From Chris: A happy update! (Oct 20th)

[Draco18s]

There's also all those people who click the "remind me" button and come back at the end to pledge then.

[x4000]

Yep.

[jenya]

I envy your optimism, dear Sirs/Madams. But the thing is, for many days the project is unable to break through $3000 per day (with an exception of the first three days).
Right now Kicktraq says that the target per day is $11800, which is about four times higher. Only on the very first day the project was able to collect more than $11800 (according to Kicktraq daily data).

Even if collection rate doubles to $6000 per day, the end spike still should be massive (two/three times higher than the start peak) to ensure that the goal is reached.

Like the project motto aptly says, "Win against the odds".

[garion333]

I envy your optimism, dear Sirs/Madams. But the thing is, for many days the project is unable to break through $3000 per day (with an exception of the first three days).
Right now Kicktraq says that the target per day is $11800, which is about four times higher. Only on the very first day the project was able to collect more than $11800 (according to Kicktraq daily data).

Even if collection rate doubles to $6000 per day, the end spike still should be massive (two/three times higher than the start peak) to ensure that the goal is reached.

They spoke to Kickstarter themselves who think they have a fair chance if they continue to put effort into this. I do not think Kicktraq is a substitute for true, professional insider knowledge.

If KS proper thinks they have a good chance, then I'm all in again and I'm just a backer. I can't imagine how encouraging talking to KS was for the team since so many amateur individuals (myself included) were expecting this to fail and posting about that more than anything.

Like the project motto aptly says, "Win against the odds".

Indeed. 

[Xgamer4]

Honestly, Kicktraq's prediction is super rudimentary. It's literally "is the current daily average multiplied by the remaining number of days plus the current funding level greater than or equal to the goal". That's all.

It's a good overview on knowing if you're average funding level is enough to sustain you, so you know if you should proceed as you are or adjust things, but that's about it.

Given that Arcen knows they should adjust things, and are actively adjusting things, it makes Kicktraq's estimate mostly-worthless for the moment.

[jenya]

Honestly, Kicktraq's prediction is super rudimentary.

The target rate per day, which is currently $11800, is not a prediction. It is a simple number which is calculated as follows: in order to reach the goal, the project needs to collect additional $237500 over remaining 20 days. The $237500 divided by 20 gives an average rate of $11800 per day.

I mentioned Kicktraq mostly because it provides useful daily statistics for the days which already passed:
https://www.kicktraq.com/projects/arcengames/ai-war-ii/#chart-daily

[Tridus]

Kicktraq is useful to us as outsiders of a gauge of how things are going. It's not as effective a tool as it could be, however, as it's based just on externally visible data. Kickstarter themselves have much better data and can make better predictions.

Seeing as how they only get paid if the project funds, it's in their interest to be honest with Chris about how it's going and what should be done. Given that, it's clear to me that if they say there is still a shot, then there is. There's no motive for Kickstarter to invest effort in something that they think will fail, after all.

[jenya]

Yet another Kickstarter advice from The Internets which may or may not be helpful, use with a grain of salt:
http://stonemaiergames.com/kickstarter-lesson-49-to-cancel-or-to-finish/

[crazyroosterman]

just as a quick question from somebody who's never ever used kick starter(but has known about its existence for a good long while) how much exactly do the site take from the finished pile that has been funded at the end?.

[Draco18s]

just as a quick question from somebody who's never ever used kick starter(but has known about its existence for a good long while) how much exactly do the site take from the finished pile that has been funded at the end?.

It's between 8 and 10%
~4% to Kickstarter
~4% to Amazon and credit card fees.

[Xgamer4]

Amazon actually hasn't processed Kickstarter's payments for... quite a while now. I think they swapped to Stripe?

But yeah, the rough estimate I've heard is around 10%, though if you scroll all the way down to the budget section on the AI War II campaign page, it shows a Kickstarter allocation of 18.9%. I'm not entirely sure what, exactly, went into that number... but I'm sure Chris did the math before posting it, so it's probably right.

[jenya]

just as a quick question from somebody who's never ever used kick starter(but has known about its existence for a good long while) how much exactly do the site take from the finished pile that has been funded at the end?.

https://www.kickstarter.com/help/fees

[Tridus]

Amazon actually hasn't processed Kickstarter's payments for... quite a while now. I think they swapped to Stripe?

But yeah, the rough estimate I've heard is around 10%, though if you scroll all the way down to the budget section on the AI War II campaign page, it shows a Kickstarter allocation of 18.9%. I'm not entirely sure what, exactly, went into that number... but I'm sure Chris did the math before posting it, so it's probably right.

The rest of that percentage is probably for pledges that fail to go through. There's always some of those in any campaign. Since the card isn't charged immediately, you run into problems like cards that got replaced/cancelled between the pledge period and the processing, limits reached, and such.

If you assume that out of $100,000 pledged you will actually get $80,000 in the end, you will be a lot closer to accurate than if you assume you'll get $92,000.

[x4000]

Couple of notes:

1. My optimism comes from the head of the games division at kickstarter, who looked at our campaign specifically and gave us specific advice, and also has knowledge of our upcoming promos and whatnot.  His take was that it's very much in a zone where it can make it.  Kicktraq is great when you don't have someone with that sort of data (which I did not until yesterday). 

2. Remember also that "typical kickstarter curves" are also typically being based around stuff that's not just games... or even if it is games, not just video games... or even if it is just video games, not our specific subset of the market.  I was speaking with the guy who was able to just yank all that data and look at it very finely for us.

3. In our ongoing efforts to be pessimistic with monetary projections (that's typically wise), we have been assuming 15% lossage to various kickstarter fees and backed-out payments.  The KS fee itself is 5% IIRC, and then it's 3-5% for the Stripe fees depending on what country the person pledging is from.  We're assuming the worst and going with 10%.  We're then assuming that 5% of the funds don't clear because of failed backer pledges.  That's WAY more than is likely, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

[windgen]

I had a long call with some of the higher-ups at kickstarter and our awesome kickstarter rep, and they had hordes and hordes of good advice and information. There's a lot of things that we can put into practice soon (starting tomorrow)...We added a new $35 tier that is the same as the $30 tier, but also adds in the original AI War and all its expansions. All rewards $35 and up now include that.

Sounds like a good idea.  in fact I seem to remember some clever person suggested this a while ago...

I think the mid-to-high backer tiers (starting maybe somewhere in the $30-$50 range?) should include an AI War Classic key.

Better late than never!