Next Stretch Goal & Manufacturing
almost 6 years ago – Thu, Jun 14, 2018 at 07:08:23 AM

We are just about to our $35K stretch goal, so I wanted to announce the next one. But first, a quick manufacturing update.

Since we've funded, I've already given the go-ahead to the dice manufacturers to make the molds for the new dice. That is underway, so production will move as quickly as possible.

Now for the stretch goal:

Blue Knot Dice - $50K Stretch Goal

A few of you who follow me in the Knot Dice Facebook group or on Twitter or Instagram already had hints about this. I want to do a limited run of blue knot dice.

When we reach this goal, for each boxed set that you receive as a reward for this Kickstarter, you can choose either the original green (which will be the default), or the new blue. You can always add-on a boxed set of another color to your reward level if you wish.

I love the way the blue looks, but I particularly like it when combined with the green:

(You may notice the silver is not quite as bright on the blues - those are prototype dice, while the greens are final. In the final version, the silver on the blues will be just as bright.)

While I love them together, I'm not quite as big a fan of actually connecting the blue and green dice, like this example:

They certainly work this way, but I prefer creating separate but adjacent designs with the two colors.

What do I mean by a limited run? Well, I don't know exactly how many yet, since I don't know how of you here will want the blues. But I only plan to manufacture enough to fulfill this Kickstarter plus a few extras. I will not have a print run of the blue available on my website later on, so this Kickstarter is the place to get it.

$50K is a stretch, but since we've made it nearly to $35K in a week, I think we can do it. Please spread the word about this campaign, and let's get there!

What do you think of the blues? Do you want a set of them, or will you stick with only green?

First Stretch Goal Achieved!
almost 6 years ago – Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:33:50 PM

We got to the first stretch goal! Now every copy of Knot Dice Squared will include the new solo game 4 Get Me Knots.

The next stretch goal is another game, this time 2-player, designed by myself and Elizabeth Hargrave. And what this game needs is a good name, so I'm taking suggestions!

As-Yet Unnamed Game

This is a 2-player competitive game in which you create designs on the sides of a wall built between the players. Play is very similar to Kells: The Abbey, in that when you roll a die, rather than looking at the top of the die, you look at the sides of the die. In most Knot Dice games, you have to use the die face that you rolled (on the top of the die), but you can orient it four different different ways when attaching it to a designs. With this game, you can choose from four different faces, but you can't change the orientation.

One player is crossed, and one is squared/rounded. Start with one die in the middle. On your turn, you take three steps: 1. Collect dice until you have three total; 2. Roll your dice (though you can choose not to roll any dice left from your previous turn); 3. Place two of your dice on your side of the wall.

When placing your dice, you may only place them one space further out than your opponent's dice in any direction (up, left, or right). In this photo below, The four rounded/squared dice are in the possible places that player could play after the crossed player placed the first die.

Your goal is to complete designs on your side of the wall, and you score one point per die in the design. In the next photo, the crossed player has scored 5 points so far.

The game continues until all of the dice have been played, and then players count their scores.

I was really happy to have another game that uses the sides of the dice instead of just the top, to add to the original Kells: The Abbey and Minarets games.

Remember, we don't have a name for this game yet - please give me some suggestions in the comments for this update!

What's Coming Next?

The next stretch goal is the one I'm most excited about. It's definitely going to be a bit of stretch to reach it, since it's at $50K, but I'm hoping we'll get there! I'll reveal it before too long.

Stretch Goals
almost 6 years ago – Thu, Jun 07, 2018 at 03:40:28 PM

I want to say thank you again for taking this campaign so far so fast. We're already knocking at the door of the first stretch goal, so I wanted to explain how those will work this campaign.

With the first Knot Dice campaign, there were a lot of little quality improvements we could make along the way (linen box, silkscreened art on the tokens, more puzzles of various types). But a lot of that is already set this time around - I can't go back and make a lesser version for the expansion! So we already know we're going to have high quality components and a full puzzle book.

So the first two stretch goals are adding brand-new games into the expansion rulebook. As we approach a stretch goal, I'll explain it in more detail in an update, so here goes the first one.

4 Get Me Knots

This was designed by Bonnie Neubauer and myself as a solo game. We started working on it for the original Knot Dice, but I really love what it's become now that we can include Knot Dice Squared.

The objective of the game is to complete differently sized knots with your dice. With a set of 44 dice, a perfect game would let you complete 8 knots (with 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 dice). But there is plenty of freedom to change your strategy as you're playing, and you might be able to score 7 knots with some knots holding 10 or 11 dice.

To start, you set 8 tokens on the table and roll four dice (of your choice).

Then you must place at least one of those dice next to one of the tokens, either as the first die by a token, or by attaching it to a die already by a token. Then you reroll any dice you didn't place, and do it again (placing at least one die each time) until you've placed all four dice.

You continue this process, choosing four more dice and then placing and rerolling from those four, until all dice are placed.

This game I scored six. The bottom left two knots weren't finished, but all of the rest have different numbers of dice in them.

It is very difficult to score a perfect game, but there is plenty of strategy along the way for you to figure out while you're improving. Which dice do you select for your current set of four? Which dice do you start the game with? Do you try to finish knots as soon as possible, or spread your focus between a large number of knots? Do you place many difficult dice on one knot, perhaps giving up on it, in order to get enough rerolls to accomplish the rest of the knots?

When we get a little closer to the next stretch goal, I'll go into detail about that game, and ask for some help to name it too!

A Question

I'd really like to know whether you are coming to this campaign primarily for the games? For the puzzles? For the art? Or is it some combination of those that really speaks to you?

Knot Dice Squared has funded!
almost 6 years ago – Wed, Jun 06, 2018 at 03:52:16 PM

Wow, that was fast! Less than a day, and we're already funded! Thank you so much for your support and enthusiasm!

As a little comparison, it took 11 days to fund the original Knot Dice. It feels fantastic to have such a wonderful and growing community of Knot Dice fans here.

I promised a few more details about the dice in this first update, so that's what I want to give you, and then in the next update I'll start talking about some stretch goals.

More about how the new dice work

The original Knot Dice are also called "crossed" knot dice because when the paths go from die face to die face, over the edge of a die, the paths are always crossing each other. You can see that in the image below.

The "squared" and "rounded" knot dice have paths that are parallel to one another when they travel from die face to die face, over the edge. In addition, there are straight lines and sharp corners on every single face of a squared die, and there are curved lines and rounded corners on every single face of a rounded die.

The "bridge" dice are the bridge between the rest of the dice. Every single face of a bridge die has at least one crossed path going over an edge, and at least one parallel path going over an edge.

Now you can see that the above design uses four crossed dice in the corners, a squared die in the center, and four bridge dice in the middle of the sides to bring them together.

This was key to me, to make sure that when you are looking at any face of one of the knot dice, you can identify that die. Now, it may take a little while to get familiar with them (much like it took some time to get used to the original Knot Dice), but you'll get there.

The original set had 18 crossed dice that all connect. The new Knot Dice Squared set has 18 parallel dice--9 squared and 9 rounded--that connect with each other, and 8 bridge dice to connect from crossed to squared/rounded.

Thanks again for helping fund Knot Dice Squared, and I'll be back in touch again soon with more!