Nova Aetas: Renaissance

You have my Sword!
almost 4 years ago – Mon, Jun 13, 2022 at 10:33:59 PM

Hello all!

We continue our journey to discover the Heroes of Nova Aetas Renaissance and today is the time of the most daring, reckless, and rude Squire in our history: Valerio!

Our proud Valerio was born and raised in Rome with his sister Sofia. Despite being very close, they immediately took very different paths. Always fascinated by the stories of knights and damsels in distress, Valerio has made his dream come true and began his journey as a squire of a Roman nobleman. Unfortunately, the noble was accused of treason by the Vatican state and was executed before finishing the training of his squire. Valerio, with his sister and two other friends, decided to start a small Free Company, taking advantage of the stormy political situation in Italy. Valerio never abandoned his dream of becoming a Knight, but he understood that even the Mercenary's way could give him the glory he was seeking ... as well as a bag full of Fiorini!

Valerio starts the NAR campaign as a Squire to take the role of the Group Tank. His abilities, and his Physical value of 4, will allow him to take hits, but also to attack with great effectiveness.

The Squire's skills perfectly embody Valerio's bold spirit. For example "Witness me!" gives him a reroll token (called Fortune Token) if, at the beginning of his activation, he is within 3 squares from any other Hero. With "Insult" he increases his Perilium by 1 point, attracting Enemies to himself more easily, to protect the weakest Heroes.

Valerio has a strong link with his Equipment. Those armors which provide additional Healt points, are really important to Valerio.

when a Hero suffers Wounds, if he has one of those Armor, he can place one wound on an Equipment for each "heart" symbol on the item card. This gives another advantage against attacks that also inflict Negative Statuses (Poison, Burn, etc): to suffer these statuses, the Hero must suffer at least one Wound on their Hero Sheet.

When Valerio has acquired at least 3 Squire skills, he can choose whether to take one of the two Advanced Classes: Knight or Mercenary.

The Knight will improve the Tank role, giving him additional Defensive skills at the expense of those of Movement and Attack. With this class Valerio will become a real bastion, able to withstand numerous attacks and attract many enemies to himself.

On the contrary, the Mercenary sacrifices defensive skills to become more offensive and agile. This class is a real challenge to master, because Valerio will inflict a lot of damage, often increasing his Perilium, but he will need to be very careful to survive the attacks of all the enemies he will attract attention to!

What do you think about Valerio? Will you be ready to play one of the most fundamental characters of the group? And how do you plan to play with him? Will you sacrifice yourself to protect the other heroes, or will you unleash your aggressive spirit and join the fray?

Tell us what you think!

See you in two weeks with a new hero of the first wave and updates on the production of wave 1!

Each Magister was an Apprentice
almost 4 years ago – Sun, May 29, 2022 at 05:39:18 AM

Hello all

We have arrived at the second update of May, and we continue to increase our knowledge of the Heroes of Wave 1.

Today is the turn for the most attractive Magister who has ever walked the magical corridors of the Black Rose Lodge: Rebecca!

Well, in the period when NAR is set, Rebecca is still a young Apprentice, unaware of the dark fate that awaits her.

To finish the last phase of her training, her Venerable Master has ordered her to travel the world to hone her arts, trying to survive in a land that harbors no love for those who frequently use the power of Magic.

After greeting her twin, Arianna, Rebecca embarked on her own journey that led her to reunite with 3 childhood friends. They formed a small Free Company. The rest, as they say, is history.

On the battlefield, Rebecca will be able to use her magical abilities to unleash the most diverse effects. Her role in the group could be defined as "Control & Destroy".

Spells in NAR are not skills, but rather, are more like Equipment (scrolls to be precise) and will occupy the Encumbrance slots dedicated to Trinkets. So, Rebecca will be able to equip herself for a Mission with a maximum of 3 Spells.

