£27,500 hit! Next up: shards in print and cardstock handouts.
about 5 years ago – Wed, Apr 10, 2019 at 01:03:43 AM

Hey folks,

We're in the final days now! 

We've unlocked Behind Bestial Eyes, another PDF mini-supplement all about the inhuman intelligences of this land. In it you’ll find:

• The Foundling, a Hero who grew up among inhuman creatures and now finds themself pulled between their House and their monstrous family.
• The Chimera, a weapon of war created by the Kitrean Empire’s experiments with ambiance who has broken free from their handlers and now seeks their own path.
• Essays on inhuman sentience from Sawyer Rankin, and weird fantasy warfare from Thea Don-Siemion.
• The Crucible - a wonder your House can work towards to reshape their biology or that of another group.

And next up - in less than £2000 - we have our third Shard of Mysthea. Wield terrifying magic as the Warlock, go beyond humanity with the Crystal-Claimed, build the Great Network or the Grand Binding, and read essays on from Kira Magrann on body augmentation, identity and magical technology, and Erika Shepherd onrelationships, magic, and relationship magic... all in The Silent Arts.

Look forward to it!

£25k hit! Dice, Cards and stickers... and French translation!
about 5 years ago – Tue, Apr 09, 2019 at 01:38:24 AM

Hey folks,

With just under 70 hours to go we've hit 200% funded! That means we've unlocked these addons:

And yes, every map board will now come with the sticker pack!

Mysthea in French!

Since we launched this campaign we've been inundated with requests to get this game translated - particularly into French. We're happy to announce that we'll be working with the folks at 500 Nuances de Geek to translate this game, and when they're done backers here will have an option to pick up the French version of the game for cheap!

New Stretch Goals

So, what can we hit in the remaining time left in this campaign? 

At £30k, we'll unlock The Silent Arts. In this Shard of Mysthea, we look at Qoam magic in full, glorious detail. How does society change when everyone has some measure of telekinetic power? How can ambiance warp the biology and social fabric of a community? When your bonds with others empower your strongest magic, what does it mean to be a powerful mage?  We'll also include:

• A boundary-pushing Hero in the Warlock.
• The Crystal-claimed, a House changed and made immortal by exposure to Qoam ambiance - but who are now forever tied to their crystal keep.
• A Wonder to bring together the borderland's greatest minds in a Great Network.
• The Great Binding, a Quest your characters can embark on to seal away an arcane horror for good.

But that's not all! If we hit this tier we'll include every shard we unlock in the core book - both PDF and Print options. We estimate that this'll add around 30-40 pages to its page count.

If we hit £33k we'll upgrade the accessories again! The handout cards will become handout boards, made of thick, glossy, beautiful cardstock. And we'll also add another card deck - a deck of Resources to help you keep track of the Surpluses and Needs your Houses are grappling with. Expect more details on these as we approach the goal!

Looking forward to seeing where we can go!

£23k hit - First Shard of Mysthea unlocked! Here's what's next...
about 5 years ago – Thu, Apr 04, 2019 at 09:33:05 PM

Hey folks,

We’ve hit £23,000 - The Rebel Underground has been unlocked! All backers will receive this PDF that dives into the city’s protest movements with an essay by Helen Gould, lets you conduct covert operations with The Unavowed Order, and work to overthrow the city’s government with The Revolution.

Next up: at £25,000 we’ll add further physical addons to the game.

• £10: A set of ten dice in five different colours, bearing the symbols of the Five islands revered by Lusma. These colours are particularly important in the solo play mode!
• £15: A pack of A4 dry-erase handout cards, one for each House and Hero type. Currently this is 23 cards, but as we unlock more houses and heroes with the Shards of Mysthea they’ll get added to this set.
• Free: Each city map board will come with four sheets of reusable stickers representing the different buildings, landmarks and factors used in this game. The stickers will be illustrated by Cecil Howe, designer of Hex Kit.

At £27,500 we’ll unlock the next Shard of Mysthea, all about the inhuman intelligences of this land. In it you’ll find:

• The Foundling, a Hero who grew up among inhuman creatures and now finds themself pulled between their House and their monstrous family.
• The Chimera, a weapon of war created by the Kitrean Empire’s experiments with ambiance who has broken free from their handlers and now seeks their own path.
• Essays on inhuman sentience from Sawyer Rankin, and weird fantasy warfare from Thea Don-Siemon.
• The Crucible - a wonder your House can work towards to reshape their biology or that of another group.

And if we hit £30k or higher? Expect an upgrade of those handouts from thin card to game board thickness, more Shards, and a way of getting the Shards in print...

Live Game Tonight! Plus: Next stretch goal.
about 5 years ago – Sun, Mar 31, 2019 at 08:23:34 PM

Hey folks,

Just a short update to say I'll be running Mysthea: The Bitter March live tonight - in 4 hours at 8 PM GMT+1! Come watch on Hijos Del Rol's twitch channel here: https://www.twitch.tv/events/RiS6YzThRVKxJ7MINVmoFw

Coming at £25k: Mysthea Dice!
 

Second, we're looking forward to hitting the £23k stretch goal and have already begun preparing for the next one. At £25k, we'll be producing Mysthea Dice - a set of 10 six-sided dice in five different crystalline colours, each marked with the symbol of one of the five floating islands orbiting the Henakor crystal. 

