Ahau: Rulers of Yucatán

Ahaus, Roll Out!
about 1 year ago – Fri, Jan 20, 2023 at 11:28:29 AM

Future Rulers, beloved backers, friends,

We have three happy announcements for this happy new year. 

1. Our manufacturing partner, Hero Time, finished producing most of the games. There is some post-production work to do after the Chinese New Year, but the games can start their journey around the world in February, as announced in the previous post. See some photos about the manufacturing process at the end of this update. 

2. We partnered with fulfillment companies Quartermaster Logistics for North America, and GamesQuest for Europe, UK, and Rest of the World. Both of them have a solid track for shipping games around the world in a timely, reliable manner. 

3. The final production copies of both the base game, Ahau: Rulers of Yucatán, and the expansion, Ahau: Eclipse, are here with us, and you can watch the creator of the game do a live unboxing at our Ahau Facebook group, tomorrow (21 January) at 17:00 GMT, and also ask any questions you may have. 

Ahau Goes Into Print
over 1 year ago – Tue, Dec 20, 2022 at 11:12:44 AM

Future Rulers, 

This will be our shortest update ever. All artwork has been finalized, and the game goes into print at our manufacturing partner, Hero Time!

Many thanks to everyone who worked around the clock to make this happen. This time, let's applaud all the people who volunteered to check the rulebook translations, the translators, and the art/graphic design team. Well done!

Please note that our partner informed us that due to the recent Covid outbreaks in China and the related workforce shortages, factories (including the main factory and those of subcontractors) are shutting down earlier this year. Due to this, it may happen that the game will not be ready by the Chinese New Year (which starts on 22 January 2023), and therefore a small delay is likely as compared to the announced timeline. Games are likely to be delivered around May. Even though this is an external circumstance we cannot do anything about, we still apologize for the delay. As a small compensation, we included an extra set of 3D pyramid top parts for all of the 5 pyramids, in case they need to be replaced due to wear and tear. This comes on top of all the extras announced in our latest update on all the final changes. 

We wish you all a great festive season full of joy and gaming!

Final Touches
over 1 year ago – Mon, Dec 05, 2022 at 04:20:21 AM

Future Rulers, 

Thank you for your patience. We received the prototype from our manufacturing partner, and as promised, here's a sneak peek.  If you read all the way through, we will also share our notes on how the components will be finalized for mass production, and encourage you to have your final say.  At the end of this update, you will find links to the draft German rulebook. 

1. SNEAK PEEK

Note that this is a handmade prototype and it is not representative of the quality of the final production copy which will be made using high-precision machines, with clean cuts and using different materials in some cases. In the photos, you will see some imprecise cuts, creases and some other wear and tear which is also a result of stress testing. :) 

Here are all of the components of the K'uhul Ahau package, including the base game and the expansion, minus the art prints. Yes, it demands quite a bit of table real estate, in this case, a dining table for 6 people. 

Overhead shot of the same:

Game board (again note that the creases are only there as this is a handmade prototype, not representative of the final production copy): 

Player board and ahau figure: 

Rulebook:

Pyramid temples (again note that the wear and tear is a result of stress testing and this being only a handmade prototype, not representative of the final production copy): 

Event cards and role cards from the Eclipse expansion:

2. FINAL CHANGES 

After our team checked each and every component, also involving outside players and testers, as well as with our manufacturing partner, we settled on the following changes for the final production copy: 

2.1. Let's start by addressing the elephant in the room: double-layered boards. After careful consideration, we decided to remove this feature and give you a bunch of other stuff instead (see the next two points, point no. 2 and 3), believing that you will get a better deal this way. Our reasoning: 

- Everyone, including outside players and testers agreed that having a duplicate layer on the player boards is dysfunctional from a gameplay perspective. The tiles (pyramid tiles and building tiles) that will be placed on the boards are large and thick enough to not get bumped around. 

- We would need to have triple layers to have the same effect on each side of the boards (given that each player board is double-sided). Not only that, but the extra layers also need to be thick enough to have a clear edge between the layers. This would have increased the costs as well as the weight (therefore the shipping costs) significantly.  

- Separate slots for each tile space would have made more sense, but that would have ruined the whole image to the point of being unrecognizable. Therefore only a single outline could have been used to separate the different layers, but this would not have prevented the tiles from being bumped around. 

2.2.  What we give instead: 

- The pyramid temple segment of the player board will receive UV finish, including the torches on the top. This will make the whole pyramid pop, and literally shine. 

- The cards will be upgraded to blackcore and will receive linen finish, to make them top quality. Even though the cards are not shuffled (with the exception of the solo game), this will ensure that the cards will not be creased even when bent, and will make the illustrations more enjoyable.  We will also increase the thickness of the summary cards. 

- We will slightly increase the size of all wooden components. The workers will be 16 mm tall, and the wooden discs 12 mm wide. The K'atun marker size will also be increased. We will also increase the size of the custom-shaped resources to be around 10-12 mm wide too. (They cannot be too big, as they can be placed on wild pyramid tiles during the game, and cannot cover up the whole tile so that the god face remains visible.)

- We will also increase the thickness of the rulebooks and the booklet paper to 157 gsm, and put oil finish on them. 

- The Eclipse expansion will also receive a plastic insert to ensure that the box remains durable. 

