With version 174, Rogue Hammer now has a completed Kill Bot army list (based on the 3e Necron codex with one or two extra units added) and a completed Hired Guns army list (mercenary troops that can be hired on by most armies.

These include updated special rules as well as unit upgrades.

You can find Rogue Hammer at https://www.wargamevault.com/en/product/418767/Rogue-Hammer-Gothic-scifi-miniatures-gaming?manufacturers_id=5701 

Already 20 stalwarts (no doubt wearing bright red army jackets or Pickelhaube) have donated to make the Victorian Scifi rules a reality. I am hoping to reach 40 so a quick update (and also i started working on the rules, so I am excited to talk about them).

https://nordicweasel.posthaven.com/nwg-does-victorian-scifi-weasel-funder for the first post.

I wanted to share a few more details at this point, as things are starting to come together and answer some of the questions that have cropped up. As usual, "Q&A" posts are a sort of amalgamation of questions I get, not the exact wording of each email or post or whatever

What scale will the rules be for?

As with Squad Hammer, any scale you like. The rules will default to 5 figure infantry squads since that's pretty cheap in 28mm and works well as a single stand in 15mm or 10mm, but you can use larger units if you like.

I am guessing 28 will be the most common.

Any rules innovations to the Squad Hammer engine?

Yes, each player will have a handful of "Generals Orders", like rallying a unit, rushing a unit forward or getting a firing bonus for a turn. Each is usable once per game. 

You will also be able to unveil a "Grand Plan" once per game, giving you extra actions (the lower of 2D6).

The activation system will otherwise be 6 actions per turn. You can combine those to take 2 actions with each of 3 units, take 1 action with each of 6 units or any other combination.

Since the game takes place on Venus, all visibility is capped at 24". As all scientists know, the humid jungle environments of Venus limits long range visibility. 

What unit types will there be?

Unit types will be characters (a single officer or hero), Squads (5 figures nominally), fighting machines (steam /ether/whatever powered robots), beasts (dinosaurs and giant bugs), heavy weapons (gatling guns and cannon) and balloons (er....its a big thing filled with hot air).

There will be 3 or 4 alien mercenary types. These will be mostly described through their traits and game stats, so you are free to pick whatever cool miniatures you really like. 

Im thinking 5 or 6 types of infantry squad, but we will see when we get a bit closer.

Will this be steampunk?

With a game like this, the line is pretty fine. I am confident a lot of the armies people will build will look very steampunk, others will be more "victorian with one weird thing". In the end, that's really up to you. 

To me, the "correct vibe" is very realistic looking late 19th century infantry with their correct weapons, alongside a dinosaur and supported by a steam-powered battle walker. But your vibe may be very different from that. 

I can't stress this enough: This game really is meant to be a creative exercise for army builders and kitbashers as much as a tactical experience. 

Can I use Napoleonic (or other black powder) minis?

Yeah, the exact infantry you pick is up to you. The flavour of the game assumes you are using rifles, but I may include some notes on using smooth bores instead. Or you can just use the rules as is really. Infantry is infantry, up to a point. 

If you have not yet committed to help make this game a reality, please consider doing so:

You can do this through a direct Paypal donation to nordicweaselgames@icloud.com 

Your donation becomes a discount towards buying the full game once it is released. I expect the final book will be in the range of 15 to 20 dollars. Anyone donating gets a shout out in the book and 25+ dollars also gets you a name drop in a game example or story. 

Bayonets, Rifle Fire and Venusian Jungles

The next NWG title will be Victorian Science Fiction wargame, set on Venus, featuring ranks of brightly clad young soldiers with rifles, dinosaurs and steam powered walkers, alongside alien mercenaries and dashing officers.

Rules will be a modification of Squad Hammer, taking some of the better ideas from around that eco system. It may end up looking like a somewhat simplified Rogue Hammer, not sure yet. This does mean the rules will be amenable to both single figures and unit bases. Army unit size 5-8 units per side but should scale fine.

There will be a single universal army list with lots of units to choose, rather than nation specific lists. 

