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Quick ink tip if you didn't know: If you are using a brush pen or fountain pen (anything that has an auto-feed system), you want to avoid pigmented inks such as classic India ink or sumi. They will gunk up your works. Instead, go for a dye-based ink specifically for fountain pens. Or use one of the pen-friendly pigmented inks such as Sailor Kiwaguro.

My array of inks right now is still basically the same as it was a year ago. I have Sailor Kiwaguro black, Thea Sketch Ink, and Noodler's Black ink. All of these are very good with brush pens, which is why I have them. They are also good for fountain pens.

But none of them are perfect. Here's my complaints about each of them.

I'll start with the lightest complaint. The Thea is just too dark. I was hoping for a very light gray ink that I could use over blacks and build up some tone. But this goes on just a bit too dark from start. Not a problem with the ink, in this case, I just chose one that wasn't exactly what I wanted.

Now, another thing with the Thea is that I started to notice more and more how blue it was. Then my brush pen went dry and I was refilling and I noticed the bottom of the jar had build up. I shook the jar, refilled, and suddenly the ink was very gray again. So there's some settling of the ink that causes it to separate into a more blue tint. I have very little experience with non-black inks, so maybe this is normal. I don't know.

Regarding darkness, I realize most folks buy these inks for writing and they want something dark enough to actually show up and be legible. But I want to draw with them. So I'll fish around for a lighter gray, I suppose. The other option is diluting some of this with water to thin it, but that isn't the greatest solution since it makes the ink a little too watery and thin.

Sailor Kiwaguro is probably my favorite ink right now. But my complaint with it is that is is inconsistently black. I noticed it more when I used it in a fountain pen. Whereas the Noodler's flows wet and dark black from the pen, the Sailor ink is spotty and gray at times. But it works wonderfully well in a brush pen.

Also, Sailor dries quickly and seems to do well with other media going on top of it.

Now... Noodler's is a real heartbreaker. It goes on very black and wet, which is quite fantastic for the fountain pen. It's a hell of a good sketching ink. Perfect flow.

But the stuff takes forever to dry. Even after 24 hours it can still smudge. And... worst of all... if you try to erase pencils under the ink, you will lift ink off the paper. A lot of it. See pic for example.

This ink does seem to be absolutely perfect for sketching and writing. It's very black. But I never use the stuff if I'm going to be erasing or using some other media on top of it, such as markers.

Noodlers. Left is no erase, right is erase after 24 hrs. No good!
I also have Dr. PH Martin's Black Star, which is waterproof India ink. It's pretty good stuff, possibly better than classic Speedball. But I tend to shy away from normal pigmented ink (like India) because it's not as friendly with brush pens and fountain pens. The Sailor ink I use is also pigmented, but I guess the particles are much tinier and so it doesn't clog up the works.

Ink... another fascinating topic worthy of a deep dive.
Sexy bottle.

Dear reader, I hope you are having a relaxed Sunday. And now for your reading enjoyment, here is an RPG a Day 2025 post. The prompt for today, the 24th, is Reveal.

The reveal, the twist, is such a popular concept in the media that the urge to use it in our games is almost inevitable.  TV Tropes has a nice write-up of the concept of the reveal.

A reveal is necessary for many plots to work, as stated in the link shared above, a mystery or investigation hinges on a reveal. Reveals as a surprise in many plots can be refreshing, but like everything, this is better in moderation.

I can understand the urge to overuse reveals, as much of the content we consume is built around them, and we are conditioned to expect them. As a beginning Game Master, I was guilty of this. I could see the excitement when my players discovered an unexpected twist, so I kept piling them up.

When I first ran the sample dungeon in the D&D Mentzer Red Box, I ran the adventure by the book. We had fun, but I could see the grind boring some of my players. So, I added a few new monsters. I saw their eyes light up, so I added more surprises and more reveals. I saw they loved discovering the properties of magic items, so I created a room full of boxes with magic items, with no rhyme or reason, and whenever they pulled out an item, I made up the descriptions and powers. Not an official item from the game, but something I created out of thin air. That’s how the halfling got an earring that turned her into a butterfly.

That’s an extreme example. I was a new GM, and I learned from that. I learned it so well that sometimes I’ve sat on reveals for years, only springing up the surprise on the players campaigns later. Some can be real a-ha moments. Like the time the BBEG was the low-level assassin they fought two campaigns ago! Or real duds, like the time they realized both fantasy campaigns happened in the same world. I was excited; the players seemed less so.

So, the advice is that revealing information used sparingly can be effective. Too much will make it less effective. But delaying reveals too much can make them fall flat. A healthy balance is the recommendation.

I think I’ll keep it short and sweet for today. What does the prompt reveal mean for you? Do you like big reveals that change a game? Or do those unexpected big surprises ruin the game for you?  I’d love to read your comments or reactions to the prompt; feel free to share them here in the comments or tag me wherever you do. If you choose to join in the conversation, don’t forget to include the #RPGaDay2025 hashtag so the community can find your contribution.

Let me say this outright - you are NOT snagging this bundle for random, probably worthless, Goodman Games 5e shovelware. There, I said it. Much of the 3rd party 5e content is shovelware. No, you are snagging this bundle for particular content - specifically Dark Tower, Monsters & Magic of Dark Tower, The Sunken Temple of Set (Dark Tower), Crypt of the Devil Lich, Monsters and Magic of Lankmar, and Grimtooth's Old School Traps. Actually, if you REALLY think of it, you are grabbing Dark Tower and Grimtooth's Old School Traps. For 12.99

Yes, you can grab the Fanatical Goodman Games Bundle for $12.99 - but most of my readers will only care about what I detailed above. I don't blame you.

