Hail, Ironlords!
Impossible decisions are constant companions for those who seek to keep their Ironhive alive, but what if the sweet offer of salvation comes from the forces you can’t fathom? Could the price for survival be too much?
Let’s acquaint yourselves with the Dark Veil — a thin film of reality, that separates the ruins of our world from the realm of the Fallen and a new card archetype in IRONHIVE.
The Dark Veil
Centuries ago, in the attempts to flee the Old World, humanity tried to open a gate to another one. However, on the other side of these portals was not the promised safe haven, but something ancient, hungry, and patient. We named them the Fallen.
The gateways from which they seeped in like the sickness became permanent scars on reality. Now, hundreds of years after they came and destroyed the Old World, these scars stopped looking like the open wounds. The Ironhives rose, religion and industry learned how to survive around the scar, and what once was a visible tear became something more subtle. What remains now is a thin membrane spread over the world, a kind of invisible film humming with forbidden energy from that other side. People call it the Dark Veil.
To the commoners, Dark Veil is a superstition, something out of nightmares or prayed to in sermons. For the priests of the Flame, occultists and scholars, it is a field of study, bordering on ritual and science. They map how the Veil reacts to symbols, sounds and sacrifices. They write equations using devotion and despair as variables. They know that every rite that touches the Dark Veil leaves a mark, a small deformation in this film that separates us from the Fallen.
Harness its power
The Dark Veil cards are the new mechanic in IRONHIVE that offers you a choice — you can accept the powers of the Fallen, but pay the ultimate price.
These cards are the essence of all accumulated knowledge about the Veil. Each card is a precise way to tap into the forbidden powers of the other side, enough to let a specific manifestation of Veil to bleed into reality.
Core Rules
Dark Veil cards offer tremendous power at a high price. Think carefully about what offer you can and cannot accept.
They are not leaving your hand after you play them. The effects of Dark Veil cards are permanent, unless you can find a specific way to break their curse.
Using Dark Veil cards does not consume action points like normal cards. Their effects often trigger at the end of your turn, which means you can’t ignore or postpone them.
Every run, you, as Ironlord, shall decide how much of this corruption you are willing to accept in order to let your colony survive one more winter.
Drawing a Dark Veil card means that the Fallen have cast their gaze upon you. The pact with them offers tremendous power, but it always asks for something back: your citizens, your resources, your devotion, or the very order upon which your Hive stands. The cost may be immediate or delayed, but it always comes.
Are you prepared to lean on the same power that almost ended the world in order to survive?
If you want to stay updated on all the future developments, make sure to wishlist the game as well as subscribe to the IRONHIVE Twitter page and join the CRITICAL REFLEX Discord server.
Let us live to see another day, together.
