Hang in there, our update is a bit all over the place.
The cover
First, Rick and I have been batting around ideas for the cover. I feel the rough sketch gives you the vibe for the action-filled cover, so I thought I would share.
Cover concept
I feel for whoever Wyatt is aiming at.
Memes
I've also had fans sending me truffalo memes, thus I wanted to share.
Truffling
TWW?
Some have also asked how the new Cypher can impact the Underflow setting and I had some thoughts.
Which Mega Dungeon is yours?
The second edition of Cypher has arrived! It has plenty of surprises for old and new fans. The biggest change is how Types are now deeply tied to the genre of a campaign. For example, we now have three favors of fantasy to play with.
There is dungeon fantasy for those who want grand stories with powerful characters who hail from anywhere in the cosmos. There is Epic Fantasy which lets PCs go from humble to heroic like a classic novel while Sword and Sorcery brings back the picaresque hero who lives as much on their wits as they do their prowess.
Each of these genres, though, can help make your Hobgoblin Market and the Underflow different and uniquely your own!
Dungeon Fantasy
This genre has Cypher and Fantasy both turned up to 11. All the rules are in play, types, focuses, manifest cyphers, and artifacts. But perhaps the biggest meta rule to consider is the “rule of cool.”
For the Underflow and Hobgoblin Market, this rule of cool turns the weird western more into an anime western with ponchos as capes and duster coats as robes. GM intrusions provide both hob bows malfunctions and ammo depletion.
For NPCs in both dungeon fantasy and Epic Fantasy, Sheriff Wyatt tries to keep the peace. If there’s corruption, he’s probably unaware of it.
Epic Fantasy
This is a world where the eventual stakes are high and you fought hard to get here. Deciding between trying to heal or use a non-rest 10 hour recovery to be rid of a curse is a really tough choice at the lower tiers - especially if your GM allows you online one chance to restore a major wound.
Just as artifacts are more rare in epic fantasy, hob bows should be as well. Perhaps there's no special custom ammo and they now have a 1 in d10 depletion roll. Those PCs wanting to embrace the gunslinger life, the Carries a Gun focus should be available.
In these more dangerous worlds, The hob bow already has a challenger as the Ironhold dwarves have developed a more fearsome weapon. The maticore crank crossbow fires multiple bolts at ridiculous speeds. A devastating weapon despite being so cumbersome it needs a wheeled tripod for transport. For PCs, it Gatling gun Heavy weapon, rapid‑fire, long range, mounted on large‑wheeled carriage; enough ammunition to fire the crossbow for 1 minute is a very expensive cost a
The GM can decide to ignore the Weird West aspects but they can add more flavor and uniqueness to their setting. It also gives a GM a chance to show off their funny voices.
Sword and Sorcery
The rough and tumble nature of a classic Western boom town fits right in with the Sword and sorcery genre. It’s no surprise that stories for both genres both appeared in the same old pulp magazines.
Much like Epic Fantasy, hob bows are different. They should be even more unreliable with a 1 in d6 depletion roll to represent both malfunctions and running out of ammo.They are also one category more expensive.
This sort of mashup embraces all the dangers of both worlds. Truffalo are walking money and food the PCs will have to protect from claim jumpers, handits, and hungry monsters.
For NPCs, life is made harder thanks to shifty merchants and lackadaisical law enforcement. In such a campaign, Sheriff Wyatt can be either corrupt, overwhelmed, or habitually turns a blind eye to Vigilante justice.
Seasoning your campaign
The beauty of the new edition is not only can you signpost to your players your expectations for the game, the genre you pick adds a whole new flavor to the campaign. A GM could use the same content and run two very different games, something that seems pretty tempting right now.
If that tempts you, let me know. You can also tell me what your plans are for the Cypher ttrpg.
First, I want to sincerely apologize for the radio silence over the past several months. You all placed your trust in me by backing The Vault of the Seven, and you deserved more frequent communication from me.
Unfortunately, life had other plans.
Over the past several months I've been dealing with a number of health issues, along with some significant family matters that required my time and attention. While neither stopped work on the project entirely, they did slow my progress considerably and made it difficult to provide the kind of updates I wanted to share.
The good news is that The Vault of the Seven is still moving forward. Work has continued, and I'm now in a position where I can see the finish line. My current expectation is that the completed project will be ready within the next three months.
