Day 13: Shield unlocked & Pigman Defeated
over 1 year ago – Mon, Nov 07, 2022 at 04:38:42 PM

We are 3600 backers strong and are heading into the third week of our Kickstarter. We just unlocked the Shield of Endurance, a truly befitting artifact for these difficult times.

 The shield allows you to prevent other players from burying heroes. You can use it to protect your own heroes, of course, but you can also save another player's Guardian if that fits your interest more. If you are truly evil, you can prevent someone from burying another player's hero and then turn over a hidden card to end the game in your favor. With this shield you get some serious negotiation power on the table and are not as easily intimidated.

 Voting Result: Pigman defeated!

Unlike our last vote, this one was pretty close. The Charlatan defeated the Pigman with a slim 59% to 41% of the votes.

 While the Charlatan celebrates and eagerly awaits to be unlocked, we are preparing the next voting already: On Friday we will ask for your feedback and ideas for the character names in the expansion. Also, while we are working on the next stretch goal, we will have a special reveal next Wednesday, so stay tuned!

 Random Thoughts: Listen to the Oracle

Are you wondering what these "random thoughts" in our votes are all about? For us, they are a great tool to see what's on your mind. Are you happy or upset with us? Our Goblin reads them all! Because of them, we are checking add on options, are taking notes for future character ideas and follow up on feedback that you provide.

 Because many of your thoughts are not only interesting but actually hilarious, we decided to share them publicly via Irda our friendly Twitter Bot. She is tweeting tirelessly since our last Kickstarter and has already shared hundreds of thoughts! Next to your (anonymous) thoughts, she also shares the contributions of last years art and poetry contests. Just in case you are in need of inspiration!

 Social Goals: 100 video likes reached

We have recently reached the 100 likes for the How To Play video on BGG and have completed one of the two conditions for this platform. Thus we are now very close to finally feeding our Possessed Poodle a nice little upgrade.  All we need are 30 more subscribers on BGG. And while you are there, your rating on BGG would mean a lot to us!

If you want to help out on the other platforms, share photos of your game or your favorite artwork using #HiddenLeadersBG on Twitter, Instagram or Mastodon!

Wait, what? Well, our Goblin is currently very annoyed with a certain platform-takeover. Because of that, he created an account on another animal-branded social media site. We are still a bit lost there, however, the good news for you is: All our Mastodon followers and #HiddenLeadersBG "toots" will count to the Twitter social goal . Likewise, you can use Mastodon to participate in our poetry contest, just make sure to tag us, we are not sure how to find you there (yet).

Special Update: About Replacement Cards
over 1 year ago – Sun, Nov 06, 2022 at 04:05:05 AM

This topic has occupied you and us for a while now. How to provide the updated card(s) for backers of the first campaign? We have listened to your feedback and comments and have evaluated many options: Print&Play, a replacement-pack, a sticker set and even sending individual cards by letter.

We thank you for all your patience, your understanding and your constructive ideas. Here is a little bit of context why things went the way they are, as well as our solution.

Context

The last Kickstarter campaign was our first Kickstarter ever. This time it's the first time we are faced with the unique challenges of an expansion campaign. We thought that an icon change on 1 of 83 cards would not be a big deal. Oh boy, were we wrong! As an indie publisher with a small box, we have low margins on the final product. For this reason, we have become hesitant to drop in anything for free that has not been carefully calculated (we learned that the hard way during the last campaign).

Apart from the business side of things, we are a team of three friends with full time jobs. We know each other for 30 years, but still we do not always agree. This debate also put quite some strain on our little team, as we disagreed strongly on what to do. From "this is not feasible" to "sure, no problem" reflects different opinions on our team, although the same goblin might voice them. Thank you for giving us the time to get the financial and the personal side of this sorted out.

Solution

Now without further ado, here is our solution: The updated Ace Fighter card will be printed with the Forgotten Legends expansion. This is the only card that was changed in the English version. The other languages will also receive their updated cards (between 1 and 3 cards) the same way. As long as you have backed an expansion copy, you automatically get your updated card(s) in the same language. No extra money or action is needed on your part.

This is how the new Ace Fighter might look like:

 Initially, we wanted to avoid producing throw-away cards and some people will end up playing the game with two Ace Fighters, still this seems the best compromise to us. We hope that this is a satisfying solution for all of you. Sorry for messing things up!

Markus, Raphael and Andreas

Day 8: Artifacts and Poetry Contest
over 1 year ago – Sun, Nov 06, 2022 at 02:16:19 AM

And here we go! We are more than 3000 backers strong and already very close to our next stretch goal. We have unlocked a highly nutritious stew that can completely change peoples' minds. This artifact integrates with the corruption module but also allows you special access to the corruption bag even when this module is not in play.

 Today, we continue to look into the story of the artifacts and what this module adds to the game. Furthermore, we are starting our poetry contest which allows you to become creative, win great prizes, get published in the rule book and unlock another social stretch goal!

