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Gloomhaven Grand Festival

Created by Cephalofair

We invite you to join the celebration and check out the latest in the city of Gloomhaven. From Gloomhaven: Buttons & Bugs, Gloomhaven: The Role Playing Game, Miniatures of Gloomhaven, Gloomhaven: Second Edition and more, there is something for everyone.

Latest Updates from Our Project:

Changing updates to once a month
5 months ago – Tue, Oct 07, 2025 at 03:07:39 PM

Good day! It's a bit of a slow news day today, as we're still waiting on the latest shipment of miniature samples to look over, and we're in the middle of a lot of progress on the RPG. I know there was feedback in a previous update to keep the updates coming every two weeks, but I think more than anything, the feedback was about wanting more information. While it may seem counter-intuitive, we think that providing less frequent updates will result in more information, or at least more densely relevant information. While there is a lot of work happening across all of our projects, updates every two weeks make for some fairly dry reading material. If we move to a monthly schedule, we will be able to provide the more meaningful updates you’d like to see. There will be more to talk about, and there will be fewer updates like this.

So that's what we're going to do. Updates will now drop on the first Tuesday of every month. Next month, we should have a lot of progress to report on the RPG and miniatures as well. So with that said, let's talk about the RPG updates for this week.

RPG

A project with the scope of the RPG means that we have a lot of efforts moving forward simultaneously. Here are some progress updates on the major efforts outlined in the last update:
  • Mechanical text review: This is now complete, and all the changes made to the text are being incorporated into the layout.
  • Table updates and layout changes: We are continuing to work through all of these. All of the tables in the class and ancestry chapters have been completed, which leaves us with the bestiary to finish.
  • Indexing: This will commence once the text flow from page to page is locked in.
  • Ability cards: Layout for these is well underway, and we look forward to sharing some examples in our next update. 
  • Art layout: Steady progress continues to be made here integrating the many artistic elements of the book and working these elements into other components across this project for a polished and unified look. While the book is the central piece to this project, it’s important that we work these aesthetics into other materials like the GM screen and deluxe decks. 

                                       

Wave 3 Fulfillment/Support reminder: If you have not received your Gloomhaven items or had any issues with your order please contact [email protected]. If you’ve already sent an email, we appreciate your patience, and we’ll respond as soon as we can!

So that's everything we have for you now. As mentioned above, we will now be moving to a monthly update schedule, so I'll catch you in 4 weeks, on the first Tuesday of November, for a more substantial update on both the RPG and minis.


You've unlocked a new item!
5 months ago – Tue, Sep 23, 2025 at 01:08:12 PM

Good day! A long time ago, it was fated that we would make a new edition of Gloomhaven, taking a well-loved game, and making it better in every possible way. It was a difficult journey, full of hardship, but with fulfillment complete, the verses written about this voyage are finally complete, and they can now be passed along to you.



This is an item already in your copy of Gloomhaven that we wanted to reward you with for completing this journey with us. Thank you!

With that said, we’ve still got two more waves to complete, so let’s move on to updates on the other projects.

RPG

I wanted to take some time this week to give you a better idea of where we’re at with the RPG project. Earlier this year, when the initial book layout was coming together, we took a look at what we had and made the internal decision that the book could be a lot better. We were rushing to finish, and the result just wasn’t up to our standards.

We wanted to spend some time making things more visually interesting and cleaning up a lot of language and rules for clarity and space. It was also a huge priority for us to enable players to experience the RPG using just the book by reducing the overhead of playing without cards. This was accomplished by cutting back some ability card complexity and mapping the modifier deck to playing cards, which we’ve discussed in previous updates.

All of these things take time and effort, of course, and we have been making steady progress in the intervening time towards completing all these goals. Completing this RPG project is our main priority, and we are getting close to finishing the files needed to start pre-production.

The main efforts we are finishing up are:
  • Mechanical text review. We brought a rulebook expert in to make sure all the rules of the game are consistent and easy to understand. He has a few more sections to finish up.
  • Table updates and layout changes. As we've made improvements to the RPG and content has changed, tables throughout the book have needed updates both visual and structural. We are still currently working through these.
  • Indexing. We’ll start this as soon as all other book text is finalized.
  • Ability cards. With updating skills and system tweaks, the ability cards similarly need to be updated to match.
  • Art layout. In addition to the technical / gameplay-oriented layout, we’re working on integrating artistic elements into the RPG components in a visually exciting way. We’ve shown a lot in the spreads provided in previous updates.
  • Other materials. The GM screen, deluxe set box, and other packaging are the last step in all this, as they are dependent on the rest of the project being done.

