(https://pendraken.co.uk/_img/slideshow/Plansfor2021.jpg)
After what was clearly a rather different 2020, many of our plans didn't quite work out and you'd think that maybe we'd try and tone it down for 2021... but why would we want to do that?! Full steam ahead with maximum shiny!
I'll start with a bit of big news and work from there:
New Website
This was something we hadn't planned for this soon, but we're going to need to update our website around Mar/Apr time. There's various reasons for this but the main one is the amount of paperwork that can be saved with one of the off-the-shelf ecommerce sites. The new site will be able to integrate with Royal Mail's Click & Drop software, so our packaging staff won't have to manually enter the names and addresses of every package that they send out. When we're doing 200-250 packages per week now it's a lot of time spent sitting and typing in data. With Brexit behind us now and the VAT OSS system looming, the new site will also be fully compliant with all of the new legislation and will save a lot of time and hassle when it comes to filing EU VAT returns.
As well as the benefits for us, the new site will also be a lot better for our customers. We'll have multiple payment options so you can choose to pay by card instead of PayPal, we'll have the ability to sell gift cards or vouchers, we can do discounts on certain ranges if we want to, there's a Wishlist function for when you want to save something for later, and also the potential for a Loyalty points scheme so you're getting a little something every time you order.
The new site will also combine all of our products into one location, so Pendraken and Minibits will become one entity. This means that you'll be able to order everything in one go rather than placing orders through two separate sites as you do currently.
And finally, one note to reassure everyone: Your logins will continue to work on the new site, there will be no need to register again! I know how frustrating it is to return to a website and find that your details suddenly don't work so we're going to make sure that this is carried over. You may need to re-enter your password on first login, but that should be it. I don't know yet if we can transfer all of the old order details (as the product codes/lines in the database won't match the new site) but we'll see if we can download those and store them here for anyone who wants them.
Peninsular Napoleonics
This has to be our priority for the first few months of the year, to get everything sculpted, moulded and out to the people who backed the project originally. If everything goes to plan then we should be able to get the bulk of the figures done through Jan/Feb, potentially into March and then we can begin shipping in April. The moulds for the cart, wagon, mule train and civilians will be done this coming week and then we'll starting working on some of the items that will be duplicated from our existing 1815 British range, just to get ahead of ourselves.
More Fantasy
During the gaps between Napoleonic prep work we'll be getting the next batch of Fantasy releases ready, which should include things like Troglodytes, Gargoyles, Unicorns, Pegasi, Dark Elf Spiders, Undead Coach, Giant Worms, Flying Lizards and Woolly Beasts... Later in the year we'll be adding Ratmen and Amazons, and maybe some Fomorians...
Arab-Isaeli
Techno has already started work on these and we should start to see the first batches of sculpts arriving at Pendraken HQ in February I think. We'll be getting them into master moulds but production moulds won't be started until the Naps moulds have all been done. We'll be covering Egyptians, Israelis and Syrians in this batch, and once complete we'll be moving on to Cold War US and Soviets.
TB Line
There's only one more range to be done in the TB 'Middle Ages' ranges and that's the Mongols. I'll get those sorted out after the Naps and Fantasy probably. Then we'll be heading to the Ancients ranges where we're going to ask Techno to clean up and tweak all of the existing masters, to give better quality figures for production moulding. This should speed up the process considerably so we'll aim to have these online somewhere around Sept/Oct maybe?
Sci-Fi Expansion!
This might be one to keep an eye on for some of you out there... In preparation for Future War Commander II we'll be revamping our entire Sci-Fi offering. Current plans are for about 20 different races/factions, over 120 vehicles, infantry, support, all sorts of fun stuff! We'll have some more announcements about this coming soon so keep your eyes and ears open for those!
Other Ranges
Beyond these projects we'll also be working on the following...
Crimean revamp - Once Tony has finished with the Naps he'll be moving on to revamp our Crimean range for us.
Post-1950 MBT's and trucks - Martin is still working on these so we're hoping to see something soon.
Korean artillery - These are all done and have just got caught up in the moulding queue. We've got a few troop additions to come as well so we'll probably release everything in one go.
Cold War Commander II
Work on the new rules continues and we should have something ready for proofreading in a couple of weeks time. I need to get the army lists formatted as well but with those being a separate entity to the rulebook I can finish them off while folks are checking over the rules text. I need to get some more example photos this coming week as well.
