FTL Updates + August Preview (Patreon)

Alright, so after last week's distraction with the 2+ update I've finally gone back to working on FTL, which has now been in early access for 1 month (yay!).

I've got most heroes, upgrades, weapons and squadron types figured out for each faction, but are still missing the special units, faction special rules and legendary fleets.

As part of this update we've also finally got the standard heroes, upgrades and weapons up as part of the core rules, but the more I work on this, the more I realize that flux reactors should probably be part of the advanced rules instead.

One of the things we've had with all of our games is that the base experience is distilled to its core, and then anything else we want is put on top as a modular thing, and I'm thinking flux reactors fall into that category.

Anyway, the latest version of the core rules is available right now, and the factions rules will be released in phases so we can take a good look at them, get some playtesting done, etc.

If everything goes well here is the plan:

• 29/07 - Core Rules
• 05/08 - Empire vs Alliance
• 12/08 - Marauders vs Nomads
• 19/08 - Progenitors vs Xenos

As we release these piece by piece we'll also start working on the full rulebook, hopefully getting the beginner's guide done by the end of August, and then doing advanced rules by the beginning of September.

My goal is to try and get the game "ready" by end of September, completing the 3-month development cycle. At that point the core rules will go out to the public so that we can get as much feedback as possible, and I'm thinking that I'd like to wait at least 3-6 months before we can consider the game to be fully stable.

Without revealing too much, we've also started work on both 2D and 3D spaceship models, which will be released as the game comes out, but in the meantime here's some previews:

August Goodies

Speaking of releases, let's take a look at what's coming at you in August:

• Jakob's Path: Chapter 2
• 2D Kingdom of Angels
• 3D Battle Sisters Walker
• 3D Dwarf Giant Construct
• 3D Tokens & Ruler
• 3D Gnoll Warrior by Manuel Boria

Next month will see the final releases to complete both the Battle Sisters and Dwarf armies, so we're going to have to start thinking about what to release next.

Seeing how both of these are "good" armies, we think it would be cool if the next two armies could be "evil", so that we could eventually have a sort of 3D print starter set, but we still have to see about that.

The 3D tokens and ruler are going to be a pretty neat addition to have during matches, and we're thinking of adding them as a sort of permanent "welcome gift" for new Tier 3 patrons.

Additionally we're also going to start providing all Tier 3 patrons with a 20% off discount on our CGTrader store, making it easier on the wallet to pick up missed releases.

 *UPDATE* Sorry everyone, I forgot to mention in the update that we're actually going to be releasing an additional 3D model. We're doing a collaboration with Manuel Boria, who provided us with a fierce Gnoll Warrior model! 

Ratmen Heroes Bundle

In celebration of the successful Vile Rattus campaign, we've created a bundle with all of the Ratmen heroes made by ThatEvilOne for OPR, which you can get at a 33% discount:

https://www.cgtrader.com/3d-model-collections/ratmen-heroes-bundle 

Add the 20% patrons discount on top of that, and you've got a pretty sweet deal. ;)

Forum Changes

As we mentioned before, the current Discourse forum is being removed and we're gonna go back to the Proboards one. What this means for you as a patron is that there will be no more patrons-only forum section.

We've removed the mention of a patrons-only forum from all of our Patreon pages, so going forward there will only be a patrons-only section on Discord. Honestly it sucks that things had to go like this, and we'll keep looking for better alternatives, but for now this is it.