Salvete sodales! Here are some updates on Ars Magica Definitive Edition.

One stretch goal of the campaign was to give backers a free copy of Mythic Venice, the open license Ars Magica sourcebook published by long-time ArM contributor Timothy Ferguson. These e-books are being distributed via DriveThruRPG; you should have received an e-mail with instructions on how to redeem your free copy. Thanks, Timothy, for this and all your contributions to the Ars Magica community!

Speaking of Venice, I want to make sure our backers are aware of Serenissima Obscura, a Backerkit crowdfunding campaign coming soon from our friends at German publisher Vortex Verlag!

The authors of Serenissima Obscura, Melina Sedó and Andreas Wichter, translated the 2nd and 4th editions of Ars Magica into German and published their long-running saga "Castel di Romena" in the German magazine Fantastic Adventure. They are enthusiastic about finally creating something for the Ars Magica universe again! We're excited too, and delighted to see a project like this appearing under the Ars Magica open license/CC-BY-SA.

We have a new iteration of the Ars Magica transmutation dice in hand. We found that the first design was just too intricate, making it difficult to read or ink.

This photo shows some of the new dice, 3D resin printed and with numbers painted. These resin prototypes are satisfactory, so our next step is the CAD/CAM work for machining an actual mold.

America's new regime remains volatile and unpredictable. As I write, there is a 10% tariff in place on goods made in China; the 25% tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports are apparently going to go into effect on March 4th. Unless there is again a last minute postponement, there will no doubt be reciprocal tariffs on US exports at that time as well. Other tariffs have been promised or threatened.

Given how things seemingly can change unexpectedly over any random weekend, we're just moving ahead and we'll see what things look like closer to printing and fulfillment time. We have gotten updated quotes for Definitive Edition with multiple printers in multiple countries. At this point, a Chinese printer is the top contender, even with an extra 10% tax on the manufacturing cost.

One wrinkle that we've become aware of is that the executive order imposing the tariffs explicitly says there is no duty drawback. Drawback is where, normally, goods that are re-exported from the US within a certain time frame are eligible to have the duty refunded. These special new Trump taxes are explicitly not refundable. This means we'll be looking into ways to handle international backer fulfillment without ever having those Definitive Editions enter the USA. It may or may not be more affordable and reliable to just bring it all into the US first. There's also a possible way to use Duluth's Free Trade Zone to defer or avoid formal entry for re-exported goods.

Another aspect of the executive order was the elimination of de minimis duty exemption on shipments from China and Hong Kong. This was quickly suspended, because the capability to assess and collect those taxes on hundreds of millions of small packages per year did not magically appear with no advance planning or funding for systems development and upgrades. If the de minimis were in place, it might make sense to have US shipments of Definitive Edition shipped directly to US backers from an international fulfillment partner, but that is not something we'll do if it would mean seeing our backers get handed paperwork and bills for a full customs brokerage/clearance process.

One way or another, we'll make it all work out! I'm continuing to watch developments closely and research all our options for all the contingencies we can see.

-John Nephew
President, Atlas Games