2020 Patreon Tier and Reward Updates (Patreon)

Happy birthday to us as a podcast! And, uh, to everyone with a January 21st birthday as well!

A year ago, we decided to embark on a journey with a Dungeons & Dragons podcast based solely on a ridiculous idea and a fairly promising test recording. As working professionals with bills to pay (and, in one case, an actual human baby to support), Anthony and I knew that unless we could find a baseline of financial support, Dungeons and Daddies would simply be a fun little short-term experiment among friends that we would wrap up with in a year and move on.

But thanks in large part to all of you fine Patreon supporters today, I’m happy to say we didn’t need to do that.

Four months into the show, we launched our Patreon and thanks to your overwhelming and generous support, we were able to financially justify and support the podcast, cook up a bunch of really fun and creatively fulfilling bonus content like At the Mountains of Dadness, commission some amazing art from our jaw dropping-ly talented listeners, set up and start a merch store, and perhaps most stunningly - play D&D professionally(!)

That’s insane. And, sure, it’s a weird version of D&D that confuses “visual” for “verbal,” and “investigation” and “perception,” but if there’s one thing I hope we’ve proved, it’s that a strict adherence to the rules doesn’t necessarily result in a good time - a healthy disrespect for your DM and all of their hard work does!

On top of all that, at the end of 2019, Beth was able to quit her day job as a Hollywood assistant and transition to podcasting and pursuing all manner of creative writing full-time. For us at RocketJump, we were able to shift a lot of our usual focus of hunting for freelance for-hire work just to survive and dedicate it to the podcast and production of Patreon bonuses. And for Anthony, he got to experience the rarest feeling of all time as a creative: friends actually consuming something you created and occasionally complimenting you on it!

Frankly, we never imagined we would be able to do any of that when we launched, let alone in such a short span of time. For that we are immensely thankful and hope you have felt your patronage has been worthwhile and entertaining!

Over the last year, thanks to your feedback, we’ve also been able to get a good sense of the ins and outs of Patreon, and armed with that feedback and experience, today we’re announce some tweaks to the Patron tier structure and rewards:

We’re going to add Merch by Patreon for people on the EX-L, Touring, and Elite tiers

Merch by Patreon is a new feature Patreon created which allows us to automatically reward people on those tiers in the US, UK, Canada, Germany, and Australia (with more countries coming) with exclusive merch for sticking around as a patron.

Basically, from the moment we flip the switch, patrons who remain pledged at those tiers will receive exclusive merch! Here’s how Merch by Patreon will affect each individual tier:

• EX-L Tier
  
  EX-L supporters will, after three consecutive pledges, receive an awesome #1 Dad D20 sticker designed by Kat Curwin!
  
• Touring Tiers
  
  For 2020, we're going to try out Quarterly Merch Drops! Touring tier supporters who stay pledged at those levels will receive new merch every quarter! First up, we got Kat's awesome #1 Dad D20 design on a mug!
  
• Elite Tier
  
  Elite tier members will get both the sticker and quarterly merch drops.

If you’re already a patron at one of those levels, you don’t have to do anything - you’ll automatically receive that award after three consecutive pledges. However, please make sure to log into your Patreon account and update it with your current shipping address, as you’ll need that if you want to receive the physical goods!

(By the way, stay tuned, as we're currently in process of receiving physical mockup images from Patreon)

We’re “retiring” the LX Tier, and all current LX tier members will receive EX tier rewards going forward

After digging into our analytics and consulting with our Patreon manager, we’ve decided to retire the $2 LX tier. From today forward, current LX tier members will begin receiving Talking Dad and be eligible for end of episode shoutouts. To be clear - if you are in the LX tier, you will not be charged more (the way Patreon is setup means we will never be able to alter what you’re paying).

Part of the reason we’re doing this is because we wanted to let more folks from the community in on the discussions around the show (especially for the stuff we bring up on Talking Dad), and it felt strange knowing that we had such a vibrant and active Discord, yet had people who needed to avoid entire channels, or who could submit questions to Talking Dad that they themselves couldn't hear the answers to.

We think that by letting more people hear Talking Dad, this will contribute to a more active discussion and just generally increase the good vibes we got goin’ already on the Discord.

In addition, we felt the tier was less necessary thanks to the merch store we were able to launch at the end of 2019, because people who simply want to contribute a bit of support now have a non-recurring option to do so in the form of merch or digital downloads.

Please note - LX tier members will not receive the earlier episodes of Talking Dad (as we felt this was only fair to the folks who have supported us on the EX tier prior). If you’re currently an LX tier member, there'll be another post outlining these changes for you.

We’re upping the limit on the Elite level to 20 seats

We’ve received a lot of emails and messages from folks who wanted to support at the $50 level but couldn’t because we limited it to 8 seats (incidentally the same number of seats in a Honda Odyssey thanks to our rigorous Honda theming)

Part of the reason we kept it limited was due to the nature of the rewards, and we needed to properly judge how much time and effort fulfilling those rewards would be. In addition to the Merch by Patreon bonus, we're also adding a Discord reward we're calling The Vizier, named after the card in The Deck of Many Things. This will be a spoiler-filled bi-monthly Discord hangout where Anthony will answer any question you have about the campaign and his plans. We players will not be allowed to hear it!

As always, thank you all for your continued support, and here’s to a 2020 full of dad jokes so bad you’ll practically demand a refund! And finally, if you have any questions, feel free to throw them into the comments below!

- The Dads

p.s. Also we realize Ep. 25 should've been named Emotional Rollercoaster and we forever regret missing out on that great title.