Dark Forest: Redwall Meets 1E in a Shadowdark World

Sailing right along!
6 months ago – Wed, Dec 10, 2025 at 07:14:07 AM

Greetings abbey-dwellers!

A December update to let you know how things are going this holiday season!

Thank you to everyone who filled out their BackerKit surveys! Woohoo. We're at 80% completion. If you haven't filled in your survey, please do so when you have a spare minute. (Of course, those who opted to use Kickstarter's pay-over-time service will still need to wait till later in January before your survey email is sent out, so hold tight!) 

On the production end, we are close to finishing our 3D STL miniatures, and they are looking great! Here's a peek at our freshly printed lineup. The darkwing, hedgehog, and otter are new. These are not fully cleaned up yet, but they're looking great. We're still tweaking the mouse, squirrel, and fox. And these are all being printed on cheap bamboo filament printers at our local library for about $1.50 each. If you can print them on a resin printer, then even more detail will pop out (and easier cleanup). The otter's bow is the tough one. I really want a bow, but we'll likely need to get rid of the bowstring, as it's breaking every time. But it may print great with resin. More testing to come. We're also still unifying the stand scale to 26mm. Our sculptor is really doing a great job (she also did the sculpts for our board game Haunted Halloween which is up on Amazon.com now, woot!).

We're also working on all our extras:

• The 6 mini-adventures are all written and have been sent to Brandon, our editor. 
• The GM Screen art is done and ready for the printer
• The Premade Character Cards are done and ready for the printer.
• The Fumble Deck is done and ready for the printer.
• I'm close to completing the Founders Digest. It has expanded a bit, and I've decided to focus it on a region of the Dark Forest world called the Isles of Dread. In Redwall, pirates, sea rats, and voyages have been a big part of many of the books, so in this Founders Digest, I'll detail that region out in more detail, plus I've added yet another class, the Corsair! Both the Assassin and the Corsair classes are included in this digest. Also, the adventure that's included in the digest is based in the Isles with more rules for ship navigation. So there's a voyage with a dungeon crawl at the end. Beware the kraken, me hearties!!

We're also close to having a full draft of the adventure book, which Anthony has expanded beyond our original intent. We're trying to keep it under 100 pages, but he's created so much cool stuff that it's going to be tough. By the holidays we'll be in the InDesign layout phase and getting started on art and maps. If you didn't back this, you might want to grab it in Backerkit.

Finally, of course, the main campaign book is shaping up nicely. I keep adding more and stuff (just added 4 more monsters yesterday!) that we need in there as we develop the extras. Apart from the art, it's very close to done. 

So right now we're on track and on target for our digital and physical delivery goals. But I'll keep you updated as things progress. 

Thank you, everyone, and may you have a peaceful day of adventure!

John & Nicole

P.S. here's art for our Barrier of Bees spell. This amazing piece is by our newest artist, Ava Gomez (aka. GhostlyMetalhead) - who btw is an environmental scientist! Brilliant!

Dark Forest Tee Shirt?
7 months ago – Fri, Nov 28, 2025 at 07:37:58 AM

Greeting noble creatures of Dark Forest,

In my enthusiasm for this project I made myself a tee-shirt on Teepublic and ordered it. Then I thought, "would anyone else want one?" This is NOT part of the Kickstarter. Just a personal creation that I realized others might be excited about, and we can order them right now (mine is already on its way!) I might even get a mug, since they can put the image I chose on various products. 

https://www.teepublic.com/t-shirt/84123439-dark-forest-tee

That's all for now! Hope you're Black Friday is filled with bargains and savings!! (and save some $ for Giving Tuesday - you can probably guess the charities we always give to - animal welfare, WWF, and anti-child slavery; Redwall themes indeed! Hit me up if you need some links.)

Cheers,

John & Nicole

P.S. New art from Yuri!! (the spell description is WIP)

A bumpy start for surveys!
7 months ago – Thu, Nov 27, 2025 at 06:40:47 AM

Happy Thanksgiving! (our 2nd one since we also celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving in October - more is better!)

Thank you to everyone who filled out your surveys so quickly! And thank you all so much for your patience while we straightened things out for all our early and VIP digital backers.  Whew! Fortunately BackerKit support is awesome, both at fixing issues, and teaching us how to fix things ourselves. 

Pay over time

We learned yesterday that if you chose pay-over time you won't get your survey emailed out until after the final payment (sometime in January for most folks). Thank you to everyone who messaged me about that!

And since it's Thanksgiving! Here's a couple of rations tokens Nicole has been working on (torches too) for you to "feast" your eyes on. She made the desserts version for our daughter (who doesn't like taking pie on a dungeon crawl?) Keep the gluttonous hares out your ole' feedbag wot, wot! 

Cheers to all!

John & Nicole

All Surveys are sent!
7 months ago – Wed, Nov 26, 2025 at 08:12:31 AM

Hey Everyone,

Thanks for your patience with our first batch of surveys. We worked out some issues with shipping, but everything is fixed and working great now. 

You'll all be getting your surveys in your inboxes from BackerKit this morning, so look out for them, and please try to fill them out as soon as you can. If you don't see it, check your spam filters. 

BackerKit is available to handle tech issues and troubleshoot, so feel free to reach out to them for help, and we're here to help too, though we might be slow getting back you over the holiday (Happy Thanksgiving to all our US backers; may you have a genuine Redwall feast!)

Also, for those in the EU or UK, we are not collecting VAT along with shipping. So delivery will be DDU (VAT on delivery). 

Thank you all so much, and may you have a festive weekend!

John & Nicole

P.S. If you pledged for the Player's Adventure Journal, please only order 1 copy. You can print as many as you need from DriveThruRPG later on with a single code (each at the cost of printing, which is around $2.47 each right now).

Backerkit pledge manager surveys are starting!
7 months ago – Tue, Nov 25, 2025 at 11:12:43 AM

Burr aye, greetins ye Redwalliens! Oi be opin ye be harvin ur deloightful day!

Just a quick update from the abbey! The BackerKit surveys are starting to go out over the next couple days. So look out for an email from BackerKit! It only takes a couple of minutes to fill out. So go for it! Huzzah!

On the production side, we're trucking right along, despite my back going out and catching my daughter's cold! The first 3 mini-dungeons are ready for editing, and I'm starting the next 3 asap. We have 4 great Redwall-like recipes in the Founder's book, and I've test-cooked/baked them with much success. My favorite is the Light’s End Spicy Seafood Soup. Yum!!

Here's a new art piece from Yuri which I can't stop staring at. I mean, come on!! How awesome!! It's for a fabled armor, shield, and sword set.

And here's a piece I'm working on as well. Who wants a Pack Lizard?  (I'm raising my paw super high).

Okay, more updates soon, and keep an eye on your inboxes for the BackerKit surveys!

Cheerio!

John & Nicole