#Universal Fantasy Supplement

[oldschoolfrp]

Trying to cut a demon down to size (Kevin Siembieda, D&D/"Universal" adventure Druids of Doom, Judges Guild, 1982)

[whumpster-fire]

Broke: Chilchuck Tims is child coded.

Woke: Chilchuck Tims isn't child coded, he's a middle-aged, divorced man with grown up children.

Bespoke: Chilchuck Tims cannot be accurately described as either "child coded" or "not child coded" because he is a deliberate commentary on the idea of "child coding" itself.

Chilchuck, and half-foots in Dungeon Meshi in general, are given significantly more neotenous proportions and appearances (e.g. larger heads and eyes, rounder faces) than the other races. This is not universal for depictions of hobbits / halflings in Tolkien / D&D inspired fantasy fiction. Compare Chilchuck relative to the "tallmen" (humans) in Dunmeshi to how small races are drawn in something like Legend of Vox Machina (many of those characters are gnomes but whatever) or in basically any official D&D art. It was an intentional artistic decision to make him look like that. This is reinforced when he's temporarily transformed into a tallman (human) and in addition to becoming much taller he gains features that make him look more visibly middle-aged (stubble, eye bags / wrinkles, a more oval face) that he doesn't have as a half-foot. See also Marcille's transformed form and supplemental drawings of what all of the main party would look like as other races. However they do NOT look indistinguishable from actual children as portrayed by Dunmeshi's artstyle and have distinguishing features e.g. larger ears.

Chilchuck is frequently mistaken for a child in-universe, or treated / perceived as one even by members of other races who know he's a half-foot, and he hates this. His infantilization and that of half-foots in general isn't just a running gag, it's a significant plot point and source of discrimination. Like when the party gets impersonated by shapeshifters copying everyone based on the others' memories of them, and most of the Chilchuck clones look and behave more childish than the real one, and they almost get away with it, even though his party should know better than to think of him as a kid.

The narrative consistently takes the position that the people infantilizing Chilchuck are wrong, and are being ignorant/racist.

Conclusion: Chilchuck is definitely not "child-coded" in the way that a 700 year old shapeshifter that looks and behaves indistinguishably from a little kid for contrived reasons. However, he is intentionally designed to make it seem plausible for people who know he's an adult to still not fully believe it and this can make the viewers fall for it too. Which I guess is "child-coding" in a sense. But the message the work is trying to send is very clearly "Don't decide that grown-ass adults are equivalent to children and treat them like children because they have physical characteristics that remind you of a child you dipshit."

While hobbits aren't real and Chilchuck's traits that get him mistaken for a child are exaggerated compared to the vast, vast majority of real people, infantilization of grown-ass adults due to ableism, racism, or just people being dumbasses who forget short people exist is a real issue, and if you start shit with people for shipping Divorced Dad Chilchuck Tims with other characters or whatever you are displaying the exact attitude that's being criticized.

[prokopetz]

Can you go over what is going on with Paladins and Clerics in DND, not from a mechanical or in universe perspective, but from what different sources/genres/tropes they are drawing on? They always seemed to have too much overlap in the basic concept to me to make sense as separate things in the dnd classes/stock character line up.

Clerics originated way back in the pre-OD&D days, when the game that would become Dungeons & Dragons was still a fantasy roleplaying add-on intended to be paired with your favourite historical wargame. One of the players in Dave Arneson's original Blackmoor campaign had an army whose commander/player character was a vampire named Sir Fang, who proved to be sufficiently overpowered that a mechanical "hard counter" was desired.

This ended up taking the form of a vampire-hunting priest character heavily inspired by Peter Cushing's turn as Abraham Van Helsing in the 1958 Christopher Lee adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula; that vampire-hunting priest in turn developed into what would become one of original flavour D&D's three core classes (the other two being the fighter and the wizard – the thief/rogue came later).

