Based on the acclaimed bestselling novels of Rebecca Roanhorse—Black Sun, Fevered Star, and Mirrored Heavens—Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game immerses you in the Meridian, a rich and beautifully detailed fantasy world inspired by the civilizations of the Pre-Columbian Americas.

The people of the Meridian are many and varied, but four great city-states are most prominent.

Hokaia is seen by many as the Meridian's beating heart; it is a vast city of great mounds lying at a juncture of the Kuulum river in the midst of wide plains. The hub of trade for the entire region north of the Crescent Sea (and beyond), this verdant city teems with peoples from across the known world.

Another great trading city, anchoring the southern shore of the Crescent Sea and bustling with maritime trade, Cuecola is a port renowned for its ball courts and tall, ornate stone pyramids, and ruled by the seven merchant lords—and once, before the magic was forbidden, home to powerful sorcerers.

Tova, the city in the clouds, spans a cluster of great mesas with the river Tovesheh rushing about their feet. It is the seat of the four Sky Made clans—Golden Eagle, Water Strider, Winged Serpent, and Carrion Crow—famed for their giant animal mounts. And it is the site of the Celestial Tower, until recently the body that oversaw the suppression of magic and god-worship.

And then there are the Teek, the greatest of the sailors and the world's best boat-builders. Devastated during the War of the Spear, the Teek have become reclusive almost to the point of myth. Teek society is exclusively female, and they are famed for their mystic Song—and the belief that their bones and body parts have magical power.

There are many others in the Meridian—the people of the Obreji mountains, the folk of the plains and, beyond them, the peoples of the Northern Wastes.

For 300 years the prohibition on magic and god-worship had brought reason and peace. Now that peace is shattered, the gods reassert themselves, and the ancient magics prove to be not quite completely lost.

Many forms of magic were once known—blood, shadow, fire, stone, and spirit, among others. Dreamwalking is another practice, gifted to (or perhaps cursed upon) humanity when the spearmaiden Seuq ventured to the Graveyard of the Gods to eat the godflesh at its heart. The ability to enter and shape others' dreams is powerful, but the practice leads many to madness. Most—perhaps all—magic derives from the gods, and little of it is well understood, even by those most intimate with its use.

Generations of peace led many to see god-worship as superstition. But god cults did not disappear entirely, and they have recently resurged. It was the advent of the Crow god's avatar that led to the Celestial Tower's downfall, and as the peace of recent centuries has shattered, more gods become active in the affairs of the world.

Prophecy is one of their most potent tools. Those they touch with prophecy find their fates bound to the gods' desires; they are tasked with the gods' inscrutable and often chaotic goals. And this is where you find yourself: subject to individual prophecies that shape your character's journey (whether you choose to follow or resist them) and larger prophecies that set the direction for your group's adventures and help build your overall campaign.

Characters in Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game might be warriors or powerful scions; they might grasp the powers of blood magic or dreamwalking, or Sing to the sea; they might ride winged serpents or giant crows. For all one's abilities, though, to live in the Meridian is to live a life that is never fully your own. Powerful oracles decree your future. Forbidden magics ache to be discovered. All-seeing gods dole out prophecies to those both willing and not.

In Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game, characters are given Divinations, personal goals akin to character arcs. Perhaps they’re attempting to revive their family’s good name, become an accomplished scholar-priest, or exact revenge on their sworn enemy. Whatever their Divinations, achieving them are sure to come with both rewards and costs.

Each group also receives a Prophecy, a shared god-given destiny they must attempt to fulfill together. Every Prophecy has the potential to impart huge changes upon the world and the people they love. And each comes with a ticking clock toward an in-world event, such as a lunar eclipse, a terrible tempest, or a planned assassination. A failed Prophecy portends a steep price for the world, but a successful one promises a terrible cost for those who fulfill it.

Characters attempt to achieve their individual Divinations while working together to fulfill their group’s Prophecy before the world event occurs. But one character’s Divination may be in direct opposition to another’s, and fulfilling the group’s Prophecy may require heartbreak and sacrifices from everyone involved. Still, for those who can pull it off, the rewards are many.

Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game is set in a fantasy world with inspirations taken from pre-Columbian-contact American cultures. It's being carefully and respectfully crafted by a team that brings together Native and non-Native designers and artists. (You can learn more about our team below.)

Regardless of your own cultural background, we think you'll love the vivid, compelling characters and campaigns you'll experience in Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game. The game provides ample immersion in a fascinating and deeply realized world, introducing concepts, technologies, and worldviews in a way that gamers used to European-based fantasy can easily come to understand. The corebook also discusses the benefits and pitfalls of playing in a world and culture that's new to you.

