Age of Dogfights: WWII

Update #61
10 months ago – Tue, Jun 10, 2025 at 01:52:47 PM

It's been 7 weeks since we published updates #59 and #60 in which we detailed the financial and health issues that arose as a result of working under pressure for a long time. I want to say that our health is a little better, but we are still not able to work at full capacity.

Update #60
12 months ago – Tue, Apr 22, 2025 at 01:47:13 PM

As we announced in Update #59, today we are publishing a new, extensive update. We didn't answer the comments and questions on the previous update because most of the answers are contained in this long text below.

We would like to thank everyone who supported us with their comments, and we understand those backers who criticized us.
 

FINANCIAL PROBLEMS

- Any project (not just Kickstarter) that needs to fit into a pre-limited budget over a long period of time is at risk that some calculations will turn out to be wrong. But, frankly, this factor did not affect our increased production costs. Immediately after receiving the money, we bought almost all the necessary material (and rented an additional warehouse) that we needed for the production of the entire series.

- We intended the rules for this game to be based on the rules of the previous game AoD:WWI which had 16 pages including scenarios. However, WWII era aircraft are much more complex and tactics much more varied compared to WWI. In order for the game to be at least at the level of the previous one, we had to significantly expand the rulebook, much more than the initial assumption. The result is a rulebook of 52 pages + scenario book of 36, which is over 5 times more. This drastically increased volume of work is in itself a large and unplanned expense.

- Due to the increased possibilities and options provided by the expanded rulebook, it was necessary to add many new elements into the set that were not originally planned. We have presented those elements back in Update #48. Then we suggested to the backers that they cover part of the costs for those additional elements with their voluntary donations, which about a hundred of you did. That way we raised ~$1000 which is about 1/6 of the increased costs. We are grateful to everyone who donated money.

- All the above-mentioned additional costs are significant, especially for a small company like ours. But the expense that is the biggest was caused by the increase in shipping costs. During the campaign we charged all backers (regardless of country) $26 for shipping for the first wave of packages containing only the basic AoD2 games. From the start, we said that the actual shipping cost is higher and that we subsidize it with about 20%. Of the 26 dollars paid by the backers for the packages in the first wave, we received only 90% – 23.4 dollars (-5% Kickstarter commission, -3% bank commission, -2% commission of the company from the USA which is an intermediary, because it is not possible to receive Kickstarter funds in Serbia).
 
Already during the epidemic, the prices of many products started to go wild, which caused general inflation, later again due to the war in Ukraine. Whatever the reason, the prices of shipping have increased several times. Overall, the cost of sending a package since January 2025 is between $46 and $53 depending on the zone (in the meantime, UPS has made a noticeable price difference between different zones). The average price (about $50) is closer to the higher value because most of the backers are from countries far away from us.
 
The difference between the actual costs and the shipping fee charged is 50 -23.4 = ~$27. For packages from the second wave, which in many cases are much heavier, and therefore the difference between the charged and the actual price is greater. We subsidized part of the costs, and we counted that the total difference between the postage charged and the actual cost would be acceptable (several thousand dollars, which is deducted from the total earnings), but due to the increase in prices, that difference is at least $36,000. This is a huge figure even for a much larger company than ours.

- We remind the backers that in this campaign we promised quite rich gifts - First Day Gift and Loyalty Gift (two expansions in hard boxes that are otherwise offered at $18 and $11). Everything we promised we will fulfill, regardless of the fact that many backers who received them did not order anything at all for the second wave, so it is easy to calculate that in such cases we are at a net loss (when taking into account the drastic increase in postage + increased by the additional weight of the gift).

- We don't do our projects for a one-time production, but with the intention of selling those games in the future as well. Therefore, from the very first campaign, we started to produce a certain number of games more than what was ordered during the campaign (in general, it is logical to make at least 20% surplus in serial production). Specifically, after the AoD:WWI campaign, we produced 30% more games and around 50% more expansions. Due to the excellent reviews of the game, all that quantity sold out quickly, so we did an additional series of games and expansions (almost everyone who bought the main game sooner or later bought a few more expansions). Based on this experience we have already produced 300 more AoD:WWII basic games than were ordered on Kickstarter (and some game components much more).

