Crowdfunding and The Business of Unfinished Promises

An investigation into crowdfunding platforms, publisher responsibility, and the financial risks carried by the people who fund tabletop roleplaying games.

Fifty-One Projects and a Few Questions

Over the past seven years, I’ve backed somewhere around 51 Kickstarter projects. My wife would probably tell you that’s about 50 too many, and depending on the day, she might have a point. I’ve spent a considerable amount of money supporting projects that interested me, primarily because I wanted to see those products become a reality. Sometimes I’ve received something genuinely outstanding. Other times, I’ve spent months, and occasionally years, wondering when the thing I paid for would finally show up.

My earliest Kickstarter experiences weren’t even tabletop roleplaying games. They were video games. Those experiences made me considerably more reluctant to back another video game campaign, although I recently made an exception for Danger Mouse. I grew up in the 1980s, and apparently a British cartoon mouse with an eyepatch can still get me to open my wallet.

Nostalgia has a way of doing that.

These days, most of my crowdfunding interests involve tabletop roleplaying games. I enjoy discovering new adventures, supporting independent publishers, and seeing what creative people can produce without major corporate backing. I’ve received some excellent books through crowdfunding, including products that have earned a permanent place on my shelves. I don’t regret every pledge I’ve made. Not even close. But I have become increasingly interested in how the business operates, particularly when a campaign raises its money, declares success, and then spends the next year or two struggling to deliver what people paid for.

Before this writing life, I spent years in construction and business management. I was involved in building Sonic restaurants in Texas and all over the Mid-South, where budgets, schedules, subcontractors, invoices, and cash flow were everyday concerns. I understand that projects encounter unexpected expenses. I understand that vendors miss deadlines, materials become more expensive, and plans occasionally need to change. I also understand something else: collecting money creates an obligation. When a contractor takes money for a job, the customer expects the work to be completed. When a publisher accepts payment for a book, the customer expects a book. That expectation doesn’t disappear simply because the transaction takes place on a crowdfunding website.

Yet crowdfunding introduces a peculiar arrangement. The customer provides the money before the product exists, sometimes before substantial development has even begun. The creator receives the capital needed to pursue the project, while the customer assumes the uncertainty surrounding its completion. And somewhere in the middle sits a crowdfunding platform that collects a fee when the campaign succeeds financially. That arrangement raises several questions.

Who gets paid first? Who bears the financial risk? What happens when the creator cannot deliver? How much responsibility should the platform accept for the projects from which it earns revenue?

And perhaps the most uncomfortable question of all: Have crowdfunding platforms created a business model that profits from customer enthusiasm without accepting a proportionate share of the consequences when that enthusiasm goes unrewarded?

That’s what I want to examine.

Not because I believe every creator is dishonest, every campaign is doomed, or every crowdfunding platform is deliberately exploiting its customers. None of those positions would survive serious examination.

I want to know whether the structure itself is fair.

A Multimillion-Dollar Business Built on Promises

Crowdfunding has developed into a substantial commercial enterprise, particularly within the tabletop gaming industry, where advance financing has become an increasingly familiar method of bringing products to market. Kickstarter reported that 6,646 tabletop game projects launched on its platform during 2024, with 5,314 successfully reaching their funding goals. Those campaigns attracted approximately $220 million in pledges, representing an 80 percent funding success rate, the highest recorded for the category during Kickstarter’s first fifteen years. The figures include tabletop games broadly, rather than tabletop roleplaying games alone, but they illustrate the enormous amount of money flowing through a market once dominated by conventional publishers, distributors, and retailers. For independent creators, access to that capital can mean the difference between publishing a game and abandoning the project altogether. For the companies operating the crowdfunding platforms, however, those transactions also represent a significant source of revenue. Source: Kickstarter, 2024 Games Report⁠.

Those aggregate figures require some perspective because crowdfunding campaigns vary enormously in size. A small independent adventure that raises a few thousand dollars and a major boxed game that collects several million dollars both count as one successfully funded project. Dividing the approximately $220 million in pledges by the 5,314 funded tabletop campaigns produces a rough average of $41,400 per successful campaign, but that calculation should not be mistaken for the amount raised by a typical publisher. A relatively small number of exceptionally large campaigns can substantially influence an arithmetic average, and identifying the median would require examining the underlying campaign-level data. This distinction matters when discussing non-delivery because many failed projects may involve comparatively modest amounts of money rather than the extraordinary totals associated with crowdfunding’s most visible successes. The loss of a $40 or $100 pledge can still represent a serious breach of trust to an individual customer, even when the campaign’s overall financial consequences are relatively small.

