Sacred Backer Time #4 - Super Short and Sweet Edition
over 4 years ago – Sun, Jun 21, 2020 at 02:32:15 AM

Hello!

Today's update will be super short.

Pinups of Death II - V

Right now the paper manufacturing is coordinating samples with us and for the delivery of the plastic so they can time printing boxes with packing models. I am excited to share a time table when I have something more clear!

Smog Singers

Development is still chugging along. The next iteration I hit the playtesters with will be the best yet. I suspect after that it will just be fine tuning and my focus will shift to the God Hand.

Death King Armor 

The pose on the awkward feeling male has been adjusted and we added the King Slayer. Don't worry, it will be larger then it appears in this video!   

Ah! I do have a render of its final!   

Smog Singer Armor 

This is starting to get pretty cool! So many instruments, you'll attract the harvester for sure! Maybe you can sing it a lullaby?     

Nat-Kay Cochran is currently hard at work on the Vibranium, the Smog Singer Location. Here is a little slice of her pencil work on it:

Campaigns of Death - Dark Flower Armor

Here is some early work into the Dark Flower Armor, a synergy set available with Slenderman and Flower Knight resources.

Gambler's Chest

I have approved Atnas and the Gambler for Production! Which will leave the 3 new armor sets and Nightmare Adam left to cut tools for and produce. Oh speaking of which, I think we are finally finished with Nightmare Adam, just working out its final size. While the larger, painter's scale version looks great, I think I prefer it being in line with the Gourmet Hunter Anna.

Showdown Tracker

This week was mostly addressing performance issues that came up during testing and eliminating rogue bugs. Nothing too major to show, but we are vectoring towards updating the public release!

Annnnnd here is Jack, gingerly detailing the molars that adorn True Form Satan's base!

Overall this week, if I am being entirely honest, was not as productive as I was hoping. I did take a day off to celebrate Asher's birthday (which is totally AMAZING) but then I lost some time trying to get a fence installed on our roof so that we could have a safer outdoor space. Ah... silly pandemic! 

Everyone stay safe and don't trust the CDC. Remember when they told us not to wear masks? What a TEE HEE that was!

Sacred Backer Time #4 - Again!
over 4 years ago – Sat, Jun 13, 2020 at 02:51:56 AM

Welcome, again, to our 4th Sacred Backer time update. This update wont have any major bells and whistles, massive images or anyone copy editing it.

Phase I reopening has started in NYC. Personally, I feel it is way too soon and haven't made any plans to go outside. Besides, how can I be expected to leave my work desk when Wave 3 isn’t finished yet?

My hope is that masks, hand washing, and some grit will get the city through this.

Office-wise we are taking full advantage of our unique space being spread across 3 buildings and 2 floors, and have reached our human maximum capacity! That's right! 6 people! LoL! Essentially everyone has their own floor and entrance. 

Here at KD HQ, we socially distance with nothing less than masks and buildings between us!

Development

 Legendary Card Pack

• We made art for the missing Life String Resource.
• As promised, the game content that is included in Pinups of Death II collection will be included in the card pack.
• The pack will include the most up-to-date strain and pattern rules and updated glossary terms.
• I have crammed in a few very modest, very small surprises. Like a strain that unlocks when you lose to the Gold Smoke Knight. I also have someone making sure that I am not cramming any more surprises.
• I am thinking this should all be wrapped up and ready for final internal review by the end of the month. That's a good goal!

 Death King Armor
  We are nearly finished with this set! Next week we'll be moving into the most fussy part, the final test print and physical review. The kits will be designed so that each of the miniatures have alternate head and weapon options. For true cross-compatibility between them though, you'll have to utilize your kit bashing skills! (This means that not every head or weapon will fit every body.) The reason why is because it allows us to make much better looking models with less restriction.

(this last one looks a little derpy, no worries we will adjust!)

Bard (Smog Singer) Stuff!

Crimson Croc Weapons

Showdown Tracker

In light of our extended new way of working in NYC, we have continued to add more developmental tools to the tracker to enhance play testing. Next week, we will be formally focus testing (hopefully the final!) version of the Smog Singers! I went ahead and had them created in their low-poly form to enhance the experience for the testers as much as possible! 

The low poly white lion is finished too! Here he is using his legendary AI card.

Vignette of Death 2

Here is another model from the second Vignette of Death that is on developmental pause and most likely will not see a release this year. The Archivist makes her playable debut! She is tracking down her lost partner Twilight Knight, but cannot recall what happened or why. For the Vignette, her name is simply "Forget".