In the coming weeks, we’ll keep you updated as we work through these efforts. Eventually we’ll move into pre-production, where there will be further efforts like packaging prototypes and pre-production samples, and we’ll get more into those then.

Miniatures


Normal progress continues on the miniature front. The factory has sent 37 miniatures across digital mods, red wax samples, and PU samples since last update, which have all been reviewed by us. Here are a few more images of some sculpts!



                                     

One other thing to mention is that I acknowledge support wait times have been longer than normal, which is obviously not ideal. We have been implementing further processes to speed things up, and the wait times are decreasing. I want to apologize for the delays, and thank you for your patience as we work through this.

That’s all we've got for this update. Catch you next time!

Wave 3 fulfillment wrapping up
5 months ago – Tue, Sep 09, 2025 at 12:57:12 PM

Good day! Thanks for all your feedback in the last update. We’ll continue to publish updates every two weeks as we work to complete the last legs of this project. It is also clear that you all are looking for more information on when the last legs - the RPG and miniatures project - will be completed, and I want to acknowledge that that, too, is heard and understood. Tariffs put a lot of timelines into flux, but we are working on solidifying more of that information for you for future updates.

For today’s update, I’m going to keep it relatively short. We’ve got continued progress on the miniatures and RPG, along with the usual fulfillment info on wave 3, so let’s start with that.

Wave 3 Fulfillment

Note on fulfillment support: We are working to get through our support tickets and appreciate your patience! If you have already sent an email please do not send additional tickets. This will bump your ticket in the queue causing further delays.

LaserOx(All regions): All organizers have shipped! If you have any issues with your shipment or the LaserOx product specifically please contact [email protected].

Asia: Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates orders have departed VFI, all current shipments proceeding as normal. Please be aware that it can take a couple weeks from Hub arrival for individual orders to arrive. You can always get the most up to date information at VFI’s hub page under the “Gloomhaven” section.
  • China: Delivered to hub on July 27th
  • Japan: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-10
  • Indonesia: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-30
  • Malaysia: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-15
  • Philippines: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-20
  • Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-10-15
  • Singapore: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-08
  • South Korea: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-08
  • Taiwan: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-07-31
  • Thailand: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-09-14
  • India and Israel: In Consolidation to be shipped out.
(Timeline varies by region and how many other products VFI is shipping to the region as they have to wait until a container has been filled.)

EU/RoW: Fulfillment complete! EU webstore preorders through July have shipped with the remainder being processed through the week. 

US: Fulfillment complete! US webstore preorders through August have also shipped with the remainder being processed this week.

Note that any backers who have not paid the tariff fee have not had their order uploaded, if you still have a remaining balance please contact [email protected].

Canada: Fulfillment complete! All remaining orders containing FoldedSpace items have shipped. 

UK: Fulfillment complete! 

AU/NZ: Fulfillment complete! Please note that some items may still be in transit, however if you have not received any type of tracking information at this time please contact [email protected].

As we wrap up all Backerkit orders for wave 3, outside of some stragglers in Asia, we'll be retiring this section until wave 4 starts to ship.

Miniatures



We have a handful of models that saw final approval this last week. While we're approaching the "end game" of models for review, we are currently in the midst of  making final modifications for molding purposes on some of our most complicated sculpts. This is a very time- and detail-oriented phase that has us touching/reviewing/opining on a significantly larger number of models than we get to publicly share progress on with you (for example, some miniatures go back 3-4 times between us and the factory when we're not happy with their digital modifications). So while we acknowledge you may be seeing a few models across each product updated, in reality, we had our hands on over 40 models in just the last 2 weeks. We're putting a lot of care into mold iteration to deliver both the most compelling sculpt, but also something that is capable of being mass produced.

We're expecting another deliver in the next few days and will be back with more progress in the next update! And in the meantime, here is a selection of some of the minis we're getting back from the factory.


