Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive TTRPG Makes $1M In Under An Hour

The highly anticipated Stormlight Archives TTRPG Kickstarter--now renamed the Cosmere RPG--broke the million dollar barrier in under an hour, joining the million dollar Kickstarter club.

Published by Brotherwise Games, the game encompasses Brandon Sanderson's entire universe of novels. It includes a world guide, a rulebook, and an adventure called Stormlight Stonewalkers. It's a new game system, based on a d20 mechanic with talent trees and skill-based magic.

The question now is whether it can beat the Avatar Legends TTRPG's almost $10M record? Avatar hit the million dollar mark after the first few hours, so--at least at this point--the Cosmere RPG is tracking ahead of it. Brandon Sanderson already holds the Kickstarter record for the most funded project ever--his novel series made over $40M on Kickstarter in 2023!

 

[Aldarc]

Brandon Sanderson is primarily a fantasy author who tackles a wide variety of topics in his books, including but not limited to: mental illness, colonialism, trauma, oppression, religious fanaticism, and how power affects people. He is often praised for his in-depth world building and magic systems. The Stormlight Archive is an epic fantasy series taking place on an alien world thrown into chaos after the mysterious assassination of the king.*

*It is hard to say more than this without spoiling the books. IMO part of the magic of The Way of Kings is becoming immersed in the setting and slowly learning how it works. You do not need to read any of the rest of the Cosmere to understand or appreciate the Stormlight Archive. The same goes for Mistborn and all other Cosmere books and series. There are more connections and crossovers than say Stephen King’s books, but so long as you start with the first book in its series, you can read and appreciate it without reading the other Cosmere books.

I love how you talk about the issues that Sanderson covers in his books, and the next sentence is that people just wanna talk about his world-building and magic system.

 

[Parmandur]

Brandon Sanderson is primarily a fantasy author who tackles a wide variety of topics in his books, including but not limited to: mental illness, colonialism, trauma, oppression, religious fanaticism, and how power affects people. He is often praised for his in-depth world building and magic systems. The Stormlight Archive is an epic fantasy series taking place on an alien world thrown into chaos after the mysterious assassination of the king.*

*It is hard to say more than this without spoiling the books. IMO part of the magic of The Way of Kings is becoming immersed in the setting and slowly learning how it works. You do not need to read any of the rest of the Cosmere to understand or appreciate the Stormlight Archive. The same goes for Mistborn and all other Cosmere books and series. There are more connections and crossovers than say Stephen King’s books, but so long as you start with the first book in its series, you can read and appreciate it without reading the other Cosmere books.

Yeah, it isn't that Sanderson doesn't write good plots, on the contrary his plots are quite ingenious. But that is why they are hard to describe concisely, particularly without spoilers.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I love how you talk about the issues that Sanderson covers in his books, and the next sentence is that people just wanna talk about his world-building and magic system.

Well, that is one of the aspects of why people like him. It is one of his strengths as a fantasy author. That is part of why I fell in love with the Cosmere, so I felt it was worth mentioning in a quick summary.

I fell in love with the Cosmere primarily because Kaladin was extremely relatable to me. But also because of the experience of being thrown into the alien world of Roshar and having to figure it out as you read. It’s a really unique and interesting setting. The rest of Sanderson’s books don’t quite achieve that level of immersion, but he is very good at worldbuilding and his magic systems are an aspect to that.

But, yes, there are a lot of deeper themes and topics discussed in Stormlight and the other major Cosmere books. Mental illness, especially in Stormlight. How religion is used and abused by governments in Mistborn, Elantris, Warbreaker, and Stormlight. Struggle against oppression in Mistborn and Stormlight. One could easily make an anti-capitalist reading of Warbreaker’s magic system, even though the novel isn’t really about that. I could go on.

 

[Reynard]

Well, that is one of the aspects of why people like him. It is one of his strengths as a fantasy author. That is part of why I fell in love with the Cosmere, so I felt it was worth mentioning in a quick summary.