- So far, a total of about 2000 expansions have been ordered (8 different ones in hard boxes), and we have made twice as many boxes - 4000. Also, all the necessary tokens for those expansions have been bought and counted. We bought the material for brochures and control panels a long time ago (there is also excess cardboard and paper). So, the main and most expensive elements of those expansions have already been done. It remains to print control panels, brochures and stickers with aircraft. So with an investment in the remaining production of a few dollars per copy, we will have about 2000 complete surplus expansions with average value (according to the prices that were on Kickstarter) of about 30 dollars.

- It is not easy to calculate the market value of the aforementioned games and expansions (surpluses). It all depends on how many would be sold to end customers at full price and how many to retailers at a discount. In any case, the total value varies between 45000 and 70000 dollars. However, there are currently two "small" problems that prevent these goods from turning into money in a short period of time: 1) it is not fair to sell the basic game before the backers of this project get it and 2) the expansions are still not finished. So it is clear that we have a large value of goods in stock that are currently "trapped".

- In the previous period, we launched several campaigns on Kickstarter. Since we were focused on the work on the AoD2 project (with all the health difficulties), we decided to make simpler games that do not require a lot of time and concentration to prepare the campaign. We did not expect any great success from the campaigns for Carom Mini Golf and later Carom Golf, but still the money collected was below the expected amount. Those two games were delivered, one a few months ahead of schedule and one on schedule.

- We also had a campaign for a reprint edition of Tank Chess (with new expansions and variants). Since it is a reprint, there was less work compared to a campaign for a completely new game. The money raised was decent, but still below expectations. Meanwhile, problems and delays from the AoD2 project spilled over into that project. We have already delivered a small part of the packages, and the entire production will be completed very soon.

- After finishing work on the rules for AoD2, we worked on preparations for two new Kickstarter campaigns (Urban Battle and Air Cargo Transport) with the intention of improving our financial situation. At least one of those campaigns was supposed to start in the fall of 2024. Unfortunately, even then our ability to work was significantly limited due to stress from working under pressure.

- The campaign for Urban Battle started at the beginning of April. It is a really good game that is already fully designed (we did not repeat the mistake like in the AoD2 project). We had high hopes for this project and it is hard for us to admit that we are disappointed with the current number of backers. We want to emphasize that funds from this project will be primarily spent on production and shipping of the Urban Battle rewards, only the profit will be used for shipping AoD2.

- At the end of last year, we had done and charged several service production jobs, and there were several more in the announcement. We have also entered into negotiations for the production of our Tank Chess game for the Serbian market with one large chain of stores. At that time, we believed that we would start the Urban Battle campaign in February and that it would be quite successful. All of that should have provided us with enough money to continuously send a large number of packages, which we announced in update #55. Unfortunately, all those announced jobs are still pending (not canceled). The main reason for this is the state of semi-emergency in Serbia due to the justified demonstrations of students and people against corruption (I don't know how much it is present in the news in your countries), due to which many economic activities are minimized.

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From everything written above comes the conclusion that we currently do not have the money to continue sending packages. We have to put shipping on hold until we find a way to get the money. We are sorry to have to state this, we fought for a long time to avoid such a situation. It could be said that the increased costs of production and shipping is our own fault, but no matter how it is interpreted, without your additional financial help, we cannot push this project to the end within a reasonable time.
 

OPTIONS FOR SOLVING THE PROBLEM

We believe that many backers are angry or disappointed with everything written above. But we hope that there are also many who understand that we did our best to prevent this situation from happening and who appreciate our author's work. In order to be able to continue sending packages, we need additional money. It is not realistic that we two authors can provide that in a short time.

In the following text, we will offer several options for additional payments, and it is up to you to decide whether you will pay any money or not. We do not demand it from you, everything is exclusively on a voluntary basis. It is the only realistic possibility to continue the process of sending packages in the short term. And backers who don't pay any extra money will get their games, but for now we can't estimate when.

1. Pure donations

There is already a page on our website where donations can be made. Formally, due to our bookkeeping, you are thereby "buying" a set of digital wallpapers with aircraft drawings. There are 18 wallpapers for now, and we will send more when the drawings of all the aircraft from the expansions are finished. We know that these wallpapers are not a motivation for payment, but we still want to offer something in return. There are donation options between €5 and €100 (each option gets all wallpapers).

DONATE

It might happen that the payment is only possible using PayPal, because there is some technical problem with the card payment service provider.