RPG

From Danielle:

Hello again mercenaries!

We don’t have a huge update today, as most of the work we’ve been concentrating on is smaller tweaks on text and design to make it read smoothly and well. Graphic design and layout are nearly completely finished, and I’m currently doing a comprehensive readthrough of the text to catch any last spelling mistakes or errors we might have missed earlier. This work is time consuming, but necessary. There are a number of things that still need to be finished up before we are done with development and can move into pre-production, but we’re working on getting all of that into a timeline that can be communicated in the near future.

                                 

And that’s it for this week. I’ll catch you again in two weeks with more updates on our progress!



Fulfillment, minis, and a new RPG spread
6 months ago – Tue, Aug 26, 2025 at 12:51:09 PM

Good day! It has been a while, but I (Isaac) am back in the update chair. I hope you all are doing well!

Today we’ve got your usual Gloomhaven fulfillment updates, along with some RPG spreads we’re very proud of. In addition, I know there has been some clamoring to get more information about how the miniatures project is coming along, so Price has put together an update for you on that as well. Let’s get to it!

Gloomhaven Freight and Fulfillment

Backer data has been submitted to remaining fulfillment partners, please note we are no longer able to change addresses for this wave of shipments.

LaserOx (all regions): All organizers have shipped! If you have any issues with your shipment or the LaserOx product specifically please contact [email protected].

Asia: Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates have shipped, and all shipments are proceeding as normal. Please be aware that it can take a couple weeks from Hub arrival for individual orders to arrive. You can always get the most up to date information at VFI’s hub page under the “Gloomhaven” section.
  • China: Delivered to hub on July 27th
  • Japan: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-10
  • Indonesia: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-30
  • Malaysia: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-15
  • Philippines: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-20
  • Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-10-15
  • Singapore: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-08
  • South Korea: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-08-08
  • Taiwan: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-07-31
  • Thailand: Estimated hub arrival is 2025-09-14
  • India and Israel: In consolidation to be shipped out

EU/RoW: Fulfillment continues! We have just under 1,000 shipments left which includes about 200 base game orders. Fulfillment Europe plans to have the majority shipped before the end of the week with the remainder shipping out Mon/Tues.

US: The last fulfillment shipment was received over the weekend! There are roughly 300 orders remaining that are expected to go out today/tomorrow, once those have shipped US fulfillment will be complete. We will update this post once that happens, then preorders from the Cephalofair website will start shipping by the end of the week. Note that any backers who have not paid the tariff fee have not had their order uploaded. If you still have a remaining balance please contact [email protected].

Canada: Folded Space pallets have arrived, and the remaining orders have started shipping! The estimate we received is that all pending orders will be shipped out by the end of the week.

UK: Fulfillment complete! Please note that some items may still be in transit, however if you have not received any type of tracking information at this time please contact [email protected].

AU/NZ: Fulfillment complete! Please note that some items may still be in transit, however if you have not received any type of tracking information at this time please contact [email protected].

Miniatures


We are continuing to make progress on the miniatures front. As we get closer and closer to final approval on everything, you can see that Jaws of the Lion has joined Forgotten Circles at 100% approvals, and both are awaiting mold production.

There has also been a lot of progress made on the summons fronts, and we are down to the last couple of batches of digital and red wax samples. We are expecting another round of digital, red wax, and PU samples incoming this week from our manufacturer so the progress can continue.


RPG

From Danielle:
Greetings mercenaries! As we discussed last week, we’ve got an ancestry spread to share with you today. I’d also like to share how we went about solving what I felt was a bit of a tricky design. Ancestry Skills are an important part of a mercenary’s toolset, and you can see ancestry influence in the board game abilities for each of the classes. The design required ancestry Skills to function with every class, make each ancestry choice feel meaningful in a mechanical way, and show off an ancestry’s skills and culture without devolving to bioessentialism.


We felt the most important of these aspects was to make each ancestry feel mechanically representative of what the culture is about. In doing this, the Skills would be naturally distinct. Then we could tweak them for usefulness. Rather than just going through the board game abilities and trying to separate what part of it came from the class, and which came from the ancestry, we looked at what we knew about each ancestry and what would make sense for all mercenaries of that ancestry to have access to.

