SeedInvest Campaign - Discussions with Richard Garriott / Lord British

Shows $25k now. Which is less than a castle, and more than a keep. No idea.

 

Will the perks keep growing? What's the program's next move ?'

"What happens to all the perky stuff if our goal isn't reached ?"
https://www.seedinvest.com/portalarium/series.b

Spoiler

I'm betting our perks grow the closer we get down to deadline
"Or there's money on the side which will come from privet places"

~TL~

 

"Deadlines" ...
I will say this about waiting till the deadline, I'd check with SeedInvest about deadlines, because it does take some time before the funds are confirmed.
I'd say it's safe to wait, but I'm not the SeedInvest company, so it's just a guess and not a fact known to me.

"Very important to know for those wishing to increase their SeedInvest"...
I do know from my own experience with SeedInvest however, that if anyone is planning to increase their pledged investment, that those funds you already sent are then sent back to you within 10 to 15 days, meaning that increasing your SeedInvest right away, needs to have the complete amount in available funds in your bank for the new amount and that those funds you already provided will not be applied to the new amount.

"In my case" ...
For me, that meant having to have my full increased amount of $1,268.17 ready in my bank disregarding any monies I had used for my initial SeedInvestment. Those initial funds will be returned to me within 10-15 days and cannot re-apply to my new amount. So, the total amount I have tied up in SeedInvest at the moment, is a total of $1767.00 until those initial funds are returned to me

There are transaction fees as well which are not a part of your SeedInvestment, which are repeated with each transaction you make, which includes increasing your amount of investment, where another transaction fee is needed. I now have 1009 "shares" of Portalarium through that investment pending confirmation of the investment, "which does take additional time".

"Finally I'd like to say, this" ...
If I had been able to have had invested 1009 initial shares in either of these past Lord British Built Companies,
Origin Systems (sold to Electronic Arts) and Destination Games (sold to NCSoft) ...

I may have had the ability today to have shown up to our EVL Guild's Fight Nights, in a little bit more style !'

~Time Lord~

 

In fairness, I suspect for Regulation D there's actual paperwork involved in proving you're an accredited investor. that said, a few 50k investments would change the outlook substantially.

 

The reasons for me coming back are not passion for the Game. Passion for watching a Business in a intresting new system doing the next move and seing hoe it turns out or how customers react.

May sound harsh but also a fascination in the sort of "they are really pulling this next step off" way and customers still ok with it.


I wan't to see the story end.

The hole "Seedinvest" move did not suprise me.

Crowfall, Star Cititzen,SotA - behind these projects are close friends who worked many years. The sure share and advise and talk about business moves.
They all 3 do very same moves .

Wonder when Star Citizen will do also the Invest move. Or have they already?

 

Over the last couple of days, I've been considering what Investor Perks that might be added that would make me want to invest. Don't get me wrong, the digital rewards are nice, and I commend @Lord British and his team. However, I'm not only investing in Shroud of the Avatar, but in Portalarium as a company. One and the same, for now...

So what would I want to see as a Perk? Well, at the lowest level, I'd like if the company showed me that my faith in them is not misplaced. So I'd start with Quarterly Investor Statements mailed to me. This is what you expect when you invest in a public company, but in crowdfunded companies they are only obligated to report operations and financial statements on an annual basis. This perk would tell me the company has faith in themselves, and in their investors.

As a step up, investors might also be interested in feeling connected to the company. I don't know if there is anything that does that more than having something tangible, that you can talk about and show to others. So, I'd also like to see some Physical Perks. I'd suggest things like... one of the Portalarium company challenge coins, which they give away at some of the telethons. To keep on the gold theme, perhaps a copy of the "gold master" DVD they use to send out physical rewards could also be sent to higher tier investors. Rild has some Crowns of the Obsidians and Oracle coins, so perhaps those could also be used. Not sure what the highest tiers might entail, but tchotchkes with the company and/or game name of them would be good.

Finally, if they do decide to add any additional Digital Perks, I do see some holes in the various offerings. First, one of the easiest rewards (and yet, strangely lacking of in-game currently) are titles. Tossing a "Investor" title at each level (Investor, Seed Investor, Avatar Investor, Lord Investor, all the way up to Royal Investor) would be cool. I'd even be okay with those being gold-colored; they wouldn't overlap any of the titles provided during Kickstarter. Additionally, there are some categories of rewards missing from the SeedInvest perks; a musical instrument (I'd choose a Harp, perhaps including sheet music for Rule Britannia), decorations (a hanging investor certificate, perhaps), an Aether Vibration Amplifier, a basement (I'd really like to see a city-sized arena basement with a built-in gustball court, and maybe a golden ball), a servant (in cloth of gold), and some RP clothing (like a crown and stole, especially if they grant an /emote while worn).

So with three weeks left in the campaign, are there any perks that would convince you to invest if you are on the fence?

