This post is to publicly thank our pledgers and everybody who has shown interest in our Kickstarter campaign or in the GRAVETIDES project as a whole.
As all failures, this one comes with lessons to be learned and we’ll take our time to try understand and correct our mistakes in order to be able to better plan our next steps.
We believe that the best advice can come from the community and If you have any observations, criticisms or anything else that you want us to know, just write it in the comments.
In the immediate future we will continue to post new articles about GRAVETIDES on this site and on our Facebook page, keep following us if you want to see where we’re heading.
Independently of its current outcome this campaign has been a pleasure to prepare and follow, let’s hope we’ll be able to plan something new in the near future!
After a laboured and long preparation our new Kickstarter will be live in the first days of June (the exact date will be announced as soon as available).
In the past months we’ve shared all the steps, from background writing to concept design and digital sculpt, of the new GRAVETIDES warfleets models that will be offered in this Kickstarter working at the same time in refining and testing our gaming rules and now it’s finally the time to release the results of our work.
The outcome of our first Kickstarter for our Undead Warfleet confirmed that there is interest for new and original fantasy warfleets models and gaming as also attested by the launch of a new naval ruleset by a notorious UK-based games and models producer.
We just hope that our new offering will be good enough to replicate the good success of our first foray to help us keep working on the GRAVETIDES project and be able to continue releasing new models (we already have A LOT of concepts and designs ready or in progress) and hopefully have the GRAVETIDES ruleset and their background polished enough to be released as a real game.
After a good deal of playtesting the GRAVETIDES Beta Rules have been updated to what can be considered their actual final state.
Further modification and rule refining are still possible but V10.0 can be now considered to be the Release Candidate of our naval fantasy rules.
Rules updates are mainly relative to hit allocation with a total redesign of the Ship Cards used to track damage and vessels status with the introduction of counters in substitution of pencil and eraser, something that really speeds up the flow of the game without (we hope) losing the level of detail we deemed necessary.
Another lock down day, another playtesting session.
Lesson learned from previous testing games (at the moment always in solitaire) have led to a complete redesign of the Ship Cards.
Pencil and eraser are gone and counters are used to record hits to the different parts of the ships or to track their status.
The new Ship Cards design also reflect new damage allocation rules that allow for a more streamlined game without renouncing to a certain level of detail allowing for different effects depending on side hit.
To allow for faster and more cinematic battles moving and firing turn phases have been unified and warships hit points values trimmed down.
All these changes will be soon incorporated into the GRAVETIDES beta rules and warfleets description making the current ones obsolete.
All is set up!
The new counters
The new Ship Cards after one Turn (Nadvidian Warfleet)
The Hailstone Mortar squadron targets the Floating Mausoleum while Bonreammers approach from their starboard side
Kavenid warfleet Ship Cards after the second Turn
The Frozen Galley rams and board the mighty Floating Mausoleum
Hailstone Mortars and Bonerammers clash into battle!
Meanwhile we are now looking into preparing our next Kickstarter with the intention to make it live before Summer.
The print of the last warship of the Neghorrethian fleet is finally here!
Differently from the other vessels of the Necralchemist fleet the Bringer of Miasma is powered by an internal combustion alchemical engine whose exhausts are used to propel against enemy warships glassy spheres filled with toxic or explosive fumes known as the Miasma Orbs.
The Bringer can also release its deadly Orbs directly in the waters on its wake plaguing the seascape with floating mines to hamper enemy shipping movements or to protect friendly vessels creating secure areas impenetrable to foe vessels.
More details on the Neghorrethian warfleet can be found in its dedicated page and GRAVETIDES rules for the Great Operator can be downloaded from here.
As lockdown is returned until Easter (hopefully for the last time) it’s a good time for an intensive afternoon of solitaire playtesting of the GRAVETIDES core rules using the models from our Undead Fleet Kickstater and warships of the new Nadvidian Frozen Necrorealm fleet that we have discarded in the process of learning 3D printing.