In the NAR Core Box, you will find 3 unique Spells for each of the 3 Schools of Magic: Omnia, Necromancy, and Chronomancy. At the beginning of the Campaign, Rebecca will only be able to use the Omnia school. But when she chooses whether she will become a Necromancer or a Chronomant, she will also be able to draw from the Spells of the chosen respective School.

Before a Mission, Rebecca will be able to choose which Spells to take with her. This will give her many options. But remember that Spells, like all Equipment in NAR, will first need to be crafted. This will test the management skills of the group of players because they will need to measure the expenditure of Reagents collected during the missions and allocate them efficiently.

As an Apprentice, Rebecca will be able to learn useful skills that will allow her to prepare for the advanced class she will eventually take. Her abilities will obviously focus on the use of magic and will help her better manage her abilities. But some of them, such as "Know your enemy", will also support the other Heroes.

If you choose the advanced Necromancer class (as many will know this is definitely the "canonical" choice) her role will turn more towards the damage dealer and debuffer, with the excellent possibility of summoning an Undead minion when an Enemy Troop rank is eliminated.

If, on the other hand, you want to write your own story for Rebecca, you can choose the advanced Chronomant class. With this class, you will increase your game control skills, which will also extend to the manipulation of the Horologium … a Skill that can be very handy to have.

And you? How will you decide to play Rebecca? Will you follow our canon, or will you rewrite her story to suit your needs? The choice is in your hands!

Before saying goodbye, we want to share with you a small report from the Modena Play fair which took place last weekend.

NAR was present at one of our demo tables, where it was possible to play the entire Prologue mission of the campaign.

During the three days of the convention, we let dozens of people try NAR and we were pleasantly surprised to find on social networks, in the various groups of Italian tabletop players, phrases like "NAR is the new Gloomheaven-Killer" (LOL) or "NAR is a work of art ".

We are obviously very happy to have received so much positive feedback and we are proud to share with you the enthusiasm that is rising around our/your beloved game.

On our part, there is even more desire to finish the work on NAR and get it to your tables as soon as possible!

As always, thank you for all your support!

See you in two weeks!

Meet the Mediceo!
almost 4 years ago – Sun, May 15, 2022 at 11:51:29 PM

Hello guys!

After the important update two weeks ago, let's start to let you take a closer look at the material that will be shipped with Wave 1. After the 3 Enemy factions from the Core Box (Fauns, Venice Republic, Rome), it is now the turn of the Heroes, to show you their skills, their strategies, and how their rules have evolved in these months of Design and Playtest.

Obviously, we start with the most badass Mercenary of the Italian Renaissance: The Mediceo!

Let's have a look at his Hero Sheet!

As you can see this game element has changed a bit from those shown during the Kickstarter; from the feedback received during playtests, we changed some ergonomic aspects, game elements, and rules.

Now the Heroic Points have their own Track (bottom left), an acrylic cube will allow you to keep track of these points. Each Hero collects Heroic Points in different ways and you will need them to activate their Heroic Skill, a "super-ability" that can be used only once per Mission, but using it wisely can turn the tide of a battle!

The Mediceo gains Heroic Points every time he deals damage using his Rifle and every time the Kid inspires him. When he has accumulated 4 Heroic Points he can activate his Heroic Skill "Defensive Exploit", which cures him of all negative statuses and provide him a series of very powerful positive statuses.

Stats management also changed from the first version. Now 2 Stats can be upgraded once when your Hero moves to one of the 2 Advanced Classes.

This change improves balance with the Heroes' growth and keep the focus on Skills upgrades. Playtest sessions with external players were really valuable and allowed us to make the Heroes' growth system more interesting and rewarding.

The Mediceo begins the campaign with the Hunter class; thanks to its skills and equipment he can be considered as a sort of Ranged-Tank, capable of inflicting serious damage from a distance, attracting the attention of the Enemies, and resisting their attacks. His rules are based on two unique mechanics: Kid's Inspiration and Da Vinci Equipment.