The paladin, meanwhile, was originally a direct, 1:1 lift of Holger Carlsen, the protagonist of Poul Anderson's 1961 fantasy novel Three Hearts and Three Lions, and was introduced as a subclass of the fighter – rather than a class of its own – in the 1975 Greyhawk supplement. Over the game's editions it's wandered from being a fighter subclass, to being a high-level "advanced class" to which qualifying characters can switch at 10th level, back to being a fighter subclass, and finally to a core class, where it's generally remained.

So, in short, the cleric was originally a purpose-built hard counter to vampire PCs loosely patterned after Peter Cushing's Abraham Van Helsing, while the paladin was originally for people who just really wanted to be one specific Poul Anderson character.

(I'm sorry if that's not a terribly satisfying answer, but you need to understand that practically everything in old-school D&D is a 1960s or 1970s pop culture reference – it just doesn't read that way to modern audiences because nobody gets the memes anymore.)

[dailyadventureprompts]

Do the ethnostates inherent in major fantasy ever feel real weird to you? You’ve got elftopia (full of elves, where everyone speaks elf and worships the elf gods), orc-hold (full of orcs and maybe their slaves, where everyone speaks orc and worships the orc gods), and dwarfton (made by the dwarves! for the dwarves!).

You might have some cosmopolitan areas, usually human-dominant, but those are usually rare enough in-setting that they need to be pointed out separately. Is this just based on a misunderstanding of the medieval era, and the assumption that countries were all racially homogenous?

This has been bouncing around my brain the last little while. Do you have any thoughts on that? Is it just in my head?

I think what you've noticed is a quirk of derivative fantasy writing, which like a lot of hangups with the genre originates in people trying to crib Tolkien's work without really understanding what he was going for:

Though it contains a lot of detail, Tolkien's world is not grounded. It functions according a narrative logic that changes depending on what work in particular you're focusing on at the time (The Hobbit is a fairytale full of tricks and riddles, Lord of the Rings is a heroic epic, The Silmirilion is a legendary history).

One of the reasons the races are separate is to instill the feeling of wonder in the hobbits as POV characters for the reader, other folk live in far off places and are supposed to feel more legendary than our comparatively mundane friends from the shire. The Movies captured this well where going east in middle earth was like going back in time to a more and more mythologized past.

In real life, people don't stay static for thousands of years, no matter how long their people live. They meet, mingle, war and trade. Empires rise and fall creating shrapnel as they go, cultures adapt to a changing environment. This means that any geographic cross section you make is going to be a collage of different influences where uniformity is a glaring aberration.

What the bad Tolkien knockoffs did was take his image of a mythical world and tried to make it run in a realistic setting. Tolkien can say the subterranean dwarven kingdom of Erebor lasted for a thousand years without having to worry about birthrates or demographic shifts or the logistics of farming in a cave because he's writing the sort of story where those things don't matter. D&D and other properties like it however INSIST that their worlds are grounded and realistic but have to bend over backwards to keep things static and hegemonic.

Likewise contributing to the "ethnostate" feeling is early d&d (backbone of the fantasy genre that it is) being created by a bunch of White Midwestern Americans who were not only coming from a background of fantasy wargaming but were working during the depths of the coldwar. Hard borders and incompatible ideologies, cultural hegemony and intellectual isolation, a conception of the world that focused around antagonism between US and THEM. These were people born in the era of segregation for whom the idea of cultural and racial osmosis was alien, to the point where mingling between different fantasy races produced the "mongrelman" monster, natural pickpockets who combined the worst aspects of all their component parts, unwelcome in good society who were most often found as slaves.

This inability to appreciate cultural exchange is likewise why the central d&d pantheon has a ton of human gods with specific carveouts for other races (eventually supplemented with a bunch of race specific minor gods who are various riffs on the same thing). Rather than being universal ideals, the gods were seen as entities just as tribalistic as their followers.

