I view Kickstarter as a way to, well, kick-start my projects. It’s not an ATM that I want to go to every time I’ve got a book to publish, just because I don’t want any risk. Publishing should incur some risk, and I should be willing to put up some of my own money to see my vision come to pass. It’s only when I don’t have enough to get the ball rolling that I want to use Kickstarter, and I’m glad it’s there for that purpose.
That said, my announcement is that, having run the numbers, barring any unforeseen circumstances, the Adventures Dark and Deep™ Game Masters Toolkit will be coming out in the May-June time frame, without any Kickstarter. The first two books, A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore and the Players Manual, have primed the pump enough that I can put out the GMT on my own. (I think!)
Looking at the project plan, it does seem like I’ll need to Kickstart the Bestiary, but it’s also bigger than the first two books put together, and I want it to have literally about 8 or 9 times as much art. But the Game Masters Toolkit is, I think, doable without another trip to the Kickstarter well, and for that I thank everyone who’s bought or supported the first two books, the Darker Paths booklets, and the first adventure module.
I just wanted to say how refreshing it is to see someone say "publishing should have some risk involved". I also respect that your products have been pretty much "ready to go" before you've asked for money. If more RPG writers/publishers did the same I would probably support more projects. As it is, I now just take a wait-and-see approach. I think the DIY element is getting lost. When you can get a bunch of funding for a few button clicks for something that hasn't really even been formed or developed yet, you end up with product designers that do not really have any idea how much work or time that the project will take.
It is sad that the first two words that popped into my head upon reading and nodding at your post had to be "mature" and "reasonable" (cf. the many kickstarter-users-abusers).
I really wish more people would publish normally without going the Kickstarter route. The delays and excuses, whether valid or not, that seem to keep coming from everything I've supported has really turned me off on the whole thing. They all seem to want to run their operation as a hobby, but when you take money upfront then it is a business. It becomes your second job with the same responsibilities that a job entails.
I will buy this just to support publishers moving back into actually publishing.
Others I support in this same vein are Tim Shorts, Dylan Hartwell, and Christian Walker.