Crowdfunding Spotlight - Hero: Tales of the Tomes

Play NYC had a lot more tabletop games this year than in its inaugural year. The basement had a couple of neat titles set up with plenty of room to play, one of which was Jimmy Ellerth's Hero: Tales of the Tomes. I chatted with him a bit about his game and it's Kickstarter that's currently in progress.

Hero: Tales of the Tomes is a game for 2-5 players. Each player commands one of the game's five heroes, each with their own unique strengths and weaknesses. Much like other card battle games, players are trying to reduce the life of their opponents down to zero so they can be the last man standing. Each of the game's heroes has three distinct ability cards, and the heroes power up throughout the course of the game which makes them all the more fearsome.

"I really liked that big multiplayer element of [Magic: The Gathering]. I wanted us to all be able to play that kind of game on the same level playing field." -Jimmy Ellerth, creator of Hero: Tales of the Tomes

Much like Gruff, everything you need to play this game is included in one box. There won't be any booster packs that you'll have to buy to get a complete experience. That's not to say there won't be the opportunity for additional content - expansions including new heroes and/or new cards are certainly something that Mr. Ellerth has in mind if there's a demand for it. Let's take a look at what you can get in the game's Kickstarter campaign:

Pledging $29 to the Hero: Tales of the Tomes Kickstarter will get you one copy of the game. This includes 5 hero cards, 15 hero ability cards, 158 shared deck cards, 45 punchout tokens, 1 score pad, 1 instruction guide, and 1 8-sided level tracker die. A $45 Collector Tier pledge gives you all of the previous stuff plus 7 hero stickers, 5 hero buttons, and 5 gold foil collectible hero cards. The $65 Print Tier adds your choice of a signed 11" x 14" (28 cm x 35.5 cm) hero print, and the $100 Ultimate Hero Tier gives you all five signed 11" x 14" hero prints.

A good chunk of the game's stretch goals have already been unlocked. All backers who grab a copy of the game will receive a book-style game box, hero card backs with full foil art, and wooden tokens. The $12,000 stretch goal was a Kickstarter-exclusive pin that's almost unlocked, and the $13,000 stretch goal is a health tracker phone app.

The Kickstarter campaign for Hero: Tales of the Tomes is sitting at just over $12,000 at the time of writing - 20% over its goal of $10,000. This is Mr. Ellerth's first campaign and it seems like he has all of his ducks in a row. I got to see a good bit of this card battle title in action at Play NYC and it looked like a ton of fun!

You can read a bit more about this game by heading over to its official website. The Kickstarter campaign for Hero: Tales of the Tomes ends on Thursday, August 30, 2018 at 8:20 AM Eastern Time - swing by and grabbing a copy before it's too late!

What do you think of Hero: Tales of the Tomes? Do you like the idea of a Magic-style game where everything is in one package or do you enjoy buying booster packs and box sets? Let us know in the comments below and don't forget to check out what else we saw at Play NYC by going to our Play NYC 2018 Coverage Hub.