By Gavin Dady
Hello friends!
2021. Well, that was certainly a year, wasn’t it? We’ve had some amazing highs and lows this year; we launched our first full content expansion, conducted a wildly successful crowd funding campaign for the board game and won Tabletop Gaming’s best Miniatures Game 2021. We had the first appearance of our amazing demo board at the Salute and Dragonmeet shows. We’ve also had all manner of COVID related shipping and logistics issues throughout the year. We also made the decision to stop development on a number of products in the second half of the year to focus on the update to the core rulebook.
So, what do we have in store for 2022?
Well, January sees the last couple of sets for Chapter 2 released, the long-awaited Giant Spider and Trolls. Then in February we have a nice little bonus release. On the second anniversary of the game’s original launch, we will be making the resin versions of the Bleak Falls Barrow Delve and the Imperial and Stormcloak Faction Starters available for retail release, so you should see them in your FLGS. These sets were previously only available direct from our webstore.
March and April will see two new terrain sets available in resin, which I will talk about once I have the painted versions back, but they tie really nicely into Chapter 2: Steam and Shadow.
May, then, sees the start of Chapter 3: Dawnguard. We launch this new chapter with two new faction core boxes, the Volkihar Vampires and the Dawnguard. These two factions are the core thrust of the Chapter, which will feature releases throughout the remainder of the year, including a couple of Very Good Boys and some Very Bad Boys.
This Chapter also sees the arrival of the long-awaited Bandit Faction. The Bandit models are designed to be multipurpose, so can, of course, be used as some dirty and smelly bandits, but with a slightly cleaner paintjob can be used as mercenaries, adding extra models to any faction, or with some glowing eyes they can also be used as Vampire Thralls. The Bandits also have their own Heroes, of course, and you’ll be seeing some familiar names like The Butcher, Haldyn, Rigel Strong-Arm and Eisa Blackthorn among the list of rogues.
We also have new heroes, followers and some new monsters, along with a special promo figure too.
We’re also aiming to have the Chapter 3 card pack available in May, but the development hiatus (more on that in a bit) and the current global logistics challenges may delay the card pack release. That does mean you may have models without rules for a little time, but we committed last year to try harder to get thing right first time, and that means things may take a little longer.
That brings me on to the core rulebook revision. Work is well advanced on this now, with the vast majority of updates and errata folded in. We are working on four outstanding parts which are the Adversaries Chapter, a clearer Spell process, an introductory turn walkthrough and some quality of life and ease of use updates like folding in the rules update cards and updating the quick reference sheets and alphabetical perks list.
Once we have a final manuscript we’ll send to layout (there’s diagrams etc. which need to be added) and then provide it for community feedback. We’ll then define a feedback window and listen to all your suggestions before we create our final print version. At that point we’ll detail how you can go about getting the revised hardcopies and make the PDF available as well. We are really keen to see what everybody thinks of the reorganisation. It’s been a mammoth task for everybody involved at Modiphius. We should see the first draft of the manuscript completed in early 2022, with first draft PDF available around March. Given time to get feedback, make the changes and get into production I would tentatively say the book should be available in the summer.
Finally, we also have a few other products in the development cauldron that don’t have fixed release dates yet. Histories of the Empire Volume 2 – Steam and Shadow has been on hold whilst we work on the core rulebook updates, but is in an advanced stage of development with some closed playtests already giving some really great feedback. Tales Of Tamriel: The Thanehold Saga will be getting more time in the early part of the year and will be launching with two or three companion products that will expand and enhance the gameplay within.
We are also hoping to get back to the regular updates and community content next year, with new blogs, features and scenarios at least monthly. We are also looking to do more competitions and community outreach and engagement and *maybe* start looking at organised play again. We’ll also have more STL’s available for those of you with 3-D printers.
But, despite what Jon said on the Fallout stream, there will be no bears.
Unless there are...