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From Hydra Miniatures

War Rocket - the game of pulp sci-fi space combat. The rules will focus on the smaller spaceship missions that are the mainstay of pulp sci-fi comics such as Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, or Dan Dare. War Rocket is designed to be a fun and fast, mission-centered game in which each player controls no more than a dozen sparking, buzzing rocketships.

 

"War Rocket is a fast-paced miniature space combat game set in the retro sci-fi future of the 24th century. The brave Galacteers fight to protect mankind from sinister alien forces. Will you command a fleet of Galecteer rockets or choose the forces of the domineering Valkeeri, the brutal Imperium of Marduk, or the enigmatic Zenithians? You can play a game of War Rocket with fleets of 10-20 ships in less than 90 minutes with minimal use of tokens and absolutely no paper record keeping! The 78-page War Rocket rulebook also includes 8 scenarios with specific objectives to encourage tactical decision making and narrative campaigns. The rules also include advanced rules include special actions such as boarding and ramming, space stations, and space objects such as planetoids and asteroid fields. Rocket customization rules allow you to upgrade your rockets with options such as force fields, lucky pilots, and disruptor beams. You can also use these rules to create your own new fleets."

 

7/29/2012 - Hydra now has the Space Pirates rules supplement for War Rocket now on their site under the Downloads section.  This free 14 page PDF details the history of space piracy in the War Rocket universe, features rocket stats for the Space Pirates, and introduces new crew and equipment customizations. The Space Pirate PDF also includes the Squadrons of Infamy—three new pirate fleets from our Space Pirate Clan Contest winners as well as a short story from War Rocket creator John Douma.

Also the miniatures for the Space Pirates class 3 and class 4 ships will be released on July 31st.

 

2/6/2012 - War Rocket update from Hydra as posted on TMP, they Space Pirate ships of class 1 and 2 are available and the class 2 had some issues and was remastered.  Space Pirate class 3 master has been printed and the class 4 will go next week so production miniatures should be available soon.  They are finishing up the Space Pirate free PDF supplement and should have it posted near the end of the month.  A new Top Secret fleet for War Rocket is also in the works.

Space Pirates class 1

Space Pirates class 2

Space Pirates class 3

 

2/27/2010 - The Galacteer class 4 and the Valkeeri class 4 miniatures are now available plus here are some preview pictures of the Imperial class 3 and class 4s.  We can hope to see some previews of the next 2 War Rocket fleets sometime this year.

Galacteer Class 4

Valkeeri Class 4

Imperial Class 3

Imperial Class 4

 

8/14/2010 - The rulebook and new ships are now available from Hydra's Online Store.  The Galacteer class 4 and Zenithian Class 4 minis will be available in September.  The Imperial Class 3 and Class 4 minis are due to show up in October.

Galacteer Class 3

Zenithians Class 3

Zenithians Class 4

Valkeeri Class 3

 

8/1/2010 - "After two years of hard work, Hydra Miniatures is pleased to announce the completion of the War Rocket rulebook, just in time for Gen Con Indy. This last month was a flurry of activity, as the Hydra team put the finishing touches on editing, illustrating and designing this stunning book. We are very proud of our final product, and we are exited to share the action-packed cover by talented Spanish illustrator Diego Gisbert Llorens. This high-quality rulebook is 78 pages in length and will retail for $25."

"We expect to have the War Rocket rulebook and the latest rocket models uploaded to our online store shortly after our return from GenCon."

 

4/25/2010 - Wave 1 of the miniatures for War Rocket have been released.  This first wave of War Rocket miniatures includes the first two rockets from each of the four factions: Galacteers (human space patrol), Imperial (forces of the Marduk the Tyrant), Valkeeri (domineering space amazons) and Zenithians (saucer men from the seventh dimension.)   This minis are the class 1 and class 2 ships, work is progressing well on the next two ships from each faction. The large models will be composite resin and metal kits. In the next few weeks, we will be heading into the layout phase for our War Rocket rules. The final 8 rockets and the rules will be available at Gen Con Indianapolis from August 5-8.

Galacteer class 1

Imperial class 1

Zenithians class1

Valkeeri class 1

Galacteer class 2

Imperial class 2

Zenithians class 2

Valkeeri class 2

 

11/7/2009 - Hydra had samples of some of the ships at Origins and GenCon this summer but no word about release. SCN Field Operative Phil Shanton recently emailed Hydra about the status of this game and their response was.....

"The rules are nearly finished, but still need art and layout. We are working on the fourth fleet right now. Obviously we blew the October deadline, but we hope to pick up speed and finish the project soon.  It's been a learning experience and I've been surprised how much work goes into the production of an entire game from scratch. It's going to be a great game and series of figures, and my best estimate for release is Spring 2010."

 

2/17/2009 - Hydra had a War Rocket demo at DunDraCon and in the notice on their account they state "The War Rocket rulebook and miniatures are scheduled for general release during the fourth quarter of 2009."

 

1/3/2009 - In Hydra's announcement of their Post Christmas Sale, they mentioned:

"we are extremely pleased with the progress on War Rocket, and plan to release the rulebook and miniatures in August 2009."

 

10/6/2008 - The latest from Hydra Miniatures:

Hydra Miniatures would like to thank everyone for applying to be official playtesters for War Rocket. The War Rocket development team only expected a maximum of 12-18 applications and were stunned to get a whopping 63 applicants! The caliber of the playtesters is very high and the decision making process will take a little longer than anticipated. We hope to notify everyone about our selections by the middle of next week.

