Order the Mistborn Campaign Setting for the Cosmere RPG today! This pre-order store will be open until February 28th, 2026.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Full Speed Ahead
about 1 year ago
– Fri, May 23, 2025 at 08:32:35 AM
One month ago, we shared our update on how Brotherwise would handle tariffs, and we were truly moved by this community's response. In spite of bearing such bad news, it was our most-Liked update ever. Backers responded with an outpouring of support, patience, and encouragement. So today we're delighted to return with some great news for you.
Back on Track
The previously untenable 145% tariffs have been paused for 90 days and lowered to 30% for at least that time period. In a stroke of luck for the Cosmere RPG, that 90-day window is within the timeframe when our products will be assessed for tariffs. In related good news, recent cases seem to confirm that our core RPG sourcebooks won't be subject to tariffs.
So, barring some other unpredictable event in the trade war, we're back on track to begin US and global fulfillment for the Cosmere RPG as promised, during the month of September.
Book production is planned to finish in the first half of June. We'll be rushing all product onto the first boats available, and it's our fervent hope that we'll be able to avoid any delays. We're also still on schedule for PDF delivery, and have announced that our digital release date is July 23.
Powering Through
Although this is good news, there’s no getting around the fact that 30% tariffs would be considered incredibly painful in any other situation. We'll see significant extra costs for about half of our items, including miniatures, dice, maps, and cards. Our freight costs from China to the US will also more than double, since the months without shipping have created a bottleneck for space on container ships.
Brotherwise will absorb all those costs, and won't pass them on to backers. But if you'd like to help us power through this unexpected situation, we're working on a couple of brand-new digital-only add-ons:
Chasmfiend Volume 2 is a follow-up to last year's magazine. It includes articles about what's ahead for Cosmere games, Mistborn art previews, a short Stormlight adventure, and more!
Speak the Words is a new adventure for 3rd-level characters, by Brooke Whitney and Johnny O'Neal. We originally created this for Gen Con, but liked it so much that we've given it the full-quality treatment with professional art and maps.
These PDFs are beyond the scope of this campaign, and not part of any pledge level. They're entirely optional and no one should feel obligated to get them. But any money earned from them will go right into supporting more Cosmere RPG adventures, accessories, and sourcebooks in the future! If you're interested, you'll be able to get both PDFs for just $10.
We'll share more details on how to get these PDFs in our next update! It's worth noting that these are helpful as a "tariff relief pack" precisely because they're digital-only, but printed copies of Chasmfiend will be available at Gen Con and Dragonsteel Nexus.
Stonewalkers Sneak Peek
This week we received new production samples of our three hardcovers, and they're looking great. Here's a look inside Stonewalkers, our hardcover adventure that takes characters across Roshar on an epic quest to aid the Heralds.
If you want to avoid story spoilers, you can watch the first few minutes, which focus on how our accessories and softcover books help create a premium adventure experience. But from 4:15 forward, this video is for GMs only!
Thank You!
Thanks again for all your support and understanding. Our gemhearts were warmed by the outpouring of love we got from the last update, reminding us that Cosmere fans are the best fans. We want to make this RPG for years to come, and your support is what makes that possible.
How We're Managing Tariffs
over 1 year ago
– Wed, Apr 23, 2025 at 03:40:44 PM
Today's update will focus almost entirely on tariffs, and how we're planning to manage them for this campaign. Before we dive into that topic, we're happy to report that production continues to be right on schedule. We've produced the majority of accessories (GM screens, cards, tokens, miniatures) and we're well into book production. Here's a look inside a final production copy of the Stormlight World Guide:
When it comes to all the factors within our control, we're feeling great about our progress. The rest of today's update will discuss how we're contending with global issues that are more challenging for us to manage.
A Rapidly Escalating Trade War
As you likely know, President Trump has imposed sweeping tariffs on most goods manufactured in China. During the past month, the trade war between the US and China has escalated to unprecedented levels. Under the latest tariffs, Brotherwise would pay an additional 145% in taxes against the cost of most Cosmere RPG products, all of which are being produced in China.
These extreme tariffs are hitting at a time when Stormlight production has been well underway for months, materials have been purchased, and factory bills have been paid. These tariffs present an almost overwhelming obstacle to toy and game publishers like us, but we’re doing our best to take a thoughtful approach to this challenge, and minimize the impact to you, our backers.
Considering Every Scenario
Before we go any further, we want to make something clear: At every step in this process, our guiding principle has been to avoid price increases for Cosmere RPG backers.
