragons! see below), or additional weapons and gear, we decided to try making the Player's Guide BIGGER!
This is something we've
never done before in our graphic novel format, but since this Kickstarter is really something special, we've decided to do something special too.
We can't promise all of the material being offered as PDF stretch goals will make it into the expanded Player's Guide, but we'll do our best.
The retail price after the Kickstarter will be higher, but we don't know by how much yet. You fine folks backing our Kickstarter, of course, are not paying any more for the bigger book—that's why it's a stretch goal for $300,000. (And yes, of course there are more Stretch Goals before that!)
Our merchant level friends may be especially excited about this announcement since they now get a greater than 50% discount on their package if we hit $300,000. We hope this starts people playing Savage Rifts® in their store every week.
So please tell your FLGS!
It's also another reason for your friends to back at the Player's Guide level: they get the book at retail price PLUS all the Stretch Goal material, including Bookmarks and Character Folio!
So you do nothing to get a bigger book. Just tell all your friends and help us hit $300,000 goal.
Three Weeks
This will delay the books by 3 weeks. We're already working on the material and ordering art. We have a plan to make this work pretty quickly, but it's still a lot of extra work from all our team.
We figured the vast majority of you won't mind a potential delay in exchange for all this material worked into the print versions, but of course if that does bother you, we understand if you need to withdraw your pledge.
The EU Solution
As we've said for a while with both this and our previous projects, we are
constantly looking at new shipping solutions to the EU. Even working with great partners overseas hasn't saved much once they add in the additional labor and freight. Companies with higher volume than ours get better rates, but we're still a little company and just can't get the same kinds of discounts that some others do.
But we do have at least a
partial solution for our friends in the EU, and we're continuing to look for even more. We just don't want to promise anything until we know for sure it will work. (Sorry, Australia and Canada, we still don't have a better solution for you.)
What we have been able to work out means that customers in the EU
pay no VAT or customs taxes. (We're paying it.)
For some of you, this means a savings of around $100 on the highest tier package. The process is this: we ship a palletload of prepackaged, prelabeled boxes to our friends in Germany and pay the customs as a publisher. They ship to you, if you live in the European Union. We reimburse them the postage.
Right now we have a little over 100 backers coming from the EU, but no way to tell if they are print or PDF backers.
This is an experiment for us, and does not yet mean a reduction in the other shipping costs (we can't alter the reward levels anyway—Kickstarter locks them as soon as one person backs at that level, to protect you).
Do you know of a warehouse in Canada or Australia who will reship a palletload of boxes? Have them email Jodi at
PEGJodi@gmail.com. So far it hasn't worked out with the usual suspects, but we'll keep trying for you.
New Stretch Goals
I bet you jumped down here to read the stretch goals already, didn't you?
$210,000 D-Bee: Quick-Flex Another very popular D-Bee race, the Quick-Flex live up to their names, excellent in combat and vehicle operation. (PDF)
$220,000 EX-5 Behemoth The "mobile home" of Robot Armor vehicles, the venerable and beloved Behemoth Explorer is a fortress on the move for your Tomorrow Legion team. (PDF)
$230,000 The Contamination Principle Adventure by Darrell Hayhurst Darrell Hayhurst has worked on Hard Vacuum, Ninja Crusade 2nd Edition, Codex Infernus, AMP Year 3, Torg Eternity with Shane, and now Savage RIFTS®. (PDF)
$240,000 D-Bee: N'mbyr Gorilla Man An iconic D-Bee race, found in many `Burbs around Chi-Town and elsewhere, and notable for its resemblance to Earth-born simians. (PDF)
$250,000 Character Folio in Print! Players and GMs alike, take note! This booklet will have a character sheet for filling out and pages for notes, character portraits, maps, NPC rosters, and more, so your character is ready to play anytime! Note: This Stretch Goal will be delivered to physical backers in print; everyone will receive a PDF copy.
$260,000 D-Bee: Lyn-Srial The Golden Ones are a winged race of protectors and peacekeepers, many earning their other nickname, the Sky-Knights. (PDF)
$270,000 Playing a Flame Wing Dragon by Sean Patrick Fannon The chance to play a genuine dragon is one of the legacies of RIFTS®. We’ll detail how to create and play a Dragon Hatchling, including special abilities and Edges for this unique Iconic Framework. (PDF)
$280,000 Murderthon PDF Adventure by Ross Watson Ross cranks out a second adventure! (PDF)
$290,000 Coalition Field Manual by Sean Patrick Fannon The armor, vehicles, weapons, and other gear of the Coalition States are some of the most coveted on the Black Market, and most despaired by any on the wrong side of a conflict with them. (PDF)
$300,000 Bigger Player’s Guide! (Print) We’ll add as many of the digital Stretch Goals into the Player’s Guide *in print* and into the final PDF. Retail price on the Player’s Guide at this point will be higher than $19.99, so backers are getting a more expensive book—a more comprehensive Player’s Guide—for free!
That's lots of news...please go share it! And thank you for your support. 