These are of course useful in playing the normal game, but gain particular use in the Solo Play Mode - where the colour combination you draw out of a bag and use for a roll will help determine what happens afterwards!

And that's not all! Stay tuned to find out what else we plan on unlocking once we hit £25,000...

Solo play unlocked, more signed books available soon, and a dive into the monsters of Mysthea!
about 5 years ago – Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 12:30:42 AM

That's 450 facebook likes - Solo Play has been unlocked! 

Next up: we'll set up the Quickstart on DriveThruRPG so that you can get a Print-on-Demand copy, and you'll be able to get it at-cost for about £3 + shipping.

Also - with us almost halfway through the Kickstarter I've decided to add 30 more slots to the £70 'Signed Deluxe edition' tier. If you want to grab them, they'll go live at midday tomorrow (12 PM GMT on the 28th).

Deep Dive: Monsters of Mysthea

Thanks to the radiance of the Henakor crystal, this world is populated by so many creatures and monsters that the discovery of new species is almost expected when venturing far from the city walls. The monstrous inhabitants of Mysthea fit into three rough categories: wild beasts, intelligent monsters, and destructive Titans.

These creatures are more like the fauna of Mysthea, even if they are empowered by Qoam radiation.

Utcoro swarms are an occasional hazard of borderlands life. They're predators with a timespan of only a few months. As soon as they hatch they hunt, roaming in packs and devouring anything their size allows. Once they're ready to lay, they die on top of their clutch, so that their toxic body can protect the eggs from the elements and predation. Thanks to their regularity, Utcoro swarms are used a rite of passage for military recruits - 'fleeing the Utcoro' is veteran's expression for over-cautious fearmongering.

Kodror is a fungal lifeform that only grows on Qoam. It's highly toxic and caustic, and once it's grown to sufficient size it'll seek out living beings and extract nutrients from them. This is particularly dangerous when infestations form on floating chunks of Qoam, creating a mobile abomination lashing out with huge tentacles.

Finally, Cannibarok are Qoam eaters. Though apparently humanoid they have no higher brain functions, living only to find at eat Qoam. As they eat they grow larger and larger, until they dwarf city walls.  For this reason the Kaetur Guild monitors the movements of Cannibarok, working out which they need to cull before they threaten built-up cities. With the war throwing the lands into chaos, who can say what Qoam eaters are roaming the borderlands growing to incredible size?

The Onygauros are collectors. Each of these four-armed scarab creatures live in small caves where they store their bizarre hoard - bottles, cogs, teeth, jewellery, whatever this particular creature fixates upon. While excellent warriors, they're even better traders thanks to their innate sense of value.

The Boulron are heralds of death. They're a new arrival, with the first sightings in recent memory. They move with sinuous, elegant gestures, observing other beings from afar. They're often found congregating around the sites of deaths and massacres, or following soldiers, mercenaries and those touched by death.

Finally, the Awoken are unique constructions. They're a mind instilled in a Qoam shard, with their own strange habits. Some are ancient remnants of forgotten civilisations, some crafted by groups of dedicated Qoam sages, but each has its own peculiarities of encoded behaviour.

Most monsters are peaceful and even show a great amount of intelligence, to the point that they are accepted inside the city walls and are also given roles in society. This coexistence between monsters and people is taken for granted by the citizens of Ilvash, but those used to travelling the borderlands know that this is not always the case. Monsters can be unpredictable and even dangerous when exposed to the wild energy of Qoam, to the point that creatures that normally cooperate in the city, are known to become aggressive in certain areas of the world. Monsters become uncontrollable when hit by energy that vibrates at a certain frequency, but the presence of this energy is undetectable. Due to this uncertainty, nonhuman soldiers are only employed for the defence of the city or in areas where they are sure they are safe from dangerous energies.

Finally, there's the titans - legendary creatures that act on the level of natural disasters. The presence of one of these creatures is likely to define a flashpoint.

It's uncertain if Caerulas lives in the mists under Mysthea, or is made of them. This three-headed creature appears from below, soaring over Mysthea screeching strange harmonic sounds. The creature normally ignores living beings, but some legends tell of the titan stopping to regard a particular human - the survivors describe it fixing them in a terrible glare as if their souls were being examined, while it's reported that those who didn't survive the encounter were brutally slaughtered.

Obsidusa is a new, Qoam-infused abomination. A champion of the war with the Empire, his research into the interaction of life and Qoam brought him to Kaetur's attention. As the war ground on, he was given unlimited resources to craft terrifying weapons of war - until he went missing, along with the contents of his laboratory. Shortly thereafter, the Obsidusa appeared in Ilvashan lands, ambushing champions and sages and absorbing them into its Qoam-studded bulk. The party line is that the creature is a complete mystery, but the leaders of Kaetur can see the signs of the researcher's experiments - and if the Obsidusa was discarded and left to roam the land, what greater horror is he now working on?

Finally, there's the great dragon Volfyirion. Soon after the city of Kyradar fell to the Kingdom of Ahatils, the great dragon came to squat in its ruins. The Houses sent to control this land found that they could channel the Qoam anomaly under Kyradar to tame the beast, and soon set to fighting each other using the dragon as a pawn in their struggle. Finally, the victor – Weldrint Volarees – used the dragon to extort power from King Ahatils, forming the first Guild. Now Volfyirion serves Volarees, intimidating their rivals and acting as a weapon of war. But if the dragon should slip its bindings... a cataclysm would truly follow.