2. Buying additional expansions or add-ons via BackerKit

As we have already said, we have produced the main components for a total of 4000 expansions (2000 more than ordered). It is still possible to order expansions, add-ons and other of our games that are available on BackerKit. We remind you that in the meantime we have offered three new characteristic expansions (see more details in Update #51).

To add items to your pledge, either log in to your BackerKit account (if you have one) and search for Age of Dogfights: WWII under "Your Surveys", or go to THIS LINK to get a new survey link sent to your email address (enter the email you used for backing and click "Get My Survey", then open the link you received in an email), as explained here.

Some orders cannot be unlocked (due to some technical reasons in the BackerKit system). If you cannot find a button "Edit Your Order", or there is a notice saying "Your order has been locked", contact us at [email protected] so we can manually add items to your order (to see all the items in offer, take a look at the pre-order store, then write what you would like to add in an email). Please note that it might take longer for us to respond to your email, especially in the following weeks when the most emails are expected. We are in contact with BackerKit support and we will try to unlock all orders, to make the procedure much simpler for both you and us.

If someone already has all expansions ordered, they can select "Future expansions advance payment", located on the bottom of the BackerKit page. It is a credit for purchasing any new expansions in the future (and we do plan to design many more expansions when the time comes, such as Spanish Civil War, Winter War, 1930s, etc.).

We believe that payments in this option can be significant and enable shipping the remaining packages from the first wave (which is a little over half). All expansions (ordered previously or now) will be sent in the second shipping wave. Other games (Age of Dogfights: WWI, Tank Chess, Panzer Strike, etc.), which we have in stock, will be shipped in the first shipping wave together with the AoD2 basic game.

3. Backing the Urban Battle project

If you pledge for a physical game option, you will, of course, get the Urban Battle game. It's a really great game that we believe you'll love. We emphasize again that the money collected in this campaign will be invested in the production and sending all packages from the Urban Battle project. The profit from the project will be diverted to a budget for shipping backlogged packages.

By pledging for a physical copy of the game, you automatically receive a Returning Backer Gift - Tank Triathlon mini game. As an additional motivation for backing, we have decided that all AoD2 returning backers will also receive the 'Flamethrowers and Explosives' mini-expansion, which is normally received as an Early Pledge Gift. Every potential payment has a double importance - it directly increases the success of the campaign, and indirectly it gives momentum to the campaign, which will attract other backers. Overall, a good success of this campaign would ultimately have a significant positive impact on our financial situation, but also on morale and motivation to continue creating original games.

The shipping order (first wave)

We hope that many backers will choose one of the options above to help continue sending packages from the first wave. It would be fair to the other backers if those who have already received their basic game also contribute.

Each backer who chooses option 1 (donation) or option 2 (order more add-ons) for a total of $50 or more will receive their basic game now*. Also, you must send us an email (to [email protected] ) informing us of your payments, because we may not be able to identify it ourselves.
* preparing and shipping the package may take up to a few weeks after payment.

All the money collected by payments of smaller amounts, extra amounts, as well as from backers who have already received their package goes to the shipping budget, which will be used to send the rest of the packages. We hope that we, Forsage Games, will be able to add some significant amount to this budget in the near future.

Plan for the second shipping wave

When we eventually take care of the first shipping wave (AoD2 basic games), with more or less of your help, conditions are created to sell the already mentioned surplus of AoD2 basic games (~300 copies). The money thus collected should be enough to send packages from the second wave. Also, in the meantime, we will do more projects, from which we will use the profit to invest in shipping of this project. We will post a separate update on this topic when the time comes.
 

CONCLUSION

Regardless of all the difficulties we are struggling with, it was never an option to make a bad compromise, be it for the game rules or components. We strive for every part of this game to be the best that we can provide at this moment as authors and as producers. We did not save on anything, everything that could contribute to a better version of the game was included in the set.

Different opinions are possible about us as company owners and project managers, but we believe that the game AoD2 with its playing, technical and historiographical qualities deserves the highest marks. It is something that will remain behind us, as a valuable work done. The fact that we made a good game is evidenced by the comments on various social networks, and here we point to the BGG comments.

Our occasional optimistic announcements that we would speed up the package shipping process were sincere, we believed it would happen, it was not our intention to mislead backers. However, various factors influenced that these announcements were not realized.