 Treasures from Ancient Times

The Mother of the Guardians has been asleep for hundreds of years, her shrines were lost and forgotten. Unknown to many, the Emperor had four more descendants that do not carry any noble name. United by their dislike of their more prominent half-siblings, they began to study the forgotten legends and located an ancient shrine dedicated to a primal Goddess. During their research, they uncovered many powerful relics. Some of them they kept, others they sold to finance their search.

 Long ago these artifacts were used by the first arrivals to defeat the Mother and her children. They were buried in the old temples to banish her into an eternal sleep and to preserve these powerful weapons for when need be. With the return of the Guardians, every leader tries to get hold of these artifacts to use them for a new purpose, to become the next Emperor of Oshra!

  Asymmetric Player Abilities

Mechanic-wise the artifacts introduce asymmetric player abilities to the very symmetrical base game. Every player receives an artifact card at the beginning of the game that they can use up to three times per game. A flash icon here indicates quick use at the beginning of a turn, an hour glass a slower use at the end of a player's turn. Although these abilities are not fully unique and can (in part) be achieved with cards too, they allow some special strategic options. Let's look at two examples:

With the Secretive Seahorn you become an expert of switching strategy. When you decide to go for your other winning option, you can simply exchange one of your hidden heroes. Also, this allows you to easily hide valuable heroes (such as the Emperor, the Queen or Guardians) among your hidden heroes or save cards for later use. Finally, you can use this card to bluff even with your hidden heroes. You can easily exchange them any time, so no one can trust you!

The Endless Bag of Seeds gives you a unique option to include the Graveyard as your personal deck. Whenever a hero gets buried, you can quickly get this card on your team. This makes burying your heroes less appealing for your opponents and gives you a nasty option to bury&steal other players' cards. If you are especially cunning, you might even bury your own heroes, just to reclaim them and user their ability again. With this artifact, the graveyard is no longer a save place!

 Poetry Contest

Sharpen your pencils because it's time for a contest. In the last campaign we really enjoyed reading all your poems and stories about our heroes. So let's do it again, shall we? Here is how it works:

 Write one (or several) poems about your favorite hero. You can share it as a comment on a picture on our Instagram feed or as a Tweet on Twitter (please tag @boardgamegoblin so we find it). The contest closes Friday, Nov. 11th at Midnight (CST). A jury from our fans and team members will pick two winners (one from Twitter, one from Instagram). Every winner can choose either a KS copy of the base game (1st edition) or a fan shirt with their favorite character. The two winning poems will be printed in the Forgotten Legends rule book. If you are in need for some inspiration, have a look at your Hidden Leaders rule book: There are two poems already in there!

If there are 30 or more participants, we will also unlock an artwork upgrade for the Woeful Water Ghost!

We are looking forward to all your creative contributions. 

Markus, Raphael and Andreas

Day 10: Charlatan VS Pigman a duel of two heroes
over 1 year ago – Sat, Nov 05, 2022 at 03:28:00 PM

Brace yourselves an Obnoxious Nightmare has escaped the underworld and is now haunting Oshra! This is the 4th Guardian hero unlocked and brings the total Guardians from 20 to 24. However, as the conflict continues, more heroes are joining the four factions.

 Duel: The Charlatan VS the Pigman

With the new artifacts uncovered and freed spirits corrupting the land, each faction is calling for the aid of an extraordinary supporter. These four upcoming supporters are experts for the old artifacts and masters of corruption. They feature special character abilities that integrate with the new modules.

 Two travelling heroes are offering their services to the Hill Tribes: A battle worn Pigman and a devious Charlatan. Who should join the Tribes and be added as a stretch goal to the campaign? Please vote in this Google Form. Only one* of them can join the tribes! The vote is open until Sunday 6th at midnight (CST).

* We need to keep a balance of cards & factions. For this reason, it can again just be one of the two. Both are available. You decide which one we will take.

From Dragons to Artifacts: Game Development Insights

Of the three modules in the expansion, the artifact module was the one that changed the most. Although the basic idea stayed the same throughout,  mechanic wise and thematically it changed a lot. Our key question was: How to implement asymmetric player abilities?

You might remember that we hinted at dragons quite a lot at the end of our last Kickstarter. At that time we had pet-dragons in mind for every leader with a mechanism that worked like this: Every player draws two Dragons at the beginning of the game. Dragons have a requirement of certain heroes in your party (similar to Mana in Magic). You can activate a Dragon and use its ability when the requirement is met. Also, you can replace it with another dragon later in the game. This turned out to be... overly complicated! Just compare the two cards below:

We found that the "play heroes to bring your dragon into the game, to eventually use it later" mechanism was strongly distracting from the core of the game: The Tug of War on the tracker. So we removed all conditions and cut the dragons down to their core feature: A fixed starting ability that could be used a limited number of times.