Kickstarter charges creators a standard fee of five percent of successfully collected funding, while payment processing adds another expense, generally three percent plus thirty cents per pledge in the United States. BackerKit’s crowdfunding platform also advertises a five-percent fee, with American payment processing ordinarily costing 2.9 percent plus thirty cents per transaction. Gamefound operates under a similar arrangement, charging five percent of collected funding alongside processing fees. These charges compensate the platforms for providing fundraising infrastructure, payment administration, campaign management, and access to prospective supporters. They are legitimate business expenses from the publisher’s perspective, and there is no particular reason to regard the percentages themselves as unreasonable. Nevertheless, their significance becomes apparent when applied to the volume of money involved. Sources: Kickstarter fees⁠, BackerKit pricing⁠, Gamefound fees⁠.

If the standard five-percent fee were applied to the entire $220 million pledged to successful Kickstarter tabletop campaigns in 2024, the resulting figure would be approximately $11 million in gross platform fees. That is a traditional estimate rather than a verified statement of Kickstarter’s actual revenue, since unsuccessful payment collections and other adjustments can affect the amount ultimately received. It also excludes revenue from other Kickstarter categories, while payment-processing charges should not be confused with the platform’s own earnings. Even with those qualifications, the calculation demonstrates that tabletop crowdfunding represents a meaningful commercial market. The same activity that allows an independent designer to finance a hardcover rulebook also provides the platform with revenue that is generally earned when fundraising succeeds, rather than when the promised hardcover reaches its purchasers. This distinction is essential because the platform’s commercial transaction and the publisher’s obligation to the customer are completed at different stages.

Consider a hypothetical tabletop publisher that raises $100,000 from 1,000 backers, each pledging an average of $100. Under Kickstarter’s published American fee structure, approximately $5,000 would be deducted as the platform fee, with another $3,300 going toward payment processing. That leaves approximately $91,700 before the publisher accounts for writing, editing, artwork, layout, printing, warehousing, freight, taxes, and fulfillment. If the publisher manages those expenses successfully, the arrangement works as intended, and all parties receive the benefits they anticipated. If the publisher underestimates production costs, encounters financial trouble, or never completes the manuscript, however, the platform has generally already received its compensation. The publisher remains responsible for the unfinished project, while the backers may discover that the money needed to complete the work or issue refunds is no longer available. It is this separation between fundraising revenue and fulfillment responsibility that deserves considerably more attention than it ordinarily receives.

The Companies Behind the Platforms

The corporate structures of Kickstarter, BackerKit, and Gamefound are relevant because crowdfunding is sometimes discussed as though these businesses are merely neutral communities connecting artists with supporters. In reality, each company operates within a commercial framework involving operating expenses, competitive pressures, and financial stakeholders. Kickstarter became a Public Benefit Corporation in 2015, a legal designation that incorporates public-benefit commitments into the responsibilities of a for-profit business. The company has committed itself to supporting creative work and publishes benefit statements describing its activities. Its status does not make it a nonprofit, nor does it remove the need to evaluate its financial incentives and customer protections. Although Kickstarter has received outside investment, the available public information does not establish that it is controlled by a private-equity firm, and such an allegation should not be made without evidence. Source: Kickstarter’s 2024 Benefit Statement⁠.

BackerKit followed a different path into crowdfunding. Founded in 2012 by Maxwell Salzberg and Rosanna Yau, the company initially developed tools to help creators manage the administrative work following successful campaigns, including surveys, additional purchases, shipping information, and pledge management. These services became increasingly valuable as crowdfunding campaigns grew more complicated and publishers discovered that collecting money was only the beginning of the process. In 2022, BackerKit introduced its own crowdfunding platform, becoming a direct competitor to Kickstarter while retaining its established pledge-management business. Its expansion demonstrates how an entire supporting industry has developed around crowdfunding, with companies earning revenue not only from the original fundraising campaigns but also from the subsequent administration of pledges and additional transactions. The services can be useful to publishers, although the growing number of intermediaries also makes it important to understand precisely where backer money goes.

BackerKit’s financial disclosures provide an unusually detailed look at the economics of one of these companies. According to information published through its Wefunder investment offering, BackerKit generated approximately $23.7 million in revenue during fiscal 2024, followed by approximately $17.1 million in fiscal 2025. The same disclosures reported net losses of approximately $890,000 and $2.2 million for those respective years. These figures establish that BackerKit operates a substantial business, but they also demonstrate why revenue should never be mistaken for profit. A company can process considerable amounts of money while spending more than it earns on staffing, technology, marketing, operations, and other obligations. BackerKit’s reported results do not support the simplistic conclusion that its owners are collecting enormous annual profits without meaningful expenses. They do establish that crowdfunding infrastructure is a commercially significant enterprise whose financial arrangements deserve ordinary business scrutiny. Source: BackerKit financial disclosures, Wefunder⁠.

