May Update
18 days ago
– Thu, May 21, 2026 at 09:12:09 PM
Hello everyone,
Bradly here, back with your latest Wares Blade update! It's been a little bit since our last post, and we've got some news to share. So let's get to it!
Status Report
First things first: delivery timeline! We're running a bit behind schedule and, perhaps obviously, delivery won't be landing in May. We're moving as quickly as we can, but we're also being extra thorough with the book. This is one of LionWing's most successful projects to date, and we want to make sure the final product reflects that. Ultimately, getting it right matters more to us than getting it out fast.
We don't have a revised delivery date to share just yet, but we're not sitting still while we finalize things. We're already in active coordination with our printer so that the moment our files are ready, they can move directly into samples and proofing. We're front-loading as much of the manufacturing process as possible to keep the back end tight. We apologize for this delay and appreciate your patience on this.
Beta Release
The beta has also taken longer than expected, but we're happy to report that its release is now imminent. We will be releasing the beta in two parts: part 1 will be all of the book’s chapters, while part 2 will be the book’s appendix. The appendix is the only part of the book not yet finished, though it’s currently sitting at about 85% finished. But to avoid any further delays with the beta, we’re pushing ahead without the appendix for now. So, keep an eye on your inboxes!
For those of you who want to participate in the most meaningful way, here's what we'd like you to look out for as you're reading through the book:
- Typos and grammatical issues
- Graphical/graphic designer issues
Anything you find, we need you to report it in our Discord, specifically our Wares Blade beta channel found here: https://discord.gg/j4ehujE7
Please use the following format when reporting: Page number - issue
Keeping all reports in one channel in this format makes it much easier for us to track and act on everything you find. Do not leave your findings on the Kickstarter page. Thank you in advance for helping us make this the best it can be. We haven't done as many passes on the laid-out book (the majority of our editing passes were in the text docs), so keep that in mind as you go through the text.
Wrapping Up
And that will do it for today's update! We'll be back with another next month. Thank you, as always, for being part of this. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out to us!
Until next time!
Bradly & the LionWing Team
March II Update
3 months ago
– Sun, Mar 22, 2026 at 11:39:46 AM
Hello everyone,
Bradly here, back with your latest Wares Blade update. We’ve got a few things to cover today, so let’s jump right in.
BackerKit
First things first: BackerKit! By this point, most of you have received your survey and already completed it. We’re currently sitting at around 70% completion, which is fantastic; thank you all for jumping on that so quickly. I’ll be honest, I think I underestimated just how excited people would be for the pledge manager. Not only did folks complete their surveys quickly, but a lot of you picked up add-ons you missed during the campaign. Seriously, thank you for the extra support. Just a little inside baseball: the top three add-ons, in order, are the two scenario booklets and the GM screen.
If you’re having trouble completing your BackerKit survey, don’t hesitate to reach out here, on Discord, at any of the socials below, or via email at [email protected]. BackerKit is generally pretty intuitive, but if this is your first time using it, or even your first Kickstarter, it can definitely feel a bit confusing at first. We’re happy to walk you through it.
Shipping
We’ve had some questions and comments asking for clarification, especially from backers seeing higher-than-expected rates (particularly outside the U.S.). There are a few factors at play here. For this campaign, we’re using a weight-based shipping model, meaning your shipping cost is directly tied to your package's total weight. The challenge is that nearly every item came in slightly heavier than originally estimated. On their own, small increases don’t move the needle too much, but when you combine slightly heavier items, rising global shipping rates, and multiple items (especially Collector’s Editions or add-ons), it starts to add up, and that’s where those higher totals are coming from. I'm really sorry that this is the state of shipping; it sucks, and there's no real way around it. I wish we could go back to 2019 when rates weren't offensively high.
A couple of important notes, though. We are not collecting shipping charges yet. Even if you’ve completed your survey, your card won’t be charged for several more weeks. So if timing is a concern, you’ve still got some breathing room. In the past, to combat high international shipping costs, we've had some backers choose to use a forwarding services. It's not ideal, and it's a bit of a hassle, but those who have done it, it's worked well for them.
If you have specific questions or want to talk through options, drop me a line.
Variant Covers
Quick note on the variant covers: When we launched BackerKit, I forgot to upload the two cover options, so if you were confused, that’s on me. When you confirm your pledge, you’ll be able to choose between the 1986 cover and the 1994 cover. I’ve included both below for reference so you can pick your favorite.
