#gm-less

I would really love to tell you more about this game, but I don't think I can do it justice. So, I have three words for you:

Cuck Tent Game

Tabletop Roleplaying Games, or TTRPGs, are meant by and large to be social affairs. A group generally consisting of a Game-Master and at least a few players, gather in person or online to play this style of game. That’s the way these games were designed to be played. That said, this is not the only way to play TTRPGs. For example, games like “Lovecraftesque” do not have a single Game-Master. The…

THEME: 4-Player-Compatible GM-less Games.

Hello friend! I've got a number of recommendations for you here, and I'm personally very excited by all of the games on this list. Enjoy!

The Creature Comes for Us, by OrionQK.

The Creature Comes for Us is a game that can be played solo or multiplayer which uses a standard deck of cards, two six-sided dice, and the players' imagination. 

You play as a group of people preparing to fight against a currently unknown threat. You will learn (through drawing cards) about the creature that is coming for you, you will find resources and tactics to fight against them, and you will learn more about the unique traits and talents of the player characters. The second part of the game brings together what you've gathered to fight the looming horrors and you will find out if your characters and world can survive the onslaught.

You’re going to need both dice and cards for this one. Slowly uncover the creature that’s hunting you, and then take what you’ve learned and turn to face the horror. It’s inspired by games such as The Quiet Year and The Junkyard. The game comes with a simple outline of the game, and an oracle for each card that you may pull. The game also comes with a number of tips for a shorter game, a longer game, and how to make the game a fun experience for different kinds of players. If you want a great summer spook story, this is worth checking out!

Scary Monsters & Nice Sprites, by Pammu. 

Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites is a narrative RPG about spending your night in one of the only clubs in your city that’s safe for creatures of the night like yourself. All you want to do is have some fun just like the humans do. Play a supernatural creature of choice, put some sick EDM on the speakers and get your game on!

You can alter how long you’re going to play by lengthening or shortening the intimacy meters between each pair of characters. You will roll dice and spend tokens to indicate the advances you make with different characters, narrating what you do to get them to look your way. While this game is primarily designed for a one-shot, the creator also provides ideas for making this a longer game. If you’re interested in a heavily descriptive game that gives all of you plenty of opportunities to flirt with each-other, this is a great option.

Waxworm, by FeatherBoy.

Waxworm is a game about legacies, survival, spite, love, and reclaiming a world taken from you by others. It is also a rule-light solarpunk tabletop role-playing game set in a world covered in water and broken concrete spires baking in the sun, and named for the questionable theory that waxworm moths might be well on their way to one day digesting plastics. Players may find themselves helping regrow broken communities adrift on the waves. They may also find that they are adrift themselves, searching for a community in which they can grow.

In Waxworm, each player acts as a Crew, rather than an individual. These Crews work together to grow and support each other, and face down adversity upon the waves and islands. The core of gameplay involves exploring relations within and between Crews, and exploring how those dynamics shift as crew-members come and go.

Another game inspired by the Quiet Year, Waxworm is a great cozy game that explores a hopeful future. The game is designed to be printed, which means that you can bring a physical copy and not worry about reading the rules off of a screen or having difficulty reading the text. 

Here We Used To Fly, by A Smouldering Lighthouse.

Here We Used to Fly is a rules-light tabletop roleplaying game about a group of friends exploring an abandoned theme park. Over the course of a single session, players will create two versions of the same character: one a child visiting the vibrant amusement park, one an adult investigating the ruins. As they discover or revisit each location in the park, they’ll play out scenes spotlighting moments of joy, frustration, fear, love, loss, and more.

This game feels like it requires a bit of prep, but each character is packaged into playbooks, so all of your options will be laid out in the same place. The play is also structured to make it easy to follow: with each Attraction you visit you’ll move from a childhood scene to a current-day scene. I’m very intrigued by this game and its partner, Endless Summer by Kay Marlow Allen. The whole feeling of nostalgia and whimsy feels perfect for a summer vacation with your loved ones.

Games I’ve Recommended in the Past

Fedora Noir, by Less Than Three Games.

Seemannsgarn, by Max Kämmerer.

Space Bounty Blues, by the Nerdy Paper Games of Rob Hebert.

Excited to share that I'm working with @delvecandles to develop 40 limited-edition deluxe boxes* for the Tangled Blessings print crowdfund.

Tangled Blessings is a solo or two-player pen-and-paper roleplaying game—no game master needed!

Each box includes:

A physical copy of the game

A thematic, limited-run scented candle

A personalized letter of acceptance in a wax-sealed envelope

2 double-sided postcards, featuring a campus map, sample class schedule, student generator, and faculty generator

Once these boxes are gone, they're gone! This includes the limited-edition candle scent. You won't find them anywhere else in the future!

I'm crowdfunding a complete print run of Tangled Blessings in February. So if deluxe sets aren't your thing, you can still pick up the physical copy by itself.

Learn more about Tangled Blessings and sign up for my mailing list: eepurl.com/ibdg9b

*Deluxe boxes are limited to U.S. addresses only.

Review of The Land Whispers

played: 1 game (7 Turns)

Of course the magic happens when you expand your definition of what a 'house' is. How else are you going to see a nebula as a home, unless a game like this fields you to answer questions that assume the nebula has walls and needs and needs tending to, so you'd better get to imagining how your group gets thatall to work. Magic.

This game is specifically written about a house in your head you go to when you’re laying in bed on a chill, sunny day with the window open and a breeze blowing in and you’re awake but snoozy, when you’re cozy but sprinting fox-like through the outskirts of your mind.

Except, this one is the house that your whole group shares in a single strata together, so it’s all jumbled up and full of waitwhatthe, and there’s something outside the house, and it has a name and it grazes, so the house’s, like, either rly big now or it’s the same size as usual—except: here it’s rly stuffed with people or else you’re all really small or else some combination of all this sort of thinking.

It does what it does. Introduces you to a place in your head, then says 'okay' and leave in a puff of smoke. This is a place maybe you haven’t seen or else a place you haven’t thought about in too long and did see once in a listing somewhere in a travel to some place and there thought ‘holy shit there it is its right there wait but thats it isnt it?’ and well, here it is again, in the shape of this group of people here with you with these faces and these voices over you and these names; and, no, it isn’t specifically your place, but it is partially. Gorgeously partially. And it’s gleaming.

Rules do make sure you do, if you do need to, declare who is in the scene with you each scene you share. I have seen groups struggle with this before: either teaming up or failing to mix in some other way. So here, if you need it: to spread all players out, get you a music staff or somet to walk up and down using your cards’ values; any people on the note you land on are in the scene with you when you describe it.

Find @ littlecuppajo.itch.io/thelandwhispers

Mad Monks of Kwantoom (OSR)

Mad Monks of Kwantoom (OSR) This review was requested by one of my patreons.   This massive setting-supplement/adventure clocks in at 229 pages, 1 page front cover, 3 pages of editorial/introduction/ToC, 5 pages of SRD, 1 page advertisement leaving us with 219 pages of content. The pages are laid out for 6’’ by 9’’, meaning you can fit up to 4 pages on a given sheet of paper, should you choose to…

Ruins of the Undercity (OSR)

Ruins of the Undercity (OSR) This is a toolkit for GM-less, solo-gaming that clocks in at 74 pages, 1 page front cover, 2 pages of editorial/introduction, 3 pages of SRD, leaving us with 68 pages of content. It should be noted that pages are laid out in 6’’ by 9’’, which means that you can fit up to 4 pages of content on a given sheet of paper when printing this – provided, your sight’s good…