New Places, Graphics, and Games (and Robots!)
over 2 years ago – Mon, Jul 10, 2023 at 11:56:37 AM

Hey robot fam, Summer is steaming right along, and so is this game's development! We've been pretty quiet on our channels lately, and that's always a sign that we're very busy (rather than the opposite). 

Specifically, this past month I've been hired to design/develop a skirmish game based on a pretty huge IP - an incredible opportunity, but very tiring. This has set AEGIS back a little bit, but it's very exciting and I think you'll all get a kick out of it if it moves forward. But now I'm back to wrapping AEGIS stuff!

Also as I mentioned last time, we will be at Gen Con, mostly in the events hall. But swing by our booth next to Giga Robo (as is tradition) in the southeast peninsula of the map to say hello and grab a convention promo card.

In This Update

• Shipping / Charging Cards Update
• Progress and WIP Art/Graphic Assets
• Robot Art Showcase
• STONESPINE ARCHITECTS!!!!!

Shipping and Charging Cards

In case anyone wants to know when BackerKit will charge their cards for add-ons and shipping, it's not quite yet. We're getting our final shipping quotes now after a little delay/back&forth, and then I'll post here and send some emails ahead of time to let everyone know what costs you're looking at. 

Ideally that'll be this month, so keep your eyes peeled.

"I haven't Filled out my BackerKit Yet!"

Please do that! If you never got an email, you can log in here.

Progress: The Chart 

While I've been busy on another game design front this month, we're still chugging along finishing the copious art graphic design that these games require (which is a majority of what's left to do anyway). 

As you can see, most of the game's design is finished. In terms of graphic design:

Boards: Noah's been hard at work recently spiffing up the 6-Player Mat and AEGIS1's boards, making them more on-brand and colorful. He drew up some props to spice them up - can you ID where these parts came from?

And here's the updated 6-Player Mat: 

More visually dense, but keep in mind this thing is huge.

And here are some WIPs of AEGIS1's 2p and 4p boards, compared to the old versions. Finding a balance between clarity and detail is the hardest part of doing these.

For the 2-Player Board, the 2018 version was a bit static and flat, and looked a bit 'fantasy", so I wanted to boost the detail/visual interest. We added some hills, bot parts, and grass detail. Next step is to noodle the contrast a bit and make sure it's still readable.

For the 4P board, it was also a very clean/empty in the original printing, so we're looking for ways to spice it up a bit and add some color. Maybe this plateau you're fighting on is a big technological remnant, covered in markings. This'll make the board pop from a distance! Though we'll tone it back and dust some snow on it.

Robot Cards: AEGIS's most daunting asset, where each one has manually arranged art and text formatting. We're doing a new, final export of these once all the flavor text is done. These new cards will have some other tweaks too, like the precon team being on the bottom to make your lives easier.

EP Trackers: 2018 Breeze built these files wrong, so I rebuilt them from scratch. While doing that, I was looking for ways to make them smaller (for both usability and cost purposes). This led to a bunch of experimental designs, but I don't think any feel as intuitive to use - such is the creative process sometimes.

Rulebook: The A1 and A2 rulebooks are mostly the same, built from the same file. I just need to go back and put A1's lore, glossaries, and specific game modes into their proper spots and both books should be good to go.

Punchboards: Also a minor task. Once the robot cards are finalized, I can produce new standees, and then those go on a punchboard. 

The Boxes: The major task left here is doing the interior box graphics, which will have a master list of all robots in the box, and their prebuilt teams. Luckily this is mostly a matter of making sure the text is large and readable, and then some beautifying. Here's a preview of that:

Re: the scribbles - At the moment I'm considering moving four of the backer commanders off of the Challenger team and listing them as alternate commanders for four of the other teams to make the box's content more "even" and increase the odds they'll be played, but we'll see how that goes. This is the sort of minor endgame design tweaking we're on.