[rebelspykatie]

Soulmate AU Part Five - The Final Part 

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Alternate Ending 

There’s a display of dnd handbooks and supplemental materials right beside it. Beyond that, Eddie spots a fantasy section overflowing with worn paperbacks that he can’t wait to sort through. 

Steve follows Eddie around, pointing out all the things Dustin loves, listening to Eddie ramble on with a fond, soft look on his face, and carrying everything Eddie has expressed an interest in around the store, including a brand new set of black and red dice. He never looks bored or disinterested, just patiently sits beside Eddie as he goes through stacks of paperbacks, nodding along to his stories and flipping through a magazine he found.

When they get to the counter, Eddie doesn’t expect Steve to whip out his wallet and pay for everything Eddie has so much as even touched, but he’s brushed aside and knows better than to look a gift horse in the mouth. He’s not going to let Steve pay for things all the time, but it’s a nice surprise that he’s willing to shell out for all of Eddie’s nerdy little treasures. 

When they climb back in the car, Eddie mutters, “Thanks, Steve. This is the best date I’ve ever been on.” It’s the only date he’s ever been on, though, so perhaps the sentiment doesn’t count. 

“It’s not over, yet.” Steve’s smirk is mischievous as he backs out and gets back on the highway. 

They end up at a tavern a few miles away. It looks like a cottage from the outside, but inside, the staff are all dressed in medieval themed attire, lots of tunics, capes, and leather straps. It’s not quite accurate, but it’s probably the best they could do on a small town restaurant budget. The patrons are a younger crowd, which leads Eddie to believe this is typically a family spot intended for kids. It reminds him of Wayne doing his best to play dress up with Eddie for his birthday as a kid, just trying to make Eddie happy despite not understanding any of it. 

A warmth that’s starting to feel like home is resonating in his chest, wrapping around his heart like a hug, a tether to the boy beside him. Steve endeared himself to Eddie with one perfectly planned date, crafting the entire evening around Eddie’s interests. It loosens the last thread of doubt he had about Steve. He’s doing everything in his power to prove that the universe didn’t get it wrong.

The conversation flows easily, the two of them getting to know each other beyond surface level rumors they picked up in the hallways of Hawkins High. Eddie learns more about the rocky relationship between Steve’s parents and how that affects the way he views the soulmate bond. Steve gets a detailed reenactment of a recent campaign, tugging on Eddie’s shirt sleeve to prevent him from climbing on the table. Eddie learns more about the hoard of children Steve babysits and how awkward it still is seeing Nancy every time he drops off Mike. 

At some point, they spot a table with supplies for kids, coloring sheets and paper crowns. Eddie grabs a crown and places it gently on top of Steve’s hair. He makes a cheeky joke about King Steve, making sure Steve knows he’s joking. They have a foam sword fight in the play area while they wait for their dessert, chasing each other around until Steve’s crown is crooked and they’re laughing so hard their sides hurt. 

It’s the most fun Eddie’s had in a long time. 

When they get back in the car, there’s a quiet calm that settles around them. Eddie ends up dozing off along the way, jerking awake when Steve shakes his shoulder after he turns the car off outside of the trailer. 

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Eddie says, “This was perfect, Steve. I know the universe magically knows that we’re made for each other, but I think this is the first time I really believe it.”

Steve grabs Eddie’s arm, fingers running over where the band is resting, covering up the mark on his wrist. He doesn’t even know why he put it on earlier, maybe just habit, or maybe he was still waiting for Steve to change his mind. He glances up at Eddie’s face before returning his gaze to the band, undoing the clasp and letting it fall away from Eddie’s wrist. 

Eddie wants to memorize the look on Steve’s face. The awestruck wonder that takes over when he sees his name for the first time. Fingers trace over the lettering, soft whispers along Eddie’s skin. It’s the first time anyone has seen it besides Wayne, who held him on the night of his eighteenth birthday as he cried himself to sleep and bought him the band the next day. 

