Stage 3 of the Kickstarter has been fulfilled, the supply
chain has received their order forms for the new releases and should be
available at many major retailers the first or second week of
February. MSRP and kit details can be seen on my retail site.
Current Retail Release:
4 New 28mm scale kits that are sure to please...
•Keilerkopf APC
•Valkir Heavy Troopers
•Valkir Assault Troopers
•Valkir Support Troopers
9 New 15mm scale kits!
•15mm Scale Leviathan Mortis
•Eight, 15mm Scale Weapon Arms for the Crusader and Mortis
Upcoming releases:
There is another shipment that is expected early to mid-March for the
Command Squad, the Panzerjager, the Thor and Odin/Loki kits. I am anticipating
an April retail release for these four kits.
Wall of text and eye candy incoming….
Sooooooo what’s next?
Two more kits for the Eisenkern faction to round out the
force selection. I think we have the Infantry component pretty much filled,
between the Basic trooper sets, the Valkir sets and specialty sets like the
Panzerjager and support weapons set, we can get a pretty balance force. The
glaring hole in the faction is the armor section. We have a super heavy slot
filled by the Leviathans but nothing in the light and medium armor selection.
The APC is a bit of an odd duck, armored like a main
battle tank, it lacks offensive punch. The Thor adds that but it is a one shot
per game weapon as the reload times are simply too long. The Odin Loki does a
fine job of adding sustainable firepower but the open top is a severe weakness.
If you run around without an infantry escort or a vanilla Keilerkopf to provide
protection, feral Shadokesh can easily scramble up the sides of the vehicle and
make short work of the crew.
The two kits planned to round out the force selection
are, a light walker, about 3.5” tall (you can see it under the foot of the
Leviathan Mortis in the box art for that kit). This will be the light armor
choice. The medium armor slot will be filled by the StuG, both hover and
tracked (pictured on the Valkir 20 man box set). Before you ask, there is not a
release date set for either of these kits yet, these will likely be released at
the tail end of the Shadokesh releases. I hope to release an accessory kit for
the Valkir and eventually the Shadokesh as well as a modular building set
similar to what you have seen in the Mortis box art.
Both I and WGF are quite eager to begin work immediately
on the Shadokesh. As the backlog of Kickstarter work they took on is finally
coming to its fruition, there will be time for them to dedicate energy towards
the next set of releases in a far steadier and less pressured manner. This will
make it much easier for us to start planning regular quarterly releases.
Shadokesh Preview:
The Shadokesh are the second faction
for the ‘ICU’ Iron Core Universe. Brutal and efficient, their gaunt frame
towers in at roughly 9’ tall. I have been reworking the base model for the Shadokesh
trooper as the Shadokesh and Handler did not come across as strong as I had
wished. After much tweaking I am happy with the base model pictured here. These
are still a work in progress but I should be able to get these over to WGF
fairly soon. The CAD program I use does hard surface modeling with ease but
organic items like their hands and the fabric are better dealt with in Zbrush.
These have not been through the Zbrush process yet, so the fabrics rough form
is blocked in but the details and small folds have yet to be added.
The Iron Core Game: ICU-Ion Core Universe
Robey Jenkis over at Precinctomega has been working with
me over the last year to come up with an enjoyable game that allows the use of
massive models like the Leviathan to play well with all those squishy infantry
and not rule the table. He delivered an innovative system that deals with that
very challenging problem. I like it, I like it quite a bit. I had an
opportunity to play a few friendly games and the resource system works as it
should to help balance the uber vs. the squishy.
Robey delivered the core system; unit selection,
movement, morale, combat, and turn sequence. Based on my experience, there are
some tweaks I would like to make and some areas I will actually be attempting
to incorporate even deeper into the system than Robey had done initially.
Without going into too much detail, there is a resource management aspect that
is key to the game but it was troubling me, it felt like an aspect that was clunky to
track as it needed to be managed turn to turn. My intent is to integrate this
even further, making it part of the decision making, activation and reaction
system, removing it mentally and structurally from the status of a ‘trackable
item’ and interweaving it into the game play so that it feels and plays like an
integrated part of the game play. That is my hope at least….
There are other rule sections I need to put flesh on,
campaign rules, vehicle and unit design rules, rules for generating your own
‘Household’ within the Eisenkern faction. As buildings are on the list of kits
I will need to develop rules for that aspect as well, to make terrain an
integral part of the experience.
I have a new forum, I still need to add content to so I
am not quite ready to post the link. I will use this forum for rules discussion
and play testing feedback.
For those of you who have been following this process for
some time, you know that I have had two other forums, both died horrible deaths
due to database corruption at the hands of the hosting service. I have moved
away from that host and signed with one that is experience with forum
maintenance, which performs daily backups. Hopefully we will avoid the wasted
time and energy associated with a corrupted database. When it is complete, when
I have content and am ready to open the game to Alpha testing I will post here
again with the address.
Thank you again for all your support.
Mark-