Rather than rushing to meet an arbitrary deadline, I want to make sure I deliver the book that I envisioned when I first launched this campaign—and the book that you backed. Your patience has given me the opportunity to do that, and I'm incredibly grateful.
Going forward, I'll do a better job of keeping everyone informed as I work toward completion. Even if progress is incremental, you deserve to know where things stand.
Thank you for your patience, your understanding, and most of all, your belief in this project. It truly means a great deal to me, and I can't wait to finally put The Vault of the Seven into your hands. I'm getting the pledge manager set up, and the surveys should be out to everyone within the next 10 days. No later than August 15, 2026.
Will the VTT include the material to utilize stretch goal material, like tokens for the creatures in the included bestiary stretch goal or handouts and maps needed for the side quests?
It would be difficult for VTT campaigns to use those stretch goal materials without the BTY module support if they are excluded, but when people have asked if the stretch goal materials are included in the VTT module, there hasn't been an answer one way or the other.
We hope your summer is full of adventures, whether you’re outdoors or hiding from the weather in your preferred gaming habitat.
A Dynamic Dungeon.
We checked in with Monte, who has been designing and running playtests for Jewel in the Sky and this is what they shared with us:
Playtesting and design continue at a rapid pace for Jewel in the Sky. In the games I'm running, I've found that the Event Tracker (the new name for the "clocks" discussed in the campaign) really makes the dungeon dynamic. Triggered when players roll 1s or 20s (or both) in the session, the tracker may result in interesting changes. The dungeon’s inhabitants move around, new inhabitants move in—often introducing some new potential story element—conflicts among inhabitants resolve or flare up, or some aspect of the dungeon changes. Even relatively minor events, such as an inhabitant moving through a dungeon area, can have big repercussions to the PC's adventures, because the inhabitant might leave a formerly locked door open, reveal a secret door, or something similar.
—Monte Cook, June 2026
I don’t know about you lovelies, but we definitely have a waaay higher percentage of folks who consistently roll 1s; hard stares go to Bruce and Kate for this! Who in your group is going to have the dials of the Event Tracker spinning, or have you found the ways to sacrifice to the dice gods for leniency?
Keep in touch for more updates. Thanks for your support.
Let me introduce you to Sir Lucius Atilius spying for the Sunless Kingdom as Drake Havermore. Mr. Havermore has many connections within the Hobgoblin Market and sometimes needs his “gentleman” troll, Brackrip, to facilitate communication - especially physical communication. You just know these two are cunning and bad news for anyone who crosses them.
Next update we’ll introduce Bash Wyatt, the orc sheriff.
Otherwise, we are commissioning more art, squaring up our word count, and doing some early-stage layouts.
The post-campaign lull has allowed everyone to take a bit of time in the tavern or holodeck, depending on your preference! Behind the scenes (or deeper in the dungeon), a great deal is happening. Monte was able to surface from the Jewel long enough to tease this report:
I'm working steadily on Jewel in the Sky, and running two playtests (one for fantasy characters and one for sci-fi characters). As I go along, I'm finding a lot of great opportunities for handouts to use at the table. I've created briefing summaries and data readouts for science fiction explorers as well as tavern menus and hand-drawn area maps fantasy characters can obtain in the nearby town, Murton. Of course, a fun thing about Jewel in the Sky is that the science fiction characters can go to Murton (probably disguised as locals) and encounter those handouts, and the fantasy characters can trigger (by accident or on purpose) scanners they find and get the data readouts. In either case, language can be a barrier, but that's what translator devices and magic spells are for!
In the dungeon itself, I'm currently working on the mysterious region that can be discovered by stepping through doorways seen only in the reflections of magic mirrors. There are multiple such mirrors throughout the dungeon and they all... well, that would be a major spoiler. Suffice to say, this Megadungeon rewards those characters really interested in exploration and satisfying their own curiosity!
– Monte Cook, May 2026
As one of the players in Monte’s Jewel in the Sky fantasy campaign, and having experienced these weird mirror rooms, I too would LOVE to know more. If only to prevent…well, ok, yes, that’s probably a spoiler too!
for both the Creatures of Vocurro Bestiary and the Vocurro Side Quests the item discriptions say that you will get a free pdf copy with your physical purchase. However we don't get the option to add on the items just as pdfs, Is that intentional or just an oversight?
I've pledged the Deluxe Boxed Set (print + pdf) level, but I cannot find out whether the Cloth Map and the Vucorro Side Quest is included or not. Please reply so I can complete my pledge.
