vol.6: take a break
Greetings, adventurers!
We took July off, but we’re back! There’s a lot packed into this adventuring kit, so take a seat and a break, grab your favourite snack, and dig right in. And don’t forget to hydrate.
No new articles this month, but in case you missed it:
Pay Attention: Black Voices in the RPG Community, by Tess Cocchio
A list of black folks active in the TTRPG community.
How a Show About Monsters Handles RPG Romance, by Emily Buza
A look at how the actual play web series LA By Night expertly incorporates a love story into their supernatural campaign.
Interested in writing for the Tabletop Micdrop medium publication? You can find more information here.
June and July Debuts are up! You can read about all of the new pods that launched here. Want to know what’s coming this month? Here’s a preview:
No Small Rolls
Join our merry band of actors for a D&D campaign where there are ‘No Small Rolls’, just battles, buddies and beverages! Dungeon Master David Knight ushers his players Ben Galpin, Chris Watts, Darrel Bailey, Grace Kelly Miller and Vicky Gaskin through a home-brewed world full of stories, secrets and silliness.
Subscribe: Apple | Spotify | RSS
More Info: Website | Twitter
Shrimp and Crits
In the balmy swamps of the Florida panhandle, monsters and mystery lurk behind every moss-draped tree and stone. Shrimp & Crits is an actual play podcast utilizing the "Powered by the Apocalypse" gaming system. Our story takes place in the small coastal town of Gullacochica. Here, tourists and locals enjoy clean sprawling beaches, fresh-caught fare, and a wide variety of small family owned businesses. Following the stories of local businessman Raymon “Ray Ray” Lareaux, greenhorn Deputy Sara Payne, and the mysterious Agent Ari Green, Shrimp & Crits will take you deeper and deeper into the twisted southern nightmare that only our Keeper can predict.
Subscribe: Apple | Google | RSS
More Info: Website | Twitter
Shadow of Arcanum
An Actual Play using the Tal’Dorei setting.
With only four episodes released, Shadow of Arcanum is a unique twist on what most have come to know as an actual play. With nearly all mechanics cut from the show, we instead get rich descriptions on roll results, which shape the heavy tone of this world. Shadow of Arcanum sees five companions set out on a quest filled with danger and peppered with foreboding. GM Josh’s smooth narrations easily paint the picture of this gloomy and sinister setting, while the players brilliantly input their characters’ hopeful natures despite the cruelty of the lands they explore.
[cw: gore, insanity mechanic]
Recommended Starting Point: The Scaled Stone
Subscribe: Apple | Google | Radiopublic | Spotify | RSS
More Info: Website | Twitter
Doing The Job, by Jeff Stormer
After 35 years in the business, "The Queen of Pain" Latisha Chains is hanging up the boots and retiring from professional wrestling. In her honor, Runnels County Wrestling has assembled a special 16-person invitational tournament to crown... THE QUEEN'S CUP CHAMPION. You have all been booked to participate in this prestigious tournament. You have NOT been booked to WIN this tournament. This is a story about people who lose. This is NOT a story about losers.
Doing The Job is a Descended From The Queen game about a group of wrestlers booked to lose a prestigious tournament. Players will take turns answering questions about their experiences in the tournament, their feelings towards the other wrestlers, and how they view the person destined to win the Queen's Cup at the end of the night.
Full Disclosure: Jeff Stormer, creator of Doing The Job, ran this game as a part of International Podcast Month. It was a recorded one-shot and will be released in September. While I am a friend of Jeff’s, I want to be clear that this feature spotlight is in no way a sponsored/paid-for ad. I genuinely loved this game.
Playing Doing The Job was an unsurprisingly delightful experience. There’s hardly any preparation, the rules are straightforward and easy to learn, and the way the game flows so seamlessly from character creation directly into play is fascinating. My favourite thing about the game is that you’re building, essentially, a character and that character’s persona. As you build the backstory and answer questions alongside your fellow wrestlers, elements of your past may be revealed and will even affect the decisions you make. Balancing the desires and needs of both character and persona can get messy, and the game is surprisingly emotional. It’s not about winning, but instead about exploring the world of wrestling through the lens of the performer. You get to build out your backstories collaboratively, and discover through various prompts exactly how your story intertwines with those of your fellow players. It’s a game that made me laugh, cry, and want to play it again.
Honestly, I’ve never really understood the fascination and love of wrestling, beyond the drama of Netflix’s Glow. But Doing The Job made me sit back and consider… wrestling events are basically season-long LARPs.
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Kickstarter Funding ENDING SOON: Jiangshi: Blood in the Banquet Hall (Ends TODAY)
This is a collaborative, storytelling RPG about a Chinese family making their living by running a restaurant in one of America’s Chinatowns, circa 1920. Despite societal backlash and anti-Chinese laws, they have turned a profit and their quality of life has recently improved.
Night, however, brings a new terror.
Players take on the roles of members of the Chinese family (mostly from Guangdong province), spanning three generations, who face threats of jiangshi (hopping vampires) at night and racism by day. It has players balancing the responsibility of maintaining their family business with protecting themselves and their community from the dreaded Jiangshi. This is primarily a game about storytelling. Combat is limited, but horror, drama and sometimes comedy are the primary vehicles for driving the game forward.