Inspiration focuses on the Kid's latent magical abilities. The baby Faun that the Mediceo protects is actually a powerful psionic. The Kid did not receive a proper training yet, so he can't control well his abilities, they can only be triggered by certain events.

The Da Vinci Equipment represents all the extraordinary inventions of the famous Renaissance genius. The Mediceo will be able to improve his basic equipment by inserting in his armor and weapons a series of ingenious gadgets, such as flamethrowers, telescopic sights, and much more!! And yes, you will be able to equip even a rudimental "Jet Pack"... we already know you were going to ask for it!

The 2 Advanced Classes focus on one of these mechanics.

The Guardian focuses on Da Vinci's Equipment, making the Mediceo a true war machine, with the right gadget for every occasion.

The Awakened relies more on the Kid's magical powers to overcome his opponents. When the Kid wakes up the Mediceo can unleash a series of effects that will leave you speechless!

All Heroes have mechanics that make them unique and fun to play; learning to master them will make the gaming experience very rewarding and always different, even if you decide to play the campaign for a second time using the same Hero! And that goes for all 11 Heroes at your disposal! We're confident NAR will keep you busy for a long time, rest assured!

Let us know what you think about the Mediceo, is he going to become your favorite Hero?

Before concluding this update, since many have asked us this question, we want to clarify that we're working to deliver Wave 1 in all languages available for NAR at the same time (not only the English version). 

That's all for today! See you in a couple of weeks with a new Hero and development update!

Very Important Update
almost 4 years ago – Sun, May 01, 2022 at 02:42:29 AM

Hello everyone,

We have prepared an update with lots of information and important news.

First of all, we want to tell you about the state of the work and the development of the game.

Project Status

We finally managed to complete the core box, it was a long and complex job that took much longer than expected due to several factors, which we will discuss below.

The positive side is that this additional development time has  several improvements to the game originally proposed on KS, let's go through them in detail.

The Enemies: in the original project, the intent of the alternative poses unlocked with the stretch goals was a purely aesthetic impact, without touching the gameplay. Already during the KS, taken by the enthusiasm of the effect of the new poses, we decided that with 2 additional cards per enemy we could make better use of these new models. So now each enemy has a unique profile and peculiar abilities, adding considerable variability at matches.

The cons are that most of the missions ready at the time of the KS had to undergo a new phase of playtesting, to make sure that the inclusion of these new enemies was giving good fun and diversity while maintaining the balance of the game. The different types of enemies inside the base box were originally a total of 12, now they have grown to a whopping 18.

Crafting objects (Formulae): in the original project we had approx 30 objects, we have now reached over 50!! We have added new hero class specific objects and new generic items, we have also added a new category of items called "Oils", with effects that can last for the entire mission, unlike potions which are instant single effects. All of these items have been tested and the enemy reward system has been re-balanced. Obviously, all these additional objects needed to be conceptualized and illustrated, we hope you like them!

Achievements: this category of cards includes both the Achievements, obtainable through different actions during the missions, and they usually do not affect the tactical part of the game but only the options and the odds of the players, and the Rewards, which are real nice objects usable during the various missions. In the original project we had 15 Achievements and 6 Rewards, today we have 29 Achievements and 8 Rewards.

Tiles: we have added 2 new ones, with a water effect side and a mud effect side. These two new tiles obviously have in-game effects and those may vary from mission to mission.

Missions: In the original project there were 26 missions, we increased them to 28. We did it to make the plot and the interweaving work better. Of course those add further longevity to the core box.

Plot book: last but not least, this book was initially a volume of about 100 pages in A5 format, now it reached about 300 pages (!!). Our graphic designers are working on the layout of its final version, changing to an A4 format of about 150 pages, presumably with spiral binding. The work on the plot book was one of the biggest efforts, with numerous corrections and reworking that came out during the playtest sessions. To make you understand better, every time a new idea intervened (on a mission, on objects, or on narrative plots), or changes were made to improve the clarity and usability of the texts during the tests, it was necessary to re-check and pontentially modify all previous closed and already paginated missions. We never managed a plot book like this before, we admit it was far more complex than expected.

