Okay, so right now, Salty Water has 10 final pieces lined. Once these are finished being colored, then there are just two bosses left for Salty to illustrate from the base game's art demands. Let's take a look at six of them below.
A monocle that will let you find things, not leaving things to chance! A tent and bed roll to make your rests more comfortable for everyone, which has direct benefits to your mind and body. A mysterious tapestry featuring Ensu fighting strange bipedal creatures that are neither ensu nor malefact... The Jertul Psalms, religious poetry to help restore your mind and soul on your journey. Then we see the Welver Bow, the first ranged weapon you might have seen just yet! And yes, that's a Wok for cooking, and probably for hitting things as well.
Here are two of the other finished traits, including a collector of antiquities and a faithful who follows the teaching of the Jertul faith. Traits are two-sided cards with text at the ends (not shown here of course) that give you an additional way to customize your character within a theme. I'm quite excited to see players bringing their characters to life over time and building a history of play.
And what's that, I didn't share these previously?? Well here are some of the other pieces from before. Tomes you might find while delving, a cursed collar and mask that keeps your soul captured as it restrains you, an amulet that makes you dodge most anything... until it doesn't work and the snakes that grant you impossible grace bite you! Or diplomatic action to break up arguments might serve you well... Then there's the strange bone that, when placed down, grows sinews and muscle to seal a passage, a door way, or to create a small bridge to get you where you need to go. Then there's the Jertul Break, an item for the faithful that, when broken, grants a small miracle of salvation!
In the coming weeks here, Salty will be finished with the base game's art work entirely. From there, we are discussing what is reasonable to add on to the end here, expanding the base game with the seventh class I wanted to add in a stretch goal, as well as adding a few more bosses, and maybe a Submerged area, which would go with the 5 others we have to give us 6 unique types of delve areas to dive into. Plus, underwater foes would be quite neat.
Once we determine what more Salty is adding art-wise, we will begin the wind down of that phase and the increase of playtesting to finalize what the game is looking like. We're still looking to manufacture and then ship early next year. My first project planned for 2026 is a tarot deck in May, and I want to have everything that's happening right now (confluence aside) shipped well before then, so we can expect HISTORIC to likely be in your hands by or in April 2026.
I think overall, we're looking at a really impressive game full of incredible art, but I want to make sure it's playable for a good while without needing an expansion or anything like that to be repeatable. Part of that is making sure the current 10 bosses aren't one-and-dones, and have the ability to scale up for repeat visits. One of them in particular is a chase away from the boss because you can't kill it... but a second or third encounter where you actually DO try to fight it sounds really fun.
Alright, see you in November with the final work from the base game that was planned, and info on what's coming next!