The company’s investment history also illustrates an important distinction between reward crowdfunding and actual investment. BackerKit’s Wefunder offering raised approximately $3 million from more than 4,300 investors through an investment vehicle, giving participants contractual economic interests subject to the terms of the offering. That arrangement differs fundamentally from a customer pledging money toward an unfinished tabletop RPG. The ordinary reward-crowdfunding backer receives no ownership interest in the publishing company, no right to participate in future profits, and generally no authority over how the publisher manages its finances. The backer’s anticipated return is the promised reward, which may be delayed, altered under the campaign’s terms, or never delivered. The financial exposure can therefore resemble investment risk without providing the rights or potential financial benefits ordinarily associated with investment.

Gamefound offers another example of crowdfunding’s development into a larger commercial industry. Established in Poland and originally associated with pledge management for Awaken Realms projects, Gamefound subsequently expanded into a full crowdfunding platform specializing in tabletop products. Ravensburger invested €4 million in the company in 2022, providing a connection with an established games publisher. Gamefound continued expanding and announced its acquisition of Indiegogo in July 2025, bringing together a tabletop-focused crowdfunding business and one of the better-known general crowdfunding platforms. Indiegogo’s announcement reported that Gamefound had raised more than $165 million through its platform during 2024 alone. These figures describe fundraising activity rather than company profit, but they reinforce the conclusion that crowdfunding is no longer a marginal experiment in creative financing. It has become an industry large enough to attract significant investment and corporate consolidation. Source: Gamefound and Indiegogo acquisition announcement⁠.

None of these ownership arrangements establishes that a particular company is exploiting its customers. They do, however, challenge the tendency to treat crowdfunding platforms as though they operate outside the ordinary expectations of commercial accountability. Their business models depend on attracting creators, encouraging successful fundraising, and retaining the confidence of backers. Those interests can complement one another when projects are completed successfully, but they do not necessarily remain aligned when fulfillment fails. A platform that develops a reputation for hosting unreliable campaigns risks losing future customers, which gives it a genuine commercial reason to discourage fraud and repeated non-delivery. Nevertheless, that potential reputational damage is generally indirect and develops over time, whereas the platform’s fundraising fees are collected much earlier. The central question is whether the platforms’ policies distribute responsibility in a manner consistent with the financial benefits they receive from facilitating these transactions.

Where the Risk Actually Falls

The most troubling feature of reward crowdfunding is not the fee charged by the platform, but the limited financial protection available to customers when a project fails after reaching its funding goal. Kickstarter’s terms assign responsibility for completing projects and fulfilling rewards to creators, while stating that Kickstarter does not guarantee their work, provide refunds, oversee project performance, or mediate disputes between users. BackerKit places fulfillment and refund responsibilities on creators, rather than presenting itself as the seller of the underlying product. Gamefound generally operates under the same principle, although it provides certain additional protections under specified circumstances. These arrangements are disclosed, and customers are repeatedly reminded that crowdfunding involves supporting a project rather than purchasing an existing product through an ordinary retail transaction. The difficulty is that disclosure of risk does not necessarily establish that the distribution of that risk is reasonable. Source: Kickstarter Terms of Use⁠.

When a publisher encounters financial difficulties, the distinction between legal responsibility and practical recovery becomes particularly important. A creator may acknowledge an obligation to complete a project or issue refunds, but the acknowledgment provides little comfort if the money has already been spent and the business cannot raise additional capital. Customers may request refunds, contact the platform, investigate payment disputes, or pursue remedies under applicable law, but none of those options guarantees that funds will be recovered. Credit-card disputes are subject to rules and deadlines, while legal proceedings can cost considerably more than the value of an individual pledge. Even when a customer has a valid claim, a publisher with insufficient assets may be unable to satisfy it. The result is an arrangement in which the customer bears much of the practical financial consequence of failure despite having little influence over the decisions that produced it.

Consider a publisher who completes a crowdfunding campaign in May with a carefully prepared budget allocating $5,000 for shipping and fulfillment. By August, the books are printed and ready to leave the warehouse, but changes in freight rates, tariffs, customs expenses, or carrier charges have increased the actual cost to $9,000. The publisher now faces a $4,000 shortfall despite having completed the product and potentially having managed the original campaign responsibly. If the business has sufficient reserves, it can absorb the additional expense; otherwise, the owner may need to provide additional capital, arrange financing, negotiate alternative shipping arrangements, or seek voluntary contributions from backers. For a small independent publisher, that could mean using personal savings or wages from another job to complete the obligation, although the owner’s legal responsibility depends on the business structure and agreements involved. This example demonstrates why crowdfunding delivery estimates are inherently uncertain, but it also illustrates the distinction between legitimate financial hardships and irresponsible publishing. A customer should not automatically assume dishonesty when expenses increase. A publisher should not assume that unexpected expenses eliminate its obligations to customers.