It has been a chaotic few weeks, and we’ve been running a lot of scenarios for how to survive this trade war. But none of those plans have involved imposing an extra surcharge on backers to cover the tariffs. Behind the scenes, here’s how we’ve reacted to each tariff increase as they’ve been announced:
20% Tariffs: At this level, we felt confident in our ability to cover the tariff costs. The success of this Kickstarter, and strong economies of scale, put us in a position to handle this kind of cost increase.
54% Tariffs: This is a huge tariff amount, and not feasible for most companies like ours. When we faced 54% tariffs, our plan was to generate some new PDF content and give backers the chance to add on a couple of “tariff relief” e-supplements. (A few $5 or $10 PDFs wouldn’t be enough to outweigh the tariffs, but would soften the blow if enough people opted in.) We considered this our worst-case scenario, but one that we could survive.
145% Tariffs: This level of tariff, which went into effect on April 10, is effectively an embargo. At this point, the costs reach into the millions of dollars and become impossible to meaningfully offset. Paying these tariffs would drastically undercut our ability to invest in the future of this RPG.
Part of the challenge we face is that these tariffs are so unpredictable. At any time, these tariffs could increase, drop, or disappear. These tariffs put us in a situation where shipping a product on the wrong day could be a multimillion-dollar mistake. There are signs that the administration may be softening its stance on tariffs, so we are closely watching the news to see how the situation develops.
Our Plan for this Kickstarter
To make the best of a very difficult and unpredictable situation, here’s how we plan to proceed. This plan prevents any price increases for backers.
1. All backers will receive PDFs and digital rewards in late July. We want all of you to be able to start playing the game you’ve backed.
2. We’ll revise our fulfillment plans so international backers are not affected. Under our revised plans, international orders (including Canada and Mexico) will not ship through the US.
3. International fulfillment will proceed on time. We’ll begin international fulfillment without delay. Assuming our production schedules continue to proceed as they have, that means international fulfillment will begin in September.
4. US fulfillment will face delays if tariffs persist. We’ll be ready to ship product on time if tariffs drop over the next two months. If not, we will hold goods in China while we reassess the situation.
5. Mistborn development has not been delayed. We’re still on track to deliver the Mistborn campaign setting on time. We’ve already set aside all funds for design, art, and production (though we’re exploring US and European manufacturing options).
Predictions are very difficult to make right now, and we wouldn't be surprised if tariff levels shift several times between now and the end of June, when our production is complete. We will continue to monitor tariffs daily and we’re prepared to jump on fulfillment quickly if the situation improves.
Always the Next Step
This is a deeply frustrating situation for everyone involved. Here at Brotherwise, we’re looking at beautiful production samples of all these books, and we want nothing more than to get them in everyone’s hands.
At the same time, we have our sights set on the future of the Cosmere RPG. We’re trying to make the choices that will allow this RPG to thrive for years to come, and that includes keeping Brotherwise productive and in business during this halt in US-China trade. Right now, we’re hearing from peers in the game industry who don’t think they can stay solvent if the tariffs last more than a couple of months. We’re seeing some publishers already starting to furlough workers and cut costs. Right now, we have no such plans.
Our teams are well into Mistborn development and taking the first steps on Worldhopper and Warbreaker content. All of our decisions are designed to maintain that long-term momentum.
Tariff FAQs
We know folks have a lot of questions right now, and here are some that might be on your minds:
Will Brotherwise have to pay tariffs on the RPG books? Or are they exempt? Right now, this is unclear. Under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, “informational materials” like books are exempt from tariffs. However, past rulings on RPGs have miscategorized RPG sourcebooks as game accessories rather than books. We’re working through this with our customs broker and hoping for new precedents to be established.
Can I cancel my order if I don’t want to wait for physical goods? While we recommend waiting for your physical rewards, we understand if you don’t want to endure an uncertain wait. As long as you cancel your pledge prior to digital reward distribution, we can provide a refund.
Can I shift my US order to an international address? If your circumstances allow, you may shift your US address to an international address. In this scenario, your new shipping cost would be whatever other backers are paying for shipping to that region.
Can I pay you more now to get my rewards in the U.S. sooner? Can you ship the books to us now and the non-book products later? Unfortunately, given the scale of this project, we can’t accommodate individual shipments. And splitting the project into multiple shipments to each backer could be even more expensive than the tariffs themselves.