Follow on Twitter | Support the Kickstarter
Kickstarter Funding Continues: The Great American Witch (Ends Aug 27)
The Great American Witch is a modern gothic tabletop roleplaying game about the secret world of witches in America and the supernatural threats working to destroy them.
Built on Christopher Grey's award-nominated RPG framework The Great American Novel, the game focuses on powerful witches who use ancient magic drawn from the feminine forces of creation. They struggle to balance their everyday lives, the supernatural, secret societies, and personal conflicts within their covens.
The Great American Witch uses a framework similar to Powered by the Apocalypse Games, FATE, and indy storytelling games like Ten Candles. It is, however, designed for extended campaign play in the tradition of World of Darkness or other urban fantasy traditional games.
Follow on Twitter | Support the Kickstarter
Kickstarter Funding Continues: Wanderhome (Ends Sep 3)
Wanderhome is a pastoral fantasy Role-Playing Game about traveling animal-folk, the world they inhabit, and the way the seasons change. It is a game filled with grassy fields, mossy shrines, herds of chubby bumblebees, opossums in sundresses, salamanders with suspenders, starry night skies, and the most beautiful sunsets you can imagine.
Follow on Twitter | Support the Kickstarter
Kickstarter Funding Continues: Twilight: 2000 (Ends Sep 3)
A classic tabletop RPG returns in a new retro-apocalyptic edition, from the makers of the ALIEN RPG and Forbidden Lands. The new retro-apocalypotic edition of Twilight: 2000, published in partnership with Game Designers' Workshop, goes back to the roots of the franchise with a boxed set for sandbox roleplaying in the devastation of World War III. The new edition will be the fourth in the series, the first being released by GDW in 1984. Just like the original version, the new edition is set in a year 2000 devastated by war – now in an alternate timeline where the Moscow Coup of 1991 succeeded and the Soviet Union never collapsed.
Follow on Twitter | Support the Kickstarter
Sara Tompson Launches The Combat Wheelchair
Sara Thompson is an established designer and sensitivity consultant. They create disability content and supplements for a variety of TTRPGs, and has quite the extensive portfolio, including writing for Starfinder, The Witcher TRPG, and the DMs Guild. She recently launched The Combat Wheelchair, a D&D 5e item designed for inclusivity, allowing a disabled party member to do exactly what abled party members can already do. It’s a brilliantly designed item, meant to provide support for both the daily activity and combat. It’s intuitive and an excellent add-on for gaming groups looking for representation and accessibility.
More Info: Combat Wheelchair v2.0 | Heroes without Limits (Founded by Sara) | Patreon
Austin Ramsey Launches “The Growing Conflict”, a new Beam Saber Supplement
Austin Ramsey of Beam Saber launched a new supplement for the game today. Beam Saber is a Forged in the Dark game about the pilots of powerful machines in a war throughout space. The Growing Conflict is currently being featured in the ongoing popular Friends At The Table actual play podcast.
The Growing Conflict is a supplement for Beam Saber, a Forged In The Dark game about pilots and their powerful war machines. It features new ways to play including 6 new Pilot playbooks, 2 new Squad playbooks, and rules for forming and managing a Faction. Pick up this supplement to expand and complicate The War in your Beam Saber campaign!
More Info: Buy on Itch | Twitter
MCDM Announces “Arcadia”, a new DnD Magazine
Matt Colville of MCDM announced the upcoming launch of “Arcadia”, a new 5th-edition Dungeons & Dragons magazine. James Introcaso, co-author of the “Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount” and author of Roll20’s Burn Bryte, will be the managing editor. As an experiment, they’re releasing the first three issues, with three articles each, to the MCDM patrons at the $5 tier and higher. I like the angle they’re going with: seeking feedback from Patrons before planning and releasing further issues, with first access to Patrons prior to greater public release. It’s clever, and an excellent way to gauge popularity and interest, and therefore worth. Colville discussed the magazine in one of his Friday Q&A videos, which you can watch here. They’ve got quite the list of writers stacking up: Justice Arman, Celeste Conowitch, Makenzie De Armas, and Rich Lescouflair.
More Info: What we know about Arcadia | MCDM Patreon | Matt Colville’s Twitter
Austin Walker, 12Face Productions, Billy Wright, Michael Bowman, Fandible, Roll Like a Girl, Dice for Brains, The Hydian Way, Christine Scherer, The Redacted Files, Landon, Darcy Kennedy, Michelle Shepardson, Adrian Brooks, John Harper, Waffles a.k.a. Mahaffay, Minna Reilly, Ryan Boelter, Rane Wallin, Rob Abrazado, Jason Lillis, Laura Boylan, Splinters of a Broken Sun, Alice Kyra, Max, Tavern Tales, Kelly Froese, DC, The Broadswords.
All Patreon dollars from July have been donated. Money has been distributed between Black TTRPG community members (designers, podcasters, and artists). Want to help? Donate now to a Black Lives Matter fund of your choice.
This month’s featured resource is:
RPG Skill Check
RPG Skill Check provides copy editing and accessibility consulting for the TTRPG community.