Gamefound’s optional Stable Pledge program illustrates both the possibility and the limitations of additional safeguards. Under the program, participating creators agree to provide full refunds when certain disclosed price estimates increase by more than ten percent after a campaign, provided affected backers request their refunds within the applicable period. Gamefound agrees to return its own platform fee to the creator for qualifying refunds, although the creator remains responsible for making the actual payments. This is not a comprehensive fulfillment guarantee, and it does not resolve the problem of a publisher that has exhausted its funds. Nevertheless, the arrangement demonstrates that a crowdfunding platform can accept a limited financial consequence under circumstances where customers are entitled to withdraw from a transaction. It establishes a practical middle ground between placing every consequence on the backer and requiring the platform to guarantee every campaign. The possibility of similar protections for other serious failures deserves consideration rather than a dismissive hand wave. Source: Gamefound’s published Stable Pledge terms, illustrated in participating campaigns⁠.

The term predatory deserves particular care in this discussion. It is possible for a business model to be structurally imbalanced without every company operating within that model engaging in deliberately exploitative conduct. Crowdfunding platforms provide real services, and their fees are not inherently unreasonable. They also have strong reputational incentives to discourage fraud and support responsible publishers, since widespread customer dissatisfaction would eventually damage their businesses. Kickstarter, for example, maintains rules against prohibited and deceptive conduct, and platforms can suspend projects or accounts when they identify serious violations. Such enforcement is meaningful, but it is not the same as providing customers with financial protection when an otherwise legitimate campaign becomes insolvent or fails to deliver. The distinction is particularly important because reputational consequences affect established creators who expect to launch future campaigns more strongly than individuals or companies that never intend to return. A platform may therefore benefit financially from a campaign that ultimately produces nothing for its backers, even though the platform neither intended nor encouraged that outcome. Whether its policies adequately address that possibility is a legitimate question of commercial responsibility.

I don't believe crowdfunding platforms should necessarily guarantee every project. Such guarantees would increase operating costs, restrict access for inexperienced creators, and make it harder for small publishers to finance their work. There is, however, considerable room between guaranteeing every transaction and accepting almost no responsibility for the outcome of transactions from which a platform earns revenue. More detailed disclosures, stronger review of creators’ outstanding obligations, clearer refund procedures, and limited fee-return mechanisms would provide additional protection without fundamentally altering crowdfunding’s purpose. Adequate presentation of information would generally impose a smaller burden than requiring platforms to insure every pledge against failure, particularly if reporting requirements were proportionate to campaign size and risk. The industry’s responsibility should be to demonstrate that it has evaluated these alternatives seriously, rather than assuming that a warning about risk mitigates every question of fairness.

What Statistics Do Not Tell Us

The available research on crowdfunding fulfillment is less extensive than the industry’s fundraising statistics might imply. Kickstarter can report precisely how many projects launched, how many reached their funding goals, and how much money was pledged during a particular year. Comparable public information about how many successfully funded tabletop projects ultimately delivered all promised rewards is considerably harder to establish. This matters because the word successful has a specific meaning in crowdfunding statistics that does not necessarily correspond to a customer’s experience. A campaign that raises $100,000 and subsequently fails to produce its hardcover remains a successfully funded campaign for statistical purposes. Its backers, however, may regard the entire transaction as a failure.

One of the most frequently cited examinations of Kickstarter fulfillment was conducted by University of Pennsylvania researcher Ethan Mollick in 2015. Using responses from 47,188 backers, Mollick estimated that approximately nine percent of successfully funded Kickstarter projects failed to deliver promised rewards, with a possible range of five to fourteen percent. The study is useful because it demonstrates that non-delivery was a measurable problem rather than merely an assortment of isolated complaints. However, it covered multiple Kickstarter categories and was conducted more than a decade ago, making it unsuitable as a current estimate for tabletop roleplaying game publishing. The industry has changed considerably since then, and it would be misleading to suggest that nine percent of contemporary RPG campaigns necessarily fail. Source: Ethan Mollick, ⁠Delivery Rates on Kickstarter⁠, 2015⁠.

