Frances Stewart writes and edits across various mediums, including for several games. Most recently, she contributed to Onyx Path’s Dead Man’s Rust, a mega-adventure that’s on Kickstarter right now! In this article, she talks about writing when you’re trying to clean up and maintain a complex continuity, while still being original and also modern and also entertaining.

Lysa Penrose is known as a writer and story creator for Wizards of the Coast, community manager of all things Dungeons & Dragons, and even a witch slinging tarot tutorial videos. In this post, Lysa shares how she combined these experiences and more into an upcoming narrative roleplaying game, Mundane Magic.

My first experience with tabletop roleplaying games happened by accident. I was between jobs, a leap-of-faith career change, my ex-corporate life funding a year off to soul search like a millennial stereotype. In a depressive fog of YouTube binging and self-doubt – hey, major change is scary! – I stumbled across the first episode of Critical Role. Curiosity got the better of me when faced with this odd 4-hour video. My mind and imagination had discovered Dungeons & Dragons, and I tipped over the precipice and into the rabbit hole….

In December 2000, Fiery Dragon Productions released NeMoren’s Vault, one of the earliest adventures for Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition put out using their Open Game License. Part of the first wave of the D20 boom, Fiery Dragon went on to release another 70 products over a decade, before semi-retiring the brand in 2010.

Twenty years later, the original Fiery Dragon trio expanded a bit and rebranded as Platinum Dragon. They’ve just released NeMoren’s Vault 20th Anniversary Edition on DriveThruRPG via the same Open Game License, this time updated for the 5E ruleset. James Bell, the original author of NeMoren’s Vault in 2000, reflects on this anniversary edition and some of the design decisions that went into the initial adventure.

Did you know the elements of campaign planning are rooted in narrative design? In this workshop, gaming veteran Monica Valentinelli introduces her “Spiderweb Method” for campaign planning and walks you through how to use it for longer story arcs. Also included is a list of tips and tricks to help manage your players to avoid […]

Want to put more spook at your table? Take a fun class with games veteran Monica Valentinelli! Class: Horror in Games Next class date: Saturday, October 24, 2020, 9:30-11:30 AM Pacific Time. In gaming, the answer to “Is horror a mood or a genre?” is “YES!” In this workshop, gaming veteran Monica Valentinelli addresses how […]

Hi, my name’s Kelly Pawlik and I’m one of the contributors to Kobold Press’s Empire of the Ghouls, the Underworld Player’s Guide, and Underworld Lairs. I was very kindly asked if I wanted to share some experiences and highlights of working on the project, so I’ll get started! How to Run a Marathon in Two […]

Death is not the end. You learned that firsthand when you died. In that darkness, you made a deal that brought you back — with something else. Now, bound inextricably to a geist — a shade, a monster, a tragic, broken soul — you stand between the world of the living and the world of […]

The Devil’s City: Horror Fiction & 5e Gaming Conjoined is An illustrated, collectible novella & companion 5e RPG setting exploring the growing darkness in Chicago of late 1800s. Currently funding on Kickstarter.com with only a few days left. This project is led by by Sara Tantlinger, Matt Corley and M.T. Black. This morning Matt Corley stopped by to tell us a bit more about what inspired the project.

Hiya, do you love playing games? Ever want to write your own or for someone else? In this class, join industry veteran Monica Valentinelli for insight on how to write your own game or for your favorite type of game. Monica has worked on mobile games, IF games, card games, tabletop games, and more! Questions […]

Netflix’s adaptation of The Witcher debuted in December 2019 and has been met with both criticism and accolades. In this second installment of my two-part deep dive into magic, worldbuilding, and motherhood I want to talk about motherhood and reproduction specifically. As I mentioned last time, I had a lot of fun with Geralt of […]

DriveThruRPG.com is kicking off the new year with a massive sale. There are hundreds of new games to choose from including Scion 2nd Edition from Onyx Path Publishing, Infinity from Modiphius, and Mortal Coil from Galileo Games Hoping for a super 2020? If superheroes are your jam, I recommend the Valiant Universe RPG from Catalyst […]

Netflix’s adaptation of The Witcher debuted in December 2019 and has been met with both criticism and accolades. If you’re not already aware, the events in The Witcher Season One are presented as a time-hopping origin story, or braided narrative, for three characters: Yennefer of Vengerberg, Geralt of Rivia, and Ciri of Cintra. The character […]

The myths of the Scarred Lands are relatively recent events. The effects of the Titanswar still ripple through the world, and the heroines and villains of many of these stories are part of living memory, if not still living.