2.3. Reminder of what else we added to your package since the finish of the Kickstarter campaign: 

- We increased the thickness of the game box to 2 mm high-density cardboard with side reinforcements and linen finish to make sure that the box will arrive at your door safely, and to make them more durable in the long run. 

- We upgraded the standard inlay to a custom plastic insert to make space for all the components in the game, including the pyramid temples which can be stored there in a constructed form. 

- We added an extra player board for the solo gameplay. 

- We increased the size of the rulebook from 21x21 cm to 28x28 cm, and from 20 pages to 24 pages to make sure it is easy to read and a joy to look at. 

- We increased the page count of the booklet from 8 pages to 12 pages to make sure we covered all important topics relating to the cultural and historical background of the game (including cities, buildings, rulers, gods, natural resources, historical roles portrayed in the game). 

Disclaimer: all these changes are subject to the final quote from the manufacturer and acceptance of them by Apeiron Games.

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3. HAVE YOUR SAY

Dear Backers, 

Manufacturing will start next week, after some final graphic changes the team is currently working on. 

This is the last chance to have your say in shaping the components of the game. Tell us in the comments what else you would like to see in the final production copy. We cannot promise anything, but if there are enough votes on a single component change, we might as well consider it. 

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4. TRANSLATION OF THE RULEBOOKS

The German rulebooks are ready - if you are a native German speaker, we would love to hear your thoughts, directly in the documents linked below. If you never used Quickreviewer before: it is very easy, just click on the link to open the document, give your name, and leave a comment by drawing a rectangle to the relevant part of the text using the icon on the bottom of the screen. 

Main game rulebook in German: https://app.quickreviewer.com/proof/#/pdf/7ed938c641dde0e67c645e0f71aa4b92/f1664bf86ca293c3327e18412990a411

Expansion rulebook in German: 

https://app.quickreviewer.com/proof/#/pdf/7ed938c641dde0e67c645e0f71aa4b92/e00934115b2542583dc8b5c7b1e17454

The Spanish, Hungarian and French rulebooks will be shared next week. 

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That is all for now! 

November Update
over 1 year ago – Wed, Nov 23, 2022 at 03:36:40 AM

Future Rulers, 

We are very excited to share with you the following updates: 

- We submitted all artwork in October to Hero Time, our selected manufacturer announced in our last update. All artwork was approved, and we paid 50% of the manufacturing cost, as usual in the industry. (Remaining 50 % is due when the boxes are ready for shipping.) The factory-grade prototype is ready and is on its way to us (probably arriving in a week or so), and once it gets here, we'll gather a large team to triple-check everything. We will also share photos here so that you can see what you will be getting. After this, the manufacturing of the game can finally start! 

- Translations of all language-dependent materials (the two rulebooks and the summary card) into German, French, Spanish, and Hungarian is complete. We used professional translators and proofreaders in all languages, but as the saying goes, nothing is better for a rulebook than a hundred eyeballs. So if you are a native speaker of any of these languages and would like to help us by proofreading the rulebook(s), please sign up using this simple form. Proofreaders will be credited in the rulebook. 

- The rulebook for the expansion is also ready and has been finalized in pdf form. 

- To finalize the fulfillment details, we are also waiting for the prototype. A team member from our partner, Other Stuff Games is dedicated to dealing with all fulfillment-related matters, and we are ensuring to get you the best deal on the market. 

October Update
over 1 year ago – Tue, Oct 18, 2022 at 04:28:01 AM

Future Rulers, 

A few quick updates on our progress: 

- We are continuing the process of final artwork approval with our selected manufacturer (Hero Time), and it is now up to the graphic design teams on both sides to ensure that the material is ready to go into print. We are double- and triple-checking each component of the game. 

- We decided to go with cardboard for the 3D pyramids, instead of a foam based material. Foam was an option, because it is lighter, and somewhat easier to assemble, but cardboard overall looks better and is sturdier.  Hope you will be satisfied with our decision. 

- We decided to give you a 2mm high density box instead of the standard 1.5 mm thickness, to ensure extra protection for everything inside the box. (As a reminder, since the end of the Kickstarter campaign, we also "unlocked" a plastic insert (instead of the standard inlay) designed by Matt Healey, and an extra player board for the solo game.) 

- The rulebook has been finalized into pdf form, and you can download it from the BGG page of the game here: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/236629/ahau-rulers-yucatan-official-rulebook-en

Shout out to Chris Spath, our editor and Tony Mastrengeli who did a great job in putting it all into its final form. We ended up with 24 pages to make sure there is enough space for the various language editions. 

- The booklet on the historical background of the game has been finished also in pdf form, and will be soon available for download. It will be 12 pages long, A4 sized, containing information on the cities, buildings, roles, resources, and gods of the game, complemented with illustrations from the game, written and double-checked by our team of cultural consultants. 

- Backerkit closed on 30 September. We are about to charge the cards for the Backerkit backers, so make sure you entered your card details correctly. (Delivery and VAT will be charged later, closer to shipping.)

- The rulebook expansion will be put into final pdf form this week. 

- Translation of the rulebook into various languages is ongoing. 

- Ahau made its debut at Essen, and there was quite a high interest for the game. Many thanks to Grand Gamers Guild and Marc Specter for providing us with a table. We also met some of our backers, including people from Germany, the Netherlands and Thailand. Note that the photo below shows an earlier version of the game. You can look up the current version in Tabletop Simulator.