President Trump promised tariffs on the campaign trail. Why didn’t you anticipate this issue? Our scenario planning did include tariffs, but Trump’s actions in office have far exceeded even his boldest rhetoric on the campaign trail. In general, most economists and policymakers do notendorse tariffs. Those who do have recommended gradual implementation of tariffs on China (e.g. 2% per month) and up to a maximum of 60%. The rapid escalation of tariffs has hamstrung the ability for American businesses, particularly smaller ones like Brotherwise, to pursue sourcing in the US or other countries outside of China.
Why don’t you shift production to the US? Production on this project began some time ago, but even looking to the future, moving production to the US would be incredibly challenging. From a trade perspective, the US focuses on services and high-complexity goods. Due to our relative wealth and standards of living, our labor costs and manufacturing base do not support lower-complexity, high-labor products like games and toys. It’s very difficult to find manufacturing alternatives to China that offer the same combination of scale (supporting our high print runs) and quality (supporting promised features like gilded edges and spot UV).
When we sourced this project, even when we looked at a “worst case scenario” of 60% tariff scenarios, prices in China were still considerably lower than those in the US, Canada, or Eastern Europe. The situation is even worse for plastic goods like dice and miniatures, which require heavy manufacturing equipment to make at scale. It would take years for the US to ramp up the capacity for tooling and injection molding, and most materials and industrial machinery required for that work would need to be sourced from China.
Why don’t you handle this differently? For example, why don’t you pass the tariffs on to backers? We’ve seen a few commenters suggest that businesses should charge their customers more for products, with the goal of turning consumer sentiment against these tariff policies. We’re also seeing a lot of our peers in the industry react to these tariffs in different ways, including those who have no choice but to pass on the costs. We’re doing what feels best to us right now, trying to navigate this crisis while keeping our promises. We appreciate your patience with the decisions we’re making, but also hope you save some understanding for publishers who can’t make the same choices.
This will all be worth it!
Confident, and Somehow Still Full of Hope
At Brotherwise Games, we are optimists. That’s what has driven us to pursue a project this ambitious, and so far, that positive outlook has been justified thanks to the strength of the Cosmere community. We’ve appreciated your support through this project’s triumphs, and we hope you’ll continue to root for us as we face some tribulations. We’ll continue to maintain open lines of communication in the weeks and months ahead. Thanks for your patience, and for believing in us as much as we believe in this RPG.
April Micro-update
over 1 year ago
– Thu, Apr 10, 2025 at 09:53:02 AM
Greetings, Worldhoppers! We are already in the second week of April, which means Spring is officially here! We've been keeping busy preparing for the digital release later this Summer and continuing the playtest for the Mistborn Campaign Setting.
This update is coming a little early because Johnny is on vacation in Japan, and we wanted to give you a timely update this month! In this update, we'll talk about:
Cosmere RPG: Gen Z Edition
Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game Award Nomination
Production and Tariffs Update
Cosmere RPG: Gen Z Edition
Please continue reading below if you are Gen Z. If you are not Gen Z, then DON'T continue reading!
Ok, now that we've got ONLY Gen Z backers reading this...wsg gng? Want to aura farm your way through Roshar and experience peak? Look no further than the Cosmere RPG: Gen Z Edition!
This brand-new edition of the RPG is tuff and hits different, so make sure to check it out! #AprilFools
Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game is up for an award!
The Mistborn Deckbuilding Game has been nominated for "Best Card Game" on Board Game Quest! We are absolutely honored to be considered for this award.
If you've enjoyed playing Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game, please consider voting for us! No need to register for anything to vote! Winning this award will help ensure the game gets seen by everyone, including non-Cosmere fans. This will go a long way towards ensuring the success of future expansions and more.
And if you don't yet have this amazing game from designer John D Clair, what are you waiting for? Hop over to the Dragonsteel Books store and get your copy.
Production and Tariffs Update
In our last update, we mentioned the Stormlight Campaign Setting is officially in production! Since then, books are being printed, dice molded, and cards cut. We're still on track to complete production sometime in June, but (in case you've been living in a chasm) the latest news on tariffs has thrown a few wrinkles into our timeline.
As of this writing, President Trump has promised what amounts to crippling 145% tariffs on (almost) all goods produced in China, which just happens to be where we're producing the Cosmere RPG. Because this situation is evolving so quickly, and changing day to day, we have to be cautious and flexible in how we plan for dealing with them. While we want to assure you that we are considering every possible option for handling these tariffs and even setting plans in motion to try and account for the various possibilities, we are going to wait until we get a bit closer to the end of production before we announce those plans publicly. There is so little certainty about things right now, that anything we were to announce today could be moot by Monday of next week.