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By Ian Hickey
Gravity Realms
2e/5e (For real this time!)
Levels 5-7

Mistress Lentel’itz-Abar, Matron Priestess of the Mother of Midnight and head of House Bu’Rin, was sent to the Rift under political pretence, ordered to prepare a waypoint to launch the next attack on the Dwarven city. Tragedy struck when the Great Rift flooded, killing nearly all. Her eldest son, Breet, a high wizard, survived by sealing off the lower levels of the house. Blaming rival houses for the disaster, Breet made a pact with the Mother of Midnight, seeking power to take revenge; he sought lichdom. Resurrecting his mother and sisters, he found the knowledge he sought, only for them to turn on him. Expecting it, he trapped them beneath the waters. Now a lich, Breet experiments in secret, while his undead family plots revenge from below. The Wraith Queen awaits!

This 95 page adventure uses about fifty pages to describe about a hundred rooms scattered across five levels and three bonus regions. This is a raid, with monster zones and empty spaces to recover in and leverage to your advantage. There is little beyond hacking to appeal, with only the occasional interesting area, but, when the monsters are stuffed with loot, hack on! The 2e min/max crowd will love this.

The pretext here is quite flimsy, enough so that it probably didn’t need to be included at all. Two deputies disappeared while searching near the “elf ruins” for the local lords son. The sheriff don’t wanna send in anybody else, but he can’t you from looking. Sounds like a dead sheriff to me, but whatever. You find signs of disturbed ground and follow it to the lake, or get attacked at night by a giant ice spider who abducts you to the underwater dungeon. And this is where an interesting thing happens …

Level one is almost all completely underwater. It’s inhabited by a bunch of wraiths. 5+HD with an eight and the 15HD wraith queen, as well as a few other creatures, eels, oysters and the ilk. But, also, there’s a tower with a stair inside of it that leads you the upper four levels, al NOT underwater. One of these has a lich in it, the rest of the levels under his control; a prison, servants quarter, a former  “magic school”. Doors lead to an outside area with a small mine area (along with the (Creature From The Depths”) and some orc/goblin caves, the former slaves of the household of which the lich and wraiths were once a part of who now are at odds. You have access, through the tower and the layout of the initial underwater level, to almost all levels immediately. 

This almost certainly leads to some interesting play. Water Breathing will be needed for that first level, and I suspect most parties will be without it, at least initially. This could lead to some interesting play as the party tries to find a way out, eventually finding the nearby tower/stairs up. This gains you access to the next level, with the upper levels being “locked” until you find some signet rings. Once you do then the upper levels, humanoid areas and mines and such become available. The party is almost trapped, searching for safe spaces and/or an exit to recoup and take a mental breather. We can imagine some desperate incursions in to the very dangerous first level or the safer second, finally finding the main entrance to get out or delving deeper to the upper levels and perhaps some safety with the humanoids or in the mines. But, of course, everyone is preying on weakness AND looking for some help with their situations. The lich needs a problem taken care of, the wraith queen wants revenge on her son, the lich, the goblins/orcs have some turmoil between them and are also looking for more living space … the lich and wraith levels. 

There are individual creatures on each level that can be tough, but, except for that first level, the levels are generally full of lower level creatures. Skeletons, zombies and ghouls will pose little challenge, and even the masses of orcs and goblins can be handled. This mitigates the level drain of the wraiths and provides a hostile environment but one that can be managed by a thinking party. For a raid/hack, it is a surprisingly interesting set of circumstances to manage.

There are, also, some issues. As there always are.

I am not exactly thrilled with the amount of exposition in this. “Along the way, the driver shares a tale from the region’s past, providing valuable background on the area and what lies ahead.” Yes, or he could just do it. As  recently mentioned, the designer doesn’t need to tell us what is going to happen right before it happens every single time. For a larger and more complex situation I’m open to this and enjoy the context for the framing to come. Then, many rooms have some exposition about them “This huge room was the main church for house Bu’Rin. Mass was held every morning, and it was mandatory for everyone to attend. Read the following to anyone seeing the room for the first time“ There is nothing in this that is gameable. Well, Bryce, maybe it helps the DM with the description, eh? To note old church features of the room? Sure. Maybe. Except the room is called “House Bu’Run Church”, the read-aloud describes a church, and the DM notes describe a church. I don’t think that even I (at least in the view of my detractors) need much more framing here to understand that its the House Bu’Rih church. Read-aloud can be long in places. Descriptions are not exactly the most evocative. The usual set of complaints. 

Moving on to more specific ones, though … There’s no real order of battle here. The notes on how the various groups react to organized incursions are a little sparse. Here and there we get a tidbit, like wraiths send out a super patrol if two of their patrols go missing.Kind of a lame response. Maybe they deserve to die? And then in other places the adventure is weirdly non-specific. A good example of this is the prison level where you can find an old drow prisoner. “The dark elf captive is a political prisoner sent from one of the lesser houses to liaise between the dark elf city and House Bu’Rin. He was quickly locked up and replaced with one of the mistresses’ daughters, allowing them to spy on the city. If needed, he can be used to replace a dead PC” It’s weird to not give him a name, or maybe a personality quirk or something? I guess the hand wave here is maybe its not needed since he can replace a dead PC? I mean, it’s even missing the required “stabs the party in the back” clause for drow. And then there’s this “An ancient suit of glowing elven chainmail bikini armour gleams on its busty mannequin: +3 suit of ancient elven mithril chainmail bikini armour” Ever the prude, I know.

But, then also, the design suffers a bit from that core interesting trapped situation. We’re told the first level is filled with water with a few air pockets … but get none of that in the adventure/map. I think the core setup here is super intriguing, what with henchmen perhaps being left behind while the party water breathes, or the spellcasters starting with depleted spell slots because they had cast water breathing (a tax upon the surface dwellers!) Huge masses of undead on the “outside” get little. The intrigue that is implied throughout is not given much attention except for a “they want new living quarters and might be open to negotiation” or something like that for each group. On the one hand it’s clear which direction to go, but, also, there’s little flavour or color to get there. Figuratively and literally “Just like the mess hall, both of these rooms are covered in moss and fungal growth.” Is that enough for you? It might be. I’m looking for just a few words more though. 

