New Elder Scrolls Game Launches Crowdfunding Campaign

A crowdfunding campaign to produce a new Elder Scrolls board game has already raised over $2 million in less than a week. Chip Theory Games has launched a Gamefound campaign for The Elder Scrolls: Betrayal of the Second Era, a new campaign-style strategy game based on The Elder Scrolls Online in which players build a character by choosing a race and picking one of five regions of Tamriel to explore. Players then choose a guild, which gives them access to different skill lines and classes. Character building occurs over the course of the game, with players having nearly unlimited customization options as they gain XP and level up their character. However, players only have a limited amount of character board space to use when they build their character.

Combat in The Elder Scrolls involves picking a skill from their character board and then rolling dice that correspond to that particular skill. Once a skill is used, it goes to the cooldown track, which refreshes dice every turn. Using a skill too often or switching forms cause the cooldown board to fill with fatigue dice, which are less effective when making checks. Player characters and monsters are represented by poker chip-like tokens, with players removing chips from a character's stack whenever they take damage. 

The Elder Scrolls: Betrayal of the Second Era borrows heavily from Chip Theory's popular Too Many Bones game, which uses many of the same character-building and gameplay mechanics. Of course, the major difference is that Elder Scrolls utilizes an existing IP while Too Many Bones utilizes a unique world created just for the game. 

One of the major factors of The Elder Scrolls: Betrayal of the Second Era is the game's high price point. The base game costs $190 while a pledge with a planned expansion costs $230. One perk to backing the Gamefound campaign is that Chip Theory Game has promised free shipping for anyone who backs the campaign.