Do you dream of escape, but don’t know from what, or to where? Looking for a chance to escape the insanity of the world, and immerse yourself into something rich, deep, and fantastical? Something that challenges the limits of your creativity as well as your intellect?
If so, then join us. Escape the Shadow of the real world and find the Invisible Sun. Enter a new Actuality of surreal fantasy where mystical characters wield fabulous powers and struggle to discover the secrets of true existence
Invisible Sun is the new roleplaying game by Monte Cook. Its focus is in deep immersion storytelling. Its mechanics and gameplay are tailored around overcoming the barriers to that immersion. Magic is not mechanical, but truly magical. Character creation and development is based around story arcs. And we’ve gone further than that. Because we know the challenges gamers face in the modern world, with conflicting schedules and sometimes distant players, Invisible Sun does something different. It embraces traditional tabletop play, but enhances it with away-from-the-table activities, rules to deal with absent players, solo play, online play, and more. All the barriers are down. All doors are open.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
How the Invisible Sun Directed Campaign Works
about 6 years ago
– Wed, May 02, 2018 at 01:46:21 AM
When the Directed Campaign launches on June 1st, those GMs who have opted in will gain access to an exclusive website. That will have two main features:
1. A package of downloadable content. 2. A GM’s discussion area.
Monte breaks both of these down further in today’s web article. And if you backed at a level that gets you the Directed Campaign, keep an eye on your inbox this week!
Implications of Worldbuilding
Worldbuilding for your stories or games can be deeply satisfying, but it also has a nearly endless number of facets to consider. Join Monte and Shanna this week on Twitch as they talk about the ramifications of decisions, logic, flavor, and other topics related to crafting settings, including Invisible Sun, Numenera, Predation, and more.
Production Update—Unboxing!
about 6 years ago
– Thu, Apr 26, 2018 at 08:51:40 PM
Hello, wise vislae—
As promised, we’re posting an update every Friday to let you know how things are coming along with Invisible Sun production. This week we’re sending the update out early, because we have something we simply can’t wait to share. Have a look!
This is the very first Black Cube off the production line, which was FedExed directly to us. As you watch the unboxing, here are a couple of things to keep in mind.
As I mention in the video, this Black Cube came all the way from Jiaxing, China to us by FedEx—about as far as you can ship something and have it remain on planet Earth, and much farther than most of the shipments to backers. With all that travel, the outer box was pretty beat up, but fortunately the Black Cube was just about pristine inside.
We did find a couple of issues with this Black Cube, most notably the cloth maps. (Other issues were more technical in nature, like the markings on the outer carton.) We’ll of course make sure that this isn’t an ongoing problem at the factory.
Did you notice the extra card space in the second drawer tray? That’s where you can put your cards from Book M. The entire Black Cube is designed to hold the contents not just for shipping, but for the life of your Invisible Sun game.
It would have been nice to give Monte the honor of the first unboxing, but since this was our production inspection copy, it came instead to Bear and me here in the Kansas City area (Monte lives in the Seattle area). But Monte gets the second copy, which is on the way to him now!
Here it is laid out on Bear's LARGE dining room table!
Fog in Shanghai
While the unboxing is super exciting, we got some less exciting news this morning:
Our freight broker forwarded the following information to us, which I’m pasting in verbatim (apologies for the imperfect English):
“Please kindly note that Shanghai and Ningbo terminals are experiencing heavy fog currently and all vessel sailings will be delayed. Right now approximate delay lead time is 5 days. Depending on the situation, some vessels delayed 8 days for departure.”
Apparently Shanghai, Ningbo, and the Yangtze River estuary are suffering from long periods of severe fog, which are disrupting schedules for ship loading and departures. Delays are currently in the 5-to-8-day range, but this is an ongoing situation so that could change. We don’t know exactly where our Invisible Sun shipment is in the queue, but we do know it hasn’t been embarked yet, and there’s a good chance it won’t until next week. This is super-frustrating, but the sort of oddball thing that sometimes happens in international shipping.
We should know more next week, and we will of course keep you up to date at that time.
Finishing Up the Directed Campaign Website
We’re currently well into testing for the Directed Campaign website. It’s the platform you’ll use to receive and download content, tell us how your campaign is going, and interact with each other and the MCG design team—if you’re signed up for the Directed Campaign! Since you can start your campaign at any point over a one-year period, and then get tailored content over twelve months, the site’s delivery system required some pretty complex coding. But so far testing has gone pretty much without a hitch!
The Directed Campaign is as unique and innovative an RPG product as Invisible Sun itself. You get a load of content (enough to keep a typical party busy for a whole year), plus a bunch of mailings of physical props and supporting items, sent to you and your players. If you didn’t back at a level that gets you the Directed Campaign, it’s not too late—you can sign up now!
Shipping for Australia
Those of you paying close attention to the audio might have heard me say, “When these ship out to backers…[they’ll] hopefully be shipping from Australia as well.” That’s right, Aussie friends! We’ve worked long and hard to find the right partner in Australia to fulfill Kickstarter rewards for us, and we are very close to signing on the dotted line with them. Obviously, we’ll have more news and details to share soon (please try to hold your questions—since the agreement isn’t signed, we don’t have any further information to share with you now), but we wanted you to know your ears aren’t deceiving you. And we’re thrilled with the possibilities that this opens for you and us.
Numenera Preorders Are Now Open!
This is off topic, so I'll keep it short: If you missed the Numenera 2 Kickstarter, here's some big news: Preorders for Numenera Discovery and Numenera Destiny are now open, and we're offering a really nice preorder deal!