Interactivity here is limited. The core trapped/five level/faction thing carries a whole lot of weight here, in a good way. Beyond that you’re going to get, maybe, one elements per area. A straight out crossword-like riddle for one. A two-way portal. There is a great deal of lower-level interactivity though: bend bars/lift gates, doors to find a way to get past, non-obnoxious traps and the usual dungeon dressing. A piller to chase you around. “A ring made of 12 skeleton arms are nailed to the door, if someone other then Breet tries to open the door one of the arms will point a finger at the person shooting out a black ray of energy!” So, not really exploratory wonder interactivity but still enough to keep a hack/raid interesting.

I am moderately surprised by this 2e adventure. The core of it is quite good and its large enough to support enough play that the local town probably needed just a little more to it in order to support the party visiting a few times. It gets lengthy in places (that church is a page long, though its also a key room.) And it looks like this actually IS a 2e adventure that was then duel-stated for 5e. This is a decent enough adventure that I’m going to go look for others by the same designer to add to the list. If you’re in to 2e then this is a no-brainer.

This is $14 at DriveThru. There’s no PREEEEVIIIEEEW! I want a preview!

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/526921/shadows-return-house-of-the-wraith-queen?1892600

 

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Saturday is here, and so is another post for RPG a Day, day 23 this time, the prompt Recent.

What recent games have I purchased? I have probably bought fewer RPGs in 2025, for various reasons. I have been travelling for work, and buying books on the road to carry back home isn’t easy. Also, fatherhood changes your priorities. I find myself picking up a book or toy for my son more and more, rather than buying a new book for myself.

But what have I purchased this year so far that has impressed me?

Pick #1: The PDF of the Demon Lord Engine: Rules Compendium by the brilliant Robert J Schwalb, a collection and update of his rules used in the Shadow of the Demon Lord, Shadow of the Weird Wizard, and other Schwalb Entertainment games. This book is not a stand-alone game, but a compendium of the rules, a refresh of the games as they have evolved through his publications, and a reference that allows the author to produce settings and other games that reference these rules. I love Schwalb’s work and this succinct presentation of the rules is great. I will continue to support his work. If you have not checked out his games, do yourself a favor and do so. Well worth it!

Pick #2: Raiding the Obsidian Keep, written by Joseph R. Lewis and published by The Merry Mushmen. I heaped praise on this adventure on Day 21, so I won’t repeat myself here, but this is my favorite adventure so far this year.

Pick #3: The Tome of World Building by Matt Finch and published by Mythmere Games. This PDF was a crowdfunding reward and is a companion to the revised Tome of Adventure Design. A fantastic resource for world-building, presenting processes you can follow to create your world, or to inspire experienced homebrewers.

Pick #4: The Darkest House, by Monte Cook Games. I knew about Kickstarter for this book, and at the time, I was uninterested. However, when I saw the physical book during Free RPG Day this year, it intrigued me, and I bought it. The maps, images, and audio available to run this online intrigued me. Since I’ve been running a lot of online sessions for our regular group due to work-related travels, this seemed like something I could use.

Pick #5: D&D 2024! Okay, so I technically began purchasing them last year, but I completed the core books this year. Despite my problems with the books shipping from WotC, and the final books arriving all banged up, I ended up getting the special covers for all three books, so I own two copies of each of the core books (PHB, DMG, and MM) plus the D&D Beyond digital versions. The books look very nice, and the rules seem very user-friendly, written with new players in mind. I haven’t played them yet, and I haven’t purchased Dragon Delves. Having skimmed it at a store, I think I’ll pass. Maybe I’ll get the digital copy. I am not a fan of how monsters are organized in the 2024 MM, but otherwise, the rules interest me. I may play the game sometime in the future. However, I am interested in the new Starter Set to see how they teach D&D to new players.

Two games I don’t own, but hope to soon are Daggerheart and Draw Steel. I want to play them sooner rather than later.  

I also hope that my friend José Gacia will run the new Alien Evolved Edition for us. The new Alien: Earth series has me in the mood to play that game!

What recent games have impressed you? What have you purchased recently or would care to recommend? I’d love to read your recommendations or other reactions to the prompt; feel free to share them here in the comments or tag me wherever you do. If you choose to join in the conversation, don’t forget to include the #RPGaDay2025 hashtag so the community can find your contribution.

I really enjoy the Tiny D6 system. I think I'll be picking up this TinyZine Bundle.

Adventurer! This new TinyZine Bundle gathers PDF ebooks of the complete four-year run of TinyZine, the tabletop roleplaying magazine from Gallant Knight Games that supports the streamlined minimalist TinyD6 rules system. Collected in four Compendium volumes, these 44 digital issues present more than 800 pages of new heritages, adventures, and optional rules for TinyD6 games like Tiny Dungeon, Frontiers, Wastelands, Pirates, Living Dead, and more – the games we're presenting right now (what a coincidence!) in our revived April 2023 Tiny Dungeon Megabundle in progress.

For just $12.95, you get all four complete compilations in our TinyZine Collection (retail value $70) as DRM-free ebooks, including TinyZine Compendium 2018 (previously in our September 2020 TinyD6 Worlds), 2019, 2020, and 2021.

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As I was preparing to write today’s post for RPG a Day 2025, a friend shared with me a video by a pair of Puerto Rican reactionary intolerant grognards, repeating tired clichés, “this is not my D&D”, “the savage orcs of old were cooler”, “there are women in my TTRPG”, “queer representation bothers me”. If you’ve been online, sadly, you’ve heard it all before. I won’t say who they are because they don’t deserve the traffic or the attention. They are pathetic, and let’s leave it at that.