“I believe it, too,” Steve whispers. And Eddie doesn’t have time to think about anything else before Steve tugs on his arm to pull him closer and kisses him. It nearly knocks the wind out of him, a mixture of surprise and joy bubbling to the surface. It’s chaste, just a soft press of lips together, but Eddie has so much pent up energy he’s grinning against Steve’s mouth, practically vibrating out of his chair.

He wants to crawl over the console and press Steve into the seat until they devour each other, but Wayne is probably waiting up and will knock on the window and shine a light in like a cop or some shit if Eddie takes too long. Especially since he’s wary of Steve after the whole crying on Eddie’s birthday thing. 

A first kiss seems like a great place to end the night anyway. He pulls back, resting his forehead against Steve’s, basking in the moment. “I’m going inside now, but next time, I’m planning the date, okay?” 

“Deal. Thank you for the flowers. I feel pretty enlightened after this, so I think your mom was right about them.”

“My mama would have loved to meet you.” Steve squeezes his hand. “This is as close as we’ll get, but I think she would have approved of you.”

“You think so?” 

Eddie nods. “She approved of anything that made me happy.” He kisses the tip of Steve’s nose, then climbs out of the car. “Now let me go grab your flowers and I’ll be right back.” 

He brings them back and kisses Steve one last time through the open window of his car. “Get home safe, sweetheart.” 

He waves a final goodbye as Steve pulls away, that giddy feeling resurfacing. He can’t predict the future, but he knows that the feeling he has right now, knowing that Steve is on the same page, is the best feeling in the world. 

💜💜💜

Thank you all so much for reading this!!! I hope you like this ending and get some joy out of this because I had so much fun writing it. I’ll be posting the whole thing to AO3 this weekend once I clean it up.

[theresattrpgforthat]

I'm a TTRPG designer, and also a big fan of the video game Terraria. I'm stuck on fun ways to handle material gathering and crafting. Send me some inspiration! Thanks!

THEME: Gathering and Crafting

Hello friend! Putting this one together was very fun. I hope you enjoy it!

Stoneburner, by Fari RPGs.

Stoneburner is a sci-fantasy solo-friendly demon-hunting community-building tabletop role-playing game.Inspired by the new school revolution movement, players take on the role of a group of dwarves who must assume control of a demon haunted mine, along with its accompanying settlement, which they inherited after the death of their distant relative.The game focuses on the dwarves' journey as they navigate the challenges of their new responsibilities, rebuild a new thriving community, and clear the mine of its fire spitting monsters.

A techno-fantasy game of exploration and survival. You’ll be delving into a mine to extract resources and attempting to maintain and protect your community not just from magical beasts, but also greedy and plotting rivals. The system is built on Breathless, which is pretty rules-lite on the face but has a lot of possibility to expand, borrowing quite a bit from the NSR but giving the GM specific cues where they have a license to complicate the story. You’ll find a lot of familiar pieces here, with character classes, special abilities, and loot tables. Stoneburner isn’t fully ready to be published quite yet, but in the meantime you can check out the free preview!

Hostile (Rules and Setting), by Zozer Games.

Welcome to the gritty, retro-future universe of HOSTILE. Based on the Cepheus Engine, these rules add in realistic combat rules as well as setting-specific rules from some of the eighteen HOSTILE supplements. When combined with its companion book, the HOSTILE Setting, you will have a complete, stand-alone, retro-future sci-fi game. HOSTILE is a gritty, near future roleplaying setting that is inspired by movies like Outland, Bladerunner and Alien. It is a universe of mining installations, harsh moons, industrial facilities, hostile planets and brutal, utilitarian spacecraft.

When I looked up info about this game, HOSTILE was described as not an ALIEN RPG, but rather an RPG that you could plug Alien into. It’s a space horror setting, but what kind of space horror is up to you. The Rulebook has rules on trade, salvaging, and other pieces of resource management, while the setting book contains construction rules for your own mega-ton spaceship. There’s also plenty of colonies, survival rules, campaign advice and encounter tables. If this is interesting to you, I’d recommend checking out the Double Shift Bundle, which offers both the Rulebook and the Setting Book for 20% off.