Also will have a set of “character skills” to customise your officers as being particularly brave, tough, cunning etc.

This will include some “weird types” that can be used as various alien troops as well. 

Some “Army trait” options to customise the force and let you have an army thats particularly keen on bayonet fighting, discipline, rifle drill or whatever.

Hoping for 10 or so scenarios in total. 

“Persistent army” rules, allowing units to gain a bit of experience, but not a heavy focus.

Scenario story generator to help set up scenarios or mini campaigns. 

Aim is about 80 pages of rulebook, PDF release and if all the stars align, have a playable version out by the end of October or mid November.

This will be a “Weasel Funder” - direct crowd fund as we have done before. You donate whatever amount you want to help make this game happen, and when the game is ready to go, you get that amount discounted off.

You will also get alpha version access. 

I am not sure of the final price, I imagine about 15 dollars, though if the page count gets higher, it could be 20. 

If you are passionate about this and want to make it happen, you can donate more than that. Anything throwing in 25 dollars or more gets their name in a game example or fluff bit. 
This time everyone who donates also gets a shout out in the intro chapter.

Donations are made directly through Paypal at nordicweaselgames@icloud.com  to avoid fee’s.

Please note that this is an indie game in PDF format, using fan photography of miniatures as art. It is NOT a glossy, hardcover book. 

An update of an old post:

Instead of a rules Q&A, I wanted to do a round-up of various questions I get that are in a more general or personal sense:

How can I get a hold of you?

Email is always best: nordicweaselgames@icloud.com 

You are welcome to ping me on discord or bluesky, but I am not reachable through any other means. 

If you don't reply, do you hate me?

Honestly, I get so much email I often get lost in it. If you have not heard from me in a few days, just try again.

Can I ask you to look at my <insert game material here>?

I am happy to do so but I must warn that I don't have a ton of free time, so please be armed with patience. I am happy to do in-depth reviews to help clean up rules though these days I must insist on some sort of compensation for doing so.

Can I ask you about something regarding game design or game publishing?

Always happy to help with that.

Can I show you my hack combining one of your games with another game?

Always happy to see what people come up with but I probably can't give really detailed feedback.

Will you ever make a hack of your rules to use another setting?

Probably not. I think that is something best left to fans. 

Can I recommend a book, band, show etc. that is like the ones you list as inspirations?

By all means!

Can I send you a copy of my game because I'd like you to have it?

That would be very kind. 

Will you come to this convention?

I'd like to do some convention stuff this or next year and am happy to do seminars or Q&As. 

Will you endorse my group/movement/hashtag?

Probably not. Even if I agree with you.

Will you join my online community?

I never find enough time to actually do justice to those, so I usually do not.

I am looking forward to September being "update month" with the first big updates to Mystic Space and SLAM as well as getting two more army lists "done" for Rogue Hammer.

There will also be an announcement about an RPG project. 

You can spend forever trying to find a reliable source of armour ratings for tanks, then figuring out how much to adjust for sloping and weak points etc.

I don't have that time and the books I have on hand giver very vague and general armour values. 

For History Dad, I basically decided to just rely on the ratings given in the Steel Panthers World War 2 computer game (freely downloadable). Their vehicle stats are pretty well researched and correspond to roughly 1 point of armour per 10mm (with some additions for sloping). 

So the HD combat rules were built to just use those, so if you want to look up a tank that isn't on the tables yet, you can do so.

Gun ratings come from the same place, using the penetration at point blank range (since even a 6x4 foot gaming table is still only going to represent 3-400 metres of distance: Basically knife fight distance for tanks). 

If you have not checked in on Rogue Hammer in a while, make sure to do so.

The first four army lists (Imperial Legion, Star Knights, Free Traders and Imperial Personalties) are now finished, meaning they have their own upgrades, psionic abilities (where needed) and have been touched up with how they work.

This does not mean they are never going to be updated. Unit tweaks are of course always possible and new units can be added (particularly to the Personalities list) but it means they are basically at a step where I am happy with how they look. 