However, that led me to reflect on how happy I am that the hobby I’ve loved for so long has become more tolerant and inclusive, and that so many people can come together to enjoy RPGs. How can we be better allies to our LGBTQ+ friends? How can we support women and feminist perspectives in gaming, as well as the representation and voices of cultures other than ours in TTRPG spaces?

FFrom my perspective as a cishet male, I advocate for speaking out. Make it clear that all gamers are welcome in our games, and that hatred and bigotry will not be tolerated. And before someone argues about it, no, I do not have to tolerate intolerance. Pictoline had a great piece about Popper and the Paradox of Tolerance. The previous link takes you to the Spanish version; you can see it in English here

We should not put up with snide remarks or comments about women, different cultures, or the LGBTQ+ community, even when those speaking then claim to have said them in jest. Speak up when others try to silence diversity! I won’t pretend to know or understand all the nuances on these topics from my position of privilege. Still, I want to share some information, continue creating awareness, and encourage our readers to share their stories, to keep learning, and to contribute to making our hobby grow as a more inclusive space.

I want to share a piece on Feminism and Tabletop RPGs. This article from the RPG Gazette titled Gygax’ Worst Nightmare – Women Rising and Enjoying TTRPGs. A list of games by women and non-binary designers.  From FemHype, a post about gender representation in TTRPG space. The article Roll for Belonging: Role-Playing Games and Inclusion in the Queer Community. And this article, Queer tabletop roleplaying games provide valuable lessons that even ‘Dungeons & Dragons’ can learn from, new research finds.

I also recommend reading: How a new generation of gamers is pushing for inclusivity beyond the table, Between Civilization & Play: A Cultural Perspective on TTRPGs, and Diversity and Representation in TTRPGs: The Importance of Inclusive Storytelling.

Human Rights Campaign has a page dedicated to Being an LGBTQ+ Ally, which I recommend checking out.

I know Michael, the Stargazer, and I won’t stand for any form of intolerance or bigotry here in the blog or gaming in general. I think it is worth repeating that all gamers are welcome, except the sexist, racist, homophobic, and intolerant gatekeepers. That lot can crawl back under the rock they came from.

Thanks for reading, see you all tomorrow on my next #RPGaDay2025 post.

Some people do these conversions on the fly, based on feel. Others like to have it spelled out for them. I'm in the former category myself, but if you are in the latter, today's Deal of the Day - Content Conversion Guide Second Edition (Pathfinder / 5E / P2E / OSR / DCC / d20 3.5 / AD&D 2e) is the guide for you.

If you've ever wanted to take adventure content from one system and use it in another, this book has been designed to be of invaluable help. 

With full support for 3.x and AD&D 2e, you can easily convert decades-old campaign material for use with more recent rules systems, or vice versa.

Return to the realms of Greyhawk, Mystara, Planescape, Al-Qadim, Dark Sun, Kara-Tur, Birthright, and even Hollow World, or explore them for the very first time, in the rules system of your choice!

Extend and enhance the options available for settings that have been republished, but much more sparsely than the hundreds of sourcebooks and adventures that are available over the decades for older systems. Ravenloft, Forgotten Realms, Spelljammer, and more: if you liked the material that is available for 5E, you'll gush at the opportunity to delve into hundreds of sourcebooks that have come before.

Relive, or relish, HUNDREDS of ancient sourcebooks, adventures, and options, in the modern rules system of your choosing.

Take the hundreds of first-party, and thousands of indie, adventures and sourcebooks that have been published for P1E and other older systems, and use them in 5E or another supported system of your choice.

Convert any content, from any of the supported rules systems, into any of the other rules systems.

Only with the Content Conversion Guide: Second Edition.

Existing CCG Owners: Why Do You Care?

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 " Created by Eric Bloat & Josh Palmer, SURVIVE THIS!! What Shadows Hide is a standalone roleplaying game and does not require any additional gaming material to play. However, as part of the SURVIVE THIS!! game line, What Shadows Hide is 100% fully compatible with SURVIVE THIS!! ZOMBIES!, DARK PLACES & DEMOGORGONS, VIGILANTE CITY, and SURVIVE THIS!! FANTASY, We Die Young, and Needleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11243274667834930867noreply@blogger.com0

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For today’s prompt, Unexpected, I’ll welcome you with a statement you don’t expect from me: “I’ve found an adventure I want to run!”

If you know me or have read my posts over the years, you’ll know I rarely, if ever, run published adventures. In 39 years as a Game Master, I’ve run four adventures: the introductory adventure in the D&D Mentzer Red Box, the D&D Basic adventure B7 Rahasia, the AD&D 1e Forgotten Realms Adventure REF5: Lords of Darkness, and the Call of Cthulhu Western-themed horror adventure Down Darker Trails, but using the Amazing Adventures rules.

I read many adventures and find inspiration in some, but I rarely want to run a pre-written adventure. I enjoy creating my homebrewed worlds and the adventures in those worlds; that creative process is something I enjoy immensely.  The first two instances mentioned above, the adventure in the D&D Red Box and Rahasia, were in 1986, just as I was starting to learn to play RPGs. The third one, Lord of Darkness, was a request from a player around 1999, who wanted me to run a published adventure. I did, and it was no fun for me.

Then, when my son was born and I started playing again in 2019, I knew that the demands of fatherhood and an infant child would cut into my prep-time, so I ran Down Darker Trails and enjoyed it enormously! There were a lot of details to fill in the adventure; it was more of a background and a series of events I could run and adapt to my style of Game Mastering.

Despite this positive experience, I have not run any other adventures since. Then I discovered this gem. When I told my friends Anibal, Felipe, and José that I wanted to run an adventure, they seemed flabbergasted.

Okay, so after all the beating around the bush, which adventure do I want to run? Drum roll, please!