In my mind, the single most infamous unfulfilled Kickstarter is Zoë Quinn’s Kickstarted in the Butt: A Chuck Tingle Digital Adventure, commonly known as Project Tingler. Launched in October 2016, the campaign sought $69,420 to produce a full-motion-video adventure game and ultimately collected $85,448 from 2,450 backers. The game was originally scheduled for delivery in February 2017, but nearly a decade later, no completed game has been released. Kickstarter’s public campaign page lists its last update as August 30, 2018, although the absence of subsequent public updates does not establish that no private communications occurred. Quinn’s association with the GamerGate controversy made the project particularly recognizable, but the controversy itself has little bearing on the financial question. Thousands of people financed a game that never materialized, while Kickstarter continues to record the campaign as successfully funded. Whatever happened during development, the outcome illustrates the distinction between raising enough money to begin a project and fulfilling the promises made to the people who financed it. Source: Original Kickstarter campaign⁠.

Although this example comes from video game crowdfunding rather than tabletop roleplaying games, the underlying distinction applies to both industries. It should not be mistaken for evidence of how frequently contemporary tabletop campaigns fail, nor does its notoriety establish that it represents the ordinary crowdfunding experience. Its relevance is narrower and more important: a campaign can meet its financial target, retain its designation as successfully funded, and still leave the people who financed it without the promised product.

A meaningful modern analysis would also need to distinguish between several different outcomes. A campaign that delivers its PDF on time but ships its hardcover six months late has not performed identically to a campaign that never completes its manuscript. Likewise, a publisher that eventually fulfills every reward after a substantial delay should not be classified alongside one that stops communicating and leaves customers with nothing. Partial fulfillment, delayed fulfillment, permanent non-delivery, and refunded pledges are different outcomes, and combining them would obscure the nature of the problem. An especially useful study would examine a defined group of funded tabletop RPG campaigns over several years, comparing original delivery estimates with actual delivery dates and identifying which rewards remain outstanding. Such a study should also distinguish the number of affected projects from the total amount of money involved, since a handful of unusually large failures could distort an assessment of the broader market. Until comparable data becomes available, the responsible conclusion is that fulfillment risk exists and has been documented historically, but its current prevalence within tabletop RPG crowdfunding cannot be stated with confidence.

The absence of reliable fulfillment statistics is more than an inconvenience for researchers. It represents a significant shortcoming in the transparency of the crowdfunding industry itself. Kickstarter, BackerKit, and Gamefound have developed sophisticated systems for tracking pledges, measuring fundraising success, and promoting the financial achievements of their creators, yet comparable public reporting on whether those creators actually deliver their promised rewards remains limited. Platforms may not independently verify every shipment or digital delivery, and developing reliable fulfillment statistics would require additional reporting standards and oversight. Nevertheless, an industry capable of reporting its fundraising performance in extraordinary detail should be expected to make a serious effort to measure fulfillment performance as well. Customers deserve to know not only how often campaigns reach their funding goals, but how often those campaigns ultimately meet their obligations. Without that information, the industry’s public definition of success remains heavily weighted toward collecting money rather than delivering products.

Funding Development or Funding Publication?

The distinction between financing development and financing publication is especially important within tabletop roleplaying games because the two arrangements expose customers to different kinds of risk. A development-focused campaign may begin with a concept, sample rules, preliminary illustrations, and an outline of the proposed book. Substantial writing, editing, playtesting, and production may remain unfinished, with the crowdfunding proceeds intended to finance that work. The publisher is effectively asking customers to supply capital before the creative product has been completed, placing them in a position where they must rely heavily on the creator’s ability to manage both development and business operations. Such projects can be entirely legitimate, and some worthwhile games would never exist without that support. However, customers should understand that they are financing an uncertain development process rather than simply paying for a finished manuscript to be printed.

A publication-focused campaign operates differently. The manuscript may already be complete, the rules tested, the artwork commissioned, and the layout substantially finished before fundraising begins. In that situation, the publisher is primarily seeking capital to finance printing, manufacturing, and distribution, rather than the creation of the underlying game. Physical production still carries meaningful risks involving printers, freight companies, customs, warehousing, and fulfillment services, but the uncertainty surrounding the core creative work has been substantially reduced. Some publishers can deliver completed digital editions shortly after funding, giving customers access to the product while the physical books move through manufacturing. From my perspective as a customer, that approach offers a more attractive balance between supporting independent publishing and assuming unnecessary development risk.

Campaigns should identify these differences clearly instead of relying on polished promotional material to create an impression of readiness. A beautifully illustrated campaign page with elaborate reward tiers can suggest that a book is nearly complete even when significant portions remain unwritten. Conversely, a modest campaign presentation may accompany a thoroughly developed product awaiting only the money necessary for printing. Customers would benefit from knowing how much of the manuscript is finished, whether playtesting has concluded, what production work remains, and how the estimated delivery date was established. These disclosures would not eliminate delays, but they would make the risks more understandable and allow publishers to distinguish completed work from planned work. They would also encourage creators to consider whether they are prepared to assume the responsibilities of a publisher before accepting substantial sums from customers.