I fell in love with the Cosmere primarily because Kaladin was extremely relatable to me. But also because of the experience of being thrown into the alien world of Roshar and having to figure it out as you read. It’s a really unique and interesting setting. The rest of Sanderson’s books don’t quite achieve that level of immersion, but he is very good at worldbuilding and his magic systems are an aspect to that.

But, yes, there are a lot of deeper themes and topics discussed in Stormlight and the other major Cosmere books. Mental illness, especially in Stormlight. How religion is used and abused by governments in Mistborn, Elantris, Warbreaker, and Stormlight. Struggle against oppression in Mistborn and Stormlight. One could easily make an anti-capitalist reading of Warbreaker’s magic system, even though the novel isn’t really about that. I could go on.

I think this is exactly the kind of inside baseball stuff @Whizbang Dustyboots was talking about: you are writing ina way that other fans will understand, but is just going to be confusing to potential new readers.

Whiz: Kaladin is one of the main characters in The Stormlight Archives, which takes place on a world called Roshar which is pretty unique in fantasy series (it isn't just a faux-medieval Europe or whatever). Kaladin discovers he has a powerful destiny while serving as a cannon fodder slave. Accepting that destiny and embracing his potential leads him to a much more important role. The broader story is about war between humans and another indigenous alien race, and there are anime power armor knights involved, along with other people like Kaladin that have inherent magic. And there's the most annoying character ever written, but that's neither here nor there.

 

[Reynard]

As an aside, that art does not reflect what I saw in my head while listening to the Stormlight Archives audiobooks.

 

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[Meech17]

As an aside, that art does not reflect what I saw in my head while listening to the Stormlight Archives audiobooks.

Yeah.. Kaladan and Shallan here match my head cannon.. But I imagined the Parshendi being much less human like. Larger in stature as well. I imagine body types similar to how dwarves are often depicted but height on par with humans.

Same with shardplate/blades.. I'm assuming that is supposed to be Adolin and his blade. I had imagined Shardplate being almost like a mech suit. Shardbearer would be like ~8ft tall in armor.

With that said.. I don't dislike this art.. I think it looks good. Just not what I had imagined.

 

[bedir than]

I was wrong. They didn't reach 5 million on day 1

They merely hit 4.9 million

 

[Parmandur]

View attachment 375746
Yeah.. Kaladan and Shallan here match my head cannon.. But I imagined the Parshendi being much less human like. Larger in stature as well. I imagine body types similar to how dwarves are often depicted but height on par with humans.

Same with shardplate/blades.. I'm assuming that is supposed to be Adolin and his blade. I had imagined Shardplate being almost like a mech suit. Shardbearer would be like ~8ft tall in armor.

With that said.. I don't dislike this art.. I think it looks good. Just not what I had imagined.

I only started reading Stormlight a year and a half ago, so I saw this sort of official art way before reading.

 

[DarkCrisis]

I have been been increasingly turned off by the long multi-book fantasy epics for reasons much like this. Sanderson seems like a massive contributor of this problem for me.


This has been my underlying issue as well.


I know a fair number of people who talk about it and play Avatar Legends. I've played in a few games of it myself. However, talk of PbtA games here is not exactly popular except among a relatively small handful of people, and I'm not sure if the more vocal ones are all that into Avatar the Last Airbender.


Ursula K. Le Guin is primarily a science-fiction author who often tackles cultural and socio-political issues in her written works, particularly issues pertaining to gender, sex, feminism, race, and violence. Her Earthsea series generally feature coming of age stories set in a fantasy world aimed for young adult readers.

Not a single sentence, but I think that would set up expectations for newcomers fairly well.

I’m just saying it’s a niche product in a niche fan base of a niche genre.

I’m sure it will do well and his fans will be happy but at the end of the day the rpg will be a blip on the radar for 5 minutes. It’s not going to rock the rpg world.

Nothing wrong with that. I’ve owned several RPGs like that. Dresden Files comes to mind.