Playing the game with a good number of actual models with their respective experimental special rules even if the obvious limitation of solitaire play and of a small and round table to play on has been a totally different experience than trying the game with counters representing generic warship with no strange weapons or other bizarre characteristics.
The war fleets of Kavenid and Nadvidia are ready to wage war
All is set up for battle
The Kavenid Ship CardsThe Hailston Mortar squadron sails forward
The Frozen Galley rams the mighty Drifting Mausoleum
A Stormbarge attacks an approaching Corpseship
A Bonerammer sends a Stormbarge to the bottom of the GRAVETIDES sea
Boarding actions in progress!
The Glacier Fortress is under siege !!
These plays have highlighted the necessity to simplify damage allocation and to remake (again!) the Ship Card to allow faster recording and tracking of damage and status preserving some aspects of the GRAVETIDES rules we deemed important like the allocation of attacks on different sides of the target and some other ‘finesses’.
In the end we are now working on a new version of the GRAVETIDES core rules that will introduce some differences such as:
damage rules will be simplified keeping the allocation of hits on different ship sides where it really counts
Ship Cards will be redesigned and simplified with damage tracking and vessel status recorded using counter instead of rubber and pencil to speed up the game and enabling players to check each vessel conditions with a glance
clarifications and tuning of the movement rules, mainly for warship propelled by magic
range and distances measuring clarifications
admirals and sorcerers ranking will be simplified with the ability to have higher quality officers to be treated as a perks to be bought during fleet composition
These changes some other ones will be reflected into ships experimental rules starting with the ones of the Kavenid ad Nadividian war fleets which were used for playtesting.
Last but not least we have also received some suggestions and clarifications requests that we will try to incorporate in the GRAVETIDES core rules.
Further playtesting will hopefully be done and reported soon.
After a lot of 3D printing, filing and assembling we are now able to show some good photos of the model of the Great Operator, the Flagship of the Necralchemist war fleet.
A huge floating alchemical generator, the Great Operator fuels the movement and the weapons of the other warships of the Neghorrethian fleet projecting from its mechanical tentacles the energy needed to recharge the accumulators carried by its lesser peers.
Even if its ammunitions are severely limited in number the huge Thunderbore cannon can severely cripple even the mightiest of enemy vessel due to the uncontrolled release of energy unleashed on its targets.
More details on the Neghorrethian warfleet can be found in its dedicated page and GRAVETIDES rules for the Great Operator can be downloaded from here.
The sculpt of last Nechralchemist vessel has been finalized thus completing the Neghorretian war fleet !
The Bringers hosts under their bridges alchemical mills for the creation of the Miasma Orbs, glassy spheres in which Neghorrethian sorcerers entrap lethal fumes produced burning in infernal distillers strange mixtures of mystical components which may even incorporate tiny Ambergis shards.
The bow cannon of the Bringer can lob the Miasma Orbs at great distance against enemy vessels engulfing them with the lethal fumes released on impact by the spheres.
As the production of volatile vapours carried by the Orbs take place directly on board the Necralchemists can create fumes with different effects depending on the constituents used in their creation.
The intrinsic inconstancy of the effects of magic used to create the miasmas may lead to the creation of ineffective Orbs, as a fatal mistake during their production may have destructive consequences to the Bringer itself.
As the firing range of the Bringer cannon can be unpredictable due to its pneumatic propelling system devised to prevent breaking its fragile projectiles, Orbs missing their targets may remain unbroken floating on the surface of the sea as lethal hazards for any ship unfortunate enough to collide into them.
Under extreme pressure or to change the tide of a battle, Bringers Captains may order their crew to release the Orbs in the waters on the wake of the warship plaguing the seascape with deadly weapons in the hope to stave off enemies vessels.
Read more about the Nechralchemist war fleet on the dedicated page, while the GRAVETIDES rules for the Neghorrethian war fleet can be found here.
Core GRAVETIDES rules have also been bumped up to Version 9.0 with multiple Boarding Actions rules correction and clarification and the introduction of the Oar Racking attack (also known as the ‘Diekplous’).