Publishing involves skills that extend well beyond writing an entertaining adventure or designing an effective rules system. A publisher must estimate costs, coordinate contractors, manage schedules, maintain financial records, negotiate production arrangements, and communicate with customers when circumstances change. The ability to produce good creative work does not automatically provide the experience needed to manage those responsibilities. In construction, a talented carpenter is not necessarily qualified to manage the finances and scheduling of an entire commercial development. The same distinction applies to tabletop publishing, where an excellent game designer may struggle with the business requirements of bringing a product to market. Crowdfunding makes it easier for creative people to enter publishing, which is a genuine benefit, but it does not remove the responsibilities that accompany accepting customer money.

The Price of Supporting a Project

A current example of the complexities involved in evaluating crowdfunding rewards comes from Dragon Kings, the fantasy setting created by Timothy Brown, one of the original designers of TSR’s Dark Sun. Brown developed the world of Khitus as a spiritual successor to that earlier setting, and two publishers are now bringing related versions of it to BackerKit. Strange Owl Games is crowdfunding the principal Dragon Kings setting book, written for Dungeons & Dragons 5.5e with conversion rules for AD&D Second Edition, while Rugby-Melee Games is conducting a separate campaign adapting the material for Dungeon Crawl Classics. Both campaigns are authorized publishing efforts built around Brown’s Dragon Kings setting, rather than unrelated attempts to recreate Dark Sun. They involve different publishers, game systems, products, and reward structures. The Strange Owl Games edition is advertised as containing the complete setting and its history alongside the rules, while the Rugby-Melee Games supplement emphasizes new DCC-compatible classes, races, psychic powers, spells, environmental rules, and monsters. For customers interested in playing within Khitus using DCC, the question becomes whether the DCC book provides sufficient setting material on its own or whether purchasing the 5.5e edition is necessary to obtain the full background of the world.

The Rugby-Melee Games campaign offers a $70 digital bundle containing the DCC supplement, an adventures PDF, the 5.5e setting PDF, and digital stretch goals. By comparison, its $55 pledge tier includes a physical DCC hardcover, the corresponding PDF, and digital stretch goals, but excludes the additional digital books. Neither arrangement is inherently unreasonable, and the additional PDFs may justify the higher digital price for customers who want the complete package. Nevertheless, the separate Strange Owl Games campaign identifies its 5.5e book as the principal source for the setting, raising a legitimate question about how much background material is included in the DCC adaptation. Some prospective backers have expressed concern that obtaining the full history of Khitus requires purchasing the 5.5e material even when their preferred game is Dungeon Crawl Classics. The available campaign descriptions do not establish that essential information has deliberately been withheld, and the two publishers should not be accused of improper conduct on that basis. The example instead illustrates why publishers offering related products across multiple game systems should explain clearly what content is shared, what is exclusive to each edition, and whether customers need more than one book to experience the complete setting.

Another independent publisher taking a different approach is Greg Christopher, better known as Chubby Funster, who recently completed a successful Kickstarter campaign for ShadowSun Revised⁠, his Dark Sun-inspired setting for Shadowdark. Christopher’s project has no connection to Timothy Brown or the Dragon Kings campaigns, but it provides an interesting comparison. Christopher has already informed backers that he expects to have the PDF available shortly after the campaign funds are released. Christopher’s announced timetable suggests the project is already well into production, rather than something being developed from brainstorming sessions once funds are released. It doesn’t mean there won’t be delays, particularly with printed books, but it does suggest a publisher who has done much of the work before asking customers to finance publication. There is a considerable difference between crowdfunding a nearly completed product and asking people to finance an idea that may take years to become a finished book. Both approaches have their place, but backers ought to know which one they’re paying for.

This example should not be interpreted as evidence that seventy-dollar digital bundles are typical of contemporary tabletop crowdfunding. Establishing that would require a broader comparison of campaigns, including their page counts, production quality, included material, and prices. Nevertheless, the example raises a legitimate question about how customers assess value when purchasing unfinished digital products. A high price does not automatically indicate poor value, but the publisher should provide enough information for prospective backers to understand precisely what they are financing.

When a setting is offered for multiple rules systems, the amount of overlapping material becomes relevant to that evaluation. Two editions may require distinct mechanics, character options, encounter statistics, and other system-specific development, but they may also share substantial portions of the same setting descriptions and background material. A customer purchasing both editions should be able to determine how much additional content is being received and whether the bundle offers a meaningful saving over purchasing the components separately. The same standard should apply when comparing crowdfunding prices with ordinary retail PDFs of similar length and production quality. A campaign may provide excellent value despite a relatively high price, but that conclusion should be based on identifiable content rather than the assumption that supporting an independent creator automatically justifies a premium.

