We’re living through a board game revolution, with friends and family members gathering in record numbers around an unprecedented range of imaginative, well-crafted games. But D&D is still a step too far for many. Why? Because it’s so damn complicated …
We’re living through a board game revolution, with friends and family members gathering in record numbers around an unprecedented range of imaginative, well-crafted games.
But D&D is still a step too far for many. Why? Because it’s so damn complicated and unwieldy to set up. A serious tabletop game night involving, say, six players can be a logistical nightmare to organise, and it requires all six people to be on the ball.
That’s why we love the idea of Fireball. This ingenious new app, currently on Kickstarter, takes the complex, endless rules and regulations of D&D and automates them for you. That means you can concentrate on the collaborative, narrative aspects of tabletop gaming, without having to learn how to calculate outcomes and that sort of thing.
That’s the pitch in a nutshell, but there’s so much more to Fireball. Here are six reasons why you need to back the Kickstarter right now.
1: Fireball takes the tabletop out of tabletop gaming. Because it’s a smartphone app, it lets you and your friends play whenever and wherever you like. That would be a boon at any time, but right now, when we’re literally not allowed to hang out with our friends, it’s an absolute godsend. And when you can gather around a table again, Fireball is a great companion app.
2: But you don’t necessarily need a group of friends to play. Fireball also lets you connect and play with like-minded strangers, with a matching system that takes into account your particular preferences.
3: You can choose your level of complexity. Fireball’s pre-made adventures are playable with or without a GM, so you can be guided through a lightweight, game book-style campaign or roll up your sleeves and start editing maps, altering rules, creating macros, devising your own characters, producing campaign notes, and more. Of course, there are shades between those two extremes – Fireball flexes around you.
4: It’s free (but you can pay to make it even more awesome). While Fireball costs nothing to download and play, you can subscribe to the Character Builder and World Builder Pass. These let you do stuff like customise the appearance of your characters, obtain additional world tiles and more detailed maps with exclusive features, gain full access to all ready-made adventures, and more.
5: You’ll be making the world a better place. Okay, this might seem like a bold claim, but let’s look at the evidence. Firstly, the team behind the project is committed to rolling out Fireball in an environmentally responsible way, limiting waste during the development and producing merchandise locally at an eco-friendly business. Also, there’s nothing quite like Fireball out right now, so you’ll be helping to foster innovation.
6: Rewards! Fireball has already smashed its fundraising goal, but there are still a few days to go and pledging now will help the studio to meet more and more ambitious stretch goals, such as homebrew races, pets, and dungeon generators. More importantly, pledging will earn you rewards. There are several tiers. At the lower end ($2) you’ll get a Kickstarter badge and a Discord role. At the top end ($5,000) you’ll get 12 months of World and Character Builder Pass, a digital map and art book, the option to create a legendary boss, and much more. You’ll even be invited, all travel expenses paid, to the game’s launch party.
You’ll have to be quick, though. While Fireball won’t be publicly available till later this year, its Kickstarter campaign ends on Friday, so if you want to guarantee yourself early access and some sweet rewards you need to head over to the Kickstarter page right now and make your pledge.
Update: Fireball Studios successfully raised over $65,000 by almost 3,000 backers and became the 5th most backed mobile game in Kickstarter’s history. If you haven’t caught the Kickstarter campaign, go to the Fireball RPG website or join their Discord. You can find the latest info there