Raiding the Obsidian Keep, written by Joseph R. Lewis and published by The Merry Mushmen.

I became aware of the adventure in a Questing Beast review video. The themes described and the adventure organization presented by Ben in his review intrigued me, so I had to get the PDF. I was not disappointed.  From what I can tell, this is an expanded and illustrated version of the original adventure available via DriveThruRPG, The Obsidian Keep, adapted for Old School Essentials.

I don’t want to spoil it, but the exploration of an island devastated by chaos is a quirky swords and sorcery adventure, featuring interesting NPCs, situations, challenges, opponents, and magic items. Dark, foreboding, but a lot of fun. The implied world seems so interesting that I now want to read the author’s Dungeon Age novels. Regardless, adventure can be adapted to other fantasy worlds. I can see this adventure being a good fit in Mystara. I wholeheartedly recommend it, and I’m now eager to run it, sooner rather than later.

What unexpected surprise have you discovered in an RPG recently? Any new game you did not know about? A supplement or adventure you’d care to recommend. A new rule that caught your attention? I’d love to read your thoughts on the topic; feel free to share them here in the comments or tag me wherever you do. If you choose to join in the conversation, don’t forget to include the #RPGaDay2025 hashtag so the community can find your contribution.

And just like in the post for #RPGaDay, for day 10, in 2016:

Knave 2e is today's Deal of the Day (usually 20, marked down to $8 in PDF). Play it as is, or use it for inspiration with the RPG of your choice.

Knave 2e is an exploration-driven fantasy RPG and worldbuilding toolkit, inspired by the best elements of the Old-School DnD movement.

This edition expands on the intuitive core of the original game, featuring elegant, modular subsystems for hexcrawling, dungeon delving, potion making and downtime activities, all in a 80-page digest-sized hardcover lavishly illustrated by Peter Mullen. The book features:

• A world-class GM's toolkit. Roll and combine results from 75 d100 tables to rapidly generate dungeons, overworld regions, cities, monsters, items, spells, NPCs and factions, or just scan the pages for inspiration. These are especially useful for people who enjoy playing RPGs solo.
• Intuitive, unified d20 mechanics that allow new players to make characters and start playing in minutes. Ability scores, armor, and difficulty ratings are placed on a 0-10 scale, yet remain compatible with the adventures and monsters from the last 50 years of fantasy roleplaying. The rules can also effortlessly switch between player-facing and GM-facing rolls.
• A slot-based inventory system that makes tracking what you carry both easy and mechanically meaningful. If you take enough damage, wounds can begin filling items slots, forcing you to drop gear, treasure, or weapons.
• Classless character generation that lets PCs draw from multiple archetypes at once. Any PCs can cast spells, call down miracles and use any weapon or armor. Their effectiveness is only restricted by what abilities they choose to improve and how they fill their limited item slots.
• A d6 Hazard Die system that condenses tracking encounters, clues, weather changes, fatigue, torch burn, and resource depletion into the roll of a single die.
• A utility-focused magic system that empowers PCs to alter the world in creative ways with 100 level-less spells. Also, a huge spell generator for groups who want chaotic, randomized magic.
• A relic-driven divine magic system in which PCs complete missions for deities to gain their blessings. Generate new deities including their domains and symbols.
• A monster-hunting alchemy system where PCs can hunt down magical creatures for their special abilities and then refine them into potions.
• Downtime activities where PCs carouse, gamble, recruit hirelings, and build bases.
• A tactical warfare system that resolves mass battles in minutes.
• Straightforward GM and player principles for getting started running an old-school style game.
• Designer commentary that explains the reasoning behind the rules.
• Easy-to-use "control panel" layout.
• Stunning art by Peter Mullen.

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Hack & Slash 

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By Tim Edmonson
Ghost Ape Games
2e
Levels 1-2

He was never meant to be a necromancer. He just had the grades for it. When the players stumble across the talking corpse of a failed wizard named Bob, things spiral fast. One page of an ancient entropy-powered grimoire is already inside him. Another waits on a savage island ruled by saurian warlords, wild elves, and ghost apes that don’t sleep. What begins as a weird jungle crawl becomes a siege defense, a dungeon delve, a psychedelic fever dream, and possibly the start of a reality-hopping campaign. Or they could just go home. If Bob lets them.

This 82 page single-column adventure details an episodic journey centering around a level-4 lich who thinks he’s a fun guy. I don’t really know what to say here. It is what it is? It’s an amateurish effort, but that’s ok. The tone, adventure-path nature, and basic mistakes in information delivery are really offputting, but only the information delivery issues are actual valid criticism?

In D&D’s long history there have been some shifts in how the game is played. These are communicated through the official rules, or through the published material like adventures, or through the way most people are actually engaging with the game, or with the visibility being communicated in online social platforms. There will be ad-nauseum arguments about the official play, the actual home play and so on, but for better or worse there are memes about the style of certain editions or eras. 2e is solidly in the plot & story area meme, and this adventure unabashedly follows that, noting it explicitly. You can’t really criticize a man for doing an episodic adventure when you buy a “story drive adventure”, or for the comedic elements when it’s communicated up front. I know the 2e crowd is fierce, so we’re going to talk a bit about this just to ensure there’s fair warning, and then I’m going to cover some of the more issues with the adventure that lead to a “but is it a GOOD story based adventure with comedy elements?”

You’re gonna start in a village of cat-people. When you reach the lich, Bob (yes, that’s his name) he’s gonna cast hold person on your group and then do some magic tricks for you before running away and escaping. He’ll later keep up a constant banter with you as you drag his dismembered body around the rest of the adventure. He throws in comments and so on. This is 100% a railroad, errr, episodic adventure adventure path. It is solidly High 2e. Are you chill with that? I’m not, but I bought it anyway and can’t really criticize a man for doing what he said he was gonna do in the sales pitch.