Additionally, the Crossing the Cultural Divide: Gaming in a Culture Other Than Your Own zine, one of the first delivered rewards, focuses on just this topic. It's being penned by Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game co-designer Kenna Alexander, who combines insights from extensive RPG design experience, her own Cherokee Nation heritage, and years of working with Native creatives across the Americas.

This campaign funds the corebook for Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game, along with When Fate Calls Your Name, a hefty book of adventures (called Prophecies), and a number of other rewards that will make your game soar.

Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game. The complete game in one hefty hardcover book, in either the standard edition (which will be available in stores) or the exclusive DELUXE edition, made just for backers of this campaign. It includes character creation, game rules, in-depth setting information, prophecy, advice on playing in the Meridian, equipment, NPCs and creatures, and adventures—everything you need to play. The deluxe edition features a foil-debossed faux-leather cover with a beautiful dust jacket, special edge treatment, and similar premium features. It won't be widely available except through this campaign—don't miss it!

When Fate Calls Your Name. A hardcover adventure book, When Fate Calls Your Name presents three complete Prophecies: The Quiet Places Between the Stars, A House of Scattered Feathers, and Celestial Songs. Prophecies are similar to the sorts of adventures offered for most TTRPGs, in that they give the GM the necessary information, stats, and guidance to run hefty, multi-session story arcs. These three tie together to form the backbone of a long-term campaign. Each Prophecy also has a story clock that ticks down toward a foretold in-world event, before which the group must achieve their goals.

Story Clock. Prophecy is at the heart of Between Earth & Sky, and many prophecies are bound to celestial activity, the movement of magic and culture, and other natural or manmade elements. The Story Clock is a boardgame-like surface that forms a centerpiece of your Between Earth & Sky game table, that serves as an in-world countdown timer for your group prophecy.

Prophecy Deck. This evocative deck helps generate prophecies and adventure goals for individual characters and the group as a whole. It can also provide creative prompts and adventure twists. The digital version of this deck is accessed through the Datasphere Deck Tool. (See Powerful Online Tools, below.)

Under the Black Sun. A GM's guide to using divination and prophecies in your game, building on the information in the corebook and providing copious examples. This short, zine-sized book has an accordion-style binding mimicking the construction of in-world books.

Magic Is Your Birthright. This short zine-sized book explores the magic systems as seen from in-world characters and libraries, including the (often incomplete or incorrect) assumptions of magic-wielding characters. Like the other zine-style titles, its accordion binding gives it the feel of an in-world tome.

Crossing the Cultural Divide: Gaming in a Culture Other Than Your Own. Written by Native designer Kenna Alexander, this zine-format title is your guide to a great RPG experience playing a game with a different cultural basis than your own. It includes specific tips for Between Earth & Sky, such as creating an authentic name for your character.

XP Deck. Characters in Between Earth & Sky earn experience points (XP) as they progress toward their destinies. The GM also rewards players with XP when activating a GM intrusion—a narrative tool that throws an unexpected twist or complication into a scene or story. Players spend XP on advancement between sessions, and also in-game, for their own narrative tools, including rerolls and player intrusions. Because XP comes and goes frequently, it’s handy to have a set of tokens to represent them, and the cards in this 30-card deck are perfect for the job. The digital version of this deck is accessed through the new Digital Deck Tool.

Between Earth & Sky Resource Deck. Creatures, NPCs, cyphers, artifacts, and similar resources from the corebook are reproduced in this handy deck that's convenient in play and when you're prepping for the game. The digital version of this deck is accessed through the new Digital Deck Tool.

Exclusive DELUXE Dice Set. Between Earth & Sky uses a d20, d6, and percentile dice. You can use standard dice, but some results, especially on the d20, have special effects—particularly the 1, the 20, and the 17, 18, and 19. These high-quality, sharp-edged resin dice are specially marked for these results—and they’re beautiful, elegant, and immersive. You’ll love the convenience and ease of the special markings—and really love the way they feel and look at the game table!

Character Portfolios. These 24-page character portfolios are a wonderful step up from the standard character sheet. They give you room for notes, sketches, and details: thoughts about your character’s appearance and mannerisms; notes on the strange and wondrous locations, people, creatures, and objects you meet in your adventures; perhaps a campaign journal, or maps and sketches of places you’ve been around the Meridian. The print version comes in a pack of five—enough for the whole gaming group—while the included PDF version includes both print-optimized and form-fillable, device-optimized files.

Between Earth & Sky is powered by Cypher, the popular, award-winning RPG system that's fast, flexible, and incredibly easy on the GM. Cypher is perfect for your games set in the Meridian: it's focused on engaging characters and rich stories, and built from the ground up to be easy to play and especially easy to GM.