Forbidden Lands, by Free League Publishing.

Forbidden Lands is a new take on classic fantasy roleplaying. In this open-world survival roleplaying game, you’re not heroes sent on missions dictated by others - instead, you are raiders and rogues bent on making your own mark on a cursed world. You will discover lost tombs, fight terrible monsters, wander the wild lands and, if you live long enough, build your own stronghold to defend.

As raiders and rogues, in Forbidden Lands you will need to scavenge to survive. Built on Free League’s Year Zero Engine, this game uses an abstract resource called consumables which your characters will have to find regularly, because food goes bad and you can only carry so many things. The game focuses on the dangers of the road, although not all dangers are terrifying - you’re not fighting orcs all the time - sometimes you’re just battling mosquitoes and cold weather. There’s also rules about building, maintaining, and defending a stronghold, which sounds kind of similar to building and defending your house in Terraria. There’s a lot to keep track of in Forbidden Lands, and as long as you don’t mind playing characters with a somewhat loose moral compass, this game might be for you!

A Fistful of Darkness, by monkeyEcho.

A Fistful of Darkness is a Weird West Fantasy hack of Blades in the Dark with heavy emphasis on the fantasy part. It’s not intended to be an accurate history lesson or a simulation of past times. It is designed to be a cinematic game which lets you play all those Weird West tropes towards the end of the world.

Imagine a world with the magic and mystery of the frontier: wide open plains of the Old Wild West in all its beauty and madness, where violence and sacrifice dominate every single day. Now add the Hellstone rush, underground mayhem in mines and brand new sciences & machines. Don’t forget immigration, injustice, vigilante justice, outlaws, gunslingers, slick talkers and setting suns. This all in the face of an impending doom: Demons and the four riders bringing the end of the world as you know it. How do you make it to the top of this powder keg, which side will you take in the impending war and how much will your soul suffer? Let’s play to find out!

Forged in the Dark games abstract your resources a bit, but the Hellstone of A Fistful of Darkness is so important to the setting that you’ll find yourselves doing whatever you can to get your hands on it. It’s a crafting material, it’s currency, and it’s the bringer of mutations and curses, what with it being a demonic material and all. Because you’ll be running a group playbook alongside your own characters, you’ll be working together to improve your tools, allies, abilities and home base, especially if you choose the Scavengers Posse. If you like action and suspense as much as you like inventory and communal goals, then this game is for you.

LOOT, by Gila RPGs.

Do you love loot? Then you're in the right place.

Go on quests, find loot, do it all over again. Your character is entirely defined by the loot they wear and carry. Loot is generated and passed out at the end of each quest with a dynamic loot pool system.

This is an application of the LUMEN system that eschews dice. Players have a number of uses for each of their approaches, which can be spent to overcome obstacles. Complications arise when you have to cobble together a solution using a different approach, or when you avoid marking an approach at all. This is a game still in a free playtest, so the designer is happy to hear feedback if you decide to give it a whirl!

[starblightbindery]

Editor's Note from The Black Sands of Socorro by Patricia A. Jackson

While researching Patricia A. Jackson’s entire body of Star Wars work for a short story anthology, I came across the West End Games sourcebook Star Wars: The Black Sands of Socorro (1997.) It’s a crucial work of Star Wars ephemera: The first creator of color writing for Star Wars in an official capacity, writing not just about individual characters of color, but centering entire cultures populated by non-white characters. A young Black woman in the 1990s wrote science fiction for Star Wars, worldbuilding with concepts like antislavery, indigeneity, linguistic divergence, and settler colonialism...while Disney-Lucasfilm in the 2020s ineffectually positions Star Wars as a post-racial fantasy.

