We’re so exited about the interest in ESR Series 3 – we’ve literally had to break shipments into waves to manage demand – that also led to us beginning to ship ESR Series 3 ten days early so we could get ahead of shipping pre-orders as soon as possible. As people have started receiving their rulebooks the last several days, quite a few are asking: “Where are the Stats?”
ESR Stat Cards
Whether you’ve been watching our announcements or looking through your new ESR rulebook, you obviously know that we’re publishing Card Decks for easy reference and convenient pickup games so that game runners and players alike don’t have to mess with rosters unless they prefer em. So one answer is: You can get Commander & Unit Stats from ESR Decks & Stats Packs. But you don’t have to buy card decks to get stats.
Free Summary Downloads
Players might have noticed that last month we published Commander Stats on our Downloads page and that there is presently a place holder for Unit Stats. We’ll be publishing Unit Stats just as we did Commander Stats for free download. So if you dislike cards for some reason, or maybe you prefer roster sheets, you’ll be able to pull down stats that way.
ESR Series 3 Campaign Guides
Thirteen months ago we began shipping our first ESR Series 3 Campaign Guide: Iberia-1s3: To Assure My Dynasty, 1808 in Iberia. Building up to the release of ESR Series 3, we had to get Iberia-1 and 1812-1 back in-print, but we didn’t want to have players buy a Campaign Guide just to realize a couple of months later they needed a new one updated for Series 3… so… we included Series 3 Stats (as well as 2nd Ed. Stats) in both Iberia-1s3 and 1812-1s3. Therefore, another answer to where Series 3 Stats can be obtained is from our Series 3 Campaign Guides.
But Why Aren’t They ‘Just’ Included in the Rulebook?
Honestly? Cost. We could have included Commander, Formation, and Unit Stats (as we did in 2nd Ed. via The Complete Player’s Guide) but we wanted to lower the cost of ESR Series 3 (which we did, by half, in addition to introductory pricing and upgrade pricing) and including them would have increased the size of the rulebook and its production cost along with its weight and cost to ship. Additionally, any ratings list we included necessarily couldn’t be exhaustive (the included lists in 2nd Ed. CPG-1 were big but still not exhaustive) because there are just too many factions/nations and Commanders, Units, etc… to cover. So, we decided instead to provide these Stats via three different methods: Cards, Campaign Guides, and free downloads, so that players could access them the way they most preferred. These offerings also have the benefit of not forcing each player to pay for (or download) all of the Stats when they only care about a subset.
OK, BUT WHEN WILL THEY BE LIVE‽‽
Yes, about that. We started shipping ESR Series 3 in waves ten days early to try and get ahead of order shipments as best as possible. Our plan was to have the Unit Stat summaries available for download by 31 March (planned release date) or just after, so that as players were receiving their rulebooks they’d be able to download Stats. We’re still aiming for that but obviously it won’t be exhaustive at launch. We’re focused on maintaining parity between our cards and downloads, so French, English, and Russians will be first up. Austrians are not far behind and we’ll be continuing to broaden the offering over time.
What the Heck is the ‘‽’ You’re Using in These Headings?
That’s an interrobang, basically just what it looks like, a mix of an exclamation point, i.e. a ‘bang’ and an interrogative, i.e. a question, used informally to express a mixture of the two motives/emotions.