Boss Cards: This month we finished the fronts and backs of these bad boys, and they look very cool. Now we're doing final testing of their suggested minion teams, and tightening up a couple other things Still very proud of this solo mode!

THE FINAL FIVE COMMANDERS

This update is actually running long, so I'm separating this big section out into to an update for later this month. Stay tuned to meet these characters!

R-r-robots!

As usual we'll cap off the update with some more of AEGIS2's robot art.

First up, the one new piece of robot art in the AEGIS1 reprint! ABB-1000 was one of the oldest pieces of art in the game and it missed the cutoff to be spruced up on the first go-around, so a while ago, Noah took a crack at it:

For reference, my beautiful old piece:

Next is the ES-Class SSM-2000 - It's hard to keep track of which robot arts I've posted in these updates vs on Twitter, but this one is always cool to see twice. It zooms and shoots missiles everywhere.

And now some GenTrigger Goodness, starting with a new IZZI. These robots dash and retaliate, and this one in particular lashes with a burning whip.

Evolving off of that is the EI-type IZZI-2000. We now have 5 EI types across the two boxes, and they're all very different. This one doesn't fly, but it's extremely mobile and can do burning tailwhips at a distance.

And here's one I've actually just forgotten to reveal up until now - Stell's EIS-type ELL-SOL. It's a Gun Dragon/Kirin! It unloads laser bullets like a six shooter, while dancing gracefully through the air.

Big Plastic Bot Update (Test Printers Wanted!)

We're sold 70+ AROZELL SOL .stls! Once we clear 100, we'll make another mini! 

Grab yours on BackerKit!

In the meantime, our minis man Pat Fahy has been cleaning up and finishing the model, making it print ready. We're looking for folks who have a resin printer to try out printing these pieces. If you have an FDM printer, you're also welcome to try, I'm interested to see the results!

It's pretty detailed, and we've never done minis before, so I'd like to make sure it's perfect before sending it to everyone. 

Just drop me a message here, discord, or email info[@]zephyrworkshop.com and I'll send you the files.

STONESPINE ARCHITECTS

Here's a game LAUNCHING TOMORROW that you'd never assume is tangentially AEGIS-related, but it is! This is a dungeon building/card drafting game by the Jordy Adan, designer of the ever-incredible Cartographers, and yet another entry into the robust Roll Player universe.

It's good up to 5 players, quick to learn and set up, and different every time it hits the table. I'd honestly recommend it to anyone.

Back through 2021-2022 I worked on this game, adjusting/developing/redesigning it as part of my other job at Brieger Creative. We wrote a big designer diary talking about our biggest contributions, which you can read on BGG soon.

It's the first non-AEGIS game I've worked so heavily on that's headed to Kickstarter, and I'm looking forward to its rousing success!

Fight and Unite

BackerKit Surveys Sent! (+ Variant Robot Art!)
almost 3 years ago – Fri, Jun 02, 2023 at 12:30:22 PM

Hey all, good news! All surveys have finally been sent out. We sent out a portion on Monday/Tuesday, but we had to fix some problems, and now it's out to the rest of you.

Those of you who have backed at No Reward/$5/$10 can upgrade your pledges by either choosing a bundle as an add-on, or by switching your pledge on the BackerKit Welcome screen. Let us know if you need help with this!

Survey questions not answered here? Send me a Kickstarter message or come to our Discord.

Since it's been a hot minute, here's a reminder on what all these items are:

The Games:

•  AEGIS: Second Ignition (AKA AEGIS2, Season 2): Our all-new robot game! Plays up to 4, has 4 solo bosses in it.
•  AEGIS Season 1 Reprint: A remastered reprint of our 2018 game. Plays up to 4, no solo content. Has the Variant Command Expansion inside it, along with 10 newly compile promo cards.

The content in these games are mix n' matchable. Billions of team-making possibilities!