Reward-tier design can make these comparisons more difficult than necessary. Campaigns frequently employ elaborate names, overlapping packages, limited-edition covers, exclusive accessories, and combinations of physical and digital rewards. While such presentations can make a campaign more engaging, they can also obscure relatively straightforward questions about what each pledge level includes. Customers should not need to compare several lengthy descriptions to determine whether a more expensive tier provides additional content or simply rearranges rewards already available elsewhere. Clear descriptions, consistent item lists, and transparent pricing would make campaigns easier to evaluate without preventing publishers from offering premium or collector-oriented products. Supporting a creator is a legitimate motivation for spending money, but it should not replace ordinary expectations of clarity in a commercial transaction.

Stretch goals introduce another complication because they can increase both the perceived value of a campaign and the publisher’s obligations. An additional adventure may require new writing, editing, artwork, and layout, while physical accessories introduce manufacturing and shipping expenses that were not necessarily part of the original production plan. A campaign can therefore raise substantially more money while becoming increasingly complicated to fulfill. Experienced publishers may account for those expenses carefully, but less experienced creators can underestimate the additional work and discover that their successful campaign has become more difficult to complete than originally anticipated. Customers should not be expected to absorb the consequences of unrealistic planning merely because the campaign attracted more pledges than expected. Responsible crowdfunding requires understanding the cost of every promised reward before offering it.

When New Projects Compete With Old Obligations

The ease with which a successful creator can return to crowdfunding creates another issue involving business priorities. A publisher that has developed an enthusiastic audience may be able to generate substantial new funding by announcing another project, even while earlier campaigns remain unfinished. There are legitimate reasons for publishers to maintain several projects simultaneously, and an established company with adequate staff and capital may manage that arrangement successfully. The concern arises when new fundraising becomes a substitute for completing existing obligations or when the pursuit of additional projects diverts resources from products customers have already financed. Without access to a publisher’s financial records, outsiders should not assume that money from one campaign has been improperly spent on another. They can, however, reasonably question whether the business has sufficient resources to fulfill its outstanding commitments.

This is another area in which crowdfunding platforms could provide more useful information. A creator’s history of successfully funded campaigns does not necessarily establish a history of successful delivery, yet fundraising totals are often more visible than fulfillment performance. A prospective backer should be able to determine whether earlier projects have been completed, whether significant rewards remain outstanding, and how actual delivery dates compare with original estimates. Such information would not require the platform to accuse creators of misconduct or punish every delay. It would provide a factual record that customers could consider when deciding whether to finance another project from the same publisher. In an industry where customers routinely commit money long before delivery, a reliable fulfillment record should be regarded as a meaningful commercial credential.

The responsibility ultimately rests with publishers to operate within their financial and organizational capabilities. A creator may have numerous worthwhile ideas, but a publishing business must decide which projects it can responsibly complete with the resources available. Taking additional money from customers introduces new obligations, and those obligations should be considered alongside commitments already made. Publishers who consistently deliver completed products establish trust through performance rather than promotional claims. Those who repeatedly overextend themselves risk damaging not only their own reputations but also confidence in independent crowdfunding generally.

A Better Balance Between Publishers, Platforms, and Customers

None of these criticisms should obscure the benefits crowdfunding has brought to tabletop gaming. Independent publishers can reach audiences that conventional distributors might overlook, finance products that larger companies would consider too specialized, and measure demand before committing to expensive print runs. Customers can support unusual settings, experimental systems, and ambitious physical editions that might never be produced through traditional channels. These advantages are substantial, and any proposed reforms should preserve the opportunities that make crowdfunding valuable. The objective should not be to eliminate risk altogether, since creative development and physical manufacturing will always involve uncertainty. It should be to ensure that customers understand the risks they accept and that the businesses benefiting from their financial support exercise reasonable responsibility.

Greater transparency would be an appropriate starting point. Platforms could require clearer disclosure of production readiness, provide more accessible information about outstanding creator obligations, and distinguish successful fundraising from completed fulfillment in their public reporting. Publishers could provide realistic schedules supported by identifiable production milestones rather than optimistic delivery estimates selected primarily for promotional appeal. Refund procedures could be explained plainly before customers pledge, with clearer descriptions of what happens when a creator cannot complete a project. Platforms might also examine limited financial safeguards that provide additional protection in cases of serious non-delivery without requiring them to guarantee every creative undertaking. These measures would impose additional responsibilities, but they could also improve confidence in an industry that depends heavily on customer trust.