When at some point all the obligations from this campaign are finally fulfilled, we intend to continue the project with new expansions and eventually probably with a book that will cover all the aircraft types represented (+ new scenarios). We also have plans for the AoD series to continue (Transonic, Supersonic, Hypersonic, ...). We are asking the bakers to help us get out of this stalemate, so everyone can get their games.

We need a longer vacation from all activities, but we can't afford it. We will take a short break and then continue our work. We will not be able to respond to all comments and messages in a short time, please be understanding about that.

Update #59
12 months ago – Sun, Apr 20, 2025 at 02:18:10 AM

This text for this update was written by me, Predrag, 4 days ago, but we are publishing the update only now because both Dragan and I got a virus, we have a high temperature and we are taking antibiotics.

We have been fighting for a long time to push this project to the end according to the high standard we have set for ourselves. We are facing various subjective and objective difficulties, which we have written about several times in updates. Now we want to point out some problems that we haven't explicitly talked about so far. We avoided writing about these details because we wanted to remain professional and not mix private problems with work, but we hope that at least some of the backers will have an understanding of our problems. Now we realize that we should have published such a text much earlier, but we believed that with increased efforts, working on several projects in parallel, we would manage to overcome the difficulties.

Health problems

We have been working under a lot of pressure for a long time, which significantly affects our health and our efficiency. I, Predrag (father), in addition to the usual problems for my age (62), have had two surgical operations in the past period. I also had a car accident on April 30, 2023 when I fell asleep at the wheel in the middle of the day. The car was completely destroyed and I got away with only minor injuries, but I'm still overcoming the psychological effects.

Dragan (son) bore most of the burden of the design and author's work in this project. Unfortunately, it is very difficult for him to fight the stress that we constantly find ourselves in, which has consequences for health. This is reflected in the loss of focus, and there are increasingly frequent blockages when he is unable to do anything creative for a long time.

We haven't had a proper vacation for several years. Constant obligations always hang over our heads: to make progress in the implementation of the project, to write updates about it, to answer numerous questions, to organize production, to deal with paperwork. Obviously, this project is too big for the two of us. We would like the most if we were more capable, more organized, smarter, in better health and that we finished all our obligations in time. Right now we need a rest or at least a break to try to find the strength and motivation to continue working at full capacity and living a normal life, without stress and enormous pressure.

For now, we are publishing only this short text about health problems. Tomorrow we will publish a new update in which we will detail the financial problems with suggestions on how to solve them in the future.

Update #58
12 months ago – Sun, Apr 13, 2025 at 10:21:22 AM

In this short update we present some technical information. In a few days we will publish a new, more extensive update.

Wrongly pasted stickers on pre-assembled version of the game

One backer pointed out that the aircraft stickers were wrongly pasted on the tokens. After we found out about it, we quickly established how the error occurred. One of our colleagues is in charge of that job. She applied all the stickers correctly - so that the longitudinal axis of the aircraft aligns with the groove on the underside of the token. Another colleague occasionally pasted those stickers, and due to a misunderstanding, no one explained to her that she had to take care of the direction. Unfortunately, we, the authors, did not fully control the entire process and that is solely our fault.

Among the unsent pre-assembled boxes, we discovered about 30 with an error, and these were, of course, immediately replaced. However, we do not know how many backers have received packages with such incorrectly applied aircraft tokens. So far, only one has reported the error, and we sent him a package with replacement tokens.

We ask all backers who received the pre-assembled version to check their aircraft tokens and contact us if they are with an error, so that we can send them a replacement.

Initial position marker

One of the elements in each box of the AoD:WWII game is the initial position marker (2 pcs). It is made of cardboard and is circular in shape. It is very helpful for remembering the aircraft starting position and is used many times during the game.

Recently, backer Gary Grunewald posted on BGG and the Age of Dogfights Fans Facebook group a 3D model for making the initial position marker out of plastic on 3D printers. We, the authors, really like that solution as it is a lot more convenient to use than the original cardboard marker.

Since not everyone has a 3D printer, we decided to make our own version of the marker and produce it.

All boxes that have not yet been shipped will be opened and one such plastic marker will be included. Backers who have already received their games will receive this marker in the second shipping wave along with the expansions. The STL file can be downloaded here.