Accessories:

•  6 Player Mat: You need this to play up to 6 players. Pretty useful for 3-player too.
•  Kaiju Variant Expansion: Adds 10 more robots to your AEGIS2 box. Some art and details below.
•  Solo Expansion: Contains all 8 bosses (4 new). You can play solo mode with AEGIS1 with this, and it adds more bosses to AEGIS2, along with larger boss standees for all of them.
•  Kickstarter Promo Pack: 2 Crossover Commanders and a special Starpoint Die. Everyone reading this gets one of these, but feel free to grab an extra.
•  10 More Dice: Each AEGIS box has these 10 d6s in it. But they're very nice dice. Why not get more?

Scenario Books:

These are cool books that fit inside your AEGIS boxes and add a ton of new gameplay content, as well as lore info on all the characters, settings, and storylines of both boxes and dozens of pages of concept art and production notes. 

They are the main "big" accessory for your game and take a lot of work to put together!

•  Scenario Book 1: 20 Scenarios for AEGIS1 with custom map setups that use this box's terrain pieces. If you already own this, you don't need a second one.
•  Scenario Book 2: 20 Scenarios for AEGIS2, this one has a string of scenarios that form a sequential 2-player campaign. (This is also called "AEGIS2 Campaign Book" in some places, they are the same thing.) 

 Other Games: 

Our friends over at Solis Game Studio made a cool little dueling game called Pocket Paragons! It's getting pretty popular these days. One of the numerous boxes is all AEGIS characters!

•  Pocket Paragons: This 3-minute dueling game is lit. This edition has 8 characters total as opposed to the 6 from the original printing.
•  Paragons Mat: It's just a sexy playmat for Paragons, or all your TCG-playing needs. Stitched edges. 

 MINIATURE ROBOT: 

As highlighted in the last update, the wonderfully talented Pat Fahy created a huge, 3 inch mini for you to 3D Print (or ask That Guy you know who owns a 3D Printer to do it!). It prints in several easy parts that slot together, though you may need a little glue depending on your setup! (Contrary to what I said in the last update)

It's so big that it takes up 3 hexes on the board!

It also comes with its boss card .jpg in case you haven't purchased the Solo Expansion.

And if we sell 100 of these, we'll make another one!

And you can choose which boss gets the 3D treatment next.

Kaiju Variant Expansion Art

The Kaiju Variant Expansion adds 10 more robots to AEGIS2, each an altered form of another bot in the box with different mechanics and new art. Some are meaner, berserk robots, while others are Commander-specific bots that gain that character's look and powers.

Of course all of this has a story behind it, which we'll cover in the AEGIS2 scenario book and some story blurbs here too. Until then, let your imagination run wild on what's happening here.

Kaiju Variants:

Commander Variants:

That's only six of the 10 variant bots, stay tuned for some other surprises!

Fight and Unite

BackerKit! Art's Done! M-minis??
almost 3 years ago – Mon, May 29, 2023 at 03:43:41 PM

Hey everyone, we're continuing to grind over here, and I have more news and pretty pictures to share with you! Hope you're all enjoying the newly warm weather.

In This Update:

• BackerKit Surveys Are Going Out Tomorrow
• This Month's Progress
• Gen Con
• Introducing New Commanders
• Robot Art Jamboree
• Surprise Miniature Update

1. BackerKit Surveys Are Going Out Tomorrow

That's the content, sorry for the delay.  We'll be asking for your addresses and this will be the time for you to adjust and upgrade your pledges. Shipping costs aren't until later.

2. Progress Progress Progress

Busy busy. Sorry for the lack of updates! Feels bad to get so many pretty pictures without sharing them! 