The following continues the recap of the Scarred Lands campaign, Fire in Rahoch. It follows the adventures of Stromm, Manuc, Rostum, and Lliese as they navigate the politics of Calastia while at the same time trying to appease the secret societies that they are each a part of.

A Land Where Legends Walk

Drawing enthusiastically on Greek mythology, the revised and re-imagined Scarred Lands nonetheless retains its place as a modern fantasy RPG setting. This is a world shaped by gods and monsters, and only the greatest of heroes can expect to be counted among them. The most populous continent of Scarn, Ghelspad, plays host to vast unexplored regions, hides unsolved riddles from ancient cultures, and taunts adventures with the promise of undiscovered riches hidden among the ruins of older civilizations.

Yet the myths of the Scarred Lands are relatively recent events. The effects of the Titanswar still ripple through the world, and the heroines and villains of many of these stories are part of living memory, if not still living.

The following continues the recap of the Scarred Lands campaign, Fire in Rahoch. It follows the adventures of Stromm, Manuc, Rostum, and Lliese as they navigate the politics of Calastia while at the same time trying to appease the secret societies that they are each a part of.

Drawing enthusiastically on Greek mythology, the revised and re-imagined Scarred Lands nonetheless retains its place as a modern fantasy RPG setting. This is a world shaped by gods and monsters, and only the greatest of heroes can expect to be counted among them. The most populous continent of Scarn, Ghelspad, plays host to vast unexplored regions, hides unsolved riddles from ancient cultures, and taunts adventures with the promise of undiscovered riches hidden among the ruins of older civilizations.

Yet the myths of the Scarred Lands are relatively recent events. The effects of the Titanswar still ripple through the world, and the heroines and villains of many of these stories are part of living memory, if not still living.

The following is a recap of the Scarred Lands campaign, Fire in Rahoch. It follows the adventures of Stromm, Manuc, Rostum, and Lliese as they navigate the politics of Calastia while at the same time trying to appease the secret societies that they are each a part of.

DriveThruRPG has launched their annual Halloween sale, and as usual, it’s a doozy; thousands of items — more than ten thousand items on Drive Thru RPG alone — are marked at 25% off. As usual, the suite of Drive Thru sites — DriveThruRPG, DriveThruFiction, DriveThruCards, DMsGuild, and Storytellers Vault — are each offering this sale on a huge selection of items. I thought I’d take a moment to highlight several items I’m particularly fond of to illustrate the depth and breadth of what’s available now through October 31. Most (but not all) follow the Halloween theme of horror and the supernatural.

The annual Halloween Sale is on at DriveThruRPG! With 25% Off these titles, it is the perfect time to try something new and spooky to truly terrify your players!  1. Little Fears Nightmare Edition In this game you assume the role of children being haunted and hunted by monsters that the adults do not believe […]

When I started out running a D&D-based game for friends a few months ago, I was thinking about converting the adventure into something I could publish on the Slarecian Vault, Onyx Path’s community content site for the Scarred Lands. I talked about that game back in March, in this blog post over on my website.

After my game wrapped, I put the finishing touches on the write-up, and turned it over to the person who was managing the project: Travis Legge. Travis and I first met at Madison, Wisconsin-based GameholeCon last year (I think – maybe we’d met before and I just forgot) and talked about a project wherein multiple people would each contribute a chapter to an extended D&D campaign using the Scarred Lands setting. I was intrigued, but also had concerns. Collaborative work takes a lot of communication to pull off successfully, and a solid guiding hand to keep things moving and make sure all the strings line up, or at least connect, to keep the storyline flowing.

The Christmas in July at DriveThruFiction sale continues! Last time, I offered ten recommendations of non-fiction books that are great for writers and narrative designers. Now, I’ve got ten new books for you to check out–some fabulous stories! Listing these reads in no specific order, I’ve picked out some cool novels and anthologies for you […]

Available now at DriveThruRPG.com I’ve recently finished my third community content project, and it went live today, Tuesday July 23, 2019. It’s an adventure for D&D 5E in the Scarred Lands setting, and it’s called Desert of Lost Relics. Desert of Lost Relics is suitable for 4-6 characters of levels 4-6. I wrote this adventure […]