Korean War Supplement
This one is a much smaller job than CWC-II so once we've got some stuff back from Rob I'll start putting together the documents. We'll probably have 2 or 3 rule mechanics in here, along with all of the necessary army lists, and it'll be available in pdf and print like we did with Libertad! for the SCW.
New Army Builder Software
The work on this was severely impacted by Covid so we're a bit behind schedule with it. I had a video chat with Chris last week and he showed me all of the databases and fancy tech stuff that'll be holding it together and it looks really impressive. Some of the new features will make this a lot better than the existing builder. Timewise we're probably looking at April/May time I think, but we might need some beta testers before then to try and break it for us! We'll let you know when this is and get some volunteers together.
Dungeon World
We've still got this one sitting from last year's plans so I'm determined to get it sorted out. We need to remould a lot of the monsters and furniture to make them easier to cast and then a quick formatting of the rules to polish them a bit. They'll be launched as pdf and print versions, so go with some shiny new boxed Dungeon sets!
Forum
Our current webguy Stewart has agreed to take over the running of the Forum so I'm just waiting on Matt to transfer the domain and files over to him. Once that's done he can run the software upgrade, fix those bugs and get it all running smoothly again.
Painting Competition 2021!
It's back! After a hiatus of too many years the Pendraken Painting Competition will return and will be running throughout February. With so many of us stuck at home it's the perfect time to get some painting done and give us all something to focus on. You can enter anything you've painted over the previous 12 months so anything from the various lockdowns is eligible. We hope to see loads of entries this year and we can all have something positive to talk about for a month.
Website Photos
One of the small successes through 2020 was the number of photos we were able to add to the website so we're going to continue that through 2021 as well. There are currently 771 anonymous codes to do which should be greatly reduced over the coming months:
- The WWII US and British artillery has been photo'd and will be added to the site in the next day or two.
- The German and Soviets will be next up by the end of the month to complete all of the WWII ranges (except the aircraft).
- The 1812 Naps ranges are over with Kev Rouse being painted up.
- The rest of the WWII vehicles are with JAD Designs and will be back with us in the next few months.
- All of the Fantasy ranges are getting a full paintjob by Cornish Mikey and will be coming back to us over the course of the year.
- The LoA range is going off to BattleBrush Studios to do his usual great job on those.
- The Schleswig-Holstein ranges are with Gun Dog and we should see those around March/April time I'd think.
Minibits
Over on Minibits we've got about 100 new MDF designs to get up and running so we'll be spending most of our time on those. We've got new fences on the way, a 10mm Cafe Gondree hopefully, a Falklands house, some Belgian gates in multi-scale and lots more.
That's about everything I can think of right now, but I'm sure there'll be something I've missed. Actually, there is something I've missed but you'll have to wait for that... It's big news, the bigliest news ever, biglier than everything I've listed above... but you'll have to wait for it... shhh.... :-$
Wow! Quite a list. Good luck with it all. One request, if I may? Any chances when the forum is handed over that something can be done about posting photos straight into posts, rather than via a host site? I can post photos direct on Facebook and Tapatalk, it would be great to do so on my favourite forum! ,
Quote from: mollinary on 10 January 2021, 05:57:22 PM
Wow! Quite a list. Good luck with it all. One request, if I may? Any chances when the forum is handed over that something can be done about posting photos straight into posts, rather than via a host site? I can post photos direct on Facebook and Tapatalk, it would be great to do so on my favourite forum!
I'll have a chat with Stewart about it but it usually comes down to bandwidth. Hosting all of the images here fills up the server space very quickly and adds a lot to the monthly hosting bill. We can add images upto 128kb currently, so we might be able to increase that to something more sensible.
Amazons?
Quote from: fsn on 10 January 2021, 06:41:04 PM
Amazons?
I've added those to the More Fantasy bit, as well as the Ratmen and maybe some Fomorians.
Quote from: Leon on 10 January 2021, 04:55:47 PM
and maybe some Fomorians...
... be still my beating heart!
Excellent news! Well done.
Quote from: Leon on 10 January 2021, 07:14:13 PM
I've added those to the More Fantasy bit, as well as the Ratmen and maybe some Fomorians.
Thank you! I'm easily pleased.