 

the faq at the bottom does address quarterly reports, even though they're not required by the sec.

 

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Frankly, if one has 4 figures or more $ of assets in the game then you might as well turn that into an actual investment.

Just my 2 cents

 

I'm sorry to say this but the SeedInvest move won't work for SC in it's current state. If I was going to go that route I'd much rather do it for Crowfall or SOTA.

 

While I like all that stuff, I think that anything physical and mailed tends to get pricy and eat up what money we're investing. All our invested $ is suppose to be going for getting more people to play through advertising. The more $ we have for advertising the more people come to play in our game.

So "what's the best and cheapest perk that best suits such an offer and what would inspire more people to wish to invest ?"
"Golden Guild Tags" (at minimum $499.00 Investment or $1000.00 Investment level) <---<<< That's low cost for Portalarium to have done
A "perk" that allows the investor to have the ability to place their Golden Guild Tag Perk on any single guild name they choose to place it on (within our current guild tag restrictions and guidelines).
The same gold color as my founder "Royal Lord Marshal" name tag has... it doesn't get any cheaper for Portalarium to do that that for us aye?

Both ingame Add-On Store as well as Pledge items are the same to me as what I'm getting through SeedInvest, just smaller with gold trim. I just don't mind blowing $1000.00 in Los Vegas and so I don't mind blowing it into our SOTA SeedInvest either because SOTA's going to last me allot longer in entertainment value than any trip back to Los Vegas would ~Time Lord~

 

Those are from SeedInvest, not directly from Portalarium, and are fairly limited in scope. Basically, updated versions of whats posted on the website currently.

True, but a limited number of small items can be shipped in a single flat-rate box at minimal cost. When dealing with thousands of dollars of potential income, that is a very small price.

I do like the idea of having a special guild tag. Perhaps a voucher item that can be turned in at the registrar to set the guildtag for that character, so it can be tradeable.

 

@Browncoat Jayson: WRT Physical perks, Challenge Coins are a cool concept, but they physical items do have a cost to produce. In addition, they aren't going to want to infringe on existing backers exclusivity..I do like the idea of a title, I even suggested optional forum titles.

 

I don't know. I have doubts that a title is going to bring someone off the fence. There is a lot of cool stuff they could add, but I can't think of anything that is going to gain mass interest short of a profitable exit strategy for the investor.

Edit: Or maybe tax free anywhere lot deeds.

 

You're probably right. Since I'm already committed, my saying "this would be nice to have" is probably not that meaningful.

 

I was inspired by your title suggestion @Browncoat Jayson ... We do truly need to come up with other ideas for Portalarium to look at, because they can't talk about it which leaves us to self-inspire any reasons for us or others to SeedInvest.

While that may be true for some, I won't debate that because it's up to Portalarium to decide to do or not to do. I just know that once I saw those SeedInvest perks be added to, then there's a great chance there's more to come. I also noticed that a few of those perks were much in line with our last Telethon, which means to me that Portalarium may be adding to those perks much more even after it closes. I say that because it's been in our history that Founder Pledge expired and went to Benefactor Pledge and now those types of "rewards" (aka perks) have transitioned themselves into our Bundles. In saying that, what I mean is that there could be more similar SeedInvest Stocks to be sold in our future and therefore need to set a trend which would help insure the Future Investor that "they too" could continue to receive added perks well after they've invested.

@Tiina Onir , I think it's very appropriate that we give our thoughts here because if "we who are invested don't, then we are not invested if our game's SeedInvest doesn't meet it's minimum goal"

With all our Portalarium Staff being restricted from commenting on our SeedInvest Campaign, they can't come dance and sing for us or provide any of the wonderful encouragement they do during our Telethons. It is truly up to us, "we who have invested" to carry along our comments to let our players know just how special something an opportunity like this truly is and just how much it will help our game, while Portalarium will help those who invest in them as well

Some may say that we may sound like a cheerleaders here and speak bad of us for it, but our SeedInvest helps everyone, but our Portalarium can't talk about it, so it's all up to us and the SeedInvest website.
https://www.seedinvest.com/portalarium/series.b
All the wet blankets aside, without adding something, our SeedInvest looks like a Telethon which wants to make it's goal but can't, so I expect some perks to be added. An added "Golden Wet Blanket" would even be nice to add to it
I just think we need to provide our added ideas and suggestions, "because they can't ask for them" ~TL~

 

GOOD NEWS EVERYBODY! There is at least one Regulation D investor now. I don't know who you are, sir or madem, but my hats off to you!

 

I see where you are going with this.

Physical Perks would be nice, but would also take away from the overall influx of cash. Of course, one physical perk that would match would be the physical Silver Serpent Pendant from Gem Treasures Designs (the only place you can get this item) from the SotA Marketplace - https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?page_id=53417

 

Raise more money by prudently refining the game we funded at the beginning and continue to fund/test to this day . . .