I non-hyperbolically refer to Patricia A. Jackson as the “Octavia Butler of Star Wars,” not because fans of color need to be officially sanctioned by Lucasfilm to create Star Wars content, but because of how difficult it is to carve out anti-racist space in a transmedia storytelling empire. Challenging even in transformational fandom spaces (e.g. fan works), to broach race in affirmational fandom spaces—or while writing content for the property holder—is to be unflinchingly subversive.

And Jackson did it first. In an interview with Rob Wolf in 2022, Jackson described her experience writing race into Star Wars in the 1990s as an “experiment.” The planet, peoples, and cultures of Socorro were a way for Jackson to obliquely, yet concretely, center Blackness and racial justice into Star Wars, pushing the racial allegory constrained by the original trilogy to its limits.

Since it’s inception, Star Wars has spent much of it’s storytelling on the fringes of the galaxy (whether it’s Tatooine or Jakku, Nevarro or Ajan Kloss.) The Black Sands of Socorro is an extension of that trope, but where the Star Wars films used indigeneity as set dressing (eg. “Sand People”, Ewoks, Gungans, etc.) Jackson creates a vivid world where indigenous culture and settler colonists collide; where characters are coded with dark skin and central to the action. The planet Socorro is distinct as a Star Wars setting. As one of the only places in the galaxy where slavery is eradicated with a vengeance, Socorro refuses to let go of a plot line Star Wars media often leaves behind. Socorro is a haven from Imperial fascism, a space where readers are invited to imagine a story that does not center around occupation.

When I learned that Patricia A. Jackson no longer has a physical copy of The Black Sands of Socorro, I realized that I had the materials and the means to create a fanbound hard copy for her home library (well, and also for my own home library.) While this handmade book is not an exact reproduction of the RPG supplement, I hope my renvisioning of the supplement as an in-universe travel guide lives up to the original work.

As the idea of creating a travel guidebook based on the original material percolated, I reflected on the State of Race in Star Wars in the year since I compiled Designs of Fate, an anthology of my favorite Patricia A. Jackson short stories. In May 2022, actress Moses Ingram debuted as Inquisitor Reva Sevander, the deuteragonist in the Dinsey+ streaming Obi-Wan Kenobi series. As predicted by Lucasfilm—and any fan sick of alt-right Star Wars related “whitelash”—Ingram was promptly subjected to a firehose of racialized harassment and misogynoir.

Yep, fascist self-proclaimed fanboys complained about a Black woman Inquisitor in 2022, having no idea (or deliberately whitewashing) that one of creators of the entire freakin’ concept of Inquisitors was a Black woman writing for the Star Wars Adventure Journal three decades ago.

Then, a public facing Star Wars account (@StarWars on Twitter) broke precedent and slapped back at the trolls. Lead actor Ewan McGregor filmed a video retort, posted on @StarWars, stating “racism has no place in this world” and telling off the racist bullies: “you’re no Star Wars fan in my mind.” A few months later, Disney+ debuted it’s second flagship Star Wars streaming series of the year, starring a Latino actor as the protagonist. In the opening episode of Andor, a police chief describes Diego Luna’s eponymous lead as a “dark-featured human,” perhaps the closest the franchise has ever gotten to acknowledging out-of-universe constructions of race, to date. The series explored aspects of imperialism with more depth than Star Wars had previously done on screen, such as the Empire’s treatment of the native people of Aldhani. And, in November, the The Acolyte, a Disney+ series co-developed by Rayne Roberts, announced Amandla Stenberg and Korean actor Lee Jung-jae as its top-billed leads. Stenberg will be the first Gen Z, mixed race, Black, Inuit, queer, and non-binary actor to lead a major Star Wars series.

On the Patricia A. Jackson Star Wars front, in 2022, Jackson’s character Fable Astin was an easter egg in the Obi-Wan Kenobi series. Jackson will again write for Star Wars in an official capacity in From a Certain Point of View: Return of the Jedi, due for publication in Fall 2023. A series about Lando Calrissian, the galaxy’s most famous Socorran, is still in production, so I have my fingers crossed that we may soon see Socorro on camera.