Stretch Goals Recap
We’ve also had a few questions about stretch goals, so here’s a quick recap of everything that was unlocked. As a reminder: you’ll receive all stretch goals that apply to your pledge level (for most backers, that’s everything).
- Custom endpapers (physical book backers)
- Foreword by the game’s designer (all backers)
- Custom dice bag (Collector’s Edition or dice add-on backers)
- Pull-out, full-color map of Western Ahan (physical backers; digital copy of the map included in the PDF)
- Quickstart Guide (PDF, all backers)
- Spot UV cover (physical books and Collector’s Editions)
- Pre-generated character pack (PDF, all backers)
- Afterword by the localization team (all backers)
- “The Mountain Where the Devil Slumbers” scenario (PDF, all backers)
Wrapping Up
That’s it for today! We’re still hard at work on the beta version, so stay tuned; that’s coming up next. As always, if you need anything at all, don’t hesitate to reach out here or through any of the platforms below:
Until next time,
Bradly & the LionWing Team
March Update
3 months ago
– Sun, Mar 01, 2026 at 05:40:31 PM
Hello everyone,
Bradly here, back with another Wares Blade update. First off, I want to apologize for missing February’s update. I normally write these on the 30th of each month, and February being a short month completely threw me off. I just flat out lost track of time. That’s on me, and I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again.
BackerKit Pledge Manager
The main topic for today is the pledge manager. This has taken a little longer than I anticipated, mostly because I had to reacclimate myself to BackerKit’s system. We haven’t used BackerKit for one of our post-campaign managers since Sainome Colosseum R back in 2018, and quite a bit has changed since then. The good news is that everything is now fully set up and ready to go. We’ll be sending out smoke tests starting tomorrow to make sure everything functions properly, and assuming those go smoothly, I expect to have all invites sent out by the end of next week. It will likely be sooner than that, but I prefer to give myself a little more runway than I actually need when it comes to these timelines.
BackerKit itself is very straightforward. You’ll receive a link at the email address associated with your Kickstarter account. When you click it, you’ll see the tier you backed, and you’ll have the opportunity to add on any items you may have missed or were on the fence about during the campaign. After that, you’ll enter your shipping address and pay for shipping. Once your BackerKit order is complete, you won’t need to touch it again unless you need to update your address later. If you run into any issues at all, the fastest way to resolve them is to email me directly at [email protected] or message me on Discord.
Wares Blade Beta
Now for what most of you have really been waiting for: the beta version of the book. All of the text has gone through multiple internal passes at this point, and we will be sending the beta out this month. I’m not going to give an exact date just yet, but it will be this month. As always, the purpose of the beta is primarily large-scale proofreading. There's only a handful of us reviewing this internally, yet there are roughly 2,500 of you. The simple reality is that a few thousand sets of eyes will catch things we won’t, and that process materially improves the final book.
To report any issues you find, I’ve created a dedicated channel in our Discord called “wares-blade-beta,” just like we’ve done for nearly all of our past Kickstarter books. That channel is exclusively for reporting errors. The format should be: Page Number: Issue Description. No replying to other reports, no commentary, and no general discussion in that channel. If you want to discuss the book, ask questions, or talk about mechanics, please use the main “wares-blade” channel instead. Keeping the beta channel clean and structured makes it much easier for us to track and correct everything efficiently.
Wrapping Up
That’s it for this month’s update. Next month, we’ll be focusing more on production progress. As always, thank you for backing Wares Blade and for supporting what we’re doing with the Legends of Japan line. If you need anything between now and the next update, please reach out. The best place to contact us is on Discord, where multiple team members are monitoring messages. All relevant social links are below:
Until next time!
Bradly & the LionWing Team
January Update
5 months ago
– Sun, Jan 18, 2026 at 08:32:11 PM
Hello everyone!
Bradly here, back with your latest Wares Blade update! It’s been a little while, so first things first: Happy New Year! 2026 is shaping up to be the year of Wares Blade in the West, and we’re incredibly excited about what this year has in store.
Progress Report
So, what’s been happening behind the scenes over the last six weeks? Well, quite a bit, in fact!
For starters, the book is fully translated! We’re currently hard at work on the first full editing pass. Once that initial pass is complete, we’ll be putting out the beta we discussed previously. That beta serves two important purposes:
- It gets the full book into your hands much sooner than waiting for version 1.0.
- It gives the community a chance to help us catch errors and inconsistencies.
Think of the beta as part early access and part community QA initiative. Your eyes and feedback genuinely help make the final book better.