The Most Important News

And finally the most important news. The Titan Bee Crest has been created, the T Shirt is on its way! Perhaps not this sale, but most def the next!

So glad that everyone joined me of these 4 sacred backer time updates! They turned into being a little bright spot for me too! Have a nice weekend, stay safe and WEAR A MASK / WASH YOUR HANDS!!! (And in Kingdom Death, there are many many many hands to wash!)

#4
over 4 years ago – Sat, Jun 06, 2020 at 03:24:34 AM

As a life long New Yorker, I am gutted and I do not know how to express my raw feelings. 

I support the team, I support the backers and I support peaceful protests and an end to systemic racism.

I say this out of love and great respect to everyone.

Thank you in advance for your understanding.

________________________________________________________________

Welcome to our 4th Sacred Backer time update. This update wont have any major bells and whistles, massive images or anyone copy editing it.

Lockdown (and now curfew) continues in NYC. Please allow me to humbly share some of our developments.

Developments

Pinups of Death Collection 2-5

All finished and still waiting on the printer for final box dimensions. Then we package and send. (I just took a minute to email our project manager there to put some more pressure on him.) (ah he just called me! They wanted to wait for the white boxes in case the sizes changed, I let him know that we are ok doing adjustments to the artwork and he is sending the dyelines now)

Bards, Kings and Crocs

The Bard Armor was a little tricky, it was feeling like the material was too stiff. 

After some fine tuning, I am feeling pretty good about its direction.

Here are some sketches for alternate heads. I asked for some more “poet” feeling ones.

In the King Armor set department we pushed forward with more weapon designs, I was digging their ‘black metal + historical weapon vibe’ so I wanted to explore that a little more. Now it’s just time to pick our favorites and make them.

Oh and here are those alternate heads all sculpted up.

Here is the croc armor with the details adjusted. We increased the volume of the layers and have larger but less fingers on them now.

Showdown Tracker

The starting survivors and the White Lion are now all complete in their low poly incarnations. Tokens will be next.

We’ve added a tool that lets us import decks which will be critical in helping us play test effectively at range. While holding on to optimism, I don’t plan on reopening the office for perhaps the rest of the year. So its essential we are setup for the long haul of remote working.

With a little bit more polish and a little bit more ironing out, I plan on releasing an updated version of the public showdown tracker for everyone. It will not have our developer tools.

Other news

We have a 1 man team printing the Death High novice. We are looking to launch another limited sale. 

Ah yes. I keep meaning to post progress on Jacks incredible sculpture. Now that there are more characters in the scene it’s starting to feel proper crazy.

Sacred Backer Time #4
over 4 years ago – Sat, May 30, 2020 at 03:30:24 AM

Welcome to our 3rd Sacred Backer time update. This update won't have any major bells and whistles, massive images, or anyone copy editing it. 

Lockdown continues in NYC. I discovered recently that one of my favorite restaurants has re-opened and is doing curb side takeout! Later today I’ll be throwing on my Death Stranding cosplay (its what we wear here in NYC to stay safe) and picking up 12 of their Meal Kits, which we will be delivering to friends via car.

And then a Zoom / Skype Thai Hot Pot party will commence! 

Developments

Pinups of Death Collection 2-5

The Dark Seamstress!  

Initially she just didn't feel you know... dark enough! So we went back in and adjusted her, here is the final! 

This week I received the final Gut Check of the models, seems like everything is accounted for in each set.

All of the artwork is finished, including the revisions I asked for. We are still waiting on our printing partner to give us the final sizes for the boxes, but we have the box art all ready.

Ok truth be told, we are going to extend the "ballin" image of the DBK Pinup Dung Ball so her art isnt cutoff by a frame.

I expect to be delivering everything to the printer next week, and printing can begin!

Oh, and here is one of the pieces of art I had revised:

Stone Face Base Inserts

These have gone thru our engineering team and now have been delivered to the factory for tooling. I’ll try my best to get them to fast track and cut the new tool.

Bards, King and Croc Armor

Please note, nothing here is finalized.

Here is a Smog Singer gear exploration:

Our Croc Armor poses are coming out well. However I feel that the layers of clothing and armor are just too thin, we are gonna go back in and refine it so it feels better in its final miniature form.

Slowly rounding the corner on the Death King armor's gear, started to pick out some favorites to be sculpted and test fit to test poses. Nothing final quite yet.

Oh and here are some more ideas from Micheal Chang, the artist that I worked with for the Gambler and Oblivion Mosquito.

And lastly here is a quick exploration into some of the alternate heads that will come with the Death King Armor set. I’ll prob pick my 2 favorite.