This past month:

• We were at GAMA in Reno! Sorting our our shipping and distribution partners. Boring, but very relevant for you - we'll be working with QuarterMaster Logistics to fulfill pledges and distribute the game. Some of you may recognize the name, they're excellent and have been great to communicate with.
• We got new, updated quotes from our manufacturer, LongPack. The total print cost of this game and all its accessories is still within our initial estimates! There's been a string a Kickstarter follies with other companies lately, so I hope you'll find it encouraging that this game is financially solvent and will indeed come out!
•  Testing! Testing! Testing! We haven't updated our TabletopSim yet since we've been doing a lot of fluid testing IRL. But now all 100 robots + 10 variants + 8 machineless commanders are in a pretty good spot, so now I'm doing a final re-assembly of all the cards in the game to put up into TTS and etc. 
•  Art! Art! Art! Most tangibly, we've completed basically all illustrations in the game now. 22 Commander illustrations, 100++ robots, variant illustrations, and the boards/board elements. Of that, 30+ art pieces have been completed by Noah, Zaryn, and Gen since the end of the campaign. Each new character and robot is a precious child, birthed by backers like you!

We're looking to have all gameplay and art parts of this game in a final state by July, so cheer us on!

 Among other illustrations, we've been adjusting some QOL and graphic things, such as the board and certain icons:

3. Gen Con

Sadly I don't think this game is going to be complete and shipped by Gen Con, so we are reducing AEGIS's presence there. We have several events throughout the weekend you can sign up for, however, and you can play around with what'll be final game assets. 

Stop and say hi at our booth, where we're adjacent to Giga-Robo once again, and opposite Solis Game Studio/Pocket Paragons. We'll also be showing off another game that weekend, "Shut Up, Cat!", by one of our friends and partners, Wil Cox. It's going to Kickstarter soon!

We're unlikely to be going to Origins or other major cons this Summer, since every con sets finishing this game back like 2 weeks. See you in the Fall at PAX West and Unplugged!

4. The New Kids On The Block (Part 1)

In our last update, we looked at concept designs for all our new backer co-created Commander characters, and now it's time to start introducing them! Instead of dumping all at once, let's start with the three new backer Commanders on the Challenger precon team!

Professor R.P.G. & Shib-4 and GERR-120 

Hailing from the Great States is the intriguing, charming, and elusive Professor R. P. G.! Sigaea's full of ancient and forgotten secrets from before humans colonized it 1000 years ago, and he'll discover them all! One of his recent discoveries is the small, sentient robot Shib-4, a living battery. What mysteries does Shib-4 hold? For now, he's a great travel companion!

This pair's personal robot is a new GERR! They use this big dog to traverse Sigaea's landscape, from ruin site to ruin site. Shib-4's unique properties as a living battery lets it shoot the Shiba Maser, a powerful laser tool to both generate energy for allies and Excavate lost treasures from times long past. The Professor has entered the Sigaea tournament to protect ancient sites from development and to unlock historical records.

Uptinea, Spacetime Hobbyist and IKUMA-444

Organizing the SIGEA Tournament is a big task, and Uptinea is one of many Sector Authority office workers that help make sure it goes smoothly. However, she's also a fighter!! Uptinea's true motive is get all her favorite foreign shows and sporting events globally syndicated. Her past DIY attempts have mostly failed, but she does have a very capable robot to show for it...

Uptinea's masterpiece is the big, round IKUMA! Engineered to pick up TV stations from other nations, it actually ended up being able to manipulate the spacetime continuum. It's also very cute. This machine can redo die rolls and manipulate enemies' positions the board. 

Eaudette, Empyreal General and EIMIR-100

After the fall of general/hero/ambassador Etwal, the Empyreal Realm had some big shoes to fill. And thus, Empyreal General Eaudette has stepped up to bat to lead the country's vast military forces. A legendary markswoman and charismatic leader, she's one of the most powerful people on the planet. She hopes that her ability and popularity will lead the Empyre to a new era of prosperity, though the royal family is keeping an eye on her.

 Eaudette's personal robot is the Empyreal flagship EIMIR! This larger E-type can mobilize allies into new positions and boost their accuracy, or aim and fire its six wing cannons - the Hexagun Arpeggio - to annihilate an enemy. 