I am hoping to "finish up" an army list every couple days, which will also mean fleshing out the lists that don't have enough units (or any units, making it somewhat of a difficult to use army list :) )

Now it needs to be said that the points values are perhaps a wide eyed estimate at best. I do not have a count yet, but I would guess we are well past 200 units and counting and with each army list aiming to have 15 possible upgrades (5 for squads, 5 for individuals, 5 for vehicles) it is basically inevitable that some of them will not make sense. That can all be solved by a nice email to my inbox, so I can work on things :)

Do note that things must be seen in context: The same upgrade may be worth more to one army than another, so bear that in mind.

It has been a long time since I have talked about Planetfall, as it slowly makes its way through editing and layout. 

So this is a quick run down of key features. I will try to do a more in depth post going into some of the information later.

*The gist of the campaign is that you are landing on an unexplored world to exploit its resources and make your colony self sufficient and successful.

*It features a planetary map. 

*Your characters this time are Unity agents and can be soldiers, scouts or scientists. You can also bring over Five Parsecs characters of course. Each class has its own special abilities and gear is usable by particular classes.

*Enemy lifeforms are randomly generated, allowing you to fill out your own unique planetary encounter table. This will be modified over the course of play.

*You also encounter a strange new hostile alien species. 

*Missions include sweeping for resources, exploring alien ruins and taking the fight to the enemy. There are 12 scenarios (if I counted right).

*Scientific research will unlock new tech, items and upgrades.

*You build a base with facilities that improve your capabilities.

*In addition to new tech, you can also get augmentations for your soldiers and find alien artifacts.

*There is an end game with multiple possible outcomes for your colony. Along the way you will achieve milestones that push the campaign to the next step, unlocking options and increasing challenges. It is self paced to an extent. 

*Fluff nerds will get some new information about Unity and its various efforts across the galaxy. 

*You also get a bit of fiction from yours truly. 

Gamers have no shortage of ideas. Some of them are good ideas. Some of them are workable ideas. The intersection between good and workable is the stuff that might make it into a book some day.

The main difference between a professional (hah!) and a hobbyist I suspect is in evaluating the workable bit, not the good bit. 

One thing to be wary of is to get too carried away with an idea that sounds appealing, but which ultimately you will lose interest in. Not everything is inspiring enough to sustain you through a 20 page game, let alone a 100 page one. Are you going to try to build a hobby empire out of it like the Brutality guy, 2 Hour Wargames or Song of X&Y? It's gotta be an idea you can sustain interest in for months and years.

I use a notepad program to track ideas. If I think of something that could be fun as a project, it goes on the list. You can use anything, I use a little app called Tot which I use only for this purpose and nothing else. But you can just use a document on your computer desktop or a piece of paper and a magnet on the fridge. For me personally, keeping it separately helps compartmentalise a bit mentally. 

Every Sunday I sit down and look back over the list. I sometimes add a qualifier to an entry like "maybe" if I am starting to wonder if its a good idea or if I have changed my mind about some aspect (this SHOULD be a Renegade Scout expansion!). If I am no longer enthused, I delete it. 

It currently had 56 entries on it for consideration. They are not sorted in any kind of order.  The last 5 (you were gonna ask) are:

A skirmish game OR scenario booklet for "Snap haner" (Danish guerillas fighting the Swedes in the 1600s), some sort of Arthurian mythology game (probably a warband game?), an urban fantasy skirmish game with vampires and werewolves and all that, some sort of campaign game based around a space ark seeking a new world and a game or scenario booklet about partisan warfare in WW2 Norway.

This also went out by email through the Wargame Vault but not everyone receives messages there.

If you have purchased Mystic Space, I would like your thoughts on a few questions. Email to nordicweaselgames@icloud.com if you would be so good

- Have you had a chance to play the game yet? If so, what did you feel about the rules? What rules worked really well and which ones were difficult to use or understand?

-are there parts of the rules that are hard to understand and need explaining better?

- From the factions which seems the most exciting and which do you feel could use some more flavour?

- If you are intending on building an army for Mystic Space, what figure range are you planning on using?

- What do you hope to see in the full version and in the future for Mystic Space?

- How interested are you in other spin-off games in the same world?