Pledge Manager Update
What else has been going on? The pledge manager!
We intentionally held off on launching the pledge manager until the start of the year, as January is typically when new shipping rates are finalized. We expected an increase, and as of last week, that’s exactly what we got, with rates rising roughly 10% compared to this time last year, which is a bummer, but alas, here we are. Now that those numbers are more firmly locked in, we’re moving ahead with the PM. We’re currently aiming to have the pledge manager live in early February.
For the uninitiated, a Kickstarter pledge manager is the system used to:
- Collect shipping information
- Process shipping payments
- Allow late backers to join
- Let existing backers add items they may have missed during the campaign
The platform we use is (very creatively) called PledgeManager. This is the same system we’ve used for our last ten projects, so if you’ve backed anything from us in the past six-ish years, the process should feel familiar. For those who haven’t, our next Kickstarter update will include a step-by-step tutorial walking you through everything.
Looking Ahead: The Future of Wares Blade
Since our last update, we’ve also been in deeper discussions with the Japanese team about the future of Wares Blade, particularly here in the Western market.
We’d talked prior to the Kickstarter about possibilities beyond the core release, but intentionally held off on more concrete planning until we saw how the campaign performed. Given the strong response and turnout, we’ve now been able to move those conversations forward in a more meaningful way.
With translation complete and editing underway on the core rulebook, I felt comfortable initiating discussions with Shindosha about expanding the Wares Blade presence in English. We’ve landed on several promising ideas that would further support the TTRPG while also exploring other ways to dive deeper into WB’s unique world. We’ll be talking more about those plans later this year, but for now, just know that the future of Wares Blade is very bright.
Wrapping Up
That’s it for today’s update! Keep an eye out for the next one in the first half of February.
As always, if you need anything in the meantime, please reach out. If for some reason you still haven’t received your Playkit, let us know and we’ll get that sorted for you. The best place to contact us is Discord, where multiple team members are keeping an eye on messages. (Here on Kickstarter, it’s mostly just me doing my best to keep up!)
All relevant social links are below:
Until next time,
Bradly & the LionWing Team
November Update
6 months ago
– Sun, Nov 30, 2025 at 03:38:39 PM
Hello everyone,
Bradly here, back with your monthly Wares Blade update! We hope you’ve all been doing well. It’s been a little while since our last post, so let’s jump right in.
Translation, Editing, and Production Progress
As many of you are likely wondering what we’ve been up to, the answer is: a lot of translation work. We’re excited to share that we are officially finished with translating the entire book, save for the latter half of Appendix 3, which covers the spell list.
So, what’s next? Editing, editing, editing! The manuscript has now been handed off to our editors, who are already digging into it. We expect editing to take most of December, with layout and text insertion following throughout January. While we were hoping to have a beta copy ready this month—I personally had my heart set on another Christmas Eve shadow drop like we did with Kedamono Opera last year—that won’t be feasible, simply because the translation phase took a bit longer than we anticipated. This is an extremely dense book, after all!
What will begin in December, however, are prelim talks with the printer, so that we can have all our ducks in a row for when the book is ready to be sent off. We'll discuss with them product dimensions, material choices, die line templates, and the overall production timeline. So, while we won't have that beta to show off next month, we'll still be quite busy behind the scenes nailing down production logistics.
Playkit and Pledge Manager
On the community side, we’ve seen quite a few groups put together games using the playkit, and that has been incredibly fun to watch. If you’ve managed to get Wares Blade to the table already, we hope you had a blast! We’ve heard from several folks who’ve enjoyed the abridged rules, which is always energizing for the team. If you didn't get your playkit code, drop us a DM, and we'll get you squared away.
Next, let’s talk about the pledge manager, because many of you have noticed that the invites haven’t gone out yet. The pledge manager is where you’ll pay for shipping or add any extras you missed during the campaign. The reason for the wait is simple: shipping rates fluctuate constantly, both domestically and internationally. Holding off until we’re closer to fulfillment allows us to give you the most accurate rates possible.
If we launched today and rates dropped by March, you’d end up paying more than you need to. If we launched today and rates increased by March, we’d be forced to absorb that difference. Neither scenario helps anyone, so we’re delaying the PM until Q1 of next year to ensure fairness across the board.
Wrapping Up
And that’s everything for this month’s update! We’ll be back toward the end of December with one final update to close out 2025. As always, if anything comes up or you need to reach us, Discord is the fastest way to contact me, but you can also reach us through our other socials or via DM here.
Until next time!
Bradly & the LionWing Team