5. Promo Commanders

OK Time to introduce some new heroes straight outta our friends' universes!

CROSS-OVER COMMANDER #1 - Mr. F! You unlocked a promo for all backers pretty early in the campaign, and here he is. Mr. F has been featured in basically every game by Solis Game Studio - Temporal Odyssey, Pocket Paragons, Space Lion, and eventually, Temporal 2. I actually just love this guy's design, and it makes sense he'd be floating around the multiverse and briefly end up on Sigaea. In-game, he'll give bonuses to stationary robots. Because he's a plant.

 Which version Mr. F should appear on his card? Top or Bottom?

CROSS-OVER COMMANDER #2 - Lilac Everdawn! Lilac is an angelic fighter from Strange Machine Games's upcoming ICONOCLASH, which also features our own Diane. This one is a surprise for everyone, since we only promised one promo. An easy commander for anyone to pick up and play with, she'll grant your robots boons while they're damaged.

 Noah did a whole new art for Lilac in AEGIS's style and everything! 

 All backers will be getting these two cards and the exclusive Starpoint Die with their pledge.

6. Robots!

AEGIS is a robot game! With a grand total of 220 some-odd robots! Let's look at some new artwork.

 First up is a big, cool level 4 AEIS-type robot, the IKA-SHAH! Find this robot on Indrix's team as his ultimate weapon. AEIS robots lack the armor of G, but they're very nimble and has access to all manner of buffs, debuffs, and other status effects. This mighty fire-squid-dragon can set enemies ablaze and rearrange their board positions in a torrent of flame.

Next, some small bots! This new ESPER robot is on Ainer's team. AEGIS1 had quite a few of these nimble, non-flying E-types, and this new one will let you precisely deal damage if it's positioned exactly a certain number of hexes away.

 When you combine an E and G, you usually get some kind of flying fortress. In this case, you get DogCopter(tm). GOF-2000 here is an evolution of AEGIS2's tiny suite of dogbots. In-game, it's actually one of the smallest Kaiju, and thus can emerge into enemy starting zones, shooting bullets and granting defense buffs everywhere on entry.

Next up, we have a mass-produced SOL robot. SOLs were support robots specific to our character Stell, but now you're able to use one on any team. It's great at giving energy and very reliably beaming enemies from the other side of the map! This bot's chillin' as one of the Kaiju team's basic robots.

Speaking of SOL's, y'all like Voltron, right? Well let's look at one of the new level-5 robots! Meet AROZ-ELL-SOL's third iteration: Arozell Sol: Final Mode! This is the ultimate form of Stell's ultimate robot. It can target any robot on the board, suck them into a gravity well, and turn them into a crater!

Zaryn did a really great job with this one!

Surprise! We have a Miniature (STL)!

People love minis, so here's a mini! It's actually very cool - this 80mm tall AROZ-ELL-SOL stands on a 3-hex base, and can be used in both solo and multiplayer modes. We're making the 3D-printable STL file available on our BackerKit for a small price (this 3D model was expensive!), and we'll make more if it proves popular.

You can also import it into TabletopSim and etc.

See it here in its clear-resin glory (opaque render impending):

It's sculpted by the incomparable Patrick Fahy, who's done work on games like Dragoon and many others, and is very highly detailed. It prints in four pieces + the base and slots together, no glue required.

The file also includes the file for its solo boss card! Check it out on your survey!

Fight and Unite

New Faces Everywhere!
almost 3 years ago – Wed, Apr 12, 2023 at 03:51:02 PM

Heyo! And we're back. 

After the KS ended, I've basically been grinding on this game nonstop, and then our March update was preempted by PAX East, and now it's already April! Develop continues rolling right along:

Truthfully, I was trying to get some more stuff together before making this update, but that would just further delay it. So expect another update pretty soon after this one.

Let's talk about...

PAX East! And other consventions!