Also we have two work in progress photos of new War Rocket ships. The first ship is a class 2 patrol ship from the Imperial fleet of Marduk the Tyrant. This ship is designed by master 3D sculptor Phil Beauchamp and this three-piece white metal casting will be approximately 2.5 inches (60mm) long.

Our second preview is from the Zenithians--the Saucer Men from the Eight Dimension! This small class 1 attack saucer was designed by our talented new digital sculptor Stephen Meli. This Zenithian saucer will be a one-piece casting approximately 1 inch (25mm) in diameter.

 

9/23/2008 - War Rocket needs playtesters:

Attention Space Cadets!

Hydra Miniatures needs a handful of dedicated playtesters for its upcoming pulp sci-fi spaceship combat game War Rocket. These speedy game rules do not attempt to simulate space combat using the laws of physics. Instead, War Rocket uses the laws of action adventure to provide a fun and fast-paced game experience.

You can play a game of War Rocket with fleets of 10-15 ships in less than 90 minutes with minimal use of tokens and absolutely no paper record keeping! The game emphasizes speed and maneuverability over firepower and encourages the types of space dogfights that are the mainstay of pulp sci-fi stories and serials.

The War Rocket rules contain a number of scenarios with specific objects to encourage tactical decision making and narrative campaigns. The advanced section of the War Rocket rules includes ship customization options like force-fields, lucky pilots, and disruptor beams. Space phenomenon like asteroid fields, planetoids, and quantum vortexes as well as a bestiary of space creatures add extra depth to your War Rocket games.

We require playtesters to play 3 or more games with their wargaming group and report the results to the War Rocket development team. Playtesters will receive playtest credit in the final printed rulebook and will earn credit towards free War Rocket miniatures.

If you are interested in being a playtester, please write a paragraph describing your previous gaming experiences and explain why you think you should chosen as an official playtester. E-mail your paragraph to hydraminiatures@yahoo.com with the phrase “War Rocket playtest” in the subject line. Playtest applications will be accepted until Monday, September 29, 2008 and the lucky playtesters will be notified by e-mail shortly thereafter.

 

7/21/2008 - Matt updated the status of War Rocket rules and miniatures on Hydra's Blog.

Highlights are:

We are currently doing extensive playtesting of the rules to insure that gamers will have an exciting, satisfying set of pulp sci-fi space combat rules. The quality of the rules is very important to us so we are taking our time to make sure we “get it right.”

Since the War Rocket ships are smooth and lack the ‘greeble’ of Star Wars style ships, the surfaces need to be extremely smooth and free of the texture left by the 3d printer. We’ve had problems making silicon molds since rapid prototyping (RP) resin leeches chemicals that cause the molds to cure improperly. This resulted in very bumpy, porous castings.

Our new printer Todd Boyce of Ninja Magic successfully steered us toward a solution he uses on his own ships. The RP master prints are taken to a jeweler and molded in a jeweler’s moldmaking material. The RP resin model is burnt away in a high temerpature kiln and molten bronze is poured into the hallow cavity in the heated mold. The mold is broken open to reveal a very clean bronze master casting. We can clean up any imperfections such as printing lines in the bronze with jewelers buffing tools. The result is a nearly flawless casting!

We will be previewing the first few production castings in a few weeks. 

Galacteer class 1: Final bronze master casting. Size (1.25″ or approx. 30 mm long)

Galacteer class 2: RP resin master. Size (2.5″ or approx. 60 mm long)

We’re gamers ourselves so we know it’s tough waiting for products when you are really excited about them. Hydra Miniatures has very high standards of quality and we are working hard to make sure the figures and rules are simply top notch products! Over the next few weeks, we’ll be showing previews of our first productions castings and the first images of the Imperial fleet of Marduk the Tyrant. Thanks for your patience and stay tuned for more War Rocket information!

 

1/20/2008 - Matt Beauchamp,  president/principal sculptor of Hydra Miniatures has announced they have a new game in the works, War Rocket.

"We opened in October 2007 and our main product range is a line of 32mm Pulp sci-fi figures based on pulp art from the 30's 40's and 50's. However, we are venturing into spaceship combat territory with our new game in development--War Rocket!

We hope to have the game ready for release this summer."

This additional information is posted on their website:

Our 32mm pulp sci-fi figures have proven wildly popular and we are currently working on more pulp sci-fi goodies. In addition, we are extremely excited to announce our upcoming product War Rocket-- the game of pulp sci-fi space combat. The rules are being designed by master painter Dave Pauwels and will focus on the smaller spaceship missions that are the mainstay of pulp sci-fi comics such as Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, or Dan Dare. War Rocket is designed to be a fun and fast, mission-centered game in which each player controls no more than a dozen sparking, buzzing rocketships.

The miniatures are being created by veteran 3D designer Phil Beauchamp and the masters were output using a 3D printer. Metal castings are made from these resin masters and the detail on these models is incredible. The scale of the rockets is approximately 1:285 (6mm) and most spaceships will be 1 to 3 inches long. However, we'll be designing larger battleships that will be 4-5 inches long.

Currently there are four factions in development: Galacteers (Galactic Space Patrol), Imperial Forces of Marduk the Tyrant, Zenithian saucer-men, and Space Pirates/Marauders. The two ships in the illustration above are from the Galacteer faction.