Pledge manager delay and the final version of the rulebook
about 3 years ago – Mon, Apr 03, 2023 at 11:17:31 AM

Hello Backers,

first of all, I would like to apologize for the longer period of silence. 

Pledge Manager delay

There were some issues regarding the shipping plan we were facing that needed to be resolved. Our partner, Funagain Logistics, which we used for fulfillment in all of our previous campaigns, closed their business and we had to find a new partner that can handle not only the Kickstarter fulfillment but also the distribution of the game. As you can imagine this was not an easy task, but luckily it happened before the Pledge Manager was opened so there will not be any further chaos. In the end, we will probably get a slight delay (in days not months :D), but this will be announced once we start the manufacturing and will know the exact date when the game can leave the factory. 

The good news is that we are now in the process of finishing the Pledge Manager which will be opened during the next week.

The final version of the rulebook

During the crazy month of negotiating, we were working on finishing the rulebook and did the last final balance adjustments to the game. It would be great if you find some time to read through the rulebook and give us feedback. Anything can be still changed, so if you will face any issues during reading let us know and we can discuss it.

Sorry for any inconvenience, but I would like to be transparent as much as possible.

Thank you,

Stepan

Develoment Progress - Part 3
about 3 years ago – Wed, Feb 22, 2023 at 10:56:41 AM

Hello Backers,

during the last month, we playtest the game more, and here is the list of changes we did to make the game even better, followed by the news about the game. 

Layout changes

We had to distinguish the cards also from the front side, as in some situations it is handy to see the card type and its subtype without the need to look at the card's back.

We also updated the technology and protocol card's background color, so the text on the cards is much easier to read. Thank you to the testers who report this issue.

The Invasion board has been reworked a bit, so now the board follows the steps the Invasion takes during its turn from top to bottom. In addition,  having the recruitment zones on the bottom helps the managing the screws that are placed on these zones.

And here is the final version of the player board as there were also a lot of changes, mainly because we needed to reword some parts to support the Team Fight game mode we added during the campaign.

Rules changes

We made a few changes to the starting deck of the Invasion and a new card needed to be added to the game. In addition, it brings more variety to the starting deck of the Invasion,  which is always welcome. 

German and French languages

As we wrote in the previous update, the Spieleschmied has been funded and the German version is unlocked. The campaign was really successful and it almost unlocked another stretch goal. If we also count what was raised on the Pledge Manager so far,  we need a couple of new backers to make it a reality.  We still hope there will be more content unlocked during the Pledge Manager.

Sadly we were unsuccessful with the French version and we have to announce that there will be no more languages added during the first print run. I am sorry for that, everyone is so slow (even us) and we can't wait any longer as we will have a huge delay.

Pledge Manager

The Pledge Manager has been temporarily closed for new backers as we need to prepare it for you first. We expect the Pledge Manager will be re-opened in 2 weeks so you can fill in your shipping details and finish your order. 

Localization and proofreading

We are preparing cards and the rulebook for public proofreading and I will share them with you in the next update. We have already started with the Czech localization and the German will follow in a couple of weeks, once we finish the proofreading.

Kickstarter exclusive content

The Kickstarter exclusive campaign is almost finished and needs a bunch of tests to be sure everything works smoothly. Once the Pledge Manager will be closed we will inform you about the exclusive content. There are some surprises waiting on you :D

Thank you,

Stepan

German campaign is funded!
about 3 years ago – Wed, Feb 08, 2023 at 10:56:39 PM

Hello Survivors,

the german campaign has recently reached its funding goal and has still some time to unlock or help to unlock another stretch goal. If it will not be directly unlocked during the Spieleschmiede campaign it still might be unlocked during the pledge manager.

Another update about the game development (the last one) is planned for the next week. And we hope we will finally have the final decision about the French version.

Stay away from the radiation,

Stepan

Develoment Progress - Part 2
about 3 years ago – Mon, Jan 23, 2023 at 09:53:27 AM

Dear Backers,

it was a crazy last 2 months. We were testing the game a lot, trying to figure out how to improve the game to be perfectly balanced and also easy to play. We did a bunch of changes to the layout and rules, and here is the list of the most important changes.

Layout changes

Major changes have been done to the card layout. We extracted combat statistics from cards. The reason why we did that is simple - to simplify the rules. In the previous version when the card was played you had to deal the damage as it was a part of its effect. Now the Main phase can be easily split into two parts:

1) Playing cards - where you can focus only on how to play drawn cards and when any card is played all card effects are immediately executed.

2) Dealing damage - at the end of the Main phase you can count all the damage on all played cards and use them in any order and combination you would like. 

This streamlines the game a lot as each player can independently manage the first part of the Main phase and at the end, they can together discuss what is the best way how to allocate the damage. Yes, there still might be some discussion during the first part as you need to decide what card prefer to play. But overall, the process is much easier to handle. 

The other layout changes were made on the game boards. We changed the position of some elements on the Invasion board so it now naturally follows the steps of the Invasion turn from the top to bottom. And there is still one little unresolved thing regarding the player board we are currently discussing in the FB group. As the final decision has not been done yet, I will show you the final version during the next update.

Rules changes

We were continuing by removing little rules you can easily forget and decide that the campaign will be driven by "Scenario cards". The basic campaign in the game contains only 2 scenarios and below are their scenario cards (back and front of each card next to each other). This also helps a lot for the bigger Kickstarter campaign which is now much easier to handle as you do not need (and probably do not forget) additional rules and options you have during specific scenarios.

As you can see, we used the card back to explain how to set up the scenario. And the front is used as a deployment zone, containing the winning condition and some other effects that change how the game is played. 

The front also contains the difficulty setting, so you can easily decide the game difficulty by placing deployed cards on any line on the Scenario card. The more upper-line are deployed cards placed, the more difficult the scenario is. Below is an example of how the deployed cards might be placed on the card.

Balancing, balancing, and again balancing

For those who know my previous work, I always try to make the game perfectly balanced so every strategy is playable and each card serves its purpose. After all the changes we did during the last few months, I can say that I am finally satisfied with the game balance and there is nothing I would like to change.  If you want to see the game in action, you can watch the video of my solo run-through with all the final changes.

Thank you for reading till the end,

Stepan

Spieleschmiede will launch tomorrow at 11:00 AM
about 3 years ago – Wed, Jan 18, 2023 at 10:22:08 AM

Hello Backers,

I would like to inform you that the landing page for the Spieleschmiede campaign is ready and the campaign will start tomorrow at 11:00 AM. Here is the link for the campaign.

I would like to apologize that I was unable to send development progress last week as preparing the landing page and marketing for the campaign was time-consuming. Anyways you can expect the next update by the end of this week.

Thank you,

Stepan