The history lesson you never asked for
Halberd Motors’ history begins in the late medieval era. Yes, seriously. In the beginning, there were a group of blacksmiths who were renowned in Great Britain and beyond for making quality pole arms. So renowned, in fact, that they were getting overwhelmed with orders placed for various weaponry, including from the British Army itself. To mitigate this, they pooled their resources together. The resulting alliance persisted through the decades, and eventually more people were hired to help administrate what was quickly becoming a organizational mess. That was the point where Halberd Ironworks was established.
Of course, technology marches on, and Halberd Ironworks took notice. As firearms became the predominant weapons of the battlefield and pole arms were phased out beyond ceremonial use, they diversified their operations and stayed relevant as a major firearms manufacturer. Multiple centers of operations were established, and eventually Halberd Ironworks had factories working in multiple countries, as well as various British colonies. Research and investment was also done in casting techniques, which led to a very special opportunity with the advent of the internal combustion engine: Halberd Ironworks was contracted to cast engine blocks.
One thing led to another, and several factories were set up to make engines and chassis. Those factories were eventually put to use for the British Army throughout both World Wars. Uncountable amounts of ammunition, weapons, vehicles and also a handful of bombed factories later, WWII finally ended. Most divisions of Halberd Ironworks were mostly working autonomously by that point, but they all came at roughly the same conclusion by 1946: people wanted cars, and Halberd had the factories to provide them. Each subdivision thus created a spin-off company named Halberd Motors, with little to no oversight from the original company back in Great Britain.
The end result was effectively multiple companies with possibly very different design and engineering philosophies who just happened to share a name, and confusingly enough occasionally competed with each other. Unfortunately for the main company, poor sales coupled with shockingly poor management brought them to the brink of bankruptcy. While corporate restructuring did allow the various divisions to fully separate themselves from the main company, Halberd Motors UK, a shadow of its former self, couldn’t stay afloat. They were eventually sold off to Volkswagen, becoming another unremarkable brand name among the many already owned by the group. This left the now independent offshoots fending for themselves, each trying to assert itself as the true successor to Halberd Motors. This struggle continues to this day.
TBD. Current goal is to start an Automation campaign, which, as the giant lore blurb might suggest, will begin in 1946, and build up a lineup from there. I also have a few standalone vehicles that were built under Halberd Motors’ brand (such as the Photon from CSR 125 which didn’t exactly fare well…) that I’m not sure I want to include as they are.
If there is something I deem important to mention in the first post and is irrelevant to the company lore/lineup, it’ll be in here. I consider myself a beginner regarding car engineering and design, so criticism and advice regarding my vehicles (…when I actually have any in the thread) is welcome.
That feeling when you're more diligent in maintaining a changelog for a forum post than any software you've actually written
- 2020-02-26: Expanded lore a bit