Characters are built with a four-part sentence. You start with a descriptor (an aspect of your personality), connect it to a type (that defines your role), and then add a focus (defining a key aspect of your identity). You might, for example, be a Star-Blessed Crow Rider who Dreamwalks; Destiny-Bound Spearmaiden who Wields a Bone Staff; or a Sun-Sought Priest of Knives who Masters the Death Arts. A character's sentence doesn't just paint a vivid picture of who they are—each of those components contributes to the character's capabilities, adding skills, Pool points, special abilities, and even equipment and potential connections to other characters and the setting.

But there's a fourth element of your character: your destiny. Perhaps your character has Death on His Shoulder, or A Storm on Her Horizon. A full sentence reads like Tenoch is a Sun-Sought Priest of Knives who Masters the Death Arts with Betrayal in Xir Blood. That's a character that comes to life at the game table, with background—and a destiny—as fundamental to who they are as the stats on their character sheet.

The Cypher game engine is built from the ground up to be easy on the GM. Crunchy mechanics are handled by the players, freeing the GM's bandwidth to focus on making the game fun, imaginative, and exciting. The core mechanic is simple and keeps the emphasis on roleplaying and creative thinking: the GM sets the task difficulty on a scale of 1 to 10; the player negotiates that difficulty downward by applying character skill, any assets they can bring to bear, and extra effort. Then the player rolls a d20, with a target equal to three times the difficulty number. So if climbing a cliff is a difficulty 5 task, the player might call out their skills, special equipment, or aid from another PC. If the GM agrees they apply, each of those reduces the difficulty by a step—so the task difficulty drops to 2, and the player only needs to roll a 6 to succeed.

There are no modifiers or math after the roll, and task resolution is a conversation between the players and GM—not a calculation of numbers on a character sheet. And the players always roll the dice. That’s how everything is resolved in Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game—an attempt to charm or influence and NPC (or to resist their charm); to flee a charging jaguar or hide from a prowling Shield; to conjure shadow magic or resist its effects; or to attack the malignant sorcerer and defend against the attacks of her powerful guards.

You'll find the complete rules—everything you need to play—in Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game. We're also offering a special price, just for backers of this campaign, on Pocket Cypher, perfect as an inexpensive second copy of the rules that power the game. And if you really like the sound of a fun, fast-paced game built for any campaign you can imagine, we also have a special, backers-only price on the full-fledged Cypher corebooks.

Want to learn more about the Cypher rules that underpin Between Earth & Sky? Download the free Cypher Primer, or visit the Cypher website!

Creating characters using Cypher (the game system that powers Between Earth & Sky) is fast, fun, and concept-first. The Cypher Character Builder makes it even easier! With this online tool you can build Cypher characters; save, modify, and advance them; and export them to print-ready PDFs or into a VTT. GMs can build campaigns and invite players, linking characters and allowing just the options they wish to include in their game. Cypher's amazing flexibility even lets you create your own types, descriptors, foci, and other character options right in the Character Builder.

Currently, Cypher Character Builder content includes the Cypher Character Rulebook, but we're constantly expanding it. Will we have an opportunity to add Between Earth & Sky to the Character Builder? Stay tuned!

A well-designed deck can simplify your game, save you time in prep and at the table, or inspire you with a clever prompt—that's why we love them, and why we're making several decks for this campaign.

But, unlike a book, a deck's utility as a digital tool is somewhat lost if it's just a PDF. So we built the Datasphere Deck Tool—a unique product format that makes our digital decks as useful for online play as the print decks are at the physical game table. Draw random cards, “hand” them to your players in the form of card images, or copy the card text with the click of a button. Peruse a deck easily, sort cards, or organize them as you see fit. You can download a PDF of the deck from the tool, too. It's everything you expect from a digital reward, and a lot more—giving our decks the time-saving and inspirational utility in the digital space as they deliver at the physical game table.

If your rewards include decks (as part of your pledge level or via add-ons), you'll get Datasphere Deck Tool access for the deck (which includes the PDF).

Check out the Datasphere Deck Tool for free! You can try out its many features using the free sample decks.

Play entirely online? Prefer to access the game and its rules through your favorite virtual tabletop (VTT)?

The VTT implementation of Between Earth & Sky includes complete compendium access to Between Earth & Sky: the Roleplaying Game and When Fate Calls Your Name, along with interactive character sheets, tokens, cards, and other elements, for Roll20 or Alchemy.

There are two ways to get Between Earth & Sky on VTT:

The add-on price gives you a substantial discount, so the better deal is to get VTT support as an add-on to a different pledge level. And for the best deal, back at an ALL-IN pledge level for a huge, nearly 50% discount when you add on the VTT.

Regardless of how you pledge for it, you can get the VTT package for either Roll20 or Alchemy. You'll tell us which one you want in the pledge manager after the campaign ends. (If you want both, simply purchase the add-on again.)

