Merry Monday Heartbreakers,

From a postage & fulfilment perspective there’s no changes to announce here.
Everything is in place and on schedule to lock addresses in mid-Jan, as mentioned in the previous message. Please check your address is correct and fix it if it’s not!

We’re here with a little pre-holiday gift for all of you. (Gift is stretching it, you did buy it for yourselves.) 

Heart GM screens are pounding their way through the presses and beginning to be stacked ready for shipping to us. We’re expecting a pallet delivery to our UK warehouse before the end of 2024. 

Here are some gorgeous photos of the physical objects as they’re coming together at our printer.

Feast your eyes on these beauties, and imagine how beautiful they’re going to look on your tables early next year.

With all the files off to printing we figured it was time to update the digital files in Backerkit for Heart & Dagger in the Heart. These are now the final versions from the community feedback process. 

We have had a long discussion (honestly, too long) about the best size for web pdfs, oscillating wildly between high quality art rendering vs small file size for easy use on your phone. In the end we’ve settled on a compromise - both. 

So you should find a new file in your BackerKit account right now with a small file size version, perfect for quick loading on your tablet (or even your phones, ya filthy animals). Then there’s a higher size file to let you really zoom in on those art pieces.

We’ve also added the PDF version of the GM Screen Booklets for you to download, and a pdf version of the GM screen itself, which will make wonderful backgrounds for VTTs, streamed games or just to wrap around your GM notebook with sticky-backed plastic like its 1999.

These should all be available to you through your BackerKit login RIGHT NOW!

Happy Holidays to all of those who celebrate. Happy Sun-death to all those in the Northern Hemisphere who don’t. Good BBQ-season to our Antipodean friends.

Have a fantastic end to your 2024s and we’re excited to get you all your Dagger in the Heart goodies in 2025.
Alex, Fulfilment & Freight RRD

Hey Folks, 

Ian (developer for The Expanse RPG) here with an update on The Expanse: Transport Union Edition crowdfunder. First, I want to thank all of you for helping to make this crowdfunder a smashing success! I knew that there is still a lot of love and excitement for The Expanse out there, and you all showed it to be true. 

 

I’m happy to say that things are coming along quite well. All but one chapter of the revisions for the core rulebook have been completed. The writing for both Free Navy Conflict is completed and in development now, and all but the final chapter of Daemon’s Gambit, a sourcebook and adventure series set during the Transport Union era has been written. I’m really excited for this series that offers a deep dive into this unexplored period of The Expanse! Finally, the Crew Companion is underway, and I feel confident that we’re on track to have all of these books available for backers by July.  

 

If you know folks who missed the crowdfunder, a link will be up soon for late backers. Not only will they be able to get the books at the crowdfunding prices, but they can unlock the final campaign achievement, the PDF adventure Shadow of a Dream! Spread the word so that we can hit that last stretch goal so that Inner Worlds adventure trilogy can be complete. 

 

If you don’t have the original edition and you’re excited to play The Expanse RPG, don’t forget that the brand new Quickstart for The Expanse RPG: Transport Union Edition is available to download. The Quickstart has everything you need to jump in and start playing right away: the basic rules of play, six new pre-gen PCs, and a new adventure called Lost But Not Alone, set during the TU era. 

 

That’s about all for now. See you next month with more updates.


Bonus: PLEDGE MANAGER UPDATE!

Hey all, this is your friendly neighborhood admin. 

The Pledge Manager is just about ready to go, we're waiting on one final estimate for the Norse Foundry Dice before we can get the Smoke Test going. With any luck, that should start later today. We are expecting to be able to run the Smoke Test over the weekend, with the remaining surveys going out on Monday. That's the plan anyway. *fingers crossed*

For those who are not familiar, the "smoke test" is where we send an initial survey to 5% of backers across all pledge levels, so we can make sure everything is working smoothly. Once we're sure that there are no problems, or we fix the issues that do come up, we can send out the remaining surveys to all backers. This is where you'll have the opportunity to upgrade your pledge, grab any add-ons you missed from the campaign, choose which dice or miniatures you had options for, etc...

We usually try to keep the pledge manager open as long as we can to give folks plenty of time to make adjustments or update their addresses as needed, but we will have to lock orders and charge cards when the books are just about ready to go to the printer, which will probably happen in spring(ish). We'll make sure to give everyone as much early-warning as possible that it's coming.

If you have any questions or concerns about your pledge, or if you're one of our smoke test backers and encounter strange problems, please email us at [email protected]. For some reason we don't get regular notifications for comments here, so the best way to reach us quickly, is email.

Hey everyone! We hope you're all having a lovely holiday season. Here are the project updates for December 2024.

As always, we want to start by inviting you to join us on The Gauntlet Discord server. Jason has been sharing regular previews for this new edition of The Between. Come join us to check that stuff out and discuss! 