Oh dear! Between Amazons and Arab-Israeli and more SF, I don't think my wallet is going to get much rest this year.
Hello Leon
Great Plans there, hopefully the TB Line Heffalumps are near the front of the TB Line Ancients queue :D.
(http://theminiaturespage.com/news/pics/2011/mar/34146a.jpg)
Cheers
GrumpyOldMan
Wow, just a couple of things. And a big surprise thing too!
Fantasy and Dungeon additions / updates sound good. The technical upgrades will certainly be welcome - and if you need some test input, give me a shout.
Sci Fi expansion / revamp is a bit of a surprise - will keep an eye on this, but really have too much 6mm already to commit to this.
(https://cdn2.scratch.mit.edu/get_image/gallery/6993522_200x130.png)
Thanks for the overview of the plans for this year, which look good :).
Lovely!
Looking forward to arab/isralie stuff....
Such a lot to look forward to.
Arab-Israeli may well get me diverted from my plans, as might the Sci-Fi. i wish you would not do this to us ! :)
Quote from: fred. on 10 January 2021, 09:27:23 PM
The technical upgrades will certainly be welcome - and if you need some test input, give me a shout.
Will do, it's one of the Shopify style sites so there's a lot more features available to us. We'll get it up and running and fully tested before we consider swapping over to it full-time.
I'll lay low odds on it being buggy after it goes live, nothing ever works ;) One thing - can we have a menu button set at the bottom of the page as well as the top, in a pic heavy post I get a blister scrolling to the top. It would be like the SOTCW forum.
Quote from: ianrs54 on 11 January 2021, 10:46:49 AM
I'll lay low odds on it being buggy after it goes live, nothing ever works ;) One thing - can we have a menu button set at the bottom of the page as well as the top, in a pic heavy post I get a blister scrolling to the top. It would be like the SOTCW forum.
If you press the "Home" button on your keyboard it'll automatically go to the top of the page (and "End" will go to the end of the page).
Or if you're using a touchscreen device just "flick" (i.e. quick flicking drag action) the screen and it'll scroll super fast.
I've only been a member for 8-9 years and never seen them. :'( :'(
Thanks Mattew
Some interesting things in there for this year.
Quote from: mmcv on 11 January 2021, 11:08:27 AM
If you press the "Home" button on your keyboard it'll automatically go to the top of the page (and "End" will go to the end of the page).
SOMETIMES pressing Home will take you to the top of the page. Far from universal in my experience.
Also, touchscreens are the work of the devil :)
No expansion for the French Revolution therefore? 😩
Quote from: Ithoriel on 11 January 2021, 12:34:00 PM
SOMETIMES pressing Home will take you to the top of the page. Far from universal in my experience.
Also, touchscreens are the work of the devil :)
I find it works most of the time, especially these days when there's less weird embedded webpages inside other web pages going on.
Quote from: ianrs54 on 11 January 2021, 11:22:47 AM
I've only been a member for 8-9 years and never seen them. :'( :'(
Thanks Mattew
There is a go up button at the bottom of posts as well, but keyboard ones work from anywhere.
Quote from: Chad on 11 January 2021, 12:44:28 PM
No expansion for the French Revolution therefore? 😩
Afraid not, I think I've mentioned previously a French Revolution revamp would have to be part of our general Naps expansion plans, so we'd want to get the Peninsular out of the way first. I think there's a lot of clamour for Russians to be done after that, but we could potentially look at the Revolution once those are done?
Quote from: Ithoriel on 11 January 2021, 12:34:00 PM
SOMETIMES pressing Home will take you to the top of the page. Far from universal in my experience.
Also, touchscreens are the work of the devil :)
I see - like me can just about manage punch cards but prefer paper tape !
Seriuos point the human body carrys an electric change and for a few people it's either too high and stops the screen work, or is too low and thewrefore the screen don't pick em up. Cure for the first is earthing yourself - the second has no cure I know of, you could try plugging into the mains. :'( :'(
Great stuff looking forward to lots of these projects coming through :)
I also just noticed from the head of the thread that my stuff survived to reach you intact! :D
Quote from: ianrs54 on 11 January 2021, 01:12:29 PM
, you could try plugging into the mains. :'( :'(
One of our mangers poor bloke, did just that a few Christmases ago. went into the office on Boxing day and wired a plug up with some twin and earth, connected the bare neutral wire to one am and the live to the other . Then flicked the switch. His wife got concerned after he had been gone a while and called a colleague and they both went to the office. Fortunately the colleague suggested the wife stay in the car. Never did find out what made him do it.