For example, most savvas have elemental cores. While the cragheart’s core is broken, they can still access Earth. Every savvas, regardless of chosen profession, has been trained to work with elements from the time they were created in the Copperneck Mountains. So of course, any savvas mercenary should be able to work with elements in a small way.

As you can see with the orchid spread, we took into account how orchids store their memories in crystals, both the process and the result. Their crystal growths are probably the most memorable orchid trait, and they use them and the rest of their physiology as tuning and vibration mechanisms. They use these vibrations to communicate, manipulate elements, sooth minds, and heal wounds. So of course, orchids have several healing abilities.

The last piece, combining any ancestry with any class, influenced how we represented those abilities on the Skills, at what level, and the pairings between primary and secondary actions. As each mercenary always has access to two of their ancestry Skills to pair with their class Skills, we wanted them to be able to act in a utilitarian manner. So, they might give a powerful attack earlier than you’d normally see, grant more conditions, or are clearly useful when mercenaries need to test their Attributes in combat. They can add versatility to classes that normally wouldn’t have a way to gain certain effects, like Shield or element manipulation.

I love all the ancestries and their intricacies, but I find the orchid mindset as one that I aspire to share. There’s so much to learn from the world, and the thought of living my life always expecting to find out something new, or gain a new understanding of something I already know is really compelling to me. Unfortunately, I feel I might be a bit too impulsive to truly identify with our orchid friends.

                                           

In other news, we’ve got a small crew headed out to PAX West this weekend, so if you’re in Seattle, be sure to stop by booth 4235 (2nd floor of the Summit Building). We’ll have demos of the mercenary packs, Gloomhaven, and Buttons & Bugs.


And finally, we’re interested in your feedback! As fulfillment on Gloomhaven winds down, we are considering slowing down updates to once a month as we work on finishing up the miniatures and RPG. We’d be interested to hear from you if you feel like this would be a welcome change, or whether you’d prefer these more frequent updates. So let us know!

And either way, we’ll be back in two weeks with more info on where we’re at. Catch you then!

Post Gen Con Update - EU+RotW Gloomhaven Fulfillment Starts
6 months ago – Wed, Aug 13, 2025 at 06:36:24 PM

Hello Grand Festival Backers!

We’re coming to you on a Wednesday this week as we had some in-office deadlines to meet earlier this week. Thanks for your patience! On the “Update Menu” today we’ve got Gloomhaven fulfillment progress, some Miniatures of Gloomhaven FAQ’s, and a brief update on how we’re listening and applying your feedback on the Gloomhaven: RPG. 

Let’s jump in.


-GLOOMHAVEN FULFILLMENT-

LaserOx (All regions): Organizers have been completed and will begin shipping out directly from LaserOx by next week!


-Asia & South Pacific 
Shipping to local hubs has commenced! Please be aware that it can take a couple weeks from Hub arrival for individual orders to arrive. You can always get the most up to date information at VFI’s hub page under the “Gloomhaven” section.

China: Delivered to hub on Friday, preparing for local fulfillment!
Japan: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-10
Indonesia: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-30
Malaysia: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-15
Philippines: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-20
Singapore: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-08
South Korea: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-08-08
Taiwan: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-07-31
Thailand: Estimated Hub Arrival: 2025-09-14
India, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates: In Consolidation to be shipped out.


-Europe, Mexico, & “Rest of the World” 
We announced in our last update that fulfillment was ready to start that week, but this was incorrect, and we are deeply sorry for the mistake. Our team misunderstood some additional requirements from our logistics partner, and so did not get them satisfied in a timely manner and missed our spot in the queue. This problem has since been rectified, and orders have officially started shipping. We are resolved to have daily updates with Fulfillment Europe to make sure there are no further hang-ups on getting all of your orders out. Additionally, we have shifted priorities and resources internally to support this tighter amount of vigilance you deserve. 


-United States
Fulfillment is ongoing, over 6,000 orders have already shipped! Packages are still going out, we expect this to continue through this week and into the next as the last container arrives. We were made aware of some issues with tracking numbers not getting sent to backers as well as an odd return address label on some packages, in talking to our US fulfillment partner they confirmed there have been some issues on the backend after the upgrade. In the meantime, we are uploading tracking#s into backerkit, this will generate an email from BK with your tracking number.