I saw some of you in Boston a couple weeks ago, and that was great! I think this was our 9th or 10th PAX East since we started noodling around making board games. Reception went well as usual, which was encouraging. 

Our next major shows will be Gen Con in August and PAX Unplugged in December. We may also hit up Origins in June, but that's to be seen. In the very-near future, I will also be going to GAMA to discuss shipping, fulfillment, warehousing, and all sorts of other exciting topics that play very much into y'all getting your games!

The BackerKit, Late Pledges, Pre-Orders

Ahead of PAX East, we set up out pre-order store! I think! It certainly functions for new customers, but it's our first time using BK as a creator, and honestly it's been a lot more work than expected figuring out how to set it up, compared to our old PledgeManager which was set up for us.

We haven't posted it anywhere yet, though it is accessible. So if you have friends that want to get their boxes locked down, here it is! The last thing we're nailing down is shipping costs and how to implement those the way we want, at which time we'll be advertising this a lot more.

We have not sent out any backer surveys yet, so don't worry, you didn't miss anything. We'll post an update when those get sent out.

Call for Playtesters / How the Game is Going

We've recently added all of the new, unlocked Kickstarter content to our TabletopSim mod! 

This includes:

• All 8 Solo Bosses
• All 8 new Backer Commanders
• 2 Crossover Promo Commanders
• And Ezork too
• 30~ updated robots for Ainer, Stell, Challenger, and Kaiju teams
• 10 Kaiju/Commander Variant robots

 So much content!

I'm actually in the middle of updating a bunch of these *again!* And we need YOUUUU to help play around with them. If you're interested in getting your mitts on shiny, unreleased content and to help shape the final version of the game, please direct yourself to our Discord where you can @ me (Brrrrz) or Kettellcorn for access to our playtesting channel.

The new content's looking pretty good, but we're definitely trying to tighten it all up for clarity and cohesiveness. AEGIS2 has a lot of content and mitigating the feeling of being overwhelmed is top priority.

New Commander Previews, Created by You!!

Well, actually, created by our eight of our most-favorite Kickstarter Backers! The cool part of working with us to make these is that all these new characters are going to be integrated into AEGIS Lore (tm) moving forward. It makes it a bit harder and more time consuming in that way, but we're trying to have everyone be important and a fan favorite. 

All of these are being designed and illustrated by Noah Nagata with input from our backers and myself. Not everyone is done, so let's just look at some of the WIPs for now, and you can tell us your feedback and favorite poses, etc!

What's the point of Commanders?

Players new to AEGIS might be asking "this is a robot game, what do these humans do? Why do I care? What is a human?" The answer is that these folks are your player avatars, and each one focuses on a different type of player/strategy, and will give you context on building and drafting teams. As of now AEGIS2 comes with 21 commanders! (wow)

Backer Commanders (ft Robots)

These first three are commanders with their own robots, much like the rest of the commanders in the box, and will be grouped on the Challenger Team! You'll now be able to choose from one of seven commanders to use with that team.

1. The Professor - A daring adventurer and his companion, for players who enjoy positioning, Action economics, and surprises.

2. The General - A bold leader and certified baddie for players who like coordinating formations and huge attacks.

3. The Office Lady - An impetuous secretary for players who want control over dice and positioning. 

Robot-less Backer Commanders

These next five Commanders are "Machineless" and can be equipped onto certain basic robots. They're very versatile, but at the same time lack the powerful robots that normal Commanders have.

4. The Dragon - An aggressive mercenary for players who want to controls players as they beat them down.

5. The Time Traveler - A speedy fighter from parts unknown, for players who like efficient movement and positioning.

6. The Heel - A breaker of heroes who can deliver powerful finishing moves on enemy commanders and combines.

7. The Cultist - An eccentric robot worshipper who gains power by when foes are cursed with status effects.

8. The After Work Hero - An independent fighter of corruption, who supercharges her team with every strike against evil.

9. The Ambassador - We highlighted him last time, but here's Ezork again. Ezork is another movement-based Commander, but unlike Ethrael (move twice!), Eaudette (move your team!), and our Time Traveler above (jump!), Ezork will let you swap ally positions around the board. Ezork is included in every AEGIS2 box, because it's his job to be everywhere.