We know that you are anxious about what this might mean for your pledges. Please know that we are going to do everything possible to get these delightful products to you with the least amount of pain. Brotherwise cares about the Cosmere and the Cosmere fan base as much as you do. One way or the other we'll find a path forward.
Marching Into Production
over 1 year ago
– Thu, Mar 20, 2025 at 09:56:24 AM
Hello, Worldhoppers! It's been a little over a month since our last update, but our team has been very busy since then! In this update, we're excited to share info on:
Production & Physical Proofs
Beta Material End Date & VTT Availability
What's next for the RPG team
Let's jump straight into the most exciting news:
Production Update
Production has officially begun! We're now in the process of printing our core sourcebooks, which are by far the biggest part of this initial print run. (We're printing more than 60,000 copies of each book!) Miniatures are also well underway, and moving to the packaging stage. We've received and approved samples of every physical reward for our Stormlight launch.
Everything is shaping up beautifully, as you can see in this 5-minute video from Johnny, the project's Creative Director:
Everything on this table is technically a "pre-production" sample, shipped to us by the factory so we can make final comments and provide approvals. We have approved everything you see in the video, so everything there is either in production or about to be!
The project continues to be right on schedule for our promised fulfillment date of September. We'll provide updates on that timing every month, and we live in a world where geopolitical events could cause unexpected delays. But for now, thanks to the efforts of our hard-working team, we remain on track.
Beta Materials Coming Down on March 31st
In our Valentine's Day update, we noted that the Beta materials and compendium content for each VTT partner will be removed on March 31st. This means that all free trial materials for the Cosmere RPG will be taken down, and won't be back up until after the digital release. Don't worry, though! The free trial material will be replaced with similar free trial content around the digital release to help recruit new players in the years to come. If you made a character using Demiplane, you will continue to have access to your playtest player characters made on Cosmere RPG Nexus both during this transition period and after.
We're just trying to give our partners ample time to change over to the final game, and minimize any crossover between outdated/Beta content with the final rules. It may be slight overkill, but the Beta materials were primarily there to A) support playtesting and B) give folks a chance to try the system before backing. We do appreciate the resourceful folks who have already started campaigns using demo materials, but hopefully, those groups can make do with downloads of existing materials. For now, our focus is on making sure our digital partners are prepared with top-quality support when we send digital rewards in the summer!
Planning for the Future
Along with all that production excitement, the core Brotherwise team just came back from a very productive off-site retreat. Thank you for being patient while we were out of the office! Brotherwise full-time staffers Jillian, Matt, and Hayden joined Johnny and Chris in California for two days of vision planning, brainstorming, and strategizing. We discussed what's next for Cosmere RPG, and where we'd like to take the underlying core rules, which we call Plotweaver.
Chris and Johnny led a presentation on the future of Cosmere Games and Collectibles
As you know, 2025 is all about Stormlight, and 2026 will see the release of our Mistborn sourcebooks. In 2027, we're currently planning to keep the focus on those two campaign settings. We'll be developing new adventure content and a fully-featured solo rulebook that's fully compatible with all the existing sourcebooks. Beyond that, we're working with Brandon and Dragonsteel on long-term rollout plans for Worldhopper, Warbreaker, and Elantris sourcebooks (not necessarily in that order).
We're also in the early stages of developing Plotweaver as a standalone system. We won't let those efforts slow down Cosmere RPG releases, but we're recruiting a second team of folks to work on fantasy, modern, and sci-fi rules that can be used for any setting. That initiative will be supported by an open game license that will allow independent creators to monetize their own (non-Cosmere) IP. For at least the next year, that work will all be behind-the-scenes, but our discussions at the retreat confirmed that this will be a major initiative for Brotherwise Games over the next three years.
Thank You!
As always, we appreciate your support and patience as we work hard to make these materials the best they can be. We're really pleased at how pre-production went, and production seems to be (knock on wood) going just as smoothly. If you have thoughts or questions, please share them in the comments!
Find Your Passion
over 1 year ago
– Fri, Feb 14, 2025 at 09:37:45 AM
Happy Valentine's Day, backers! This is a day for love and appreciation, so we're excited to send an update to show you all how much we appreciate you. We have a quick production update and a reminder to finalize your BackerKit selections, but first... something fun.
