In December 2025 we presented the all-new Old Gods of Appalachia RPG Bundle featuring the Old Gods of Appalachia Roleplaying Game, the Cypher System RPG of eldritch horror from Monte Cook Games based on the captivating Old Gods of Appalachia anthology podcast created by Steve Shell and Cam Collins. Set in an alternate version of the Appalachian Mountains of the eastern US, Old Gods of Appalachia tells of the Green, the Dark, and things even more ancient. Long before anything human roamed the Earth, the Appalachians towered tall. For eons those peaks entombed beings of malice and unknowable hunger. But now the mountains are mere hills, and the prison walls wear thin. Things that had slumbered, now restless, call to the people in the mountain hollers, whisper to those vulnerable to their temptations, and seek to influence our world.
Funded in a sensational US$2.1M April 2022 Kickstarter campaign, the Old Gods of Appalachia Roleplaying Game is a standalone RPG driven by the Cypher System rules. You play characters who try to protect what matters to them, be that family, community, a place, or something else. You might be a local miner who delved too deep and uncovered something that now stalks your dreaming hours. Perhaps you’re a charismatic preacher who extols the virtuous life, to atone for the dark bargain you made long ago. Or maybe you’re an outsider, a reporter sent here to debunk accounts of monsters from the mountains, but the story you uncovered now lives in your bones. Spin your own tales of ravenous creatures of the Inner Dark, sinister plots of the Hollow Men, unearthed beasts, and angry forces of the Green. Seek to know the unknowable. Every choice requires a sacrifice, and your word is your bond.
Appalachia’s history runs with blood. In the 18th and 19th Centuries, pushing deep into the remote mountains of the eastern United States, European immigrants massacred the original inhabitants from the Atlantic coastline to the far foothills. The settlers formed isolated communities in sheltered valleys called hollers. By necessity these folk had to be self-sufficient to rough out an existence. Though the area is vast and the settlers are diverse, they are united in their shared experience of homesteading, self-reliance, support for neighbors, hardiness, fortitude, and their insular existence.
The region’s “granny magic” and witchcraft include songs, spells, rituals, and charms created to heal or harm, bring good luck or bad, increase fertility or the harvest, dowse for wells, and work with spirits. This magic derives from the Green, an elemental manifestation of life and the natural world. But the long-entombed beings beneath the hills command an ancient magic as old as the land itself, a powerful and wholly unknowable magic that cares nothing for humanity. Characters can tap this Inner Dark to craft powerful objects, call on creatures and ask for favors, and make life-altering bargains with powerful entities. But all magic in this setting comes with a price.
This all-new Old Gods of Appalachia RPG Bundle included everything you need to join the Family where the shadows stir in the darkest mountains in the world. There were three titles in our Appalachian Starter (retail value $35) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete full-color 418-page Old Gods of Appalachia RPG corebook and the Player’s Guide excerpted from it, plus the Railroad Guide prop and play aid.
Those who paid more than the threshold (average) price also got our entire Bonus Collection with five more titles worth an additional $38 – a full poke including the recent character rules expansion Dig Your Own Grave, the full-length scenario Best Leave Them Ghosts Alone, the print-and-cut Resource Deck and XP Deck, and the GM Screen.