Can the Cypher rulebooks pdfs be given ahead of the adventure files, for people who pledged the Dungeon+Cypher tiers? It would be nice to begin to read through starting now to be ready for the Jewel when it releases in several months.
Hello, backers, and thank you so much for a great campaign!
After more than three days, Overtime Mode has come to an end, and with that the Jewel in the Sky crowdfunding campaign has concluded. All of us here at MCG are so happy that you’ve helped us craft a very cool book into an amazing boxed set and adventuring experience. Thank you!
During Overtime Mode you unlocked not only the expansion to the Creatures of Vocurro bestiary (which we'd almost hit at the scheduled end time), but went on to unlock two more goals, upgrading to the Twin Clocks Timer and adding foil stamping to your XP card collection. Nearly 250 new backers pledged to the campaign while we were in Overtime Mode—what an amazing result!
Please Read On!
We want to tell you a bit about where things go from here, but first let’s give out a little credit to the small team here at MCG that works so hard to bring you our games—and this crowdfunding campaign.
Monte has been working on Jewel in the Sky for some time—well before this campaign launched and all through it. Other members of our design team—Sean, Bruce, and Shanna—have been working on other upcoming products, including The Electric Sun (for Invisible Sun), Face Your Fears and Do Not Open (for The Magnus Archives Roleplaying Game), and the Predation setting for Cypher. They’ve also overseen tweaks to the new Cypher corebooks as those titles have moved through layout and proofing.
Bear and Javier wrangled art, imaged new products, and designed XP cards for this campaign, while working on layout for the Cyper corebooks and other projects. With Teri and Dominique, they’ve also moved titles like Face Your Fears and Come Hell or High Water through production.
Jen, Olivia, and Kate have answered your questions (and are always available to provide support to you, our wonderful community). Tammie has been steering the ship and keeping the logistics moving through the many challenges of our era. Daniel has been supervising our warehouse, working hard to fulfill rewards and orders. And Charles planned and ran this campaign (and is writing this update).
We are a small team, and we keep a lot of plates spinning at any given time!
Now, here’s what to expect as we move forward from here. Please give it a read!
The Immediate Future
Running a crowdfunding campaign is hard work (and Mega Dungeon Month was close on the heels of our last campaign). So we’re looking forward to getting a bit of rest. You might not hear from us for a little while, but don’t worry. Monte’s been working on Jewel, while Bear has been wrangling art and maps, for some time—and they’re keeping at it! We’ll post updates any time there’s news share.
The Next Few Weeks
BackerKit began collecting pledges the moment the campaign closed. But it takes them a full two weeks to release those funds, along with the data on our backers.
In the meantime, we will get the pledge manager fully set up. The pledge manager gives us the information we need to fulfill your pledge and lets you manage your add-ons and make any pledge upgrades you want. We’ll notify you when we open the pledge manager, which should be in about three weeks. You MUST look out for, and respond to, that notification!
The Next Few Months
Once you’ve completed the pledge manager survey, we won’t need anything else from you until it’s time to start fulfilling rewards. We’ll be busy making Jewel in the Sky for many months. We’ll post regular updates, but if you don’t hear anything for a few weeks, don’t fret.
At the same time, please pay attention when you do get communications from us. Our emails and updates include critical information about your rewards.
When Your Rewards Ship
Every time a reward is ready for you, we’ll contact you by email to begin the fulfillment process. Generally, we’ll direct you to the MCG Shop, where you’ll log in, “buy” the product (for free, because you’ve already paid for it through this campaign), and check out.
This is an important part of the process because it ensures we have accurate delivery information for every item we send out. (With thousands of backers getting rewards, it's amazing how many people will change their address over the fulfillment period.) You'll pay for shipping at that time.
Please pay attention to communications from us—don't let our updates or emails go to your spam folder, or otherwise ignore them, because if you do you could miss out on some of your rewards.
Thanks for your support! —Team MCG
What, No Announcement?
If you’ve a longtime backer of MCG’s crowdfunding campaigns, you know we often tease the next big thing right here in this space. For the next few months, we’re going to be focused on the launch of Cypher—one of the biggest and most important new product launches in MCG’s fourteen years. Follow us on social media, join the Cypher Unlimited Discord, and check the MCG website in the months to come for loads of cool info as we approach the release of the Cypher corebooks.
We do have something very exciting lined up for later this year, and we can’t wait to tell you about it. But for now, Cypher deserves all of our attention!