Thanks to Gary Grunewald for suggesting this solution. It is an example of how interaction between creators and backers results in a better final product.

Rules analysis

We still expect backers who have received their game to write their impressions about it in the comments on this Kickstarter page or elsewhere. Several reviews and videos have already been posted, but we'd like to single out one on BGG from the aforementioned backer Gary Grunewald:

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/3492421/nice-improvements

He analyzed the individual rules in 6 points by comparing them to the rules of Age of Dogfights: WWI. We are very satisfied with the analysis and it gives us confirmation that we managed to properly implement all the new mechanics for the more modern aircraft from the 1940s, and that our principle Minimum Complexity, Maximum Diversity proves itself.

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In a few days we will publish a new, more extensive update.

Shipping and announcement of a new project
about 1 year ago – Fri, Mar 14, 2025 at 04:43:03 PM

We continue our work on the realization of several Kickstarter projects:

Carom Golf update
Panzer Strike: Western Front 2 update
Tank Chess (reprint) update

The reactions of the backers who received their Age of Dogfights: WWII game (see some comments and forums on the BGG page) assure us that our efforts were not in vain, and we are very pleased with that.

New project: Urban Battle

Thanks to the fact that we invested money in production capacities in a timely manner (see Update #54) we managed to survive as a company during a long period when we, the authors, were too busy working on an extremely demanding project such as the game Age of Dogfights: WWII. Producing board games for other authors and publishers brought us the necessary money, but due to our long-term plans, it is still necessary for us to occasionally launch new projects on Kickstarter.

The campaign for the game Urban Battle was planned for the period September–October 2024. It is a simple game that is very suitable for production because it has very few elements. The project was 90% ready in the summer of 2024, but we decided to postpone the campaign for two reasons:

1. First to focus on older projects in which there is a delay in delivering packages.

2. To start the campaign when we are 100% ready, so we don't end up in a situation where we are late with the realization of the project due to some unplanned circumstances.

In the meantime, many ideas have "settled", so we as authors are really satisfied with how we designed the whole project.

As said above, it is a simple game that by all criteria falls into the 'EasyPlay' category (which is indicated on the game box). The game was created by compiling the best solutions from several of our earlier tank games (Tank Chess, Panzer Strike and an early concept predating both of them). The emphasis is on simplicity, not on some realistic depiction of historical games. There will be several variants of the game, offered at very favorable prices considering the contents. Depending on the variant, the game contains 50 to 100 tank pieces, with which very diverse scenarios can be played. The time required to prepare the game is extremely short: only 1 to 3 minutes.

The rules are short and simple, with many illustrated examples. There are three game modes, with minor differences in the rules but the character of the game depends very much on the chosen mode:

1. BASIC MODE – relaxed, fluid game, with the influence of luck (with dice)
2. ABSOLUTE MODE – without the luck factor (no dice), more strategic gameplay
3. REALISTIC MODE – more realistic firing angles, requires using a ruler

As always, we have prepared interesting gifts for early pledge, as well as for our repeating backers (from any of our earlier projects). The campaign should start in the next 7 to 15 days, if you are interested go to the link below and click 'Notify me on launch'.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1732812836/urban-battle

We sent several trial edition copies of the game to various reviewers around the world. Here are some quotes from their posts:

"Beautiful components, packed with tons of goodies, easy to learn and play, fun games, family friendly." — Richard Martin (Armchair General)

"It's taking Tank Chess to the next logical step, to an actual battlefield", ... "I like the game. I think it's a nice streamlined fun game that you can sit down, play out in an evening without a whole lot of huge thought process behind it." — Nate Rogers (TheGimpyGamer)

(Trial edition mostly contains tank pieces in some camo colors, such as gray and olive green, but in the meantime we decided to make them red and blue in serial production, for several reasons.)

Just as we made the gameplay itself as simple as possible (EasyPlay), we also envisioned the game to be simple to produce. We created a detailed plan for the production of every single element of the game. On the Kickstarter page, that plan will be presented with all the details: a unified boards for all variants of the game, a choice of colors for tank figurines, a plan in case there are few (100-300) and in case there are many (> 1000) backers; places where we will acquire material and possibly new 3D printers... Having learned from the experiences of some previous projects, we believe that a detailed production plan is necessary for the successful and timely realization of the project.