I’ve been elbow-deep into Forged in the Dark games here for the past several months. I ran Court of Blades for the IGRC online convention in December, and now I’m several sessions into the excellent second edition of a|state from Handiwork Games. Right now I think it’s best in class on many fronts, the current… Continue reading Hammers In The Night: FitD 101
Author: Paul Beakley
A Tale Of Two (and a half) Trophies
When is a game “published” anyway? Is that even the right word these days? “Released?” I’m old-fashioned. In my dumb head, a game isn’t really out in the world until there’s a dead-tree book available for purchase. Even if 80% of my new game purchases are PDF. Like I said: dumb head. There are two… Continue reading A Tale Of Two (and a half) Trophies
Hello Friends (and another podcast is up)
Hey folks. You've probably noticed I went silent for a couple months. It wasn't on purpose, but it was the culmination of stuff both within and outside my control. Been thinking a lot about the work I/we do here, goals and the overall environment of gaming talk. Two big realizations have recently shifted my thinking… Continue reading Hello Friends (and another podcast is up)
In-Person Gaming Got Weird (Again)
I went to my first major in-person convention this past weekend since 2020 and it was, as you might expect, really weird. But I got to run and play a lot of mostly new-to-me RPGs. I attended Forge Midwest in Madison, WI back in April, but that’s a pretty small event. 30ish people maybe? Two… Continue reading In-Person Gaming Got Weird (Again)
Stagecraft
I was reminded of a favorite bit of stagecraft I really enjoy doing. It's a trick I indulged in running Trophy Dark (longer review coming next week) for a couple very new gamers at a recent local convention. They were all in on the storygame elements, they hadn't had enough training to make assumptions about… Continue reading Stagecraft