If you added on Brindlewood Bay and/or Nephews in Peril, we need your address, so please fill out the below Google Form if you haven't already done so. We'll then cross-reference with our list of add-on customers from BackerKit. US customers will have their books sent out as soon as we have your address. International customers will have their books in late January (we need to get supply to the international fulfiller) but please go ahead and fill out the form. Please note: you will still have to fill out your pledge manager survey for The Between whenever we send those out (some time in January). Here is the Google form.

If you pledged at a level that gets you online game sessions from the game creators, be on the lookout for an email from us after the holidays.

Progress is moving along nicely on the books. We expect the draft of The Between to be complete and ready for layout by the end of the year. Shadow Society draft should be done by the end of January. We don't yet have an estimate on when the Suns draft will be ready for layout—it will depend on how development goes on Court of Wolves and Blood & Coal—but mid to late February is probably about right. 

An exciting announcement for the holidays: The Nutcracker Threat will be added to Shadow Society! The Nutcracker sees Hargrave House on the trail of a serial killer who is emasculating ballet dancers and posing their bodies in grotesque tableaux around the city. You can pick up the original version of The Nutcracker for free on DTRPG.

As ever, thanks for your support. Happy holidays!

-The Between team

Ciao Paisans! If you have a second, I sure would appreciate a quick vote for Weird Heroes of Public Access for EnWorlds Most Anticipated Game of 2025! I’m up against the big dogs so your support would really help!

https://www.enworld.org/threads/its-time-to-vote-for-2025s-most-anticipated-ttrpgs.709182/

All files are out to the printing company, and the zines are already safely stored in the Mozzarella Mausoleum (my basement)!

Happy Holidays!

Hello Everyone,

Before I get to the meat of this update, I wanted to remind everyone to check their e-mail boxes and DriveThruRPG libraries to make sure that you have received and downloaded you Random Acts of Violet PDF content.  These download links were sent back at the beginning of November.  After posting my last update, I have heard from a handful of people that they had a problem with receipt of their digital content.  Also, from looking at my DTRPG download counts, there are still a number of people who haven't accessed their RAoV content.  Please reach out to me at [email protected] if you have any issues regarding your PDF's.

For this update I wanted to share a behind the scenes look at how the printing process works and how it was executed for my Random Acts of Violet campaign.  As a total process geek, I find this stuff really interesting and I am sure there are others out there who will feel the same way.  This post is for you.  If your only interest is in the fun gaming content, that is cool too.  If that is you, then the rest of this particular update may not be your cup of tea, so feel free to skip to the end.

First, I wanted to show you the final printed product, and what everyone who backed Random Acts of Violet at the physical content level will be getting.  Your content will show up as a 48 page, saddle stitched (staple) book, along with a shrink wrapped package of 5 individual, full color, cardstock stretch goal adventures/content.  All of this is in a full 8.5" x 11" format. 

One of the things I really enjoyed about this project was that my local printer let me come into their workshop to see the entire printing process, front to back.  It was really cool to see how my  digital files came to life on their printer machines.  Here is the finished print job on a pallet, just before it was shipped to our fulfillment partners. 

For this project, the interior pages were printed on massive sheets, of 8 pages each, using a Heidelberg press.  These pages were in black & white, so it was a fairly straightforward print job.  Here is the actual press that printed these pages.

I was unaware of how many times the printer needed to make test runs, just to ensure everything was lined up and laid out correctly.  This step was done using recycled scrap paper so as to minimize waste.  As you can see in the picture below, the printer would run 3-4 test prints over the same sheets of paper, focusing on the print marks and margins to make sure everything was square and that all of the bleeds (pictures going off the edge of the page) were correct.   

Here are some of the finished print sheets for the interior pages before they were cut to size.  For a size comparison, I placed one of the finished 8.5" x 11" books on top.

The book's color cover was made with a completely different printer.  This was due to the fact that it was a 4 color print job with a special coating and thicker stock of paper.  Here is the printer that created the covers.

Overall, I had a ton of fun seeing how my books and content were physically produced.  If you made it this far in the update, I hope that you found this peek behind the scenes interesting as well.  

Thanks again for all of your support.  I can't wait to hear that the fulfillment is complete so that I know everyone has received all of the awesome Purple Planet adventuring content created by Goodman Games and all of the Horde creators.  I know I can't wait to start running players through the trials and tribulations found on this alien world. 

Tim Sattley
High Dive Games

Hello, archivists!

Winter has arrived in here Kansas! Are you staying warm, deep within the archives? Is the darkness that shrouds you like a blanket keeping you—and whatever else lurks in there—warm? We hope so…and we hope that, no matter what you’re celebrating, you have a cozy December!

This is a tradition here at MCG: we give you a $10 coupon for the MCG Shop. Use it to get a little something for yourself or a loved one—or turn it into a donation to one of three charities we’re supporting this holiday season. We make the donation (100% goes to the charity) and you pay nothing!

This year, we're supporting the Southern Poverty Law Center, Heart to Heart International, and the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund!

The deluxe edition of The Magnus Archives Roleplaying Game reached our US warehouse recently. There were some unfortunate freight delays getting it to our UK and Australia warehouses, though, but those are now substantively resolved—so we hope to begin fulfillment of this beautiful book in the days to come. Look for an email from us soon!