Hard Drive Land

So I tracked down hopefully the exact model of HD that failed and I grabbed a cloning station. Ohhh boooy, I can’t wait for all this fun ;_;

Show Down Tracker

Low poly Lucy & Allister join the tracker!

Started to mess around with subtle animation when you move pieces around. Nothing finalized of course. And aiming to get a “path” feature added, this will leave a trail after a model is moved for a little while to help everyone see collisions etc.

We’ve also started to add a lot of tools to help us with remote play testing. Unsure which of those may or may not make it into the free public tracker yet.

And laslty, perhaps a character for the Abysaal Woods campaign. It's gonna have a bit of a "fairy tale" flare to it!

Ok! I am off to eat this take out hot pot and put in some extra hours on monster dev of the weekend! Have a wonderful time everyone!

Sacred Backer Time 1.5 Edition #2
over 4 years ago – Mon, May 25, 2020 at 06:54:40 PM

Welcome to our 2nd Sacred Backer time update! This update wont have any major bells and whistles, massive images or anyone copy editing it. It’s just a simple little sunny friday update.

New York City is still on lockdown. I plan to eat a pizza on the roof!

Developments
 

Pinups of Death Collection 2-5

The Pinups of Death collections are moving as swiftly along as I can! We now have art for all the content that was finalized last week, everything except some box art and 1 settlement event is now finished! Here are some more little peaks of what will be sprinkled around the collections.

Here are some Pinup Percival Action tokens:  

 I ended up requesting a revision on endure, but hopefully it will come in over the weekend. 

 Pinup DBK baller trait:  

 Pinup Kingsman Familiar Face AI card:   

Meanwhile, final samples of the plastics are currently en route the printer, so we can determine final box sizes and ensure everything is there and fits nice and snug. I am pushing to get all this underway ASAP.  

Stone Face Base Inserts 

My "scope creep" on this little project is finished! The new bases have been handed off to our engineering team, where they will get everything ready for hard plastic tooling.  

Original:  10 x Stone Face Bases, 5 x 50mm bases, 1 x100mm base.  

Post Scope Creep:  10 x Stone Face Bases, 6 x Unique Stone Face bases, 6 x Unique 50mm bases, 1 x 100mm base. 

The image below does not show the 10 x stone face bases we all know and love.   

Hard Drive Failure 

During a freakshow sunny thunderstorm, we had a power flicker and down went my 5 hard drive raid. I spent a bit of evening time trying to get it back up and running. Nothing work related was lost. However it does look like I lost some personal photos from way back in the day when we were allowed to leave our homes in NYC. And now I might have to get this amazing not yet released, monster 3D scanned again. Overall not a big deal. BUT GOSH I WAS SO BUMMED YESTERDAY!   

King Resources

Started to lay out the resource deck! Thought I might share some art. Lorinda always totally kills it with resource artwork!   

Death King Armor & Gear Explorations

Here are some illustrative explorations / brainstorms into what some of the gear might be. This is all going to change majorly over the next 2 weeks, as I am actively working on it everyday.

Pose!

I think the style of these narrative armor sets, will be that each can be built with 1-3 weapon choices. And then i'll add a few extra weapons on the sprue for the kit bashers out there!  

The People of the Dream Keeper

Work on the campaign continues to truck along. Instead of a Lantern Hoard, survivors live under a massive ball of snoring masses. Still working on finishing this one with Nat-Kay Cochran.

Crimson Crocodile 

Beyond tweaking some gear and some final resource costs against the rest of the campaign. V5 Crimson Crocodile has passed inspection and is moving into final rules templating and copy editing. Here's a quick pose sketch for one of the narrative sculpts.

Showdown Tracker 

We have a phoenix! Here is our low poly phoenix that Kieran, painstakingly recreated by hand. We found that  lower end machines were really struggling with the 200k version of it, so Kieran made a 20k version, defining every last triangle by hand!

Gencon 2020

Gencon 2020 has been canceled. We have decided to show our support to Gencon by not taking our refund and rolling over into Gencon 2021. Its not much, but it is the least we can do. The team is looking into virtual plans, however If I feel they are impeding on the development of wave 3, which is now my ultra on fire dont sleep anymore priority. I will hold off on them. This means that our planned Vignette, which was going to be released at Gencon 2020, is also now on hold, and may not see a release this year. Sorry, i know this news double sucks. But it's for the best. Here is a quick photo of 2 of the 4 survivors that will be included in it.

Gencon is a huge highlight for myself and the team. I will really miss seeing everyone in person!

I will of course, keep everyone in the loop if we decide to do something virtual. Thanks!