It ought to go without saying, but we'll say it anyway: we'll never use generative AI to make any of MCG’s products.

We're making Between Earth & Sky because we really want to make it—why would we have some mindless algorithm do it instead? We love making games, and we make games that inspire us, with people who inspire us, for people who inspire us—and every word and image comes straight from our 100% human imaginations. We won’t insult your creativity, or ours, by delivering purposeless machine-generated drek, especially when we have so many great visions and ideas we’re excited to explore with you!

Most of this campaign’s key rewards are not subject to tariffs, and we’ve planned for tariffs on the items that are or might be. Although we can’t predict every possibility, to the best of our ability we’ve ensured that you will not be charged extra for tariffs, and future changes to tariffs won’t stop us from delivering your rewards to you. Here’s how:

The key products funded by this campaign are books. We’ve been publishing RPG books for fourteen years, and throughout that time we’ve worked with a reliable, high-quality partner in Canada. They will be our vendor for the majority of products funded by this campaign. Books printed in Canada are not subject to tariffs. Should that change, we have identified quality American vendors we can turn to.

A few items, such as card decks, may be subject to tariffs. Traditionally, we’ve printed such items in China, but we also have good options in Europe, Canada, and the United States. When it’s time for these items to go into production, we’ll choose the best option based on the costs and tariffs at that time. Regardless, we’ve ensured we can produce and deliver these rewards even if tariffs create higher costs.

As we've produced the rewards for recent campaigns, we have seen some delays with products impacted by high tariff costs—or supply chain disruptions caused by those tariffs. We've continued to deliver all primary rewards on or ahead of schedule. A relatively small number of secondary rewards have seen delays, but we've never failed to deliver a reward. We’re a nimble team with fantastic production skills, a wealth of resources, and a proven history of delivering complex rewards. And we've built a production plan designed to limit impacts to, at worst, delays, and ensure we can deliver everything you pledge for.

You must receive email from us to claim your rewards! Modern mail clients and AI systems filter your email before you even get a chance to see it. Ensure that our emails are reaching you by marking any email from Monte Cook Games or BackerKit as a safe, trusted, or preferred sender, and adding us to your contacts. Simply replying to an email, or starring it, also helps train your email platform to let you see our emails. These steps help ensure that our emails reach your inbox. (We do send promotional emails, but we promise not to bury you in them. We average fifteen or twenty promo emails per year.)

Your digital rewards (PDFs) will be delivered via three platfoms: BackerKit’s Digital Distribution feature; our online store (the MCG Shop); and DriveThruRPG. (You can use any or all of these platforms to download your PDFs; the files will be identical.)

When a digital reward is ready for you, you will receive a message via BackerKit with a link to download your digital reward, as well as messages from the other platforms. You can use whichever you like (or all of them), but you will only gain access to the Datasphere Deck Tool by redeeming your digital deck rewards via the MCG Shop.

Your physical rewards and add-ons will be delivered through our online store, the MCG Shop. When a physical reward is ready for you, you will receive a message sent through BackerKit with a link that will take you to the MCG Shop to pay for shipping and redeem your reward for free.

We offer a variety of domestic and international shipping methods from which you can choose. As of this writing, basic domestic shipping is $9 per shipment, but we do not control future postal rates, so that cost is subject to change. International shipping is calculated by destination and shipment weight.

We operate our own warehouse in the U.S. and work with trusted global fulfillment partners in Europe and Australia. We do everything in our power to get your rewards into your hands as quickly, reliably, and affordably as possible.

United States: Your rewards will be fulfilled by our shipping center in the United States.

Canada: Your rewards will be fulfilled by our shipping center in the United States. You will be responsible for import duties, taxes, and brokerage fees (if applicable). Please note that our books are printed in Canada, and thus they are not subject to import duties; however, they are subject to GST. Items not manufactured in Canada, such as dice and decks of cards, are subject to import duties and GST.

Central America, South America, the South Pacific, and Asia: Your rewards will ship from our shipping center in the United States. You will be responsible for import duties, taxes, and brokerage fees (if applicable).

The EU and UK: We have worked for many years with a shipping center in the UK, but as this campaign launches, we're in the process of moving to a new provider. This transition should be complete about the time this campaign ends—well before the delivery of your rewards. We expect the shipping experience to be similar to our prior arrangements. UK and EU backers will not pay import duties, but will pay VAT where applicable.

Australia and New Zealand: Your rewards will be filled by our shipping center in Australia. Backers in Australia and New Zealand will not pay import duties and taxes.

For detailed information on shipping and our fulfillment process, visit our Crowdfunding Reward Fulfillment page.