Cripes
(https://media1.tenor.com/images/7f0ef9124c81898f6b155af241e49f08/tenor.gif?itemid=5928699)
Any news on the Samurai castle?
Quote from: fsn on 12 January 2021, 08:35:05 AM
Any news on the Samurai castle?
I've deliberately left those off until we've got the Peninsular buildings all sorted out and I can start scheduling things with John at Ironclad. He's still catching up after his heart attack so we'll hang on until he's sorted.
This hobby's more dangerous than I realised!
Hmmm. Don't know whether to be grief struck or relieved.
:-\
Will go for hopes of John's continued recovery.
Quote from: fsn on 12 January 2021, 09:54:33 AM
Hmmm. Don't know whether to be grief struck or relieved.
:-
Will go for hopes of John's continued recovery.
When I spoke to him last week he was hoping to start production on the Japanese walls and fences in February, so we'll have another batch of Castle Arts stuff coming.
Good stuff!
Gargoyles and Fomor, oh my...
All being well, I reckon I'll have the Israelis finished by the end of the month.....Then it'll be on to the Egyptians, then the Syrians.
Not sure when I'll get a chance to go back to the Formorians. :-\
Don't say it, Ian......I'm at warp factor 13 already. :D
Cheers - Phil ;)
Make it so, Mr. Techno.
Only going to say that the Egyptians and Syrians should have come first, they are more useful than the Israleies being a good proxy for most Pact armies.
But since you asked WORK FASTER :P
But the engines cannae take it !!
(S'all right, I'll eject the warp core. :D)
Cheers - Scotty. ;)
I swear ejecting the warp core is written into every page of the Star Fleet ops manual :D
Why yes, I have just watched Discovery and Picard, why do you ask?
Quote from: toxicpixie on 13 January 2021, 01:15:23 PM
Why yes, I have just watched Discovery and Picard, why do you ask?
Oh dear. Have you been very bad?
No, very good!
Picard was decent but a bit... overly nostalgic and nothing new, which given it's "crusty old bloke goes off to do what he did a crusty middle aged bloke" in style and format is not unexpected.
Disco is very, very good (barring the S2 finale which everyone except me liked, and I did really like but it didn't feel very Trek to me - more B5 or Star Wars).
Quote from: toxicpixie on 13 January 2021, 01:15:23 PM
I swear ejecting the warp core is written into every page of the Star Fleet ops manual :D
Step 2 in any problem solving situation. Reversing the polarity is always step 1.
It's like the ia for a stuck lap top, reboot it. (IA - intial action when your rifle has a stoppage)
Quote from: toxicpixie on 13 January 2021, 01:23:14 PM
No, very good!
Picard was decent but a bit... overly nostalgic and nothing new, which given it's "crusty old bloke goes off to do what he did a crusty middle aged bloke" in style and format is not unexpected.
Disco is very, very good (barring the S2 finale which everyone except me liked, and I did really like but it didn't feel very Trek to me - more B5 or Star Wars).
Discovery I've found to be a bit too action-focused, a bit like a lot of the new films, and lacking the "feel" of a lot of the other ones, which I find hasn't really drawn me in. I've still to watch the latest series mind you.
If ejecting the warp core doesn't work, there's always the sonic screwdriver! Oh wrong franchise...
It is pretty darn gung ho, more a return to the Shatner years if the TOS team had a budget and the tech for decent space ships and aliens, and a cast that didn't want to burst their corsets or ruffle their toupee's :D
S'worth it for Michelle Yeoh alone :)
I'll give Picard a pass. Was nice to see some of the old gang back, but they seemed to run out of ideas and had a very silly end.
STD is awful, mostly because I cannot take to Michael Burnham, and I hate that they turned Spock into a grinning codpiece, and that they inserted Burham into Sarek's family. Oh, and what on Klingon did they do to the Klingons?
I'm more hopeful for the Pike/No1 spinoff that is promised.
I will agree that Micelle Yeoh is always watchable.
Michelle Yeoh was definitely chewing the set and loving it.