But Bryce’s pillars stand apart from that. This is a rather amateurish affair, and I mean that in the best way possible. It’s a single column effort, which remains difficult to read and comprehend. I know that the point seems trivial, but the eye travel study on comprehension is real, as is the anecdotal data for anyone who has had to use single-column. It’s just going to be a little more difficult to comprehend the adventure and use it. 

And then there are the asides. There are a lot of these. This one, early in the adventure, is a good representative example of what I’m talking about: “This episode is meant to open in media res—no meeting in a tavern, they start to learn how to be a team and how to play the game immediately. Characters either begin here in their home village or are here on personal business.” It explains what is about to happen. Is there a need to explain what is about to happen? I don’t think so. I’m a big fan of the designer framing what’s to come, in terms of how it works, but this isn’t that. It’s not explaining how the different areas work together or the tone, it’s instead just repeating everything that’s to come in a different tone of voice. And that’s just padding that is of no use and just gets in the way of running the adventure.

And then text grows overwrought and purple in places. “You find a patch of earth that hasn’t been claimed by vines. The river gurgles behind you, dark and sluggish. The trees here lean in, like they’re watching. The air smells like burnt grass and rotting fish. You can make camp. You can rest. But you are not welcome.” This isn’t consistent, but, also, it’s clearly trying for this epic adventure vibe (it says so explicitly) and I’m guessing that this is a part of that. The purple prose is not great. At all.

But it’s also not doing an altogether terrible job with the descriptions. If we take that purple section above, it’s not too bad. A gurgling river. A patch of earth not claimed by vines may be on the edge of purple, but the air smelling like burnt grass and rotting fish isn’t bad. In other places we get a decent description of mudmen attacking the village that ranges from te usual to very good. “A child screams. You hear the splash before you see the thing—humanoid, muddy, crawling on malformed limbs. It twitches like it’s listening to the ground. Someone yells, “It’s in the ground!” and you see dark veins stretching out from the water, moving in the soil, like the river itself is leaking something alive. As you watch, another mud creature forms before your eyes, first pseudopods made of stinking, corrupted soil, then something resembling a humanoid figure with arms and a large torso” I hate the pseudopod thing, in general, and corrupted soil is a conclusion that should be a show don’t tell thing. But, hey, not bad. We’re not saying “three mudmen attack”, it’s instead trying to describe them, something the adventure tries to do consistently, and that’s a good thing. I’m going to go out on a limb and make an assumption from this that dude is an ok dungeon master, just not a great adventure writer.

If we follow through with the mudmen encounter, this is the next thing that happens once they are defeated “When the last Mudman collapses into a puddle of inert sludge, the village is in shock. Farmers report rot in the irrigation ditches. The elders whisper about the water. Something is poisoning the land.“ This is a crude and amateurish attempt to have, I believe, a chaotic battle aftermath scene in the village. People all over the place, side conversations, helpful and unhelpful injections from by standers and so on. I think I am not alone in reading that in to the description provided? And, yet, that’s not a strong description of it or how to run it or anything close to it. And I’m sure we all know what I what I think about supporting the DM. 

In other places there’s a certain degree of disorganization of the text that requires you to be completely familiar with it in order to run it effectively. This comes to pass time to time; the designer has lived and breathed their adventure for months while any of us who have simply bought it to run and read and re-read it can never know it as well as the designer can. Thus, after entering the dungeon we get notes about a second entry point to the dungeon. I think, perhaps, it should be obvious to everyone that “Entering the Dungeon” comes after “Outside the Dungeon”, but not in the kind of stream of consciousness layout from a designer that knows the material inside and out. Likewise, somewhat later in the adventure we’ll get notes buried in a paragraph about how the second entry point is in this particular room being described right now. Perfect if you know the adventure inside and out and less perfect if that’s not the case; it just looks like throwing information in wherever … or almost a subcase of  room 54 reacting to the inclusion in room 1 … in the description of room 54. 

This is hardcore story mode 2e. It’s got a slapstick comedic element that, on going, that proves that the Mork Borg call is coming from the inside the house the entire time. But, beyond these tonal baselines, it’s also not the easiest to follow and run with as a DM. 

This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $1. The preview is five pages. You get to see the mudman attack. This is enough to show the conversational tone, asides, and sometimes decent imagery and sometimes purple imagery that is conveyed. 

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/530935/son-of-a-lich?1892600

I'm reading DC Comics' output from January 1980 (cover date) to Crisis! This week, I read the comics on sale on August 23, 1984.
Fury of Firestorm Annual #2: Conway and Arthur Byron Cover do one of those occasional illustrated text piece stories that I almost always find dull (which is the case here). The art by Kayanan and Colon doesn't seem up to their usual standards, so maybe it bored them too? Anyway, Ronnie plays poorly at a game and worries about letting the team down at the next one because he's hallucinating villains all over the place. To make matters worse, some weird alien, exiled by the Guardians of the Universe, has crashed on earth and decides to use Firestorm as a living power plant to get him into space again. The alien is thwarted, and Ronnie shoots the winning buzzer-beater, redeeming himself. The source of the hallucinations turns out to be the emerging psychic powers of the student manager of the team. The story has real Spider-Man vibes, but of the sort of Spider-Man story you might see in other media. 

Action Comics #561: Despite a cover by Barreto promising something with more, well--action, Kupperberg and Schaffenberger /Jensen provide a silly and mostly stakes-free story of the Toyman setting up a fake quiz show so he can trick a childhood rival into revealing what happened to the very first toy the villain made. The second story by Bridwell and Boring is marginally better with a red kryptonite exposure splitting two Supermen from Clark Kent: one, a Superman of the future with "future powers" and an eight-year-old Superboy from 1963. 
It's not like there haven't been stories done in a more modern storytelling vein or arcs with truly dangerous villains, but we keep coming back to this sort of continuity-free, low action material like it's still the Silver Age. I suspect the blame lies with Schwartz in the editor's seat.