CROSSOVER BACKER COMMANDER!

Will be announced next updated, with some surprises too!

R-Robots?

Oh yeah, it's a robot fighting game!

We've been wrapping up the set's remaining robot art! Let's look at some of those too:

Puppy!!!!!! This robot projects defensive shielfsonto its allies and itself. Find this boi on the Kaiju team.

Dragon!! This is the most basic of all Shah-make robots. It burninates enemies and the countryside. Find it on Ainer's team.

Actually the final robot game designed for the set, this shieldy boi can absorb and redirect damage into your enemies' faces. A fourth combine option for the Challenger team.

And we have some big bots left to do too! This one is a speedy, melee-attacking Kaiju robot who will certainly take your opponents by surprise when it emerges in their start zone.

And that wraps up our "short" little showcase! Let us know what you think and who your new faves are.

Next Time On AEGIS

I'll ideally have some more concrete deliverables re:BackerKit, shipping, and updates on promo materials! Thank you for your patience and support.

Fight and Unite

Incredible Ending! (+ Campaign Summary)
about 3 years ago – Sun, Feb 19, 2023 at 05:00:44 AM

Thank You Everyone!

• 31 Days! 
• 1016 Backers! 
• $106,104! 

When we started this campaign, I had two final goals in mind: $100k, and 1000 backers! And we got there! Go team! This campaign did about 2x better than our first campaign and I'm very happy with that. I'm also very tired and took a day to post this!

Also a stunningly low number of people with broken credit cards! But if your pledge got flagged, please fix your payment! Kickstarter will remind you every 2 days, and then I will too!

Another request: If you have a BoardGameGeek account, give the game a little like/subscribe. Retailers are distributors love BGG stats.

Update Summary

For those who joined on not day 1, I've compiled all our updates here if you want to check out some of the art, lore and mechanic overviews we've posted:

• 1: Unlocking Team Ysis and Organizer Tray
• 2: Unlocking Pocket Paragons and Oon&Racca, 6-Player Mat Poll
• 3: The AEGIS Theme Song, and unlocking FALSETTO THE ROBOT KING
• 4: Solo Mode, and Unlocking Cyndane & Kaiju Robots + Ashla Intro
• 5: AEGIS2's New Board! + Ethrael Intro
• 6: KS Backer Gift - Promo Cards vs Die! Unlocking Mika  + Ganith Intro
• 7: Box Art Poll + Indrix Introduction
• 8: New Combat Mechanics, Unlocking Punished Ainer
• 9: Art Showcase, Unlocking Sheriff Stell + Salazar Intro

Stretch Goal Unlock Summary

And for anyone not counting, here is what you're all going to be getting after hitting all those goals!!

• AEGIS2 started at 50 playable robots (5 precon teams and some extras) + 2 solo bosses
• We added 50 more robots and five more prebuilt teams! 100 robots separated into 10 teams! 
• There are now 8 solo bosses!
• The box now has a tray and interior printing (update 7)!
• The six-player mat is being upgraded (update 2)!
• Everyone is getting some promo cards and/or a special die! (update 6)
• Everyone $59+ is getting two new mini expansions! 

We actually streamed a lengthy look-see at all 100 AEGIS2 cards last week! (video is timestamped by teams)

Final Unlocks!

 Our $99,999 unlocked both final expansions, the Kaiju Variant expansion and the Solo Expansion.

