[Vienna-pm] Robot Turtles - a board game to teach programming

Roland Angerer r.angerer at 123people.com
Tue Sep 17 05:25:02 PDT 2013


Hi Nick,

I own Robo Rally and I have to say, that its even difficult for grown 
ups to master. Robot Turtles seems like a brilliant version or Robo 
Rally that you could really play with kids.

Love it - want one. Count me in if pricing is possible around €30.

Roland Angerer

On 09/17/2013 12:34 PM, Nicholas Clark wrote:
>      Robot Turtles is a board game you play with your favorite 3-8 year
>      old. It sneakily teaches programming fundamentals.
>
> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/danshapiro/robot-turtles-the-board-game-for-little-programmer
>
>
> I am intrigued by this. Partly because someone (can't find the attribution)
> commented that for an adult, children's games seem to partition either into
> pure chance (E has at least one like this) or where the adult is subtly
> trying to loose*. So this looks like fun, even without the ulterior motive**
>
>
> So, anyway, I believe that I want to purchase one. ONE. Problem is that
> with the international shipping, purchasing one is not very cost effective.
> (ie $60)
>
> There is a "3-pack", which is $120 including shipping, and a "Deca-pack",
> which is $340. These look viable, as they bring the unit cost down to
> something like the price of a regular new board game (eg Settlers of Catan
> or Monopoly ship from amazon.de for about 30 EUR)
>
>
> One niggle here is that I can read that if I were to ship stuff to the UK,
> tax and import duty are both payable. It's 20% VAT on anything over £15, and
> "phone us up, because we make it way too complicated with 14000 categories"%
> (typically 5-9%) import duty for anything over £135
>
> 1) I don't know how to find the relevant numbers for Austria
>
> 2) If I assume that VAT is unavoidably going to be charged, at 20%, but only
>     on the games, not the shipping, then the price actually isn't terrible:
>
>     3-pack:  $80 * 1.2 + $40    = $136 = EUR 101.78 =   EUR 33.93 each
>     10-pack: $240 * 1.2 + $100  = $388 = EUR 290.38 =   EUR 29.04 each
>
> 3) So, is anyone else interested?
>
> 4) What is the threshold for paying duty? And the rate?
>     The UK rates work out that (I think) duty has to reach 23% before the
>     10-pack is more expensive than the below-threshold 3-pack.
>
> 5) What is the charge that gets made by the delivery firm for collecting
>     the duty?
>
> Nicholas Clark
>
> *  Somehow my grandmother was even able to loose at Snakes and Ladders, which
>     is strange give that it is a game of pure chance. This takes *real* skill.
> ** Programming is a useful skill. E needs to go to work, so that I can
>     continue to have ice cream. :-)
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-- 
Roland Angerer

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