Arion Lord of Atlantis #25: Kupperberg and Sherman-Tereno/Rodriquez open with Arion lost in the Darkworld with no way home after the defeat of Garn Danuuth. Guided by his father, he begins searching through the everchanging landscape for the Nexus, the one place where he might escape. He encounters some alien beings likewise trapped, and they become traveling companions for a time, but they encounter only violence and hardship. Eventually, Arion finds himself at the Nexus. Its elderly guardian demands Arion fight him to the death. Only one of them may leave Darkworld. Arion rejects all the violence and refuses to fight the old man. In being willing to be sacrificed, he frees both himself and the old alien, and they return home.
While the solution to Arion's conundrum was fairly obvious, I thought, this sojourn into Darkworld was a nice change of pace. 

All-Star Squadron #38: I owned this issue as a kid. Any new hero appearance was interesting to me, and I was unaware of Amazing Man prior to this. Thomas and Hoberg/Collins follow-up the events of last issue as a group of All-Stars arrive in Detroit to find Amazing Man. They encounter more racism than they expected and a Phantom Empire (Klan stand-in) rally attempting to drum up support for stopping black migrants to the city from getting housing. In a clash, Amazing Man is defeated by the masked Real American, who is somehow able to drain his powers. Trying to serve the law rather than justice, the All-Stars are spurned by both sides in the conflict. Meanwhile, in Washington, Green Lantern and Hawkman fail to persuade President Roosevelt to lend a hand, so they decide to fly off to aid their comrades.

Detective Comics #544: Nocturna is forced to attack the Thief of Night to save Batman's life, but the Thief gets away. She reveals she knows Batman's secret identity and again suggests they marry and be parents to Jason. Otherwise, she'll keep his secret, but she will still compete with Bruce for custody. Batman is so enchanted by her that he just has to get away rather than give an answer. The trail of the Thief is a dead end, but Batman has better luck pressuring the recently released hitman that tried to kill Bullock. The assassin reveals he's a member of Fang's crew doing the bidding of Mayor Hill. Convinced Hill is also responsible for Bruce's legal troubles, Batman vows to take the Mayor down. Meanwhile, Nocturna turns up the charm on Jason, too.

Omega Men Annual #1: Moench again leans into his very science fantasy interpretation of the Omega Men, as he and Niño/Smith revisit the situation with Harpis' missing wings. They fly through space (telekinetically, not by flapping, if that matters) chased by Hokum and the Citadel and Harpis. The other Omega Men are chasing after her. They come to the planet Sindromeda where a long-ago accident has created a hellworld and a psychically empowered monster. Confronting her on past, and with the help of a balloon-like grafalloon, Harpis reclaims her wings, but refuses to kill the creature that had usurped them. Whether this controversial-among-her-fellows decision leads to good or ill in the future is purposely left unrevealed.

Sun Devils #5: Rik and Anomie are not quite as dead as it appeared last issue, but they are still being attacked by a relentless sauroid warrior. Their friends eventually come to the rescue but not before we get some of Scylla's backstory--and the revelation that there's a traitor among the Sun Devils. The rescue may be too late, though, as Anomie returns to consciousness to see Rik floating away into space, the helmet of his spacesuit shattered.

Super Powers #5: Kirby takes the reigns for this final issue, and the art gets a bit better, but unfortunately Theakston's inks smother a lot of Kirby's detail, so it doesn't look all that great. Despite the failures of Darkseid's emissaries, his invasion of Earth commences, but Metron joins in on the side of the heroes. The seed of Apokolips' armies defeat are in the powers given to Earth's villains. Anyway, I guess this helped sell toys. It was also probably a lot of kids' first introduction to Kirby.

Tales of the Legion #316: Newell works from a plot by Levitz/Giffen as Wildfire finds himself again in the Dream Dimension with the two Invisible Kids. Invisible Kid II has figured something out about these strange evens and reveals that Lyle Norg is actually a demon looking to trap them. The two manage to trick the creature and escape.
In the backup by Levitz/Newell and Tuska/Kesel, the other Heroes of Lallor conspire to help Duplicate Boy regain his confidence and his powers as he mops over Shrinking Violet dumping him.

World's Finest Comics #309: Busiek and a journeyman Texiera with inks by Alcala have Superman made the trustee of wealthy businessman Raymond Arnau's estate. Since Arnau appears to have been murdered, the selection of Superman seems particular significant, so he asks Batman to help him investigate. After some investigative work, the two heroes discover that Arnau's former partner Crane is wearing a powered suit and running a criminal operation as Quantum--and he murdered Arnau when he found out. As seems to happen a lot these days, Quantum's suit is able to emit Kryptonite radiation, but Batman is able to take out the villain while he's gloating. 

Day 20 of RPG a Day 2025, the prompt is Enter, and all I could think of was this.

“Enter freely of your own will and leave some of the happiness you bring.” Dracula

That quote, from the movie Bram Stoker’s Dracula, paraphrasing the line from the book, is ominous in its original context, but I want to twist it around and read it literally. Let’s give it a positive spin and explore ways to welcome new players into our hobby, encouraging them to contribute and bring happiness to our games, both in particular and in general.

As an admin in two very active groups on Facebook, the public group Puerto Rico Role Players, and the private group Dungeons and Dragons Puerto Rico (Follow the link for the specific group, there are a few with similar names, and you must agree to the group rules before your request can be approved. But I digress!) every week there are people interested in playing, new folk who want to learn to play the game, or people who know how to play and want to find a group.

Thankfully, there are local FLGS where people can play in Puerto Rico, the ones that I know of being Titan Games, both in Caguas and Río Piedras, Star Games in Moca, and Yahtzyyy TCG, Games & Collectibles in Mayaguez. There are more hobby shops in Puerto Rico. If you want to see a list of local stores, visit the Roleplayers de Borikén Discord and see the complete list.