•  Kaiju Commander Variant Expansion: This expansion will have ~10 cards that are variants of robots in AEGIS2. Half will be Commander robots based on characters in the box, and the other half will be rogue monster robots with abilities like Emerge.
•  Solo Expansion: This expansion box will come with all 8 unlocked bosses. (4 are in AEGIS2 already and will feature alternate art), larger standees for all of them, and a set of Rondo AI Cards. This will allow owners of the original AEGIS to play Solo Mode, as well as give AEGIS2 owners additional options.

We'll have some pretty pictures of these in the coming weeks!

Surprise Unlock! It's Ezork.

He's here, he's there, he's everywhere! Lucky Commander #13. 

In AEGIS1, the mighty and brutal Etwal was the de facto figurehead, ambassador, and military general for the Empyreal Realm. Since his disappearance, those responsibilities have fallen onto Ethrael, Ezork and someone else you'll meet soon. 

Always plucky, always helpful, and most of all, always present, Ezork zooms around Sigaea meeting and greeting... everyone! Considering his country's recent history though, he's not often met with open arms. Oh, Ezork.

Ezork is a Machineless Commander, meaning he can be equipped onto a number of different basic robots and grant them a Commander Ability. In his case, Ezork can teleport and swap places with allies around the board!

Through the campaign we've been working with the Ultra Add-on backers, and Ezork is a teaser for more new Commanders to come!

What You're Getting

So what're you

All $1 - $5 and etc Backers

• You'll be able to upgrade your pledges in the BackerKit and receive the Kickstarter Backer Gift in Update 6. We are still finalizing this, updates coming! (You can still vote!)

All $10 Backers and others getting Physical Rewards

• You will receive your pledges!
• The Kickstarter Backer Gift in Update 6. We are still finalizing this, updates coming! (You can still vote!)

All Backers $59+: 

• You will receive your pledges!
• The Kickstarter Backer Gift in Update 6. We are still finalizing this, updates coming! (You can still vote!)
• The Kaiju Variant Expansion
• The Solo Expansion
• We may just compile all this into a Deluxe Kickstarter Edition AEGIS2 box similar to the first campaign's, stay tuned!

What Comes Next

For those looking to upgrade their pledges, the BackerKit will be coming in March! Tell your friends to keep their eyes peeled. BackerKit backers will be able to add all the above items. Prices will likely vary from this campaign! But not by much.

In the meantime, I dug up this old chart file from our first KS. Nostalgic? This is where the game is at right now -- tldr; we're testing stretch goal content and then putting the final graphics together. 

If you would like to help test things like the solo mode, jump in our Discord! Or give me a buzz and I can get a Print & Play together for y'all.

I've also updated the Solo Mode demo with five of the eight bosses and updated rules.

What to Back Next

Hot off our campaign! Our friends at Solis Game Studio are going to Kickstarter with their new season of Pocket Paragons! Featuring Space Lion and Penny Arcade's Acquisitions Inc (and AEGIS!) 

It's a very good game, and if you enjoy AEGIS Pocket Paragons (give it a spin on TabletopSim), you'll like the other boxes too! Hit up their Discord for links.

Also their game Space Lion is basically multiplayer Pocket Paragons / multiplayer Marvel Snap. It's so good. You'll be able to grab a copy on this campaign too. Through a comedy of misfortunes, its original Kickstarter only did "just OK", and I'd personally love for more people to scope it out. It's also up on TSim.

Our other homies also have campaigns wrapping up soon.

•  Witchbound is a cool solo RPG with that Ghibli/Zelda aesthetic. They've been killing it over on Gamefound and I think this is going to bloom into something special.
•  Micro Bots: Duel! for you robot fans out there (who here like robots??), this a tiny dueling game in a mint tin! 
•  Alynthia! DRAGON MEEPLES. These guys are where we were a few years ago, pouring a ton of passion into their big, cool game.

Per usual, you can keep track of us in real-time on Twitter, Twitch, and Discord. Look out for playtest streams! Expect the next update in a couple weeks where we'll look at a bunch of the new Backer Commanders.

Fight and Unite