We’ve received printer samples of the Magnus Archives Playmat from two different vendors and picked the strongest one (the one on top in the photo). It’s an oversized playmat like many we’ve done in the past, and it is currently in production. Because it’s coming from China, it won’t end up shipping until after Chinese New Year early next year, but we’re very excited to get this out to you! Thank you once again for helping us bring this handy tool to life.

We have incredibly exciting news to share with you today, backers—if you love the Magnus Archives RPG and all the high-quality, immersive supplements we're making for it, you won’t want to miss this…

STATEMENT BEGINS. There is a game. It seems to be about...me. Well, us. The whole team. They're playing through my memories. They're—lord—they're creating new investigations. New statements. New webs. I have a feeling this is just the beginning of something. Something big.

Crowdfunding early 2025, The Magnus Archives: Tangled in the Web is your chance to get the corebook, as well as supplements and exclusive items, with, as always, fantastic crowdfunding deals! (If you like A Guest for Mr. Spider, well, there may be similar exclusives in this campaign.) Don't miss it!

Sign up to be notified and get an exclusive Magnus Institute patch FREE with your rewards!

Thanks again for your support!
 —Team MCG

First off let me say, Merry Christmas to those who celebrate and Happy Holidays to those who don't, and Merry Monday to whomever is left over.

To say it has been a helluva a year for me would be to understate it.

Clearly we do not have the no-art laid out version here. I could make excuses, I could do a dance, but that would be sharing private information from members of the team that is not my place to share.

We missed our very loose target date, and for that we are sorry.

The game, of course is still playable as is, it just doesn't look as sexy as it should, yet.

We will get there, do not worry. It just may take longer than expected or predicted due to things that are literally beyond my control.

That said you will continue to get monthy updates, like the one attached here, until the end of the project, with the last one being sent out when we are ready to start the print process, et al.

In this version you will see the Zenith Universe chapter has been removed, and made it's own document. There is a very simple reason for that, most folks just want to use the game and not the setting, so I decided it would be better for everyone to have the book of rules, a setting guide, and the adventure/npc book (including all of the ICON level creations). Some will agree, some will not, but hopefully you'll all enjoy the final product.

Without and further ado, attached you will find this month's updates, I hope 2024 ends well for you and your family, and that 2025 brings us all the success and joy we deserve.

It's been a helluva year!

Andrew Collas

Hey there,

It's been a while, but I thought I'd just drop in with some news before we head into the quantum timewarp that is the festive season.

So, after the campaign was over, I announced that we would be honouring late pledges in the target for stetch goals. Well, that has now served us well as we have blasted past our final stretch goal: The Headlands.

Which, I suppose, means I will have to finally spill the beans on what the Headlands actually is. There were a few valiant (and expansion-inspiring) attempts made by some of you.

Well, it is what it is. Imagine a world that is situated on the head of an emergent creature. A creature whose size spans that of a large town -- or bigger if you wish. It's a place where things shift and not everything is what it seems.

If you want the general visuals on this, check out Simon's piece of art, Forever Home which is also available in the late-pledge add-ons.

As with the whole project, Simon has created original creatures based on his work, so The Headlands may look slightly different, but you get the idea.

Okay, that's all for now.

On behalf of Simon and myself (Tim) I'd like to wish you all a great festive season, whatever your plans are and we'll be back with the updates next year ;)

Be kind!

Tim & Simon

Hello backers,

Before we close for the holidays, I want to give you an update about where the Fifth Season RPG is at and when you can expect it. The game is currently scheduled for a March release in print, with the PDF coming the month before. Art has continued to come in, so it’ll largely be a matter of finishing the book’s layout in January. We plan to send the Game Moderator’s Kit to print at the same time, so they can ship together.

So, that’s the plan. N.K. Jemisin has already read the game and given us feedback, which we have implemented. Once the layout is done, we will send her a PDF for final approval. When we get the thumbs up, you’ll get the PDF and we’ll send it to print.

Thank you for your patience. Have a great holiday season!
Chris Pramas

And now, some more art previews with commentary from Hiromi!

This is Moasi, everyone’s favorite Strongback! (or at least Hiromi’s favorite) She’s coming back from a successful hunt that took care of a wolf threat to the comm. As a bonus, it’ll provide a warm fur pelt, a fair bit of meat, and assorted other bits that the comm can make use of. Art by Danil Luzin.

This is Kaneya Fivering, formerly of the Somidlats, now quite obviously based out of Fulcrum. He’s out on a mission, fixing up a comm wall that was damaged in an earth shake. Art by Danil Luzin.

This is a Season-changed kirkhusa. They’re ordinarily quite cute and cuddly, but this one will take your face off if you’re not careful. Art by Claudio Pozas.

Moasi’s back! (I told you she was Hiromi’s favorite Strongback) Here she is giving a commless raider a quick lesson. Art by Claudio Pozas.