But somehow it felt odd to have a Dragon with diminishing power and for their unusual mechanic they look very similar to regular heroes. Through our work on Almost Innocent, we noticed what amazing gear Satoshi Matsuura created for this game. So we put the dragons on hold and went for some mighty artifacts with a limited number of charges. This way, they integrated smoothly into the game, without distracting from the core mechanic and with a clear visual distinction between hero & ability.

And what about the dragons? To be honest, we don't know exactly what will happen to them. Who knows, maybe we'll see them again in a future BFF Game (set in the world of Oshra, of course). Or do you happen to have an idea for yet another expansion? Let us know in the comments!

If you don't know us through him, you know him through us. The art of Satoshi Matsuura is closely linked to Hidden Leaders. We are incredibly lucky to have started working with him early and are happy to see that the demand for his art has increased since our first campaign. We ourselves created the art for Almost Innocent with him, but also other board game designers are taking a strong interest in his art (more on this in a later update).

Under the name HiziriPro, he has drawn countless characters. On his Instagram, Twitter and ArtStation account you can look at all of them for free. If you are a true fan of his art, you can also support him on Patreon on a regular basis and look at videos of how his amazing art is being created.

Last year he also released an art book with more than 600 unique characters. We ordered it on day one from Japanese Amazon and read through the few text sections with the Google Translate app. It's a great piece of inspiration that we highly recommend!

 We wish you a nice weekend! We will be back with a mini-update in the comments on Saturday and a full regular update next Monday!

Best wishes,

Markus, Raphael and Andreas

Day 6: Shelfish Defender unlocked and Guardian Upgrades
over 1 year ago – Mon, Oct 31, 2022 at 06:38:04 AM

Behold, another mighty Guardian has awoken and is now defending the shores of Oshra. We are very close to 3000 backers and with that to yet another stretch goal: A pot of highly nutritious stew!

Stone Golem Defeated!

The battle between the Golden Golem and the Stone Golem is over. What a decisive victory it was! Almost 400 of you have voted and provided the Golden Golem a land-slide victory with 87% to 13%. The Stone Golem had to retreat and is hoping for revenge another time.

 We will hold our next vote on Friday. Then another duel will commence between a nasty Pigman and a devious Charlatan.

 Putting the Guardians into perspective

We are consistently working on our social goals. But what upgrades can you expect? Instead of the weapon upgrades from last campaign, the artwork additions here aim to put these gigantic creatures into perspective. Here are some instruction we provided for the artist:

Some humans for size comparison should make it clear that these Guardians might be limited by the card size, but are much bigger (and thus mightier) than your every-day hero. What do you think of this idea? And what further Guardians would you like to see upgraded?

What can you do to help?

Would you like to help us unlock these goals? Of course, you can follow us only once, but you can post Tweets or pictures several times a week, if you like. 100 Tweets may seem a lot, until you notice: that's just 4 Tweets per day of the campaign. In addition to unlocking the upgrades, this also helps us a lot to grow our audience and to bring the game to people who don't know it yet. 

Here is where we currently stand:

So, if you could lend us a hand on Twitter or Instagram and share photos of you playing the base game, some artwork of your favorite heroes or facts why you like the game, we would appreciate it a lot!

 Free Hidden Leaders mobile Wallpaper

You already supported us so much, so we want to give something back. Andreas (who is both: a team member and our best merchandise customer) loves using Oshra-art wherever he can. Since day one, he uses Oshra wallpapers on his smart phone. So we thought, maybe you like them too?

 We have created 12 wallpapers (16:9 format) with characters from Hidden Leaders, Forgotten Legends and Almost Innocent. Maybe you have seen them on our Instagram or Twitter already? You can download them as a free bundle here using the password: OshraWallpaper22.

 We are From Austria! (Austrian Section)

Wir freuen uns besonders, dass Hidden Leaders (aka. Heimliche Herrschaft) auch in unserer Wahlheimat Wien solch positive Aufnahme findet. Seit der letzten Kampagne haben wir so viel tolle Unterstützung erfahren und viele neue tolle Brettspiel-Fans kennengelernt. Insbesondere danken wir:

Der Paradice Board Game Bar, dem Spiele Cafe unserer Wahl, Austragungsort unseres Retail-Launches und dem Nr. 1 Personal-Rekrutierungsbüro in der Wiener Brettspielszene!

Planet Harry, dem Brettspielshop unseres Vertrauens, der sich nun schon zum zweiten Mal bereit erklärt hat die versandkostenfreie lokale Selbstabholung zu übernehmen.

Dem Wulpertinger Spieleverein für ihre Untersützung, ermutigendes Feedback und das nachfolgende tolle Video.

Dem Austrian Board Gamer für viele tolle Videos schon beim Base Game und erst recht bei der Erweiterung.

Solltet Ihr in Österreich als Brettspielladen, -Verein, -Cafe oder ähnliches aktiv sein (und vielleicht noch gar keine Hidden Leaders copy haben!) tretet gerne jederzeit mit uns in Kontakt via [email protected].