The Thirsty Scholar
A couple of weeks ago, Jillian asked the RPG team if they had anything to share for Valentine's Day. She was thinking they might have a message for the fans, or maybe an idea for a Cosmere RPG-themed Valentine's Day card. She should have known they'd have something even better...
Some key members of the RPG team, with a little help from Dan Wells, were already cooking up a new Scholar specialty: the Devotary of Thirst. Inspired by Ardent Ellista, this talent tree is perfect for anyone who wants to bring a little romantasy into their fantasy.
Now you can live out your fan fiction dreams and cultivate some passion! This path is totally unofficial, but it's a lot of fun. It's fan content that just happens to come straight from the Cosmere RPG team. Which brings us to our next topic...
Fan Content Policy
Ever since the Beta went live, players have been asking us about our fan content policy. While we're still working on a formal policy with more detailed legal language, we've posted the key information on the Cosmere RPG website. The TLDR:
Homebrew game content is encouraged! Just make sure it's A) not monetized, B) doesn't copy the official graphic design elements like borders and backgrounds, and C) specifies that it's fan content.
Actual play content is in a category of its own, and can be monetized (e.g. on an ad-supported YouTube channel). We'll be offering some perks and support for Cosmere RPG APs.
Plotweaver™ (the system underlying the Cosmere RPG) is coming! It will have its own open game license, which will allow for monetization of IP that you own.
Reminder: Stormlight Physical Items Leave Backerkit on February 28
We will be taking the Stormlight Physical Items off of the BackerKit pledge manager and pre-order store on February 28th! This timing will ensure we have accurate estimates for our printing quantities.
This includes all physical items in the "Stormlight RPG Products" section (but not PDFs, VTT modules, or miniature STLs). Of course, all Stormlight retail items will be available in the future when the game hits store shelves.
Digital items for Stormlight and all items for Mistborn will remain active in the pledge manager and pre-order store.
Pre-Production Turnover is Complete!
In our update two weeks ago, we said that we'd be sending all print files to our factory partner by the end of the Chinese New Year holiday. Since then, our team has been working hard to do just that: we've handed over files for the Plot Decks, Item Cards, Map Pack, and Token Collection.
As we like to do, we've put some extra love into those items along the way. We promised "over a hundred" tokens, and the final number is 195. We promised 12 maps, but decided to make them all double-sided, so the final pack really contains 24 ...including every battlemap from Bridge Nine and Stonewalkers. The card sets are also looking awesome.
Now that they're back from the Chinese New Year holiday, our friends at LongPack are working to send physical samples of the RPG for us to review before mass production. We've already sent notes on the Handbook and eagerly await the other book proofs.
What about the digital products?
We've seen some folks on our Discord server theorizing that digital rewards would be released early, but we want to clarify that we're still following the plan we announced during the campaign: we'll send digital rewards shortly before physical fulfillment begins. There are a few reasons for this:
We want to make sure the files are in perfect shape before we hand them over to our partners at Roll20/Demiplane, Fantasy Grounds, and Foundry. We've just sent those files for the core books, and we're still working on the e-supplements.
Our partners want to make sure that content is in great shape, so they're taking the time to get everything right.
We don't want there to be too much lag between people getting digital rulebooks and physical books.
That last point is really the most important. We want the Cosmere RPG to have staying power, which is part of why we set up this Kickstarter to fulfill across two years of releases. We think the digital materials are a great preview for backers, but we don't want the game to feel like old news by the time you get your physical books. It's tricky to time everything out over the course of years, but so far we're right on track!
The only reason we haven't set a specific date for digital delivery is because that depends on how everything's going with physical reward fulfillment. Our goal is to send digital rewards to all backers 2 months before physical rewards begin reaching US backers. If we stay on track for our physical fulfillment in September, digital rewards will go out in July.
VTT Availability
As mentioned above, we are working with all our VTT partners to get the finalized ruleset for the Stormlight Campaign Setting up and running on their platform. Starting on March 31st, each platform will remove its compendium content, and the free trial for the Cosmere RPG will be taken down until after the digital release. (However, it will be replaced with similar free trial content to help recruit new players in the years to come.)
If you made a character using Demiplane, you will continue to have access to your Playtest player characters made on Cosmere RPG Nexus both during this transition period and after.
Production & Fulfillment Timeline
Physical proofing can take several weeks, and once that process is finished, we'll have a better idea about LongPack's production timeline. This will determine our projected fulfillment timeline for digital and physical rewards, so we'll keep you posted in future update.
Thanks for your support, and have a very happy Valentine's Day! ❤️