Join us Friday evening for our weekly Invisible Sun game! Monte GMs for Darcy, Shanna, Bruce, and Sean in his campaign, The Raven Wants What You Have. If you’ve ever wanted to sit in as the MCG team plays our games, be there tonight! Plus we’re live in the chat as well, so you can truly hang with us as we play. It all happens at 10 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. PDT. (If you’ve missed the campaign so far, you can catch up starting with the first episode on YouTube.)
—Charles and the MCG Team
Production Update—Medallions Are Finished!
about 6 years ago
– Fri, Apr 20, 2018 at 10:38:17 PM
Hello, wise vislae—
As promised, we’re posting an update every Friday to let you know how things are coming along with Invisible Sun production. Black Cubes are on the move this week, but the big news is that we’ve heard from Campaign Coins that production is complete on the Invisible Sun medallions. You may recall that there are nine sun medallions, plus the five orders—so fourteen total designs. But some backer levels get some medallions in unique finishes, so there’s actually something like 22 different variations. They’ll all ship to reach our warehouse within a couple of weeks. (Being much smaller and lighter than the Black Cubes, they’ll come to us by air freight rather than a slow boat.)
We’d hoped to have a Black Cube to unbox for you in today’s update, but unfortunately our first couple of games are still in transit to us. (Even via FedEx, it can sometimes take several days for items to make it all the way from China to a US address.) As excited as you may be to get your hands on your copy, after nearly two years of working on it, we—and especially Monte, who really put his heart (as well as hundreds of hours of work) into Invisible Sun—are starting to go crazy with anticipation!
Are You Getting the Directed Campaign?
The Directed Campaign is really cool—twelve months of Invisible Sun content, tailored to the events of your campaign. Plus a bunch of mailings of physical props and supporting items, sent to you and your players. If you’re looking for Invisible Sun content and inspiration, the Directed Campaign gives you a whole year’s worth!
The Directed Campaign is as unique and innovative an RPG product as Invisible Sun itself. If you didn’t back at a level that gets you the Directed Campaign, it’s not too late—you can sign up now!
Join Us Tonight!
Join us tonight for our weekly Invisible Sun game! Monte GMs for Darcy, Shanna, Bruce, and Sean in his campaign, The Raven Wants What You Have. If you’ve ever wanted to sit in as the MCG team plays our games, be there tonight! Plus we’re live in the chat as well, so you can truly hang with us as we play. It all happens at 10 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. PDT. (If you’ve missed the campaign so far, you can catch up with the first episode on YouTube.)
—Charles and the MCG Team
Production Update—Black Cubes Are Being Made!
about 6 years ago
– Sat, Apr 14, 2018 at 12:02:49 AM
Hello, wise vislae—
As promised, we’re posting an update every Friday to let you know how things are coming along with Invisible Sun production. This week the first big batch of Black Cubes were assembled, with the initial copies coming off the line today.
Beautiful Testaments of Suns!
Shipping arrangements are now finalized, and the Black Cubes should move to the Shanghai docks this coming week. This is a couple of days later than we’d hoped, but we’ve built some wiggle room into the shipping schedule, so things remain on track. From Shanghai, pallets of Black Cubes will begin the transit across the oceans, not just to the US but also to the UK.
The first few complete Black Cubes (and I mean, literally, just three or four) will be air-shipped to us here in the US. So we should be able to show you a final Black Cube—inside and out—next week!
Pallets of Black Cube boxes lined up for assembly.
Don’t Forget to Join Us Tonight!
Join us tonight for our weekly Invisible Sun game! Monte GMs for Darcy, Shanna, Bruce, and Sean in his campaign, The Raven Wants What You Have. If you’ve ever wanted to sit in as the MCG team plays our games, be there tonight! Plus we’re live in the chat as well, so you can truly hang with us as we play. It all happens at 10 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. PDT. (If you’ve missed the campaign so far, you can catch up with the first episode on YouTube.)
—Charles and the MCG Team
While the Black Cube is being made, we're hard at work on Book M. Here's a sneak peek at some artwork by Jason Engle.
Production Update—Heading into Assembly!
about 6 years ago
– Sat, Apr 07, 2018 at 01:25:29 AM
Hello, wise vislae—
As promised, we’re posting an update every Friday to let you know how things are coming along with Invisible Sun production. We don’t have a lot of news this week, but what we do have is really exciting: The factory starts to assemble the finished Black Cubes early next week!
The first shipment of Testament of Suns is now in transit to the factory, and is expected to arrive on Monday.
The Black Cube boxes are through the drying process and ready to go.
All other components are complete and ready!
Dice! The blue ones are the mundane dice, which were one of the last components to complete manufacture.
Check out the secrets envelope, complete with wax seal.
The factory will begin assembling the Black Cubes as soon as the Testaments of Suns arrive. Roughly half the print run should be ready to go by the middle of next week. Then they’ll be loaded into a container, trucked to Shanghai, and loaded on a ship. If all goes well (but be warned: this part of the process can be fraught with unforeseeable delays), they should be aboard ship by this time next week.
This first shipment will be sufficient to cover backer fulfillment. The rest of the print run will follow in a couple of weeks.
We’ll have more specifics on the transit next week. In the meantime, don’t forget to join us tonight for our Friday night Invisible Sun campaign, The Raven Wants What You Have. It’s on tonight at 10 p.m. EST (7 p.m. PST). (If you’ve missed the sessions so far, you can start with the first one on YouTube.) See you tonight!