On the ocean fulfillment side, our last container needed to complete fulfillment arrived at port on Aug 1st as scheduled and is making its way to our fulfillment hub. 

Note that any backers who have not paid the tariff fee have not had their order uploaded, if you still have a remaining balance please contact [email protected].


-Canada
FoldedSpace pallets are on the last leg of their journey and are expected to arrive by Friday, remaining orders will start shipping out early next week! All pledges and backerkit preorders that did not have FoldedSpace(FS) items have fully shipped. 


-United Kingdom
Fulfillment complete! Please note that some items may still be in transit, however if you have not received any type of tracking information at this time please contact [email protected].


-Australia/New Zealand
Fulfillment complete! Please note that some items may still be in transit, however if you have not received any type of tracking information at this time please contact [email protected].


-MINIATURES OF GLOOMHAVEN-

We don’t have much to discuss today, mostly because I’ve been in meetings and discussions with our manufacturing team who were out of office, alongside our team, at GenCon and upon our return home about how we can better streamline and expedite progress being made on this project. As 100% of our sculpts have been submitted, we’ve expressed our (and your!) desire to see more progress being made here and believe we are on the cusp of that better workflow.

Speaking of Gen Con, we had a significant number of miniatures on display across all titles and received really positive and encouraging feedback from all our booth attendees. Thank you if you had a chance to stop by and check them out!













To field some questions we’ve seen in the comments:

Q. When will the miniature projects be completed and fulfilled?
A. We still need more information and more progress made with our manufacturing partner in order to give you a confident answer here, and the last thing we wish is to give you an overly ambitious goal, given our tendency to underestimate fulfillment windows. 

Additionally, not to blame, but to explain, a portion of this will be dependent on what the current USAxChina trade situation looks like at the time we are ready to pull the “mass production” lever. All the more motivation to have things completed sooner than later. 

Q. Will the quality of enemy miniatures match that of the board game? (i.e. Gloomhaven)
A. Yes, and no. Our goal is to generally exceed that of our board games, as we’ve signed this project with one of the larger and better known miniature factories in our industry. While the bulk of miniatures (due to the sheer quantity of monster groups and production costs) will consist of single-piece molds, several exceptions are being made for our most dynamic sculpts including Demons, Lurkers, and Bosses.

Q. Will miniature sets contain miniatures for 1st or 2nd Edition Gloomhaven?
A. Generally, both. While you may not get sculpts for both art styles of some enemies that received new artwork in 2nd Edition, boxed sets will still contain both enemies and summons removed between 1st and 2nd Editions of Gloomhaven. We hope these are welcomed over-inclusions that will help ensure you have the miniatures you need in either case, and even more to play with or use across the Gloomhaven: RPG if you so choose. 

Q. Will all Miniature of Gloomhaven sets ship at the same time?
A. Yes. Both production logistics, and shipping charged on the campaign, were aligned to take place at the same time to keep costs as low and efficient for all parties (factory, us, you) as low as possible. 


-GLOOMHAVEN RPG-

Now I’ll pass the update baton once again to our RPG lead, Danielle:

Greetings Mercenaries!

Thank you for all your feedback on our playing card system! We’ve been reading, digesting, and discussing your feedback and appreciate the passion that everyone is bringing to the table, and that so many people are engaged with wanting to help us make the game the best it possibly can be. 

For now, we will provide two different types of character sheets: one that includes the playing card mapping, and one that does not. (available as free downloads). People can then easily pick the type of sheet that suits their needs best. 

The details about using your own playing cards have been moved to a dedicated appendix in the book rather than being interspersed throughout the class content, so you will only engage with it if you choose to. (The deluxe box will only contain sheets without playing card mapping , as it also includes a full set of attack modifier cards.)

We’re still plugging away at making the layout look awesome. In addition, I’ve been polishing up flavor text on the ancestry Skills. Ancestry Skills were designed to feel as useful and important in combat as a class Skill, but also have clear narrative implications for use outside of combat.

My goal is that the short line of flavor text is enough to spark the imagination on what the character is doing to create their combat effect, and what other kinds of effects such an action might have outside of combat. 

In our next update, we’ll have the full ancestry page spreads in a polished enough state to share one with you!