Mea culpa, as the Latins used to say.

All these implementations, which here in the studio, generated enthusiasm thinking about the final version of the product, caused delays in development.

The situation in the recent past did not help, we already told you about the difficulty in carrying out the playtests, with live sessions blocked for months and with jumping sessions due to various absences due to illness and various isolations, and then the need to re-work on so many of the missions, which passed the internal playtests, but then failed during the external tests.

We must honestly admit that we underestimated the overall work needed, the integration of the stretch goals released, the solidity of the internal playtests carried out before the KS, the impact of the finalization work, and the consistency of the plot book. We must admit that even if there was no pandemic, we would still have had serious difficulties in completing the work on time.

It is our duty to take responsibility for this.

It is also our duty to apologize for failing to communicate: often in the hope of being able to catch up with delays and bring you good news, we have slowed down the pace of communication on development, actually doing worse. In any case, we should have kept you updated on the positive news, on the difficulties, on the options developed to overcome them, and on the impacts on the timing. This project exists and will see the light only thanks to you, and this transparency was therefore due to you.

Let's start right away, by communicating two important decisions just taken, regarding Updates and 2 Waves shipping.

Updates: Starting from May we will release 2 monthly updates, in order to keep you constantly updated on the status of the work, development, and production.

We will share images related to the playtests and images of the graphics of the various elements of the game, and we will of course give you insights on individual features and special elements.

2 waves shipping: This is the biggest news today. We did an accurate estimate on the time it takes us to complete the expansions, part of the stretch goals, and then localize NAR in the 5 promised languages. Given the amount of text on cards and the various Plot books (yes, even the expansions have their own Plot book!), the timeline looks very long to complete all the translations, so sending everything in a single shipment would lead us to deliver everything around mid 2023.

We have therefore decided to split the shipments in two waves, in order to deliver part of your pledge to you more quickly, to let you start playing while we finish the work on the second part.

The additional costs for the management of the two waves will be absorbed directly by us.

The first wave will include not only the core box, we are also working to add all the following material: Hyperion, Draco, The Mediceo, Minotaur, plus all cosmetic add-ons (Artbook, Card Holders, Dice sets). We will also include Magister pledge stretch goals for everyone, this means that Magister pledges will be fully delivered, together with all BRW crossover material.

Shipping Timeline

Production of the first wave will start in June, we plan to load cargo on ships in China by the end of the year, we are awaiting feedback from the factory to confirm these dates.

Production of the second wave will start before the end of the year and, considering the Chinese New Year that blocks factories for about a month, we think we can load cargo on ships between April and May next year.

Let's add a clarification note about working on new projects while other projects are still under development/finalization. Some of you, understandably, expressed doubts and concerns about this situation. We want to give you more clarity about this topic, the work teams are different, people work in parallel on multiple projects, and the overlaps that can really slow down the work can happen in very few occasions. Let's go into our specific situation: at the moment, as many of you know, the creative group of the Studio is working on three projects: "Nova Aetas: Renaissance", "Black Rose Wars: Rebirth", and the new arrival "The Breach". Regarding the game design, Andrea Colletti and Luca Bernardini (the authors), Diego Fonseca and now Marco Presentino are working on NAR, Marco Montanaro (the author) is working on BRW: R, Michele Morosini (the author) is working on The Breach. The internal playtests are managed directly by the game designers, for the external playtests each game design group moves its tests independently as needed. Regarding illustrations and sculptures, the work on NAR has been completed months ago, the work on BRW: R is done and we are in an advanced stage of reviewing the print files with the factory, it is on The Breach that illustrators and sculptors are now engaged. Regarding the graphics work, we have 4 people at the moment who follow the different projects, each person with his/her specific focus.

