And how did I miss it?

According to Albion's Facebook page, about three months ago.

It's curious that Albion didn't announce its release on this forum as they did with every previous model.

Here is a photo that I found over at Albion Europe, showing all the released Maestros.

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Maestros

Should have come to ISMAC... they even let us play with some in Mr. Tobler's Leckuechner Messer class

Albion seems to have been pulling back on its forum-based online marketing for quite some time. They seem to be using Twitter (where they have 81 followers) and Facebook (where 2,284 people "like" them) instead of forums such as ours (which has 23,321 registered users).

So how is the marxbruder? Does anyone have one? Obviously some of you have played with them.

I'm a little surprised by the cord wrapped grip on a messer. I like it on my I.33, but it's a little jarring on the marxbruder.

The blade looks perfect for my use from the picture, and the cross and pommel are nice, but I'm not sold on the grip yet.

As for where they update, it's also not posted on their front page on their main site, just in the maestro section. I went there to look at the Meyer, and was surprised to see the Marxbruder, which I'm frankly far more interested in.

Hi Craig (and everyone else)!

Craig Shackleton wrote:

So how is the marxbruder? Does anyone have one? Obviously some of you have played with them.

I have two, purchased at ISMAC. They've seen considerable use both in my classes here and in our forthcoming DVD "Sword, Buckler, and Messer".

Quote:

I'm a little surprised by the cord wrapped grip on a messer. I like it on my I.33, but it's a little jarring on the marxbruder.

Yes, I wish they did the proper knife-form scale grip. I actually don't care for the cord grip in any case; it's pretty abrasive.

Quote:

The blade looks perfect for my use from the picture, and the cross and pommel are nice, but I'm not sold on the grip yet.

Handling is superb on these - they're wonderful in that regard. My two, plus the two we tested at ISMAC all had too defined a back spine, which was prone to notching. They've since rounded this off, mitigating the problem, or at least to a degree.

Quote:

As for where they update, it's also not posted on their front page on their main site, just in the maestro section. I went there to look at the Meyer, and was surprised to see the Marxbruder, which I'm frankly far more interested in.

It was still listed as a "reserve yours" thing on their site well after ISMAC too. I only became aware via this thread that it's now official.

Long story short: there are things I wish were different, but on the whole these are really great.

Cheers,

Christian

I have one, as do a couple of my students. We all had preordered these when they were much cheaper, and for the price we paid, these are amazing. I'll admit that at the current price they're a little harder to justify, but they are still quite a damn good trainer.

Like Christian, I do wich they'd used the scale grips. Nonetheless, that's more of an aesthetic thing for me than anything else. The handling is fantastic: It's exactly what I want out of a messer. There is a reasonable amount of flex in the thrust, but the main portion of the blade is still quite stiff. These also are quite tough. Pamela Muir and David Rowe both have the original version with the squared off spine, but I received mine with the spine rounded, and mine only came a week later, so they fixed that problem very early on.

All in all, it's a wonderful trainer, and I super happy to have mine.

Just a guess, but I imagine they see our Forum as after-market competition for their new sales. I know I would if I were in their situation. Much rather sell a new unit than see a used one sold for less, perhaps!

I think it's too bad that Albion has reduced it's forum participation as myArmoury.com is pretty much where I've learned about every new release and planned new edition from Albion. I'm one of those who "Like" Albion on facebook but to be honest, I spend so little time there that I think I've only seen two or three Albion posts in the time I've followed them.

For what it's worth, I would ask that Albion go back to participating more on forums as it keeps me informed and more importantly, it keeps my enthusiasm for this hobby at a high level.

Hello all,

Well, this thread certainly morphed! ;)

We (Freelance Academy Press) advertise here, at SFI, the Armour Archive, and via Facebook/Twitter. I have to say that each has been valuable. In particular, we very much appreciate what a vendor-friendly environment myArmoury is.

@Jonathan: We've had good luck with our Facebook announcements - any one of them is guaranteed incremental busines.

Cheers,

Christian

Apart form the marxbruder (if in fact they did not post it's release here) are there any other products they have not introduced on these forums which have been released in the last few years?

They probably seem less active becasue they have not had many new releases lately.

Or it could be because they suffered alot of negative feedback last time they announced price increases and decided the abuse didn't warrant their further participation here.

I suspect that the reality is that Albion is spending their efforts trying to penetrate new markets and widen their reach. They already have a pretty damn good lock on this audience as a marketing demographic. As a small company, they have limited resources. They have to use their resources carefully and still maintain the same basic goal of all businesses: grow or die.

Regardless of the reason, speculation doesn't get us anywhere and, in particular, negative speculation gets us to a place where we don't really want to go.

They forgot to announce a product here. No big deal. We found it anyway, right? :) ;) ;)