So, what can we do to help new players enter our hobby?

First of all, be welcoming, and share your love and knowledge of the hobby with people interested in learning. Be willing to run games for new players and invite them to play with your group.

Be patient. The growth in popularity of tabletop role-playing games has created interest in many people who might not have discovered the hobby in the past. These new players will have questions, and younger players may have different cultural references than you. Listen, embrace them, and support their interests.

Be supportive. New fans of RPG games may play differently than you; be accommodating and recognize that we all play in different ways. Encourage them and help those interested in becoming Game Masters.

Embrace diversity; everyone is welcome in our hobby. We may not all have the same experiences, so let’s celebrate those who think and act differently. The things we can’t support are intolerance, gatekeeping, and hate.

All are welcome, and they all bring their own experiences and ideas that will enrich our hobby. Let’s do our part to encourage new players to join the tribe!

What do you think we can do to welcome those interested in learning to play? Any additional suggestions? Any specific ideas? I’d love to read your thoughts on the topic; feel free to share them here in the comments or tag me wherever you do. If you choose to join in the conversation, don’t forget to include the #RPGaDay2025 hashtag so the community can find your contribution.

This was a different kind of a Gen Con for me this year. It had several highs and a few lows. As usual I filmed several interviews, This was the first year I was reporting for both Through Gamer Goggles and Through Wargaming Goggles, which did seem a bit odd at first, but I am glad I split the channels on YouTube. Over the last three years Gen Con has felt different in regards to news and media coverage, this made me start to think long and hard about what I am doing and why. I will come back to that in a bit. On to the experiences and lessons.

Everyone that knows me knows I am a foodie. My wife calls me a food snob and that may be true. While I am willing to explore a lot of tastes and I love things like ethnic fusion, the food at the block party is loosing its steam for me. I have been talking about it for a few years now and every year it’s one of my low points. Why is that? The food isn’t bad it’s not that at all. The sirloin burger that St Elmo’s used is excellent, but the burning beast wasn’t for me. I couldn’t taste the Cheetos. I would much rather have had a hot sauce inspired Flaming Hot Cheetos, or their world famous cocktail sauce; not that would have been one hell of hot burger. Hot box is in the same boat, I have been eating their concoctions every year since the gold dust pizza. I have only really liked one since the first and I didn’t the pizza this year. With that said I will eat their pepperoni pizza any day of the week. It’s not bad food it’s just a little too weird for me. I will continue to check it the specialty foods, but I think I will be taking a longer look at the food trucks and exploring more restaurants from now on.

The worst thing that happened was I botched an interview session with SFG. It would have been on a top secret project that is embargoed until later in the year. The real bummer was that it was all my fault. A lesson I learned last year was to put my email on my phone, I did. I thought it was working great. I was receiving emails just fine, but when it came to sending the message were listed as sent, but they never reached their destination. When the request was made to change the time the attempts to communicate all failed. Next time I put my email on my phone I will test it.

The good news is it only gets better from here. As I mentioned I had some great interviews, here are the play lists.

and

One of my most unexpected moments was running into Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford at the Free League booth. Unfortunately, I did not get to talk to them very long.

I did play in the Pathfinder 2e Battlecry event. If you don’t know what Battlecry is you can check out my overview here

.

Basically, the Battlecry rules allow PC’s to join the troop type so you can use the action economy to fight heroic skirmishes. The full rules set wasn’t used at Gen Con, but every player was given a troop type on the battlefield spread across three tables. Each table had up to 4 players and a G.M. The tams of players used their troop types to out flank and maneuver the enemy which was a lot of fun. I find Battlecry to be a refreshing rules set that has been missing from the #ttrpg scene for far too long.

Lisa and I started two traditions this year. The First is to eat at 2 restaurants every year; we normally eat in our room. Eating in our room has saved us a lot of money over the years and we are very good at that – that will be an article at another time. The second was really started last year when we went to Marc Gunn’s Hobbit drinking songs concert. We had a blast!!. This year we went to the Firefly drinking songs with Marc and Mikey Mason. We had so much fun that we will attend at least one every year from now on. I am a terrible singer and I had a blast.

I didn’t bring back that much swag this year and I will be putting that video up soon on YouTube @gamergoggles

Remember that part where I said I was reflecting a lot at the show? Here is what I learned.

Stay focused: Earlier this year I split Through Gamer Goggles into two channels Gen Con revealed to me that if I want to write, and create YouTube content I have to pivot. I can no longer film 350 unboxings in a year, for a couple of reasons. One, it doesn’t build an audience or a community. Two, it’s a lot of work that interferes with creating content focused on narrower topics. Three, between writing, working full time and filming content I can’t keep up with a pace like that. I thought making the split was going to be a mistake. After this Gen Con I believe it was the right one. It will allow the two channels to focus on their niche while I retrain the YouTube algorithm who they are. Heck, I haven’t even taught myself that yet; there is just too much RPG and wargame candy out there. There is just no way t o taste it all. There is certainly no way to do it all. None the less, you will see a lot more focus and direction.

Schedule: There is so much to do at Gen Con and I miss a lot of it. Every year I wait to buy tickets and I miss on a lot of the events I want to participate in. This means I miss sharing those experiences with you. Fortunately, by focusing on a few directions instead of a thousand I will be able to buy tickets and make interviews happen around that. I still won’t play as many events as I want to because so many are 4 hours or longer and I really need to spend more time in the exhibit hall. I always feel like I rush through it. Balance is always the hardest thing at a show like Gen Con.

Thank you for reading this far. I look forward to sharing the direction for both channels and the blog in the near future. I have so many thing I want to do, like cooking get togethers made easy for gaming or terrain building. Life has limits on the time that I have for every pursuit again balance is hard.

Thanks

Matt