This is just to give you more evidence that, for example, not releasing The Breach would have no impact on speeding up NAR. We hope that this brief description will help to better understand the internal dynamics and to reassure you that NAR is not and will never be a parked project due to new initiatives.

Last note, now that here in Italy the security measures related to the pandemic are finally reducing a lot, if you want to come and visit us here in the Studio just contact us and you will be welcome! After so much forced distance it will be a pleasure to have the opportunity to chat and show you the work in progress. Of course, we are not really within the reach of all of you, but never say never :)

That's all for now, we hope that this update has transmitted to you the commitment and passion we are putting into developing this ambitious game.

We'll be back in two weeks!

Designer Diary - Mission Design and Work Progress
about 4 years ago – Sat, Mar 19, 2022 at 06:52:19 PM

Hello Guys!

Here we are at the March Update, which as we had anticipated will be dedicated to the development status!

First of all, we will let you take a look at the Missions design.

The system we have developed for the missions will allow you to have a deep gaming experience and very high replayability!

Mission cards allow you to prepare and manage missions in a simple and fun way.

During a mission, you will find yourself passing from the cards to the Plotbook, where you will find narrative passages that will illustrate what is happening and will put you in front of choices or tests of skill to overcome particularly challenging situations.

The location system will allow you to explore the mission maps in a way never seen before, when you enter a house or a dormitory of the guards, you will have many choices to make, such as looking for objects important for the success of the mission (Achievement) or talk to the many NPCs you will meet and who will give you useful information and insights.

As you know the heart of each mission is the deep and solid tactical combat system, where you need to use your skills to try to get out of challenging encounters with enemies and bosses alive.

We are sure that you will like the system, we are having a lot of fun creating and testing each mission, even if the development and the correct balance of each of them, of each character, each enemy, and each object is very challenging and inevitably long.

Here is an outline of the creative process behind each mission. 

As you can see, this process involves a series of steps that end with the External Playtest, in many cases, they are repeated cyclically until each mission reaches the quality level we want.

Considering that this process must be applied for as many as 27 Missions for the core box only, you can understand how the development of the core box and all the expansions is taking a great amount of time.

Following the delay accumulated in 2021 due to the impossibility of carrying out live playtests, given the anti-covid restrictions applied in Italy, we have increased our staff, added new people to the development team, the Illustrators team, and the Graphic designers team; this restructure is giving positive results and fruit and accelerating the development processes.

This table shows the current status of the work on the Missions. We have not included any other game material such as miniatures and punchboards, simply because these are completed and ready for the mass production.

Currently, there are only few external playtests left to consider the Core box completed and begin the translations of cards and plot book. The Rulebook is currently in translation and we will soon share it on our web app (app.ludusmagnusstudio.com) to allow you to read it in advance and be ready to play as soon as you receive your pledge.

In the meantime, we have started work on the missions of the Expansions that inculde new campaigns (Vesuvius and Under Siege); to make the work of the translators more fluid, we will leave the development of the expansions that add secondary missions (Hyperion, Catacomb, Minotaur and Draco) for last. 

The Mediceo is completely finished and he is already sowing panic on our Battlefields! We will show you its rules in one of the next updates.

Based on our estimates of the work done and what remains to be done, and the time it will take to translate all the huge amount of material into 5 languages, we aim to start mass production by summer 2022 and start shipments by the end of the year.

Before concluding this update, we are happy to inform you that tomorrow we will be guests of the Twitch channel JocoGameStudio to play one of the Core Game Missions live! (spoiler alert)

The live broadcast will start at 04:00 PM (CET) and will be in Italian, but we will also answer questions in English. We hope to see many of you, answer your questions, and show you a lot of preview material.

That's all for today! See you tomorrow on Twitch and in a couple of weeks for a new update!