Battleborn is an upcoming action-packed sword and sorcery magazine curated by Sean CW Korsgaard and published by IronAge Media. Read this to learn the scope of this supercharged magazine, the crowdfunding campaign needed to make it a reality (Indiegogo Aug 1st!), and learn Black Gate Exclusive scoops!

As an editor at Baen, Sean CW Korsgaard championed the Hanuvar series, and was mentored by the author, the late Howard Andrew Jones.  Sean CW Korsgaard states that Battleborn is emulating Howard’s run on Tales from the Magician’s Skull, both in style and in terms of authors and artists tapped. The magazine will feature a new Hanuvar tale from the late author, and from first issue to last issue, this will be on the masthead: “Howard Andrew Jones – Editor Emeritus.”

Expect:

• Contemporary authors
• Classic reprints
• And, perhaps adding to a Heavy Metal flair, each issue will have a short comic crafted by Schyler Hernstrom.
• If all stretch goals are met, they will have room for 20k words more per issue… which WILL be open to submissions.

Campaign Timing:

• Started Aug 1st 10:30 AM EST (synchronized with a Gen Con Writers Symposium panel on S&S)
• Runs through mid-September
• Linksto IndieGogo Page

Battleborn Magazine Gears Up to Join the Frontlines of Fantasy!

We launch on Indiegogo for our first year — and we can’t wait to share what we’ve got planned!

A few say that short fiction is dead. That the market is gone, that AI will wipe out what is left.

We publish sword-and-sorcery. Our genre has survived worse, we’ll be damned if we surrender now to robots and romantasy.

And if this be our Ragnarök, let our death be magnificent.

Rally behind us, write for us – and get ready to remember what glories heroic fantasy can achieve.

Become a hero.

Become a legend.

Become BATTLEBORN!

Issue 1 TOC thus far (in no particular order)

But you are needed on the front lines now!

Updates on the campaign will more details, but we need you to help the war!

• Front #1: Ideas for a THIRD classic reprint for Issue 3:

  • Battleborn is eyeing stories from Michael Shea and David Drake, but is considering a third.  They are leaning towards Karl Edward Wagner or Roger Zelazny, but feedback is open to the Black Gate comment section! Make your cases below.

• Front #2: The Indiegogo campaign features the default cover, but variants exist!

  • Soon, or perhaps already, backers will be able to vote on their favorite.  Will it be  “A” the default, or one of the other three?
  • Logistics have not been ironed out in full, but the cover artist has some limitations.  But Battleborn wants to know backers’ preferences so they can work toward making the favorite the cover.
  • Which cover(s) feel best?
  • Note: the top left is the current official one  (one with less detail than the initial drawings).  B_D are concepts based on other drawings created during the design phase and colorized to facilitate this vote (if the crowd prefers something other than A, the editor will reconnect with the artist to share the polling data and work on options to go forward).

Crowd Fund Now!