The distinction between limited safeguards and comprehensive guarantees is important because the two proposals would have very different consequences. Requiring crowdfunding platforms to guarantee every reward could lead to higher fees, more restrictive approval standards, and fewer opportunities for inexperienced publishers to raise capital. Platforms would need to price the additional risk into their services, potentially making the smallest and most experimental campaigns less attractive to host. By comparison, publishing more accessible fulfillment records, requiring clearer production-readiness disclosures, and presenting refund terms in ordinary language would not require the platform to insure every transaction. Such reforms would still involve administrative costs and decisions about how to verify creator information, but those burdens could be proportionate to the size and complexity of the campaign. The objective should be a better-informed marketplace rather than a system in which every failed creative project automatically becomes a financial liability for the company hosting it.

Publishers themselves have alternatives to financing every new idea through crowdfunding. A digital-first approach allows a creator to complete a manuscript, publish the finished PDF through a marketplace such as DriveThruRPG or directly to customers, and reinvest earned revenue into subsequent releases. Print-on-demand services and smaller production runs can make physical editions possible without requiring an elaborate fundraising campaign for every book. This approach places more of the ordinary development risk on the publishing business, where I believe much of it belongs, while allowing customers to purchase completed products with a clearer understanding of their contents. It will not suit every project, particularly those requiring expensive manufacturing or unusually ambitious production, but it demonstrates that advance customer financing is a choice rather than an unavoidable requirement of independent publishing.

The difference is not simply one of distribution methods, but of who supplies the money while the product is being developed. Under a conventional publishing arrangement, the creator or publisher ordinarily bears the expense of producing the manuscript before customers purchase the finished work. Crowdfunding allows that expense to be transferred, at least in part, to prospective customers who agree to pay before the product exists. In return, those customers may receive exclusive rewards, discounted editions, or the satisfaction of making a worthwhile project possible, but they generally do not receive ownership or a share of the publisher’s profits. This arrangement can be reasonable when the terms and risks are understood, although it places more early-stage uncertainty on customers than an ordinary retail purchase would. Independent publishers should therefore consider whether crowdfunding is necessary for a particular product or merely the most convenient way to finance development without committing their own capital.

After seven years and approximately 51 backed projects, I remain convinced that crowdfunding can be an effective means of supporting independent creators. I have received enough worthwhile products to appreciate what the system makes possible, and I have no interest in discouraging publishers who approach it responsibly. My concern is that the commercial arrangements underlying crowdfunding have become so familiar that their consequences are rarely examined with sufficient care. Kickstarter, BackerKit, and Gamefound provide valuable services, but their ability to earn revenue when a campaign reaches its funding goal does not necessarily correspond to the customer’s ability to receive the product being financed. That difference deserves consideration whenever the industry celebrates another successful fundraising year.

The available evidence does not justify declaring every crowdfunding platform predatory, nor does it establish that most tabletop campaigns fail to deliver. It does establish a substantial financial industry in which customers can assume considerable risk while receiving limited practical protection when projects collapse. The platforms, publishers, and customers involved in these transactions do not occupy equivalent positions, and the consequences of failure are not distributed equally. Platforms have legitimate reasons to discourage fraud and repeated failures, but those incentives are primarily reputational and operate over a longer period than the collection of campaign fees. Addressing the imbalance would strengthen crowdfunding rather than undermine it, particularly if reforms made it easier to distinguish responsible publishers from those who repeatedly fail to meet their commitments.

My years in construction taught me that securing financing is only one part of completing a project. A contractor can obtain funding, purchase materials, hire subcontractors, and begin construction, but the customer ultimately expects the building to be finished according to the agreed terms. Publishing should be approached with comparable seriousness, even when the product is a fantasy adventure rather than a commercial building. Crowdfunding does not eliminate a creator’s contractual responsibilities, but it can make those responsibilities difficult for an individual backer to enforce, particularly when pursuing a claim would cost more than the original pledge. Delays may be understandable, expenses may increase, and circumstances may require changes to the original plan. None of those difficulties, however, removes the responsibility to account for money received and promises made.

After seven years and approximately 51 backed projects, I still believe crowdfunding has an important place in independent tabletop publishing. I have supported enough worthwhile projects to appreciate what the system makes possible, and I have no intention of abandoning it. But I also believe that the industry owes its customers more than an impressive record of fundraising totals. A campaign reaches its funding goal when enough people believe in a promise. A publisher earns the confidence of its customers by fulfilling that promise. Those are two different accomplishments, and the long-term credibility of crowdfunding depends on recognizing the difference.