I thought the whole of Discovery was great, but did think the ending was a bit meh!
Not done Picard yet. Won't be long I'm sure. 8)
Loved ST:D but so far found Picard a bit of a yawn. Maybe it picks up.
I'd agree on Picard, actuallly I think it felt like they dusted off a generic ST:NG plot and just said "Picard groans a bit 'cos he's old"...
Michelle Yeoh is channelling the no spirit of the Mighty Shat, for sure. Except she doesn't look like she's about to need a sit down and a rest after three punches ;)
Burnham changes quite a bit thru the series - I'd not taken to her to start but she's come good! I was
amused rather than upset at her being slipped into Spocks family, no worse than artfully writing Section31 and Disco out of the Federation history to explain why no one ever mentioned them before in the future ;)
The Klingons are explained in at the start of Season 2 ;) Also I loved it touched upon the difference between TOS, NG and used the old FASA explanation :D
Quote from: Leon on 10 January 2021, 04:55:47 PM
That's about everything I can think of right now, but I'm sure there'll be something I've missed. Actually, there is something I've missed but you'll have to wait for that... It's big news, the bigliest news ever, biglier than everything I've listed above... but you'll have to wait for it... shhh.... :-$
Hmm.... what could it be...?!
The Maus!
Chariot armies!
No ...
I've got it! ...
You've bought out Games Workshop!
Silly Nobby!
That's not 10mm ...
What more is there to do? Are you not master of 10mm? Are your enemies not strewn about your feet like so many empty wine skins? Do they not call you Mr 10mm?
Quote from: fsn on 26 January 2021, 08:53:01 PM
What more is there to do? Are you not master of 10mm? Are your enemies not strewn about your feet like so many empty wine skins? Do they not call you Mr 10mm?
http://www.pendrakenforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,20472.0.html
:-bd
Very interested to see the sci fi expansion and future wars commander, part of me wishes you had bought spartan games planetfall after there demise.
Quote from: Adamwest on 27 January 2021, 05:02:41 AM
Very interested to see the sci fi expansion and future wars commander, part of me wishes you had bought spartan games planetfall after there demise.
I don't think we'd have had the funds for that! Were they picked up by TTCombat?
Warcradle picked up all the licences. Obviously they can only start on one project at once and they started on Dystopian wars, I think it will be a long time before there attention gets to Planetfall.
Are you able to give us any hints to the sci fi expansion leon? Please? Pretty please?!
Quote from: Adamwest on 27 January 2021, 10:11:38 AM
Are you able to give us any hints to the sci fi expansion leon? Please? Pretty please?!
Well there's a whole new Universe out there (maybe even many multiverses) to be boldly explored ... I suspect ;D
Quote from: Adamwest on 27 January 2021, 10:11:38 AM
Are you able to give us any hints to the sci fi expansion leon? Please? Pretty please?!
Not a lot at this stage but there'll be info soon. We've got 20 different factions planned with vehicles already 90% complete for all of those, so we'll just need to get infantry and support weapons done as well.
No doubt the development of the new website has well progressed and I'm too late for this suggestion but I came across Pendraken's U.S. stockist today and I quite like the 4 to a row "side by side" presentation of products as illustrated in the link below (as opposed to the single product per row which, in the case of the ACW range with 70 odd products, takes ages to scroll down).
https://darkhorsehobbies.com/10mm-scale-historical-american-civil-war-tabletop-gaming-miniatures-200 (https://darkhorsehobbies.com/10mm-scale-historical-american-civil-war-tabletop-gaming-miniatures-200)
On the mobile (iPhone, Safari) that site displays as a single column!
Quote from: Westmarcher on 01 May 2021, 03:22:15 PM
No doubt the development of the new website has well progressed and I'm too late for this suggestion but I came across Pendraken's U.S. stockist today and I quite like the 4 to a row "side by side" presentation of products as illustrated in the link below (as opposed to the single product per row which, in the case of the ACW range with 70 odd products, takes ages to scroll down).
The new site will have the products in more columns, so no worries there. I think it's either 3 or 4 columns and then you can click into each product to get more info. You can 'Add to Basket' straight from the list page though, so no need to click in and out of things constantly.
As an aside, I really like the extra work that Dark Horse has done on our product listings there, he's made custom images for the products and ranges which are really nice.