I wonder if this past year will have been a fulcrum year for BIPOC fandom. Maybe Disney has finally realized it’s bad for business that the alt-right uses social media algorithms and Star Wars fan spaces as a soft recruiting ground to radicalize young white men? Maybe Star Wars as a franchise will continue to loudly disavow fan whitelash and firmly position performers of color in true leading roles? I really hope so. On the other hand, as much as I am in favor of increased representation in Star Wars storytelling, I am also troubled by Disney-Lucasfilm’s framing of the Galaxy Far, Far Away (GFFA) as “colorblind.” Recently, Star Wars fans have been asked to accept that in the (a long time ago) sci-fi futurepast GFFA, humans have always been post-racial, and it’s just a coincidence that racialized people were not caught on camera the way white characters have been for years. The galaxy is post-racial and it’s just acoincidence that the movers and shakers of the galaxy have largely been depicted as white men for the past 40 years of media.

For example, in the decade since Disney rebooted the expanded universe, fans have learned that Star Wars’s biggest galactic war criminal to never be depicted on screen is Admiral Rae Sloane, a bisexual Black woman who was the leader of Imperial remnant forces, one of the architects of the First Order, and personal mentor to General Hux. Under Disney-Lucasfilm’s post-racial retcon of the Star Wars universe, the allegorical fascists are intersectional equal opportunity employers (at least in expanded universe content like animation, video games, and novels.) Along those lines, several of the franchise’s newly introduced, prominent women of color have been part of the Empire: Imperial loyalist Cienna Ree (Lost Stars), Inferno Squad leader Iden Versio (Star Wars: Battlefront II) former stormtrooper Jannah (Episode IX), First Order pilot Tamara Ryvora (Star Wars: Resistance), Inquisitor Trilla Sundari (Jedi: Fallen Order), Captain Terisa Kerrill (Star Wars: Squadron) and, most recently, Inquisitor Reva Sevander. Once the sole purview of stodgy, very white and very British men (demonstrably so even in the sequel trilogy movies,) now anyone can be a stooge of the Empire.

That’s not to say that marginalized people can’t collude with fascism, or that there haven’t been heroic characters of color introduced in recent years. Rather, I posit that in order to sell audiences on the post-racial/colorblind GFFA, fascist-of-color characters like Rae Sloane or Giancarlo Esposito’s Moff Gideon (The Mandalorian) are created by necessity. The franchise wants to at once be racially inclusive and yet never directly address race. In Star Wars, real world oppression is primarily explored through allegory—such as Solo (2018)’s bit on droid rights, the clone army, or the myriad of non-human alien bodies that nonetheless are coded with racial stereotypes. A lot has been said about how allegory in sci-fi allows audiences to grapple with inequality from a comfortable distance, and not enough has been said about which audience is being prioritized for comfort.

What does it mean when race is supposedly a non-issue for humans in the GFFA, but creators and actors with marginalized identities cannot participate in Star Wars in any capacity without experiencing identity-targeted harassment? In the past ten years, this has been true even for white women like Kathleen Kennedy and Daisy Ridley, but the vitriol has been most strongly directed towards Black women like Lucasfilm Story Group lead Kiri Hart, author Justina Ireland and The High Republic Show host Krystina Arielle. Can the Galaxy Far, Far Away truly be “colorblind” or “post-racial” (never-racial?) if the narrative continually centers white characters and replicates all the common racial inequities seen in commercialized Hollywood storytelling? Upon the release of The Force Awakens in 2015, critic Andre Seewood aptly described Finn’s positioning in the story as “hyper-⁠tokenism,” even presciently predicting that Finn would continue to be hyper-⁠tokenized in Episodes VIII and IX. As the narrative veered away from Finn, it also left unrealized a stormtrooper rebellion plot line where Finn could have been, in effect, a Black abolitionist. Actor John Boyega’s critique of his experience in the sequel trilogy aligns with Seewald’s assessment: “Do not bring out a Black character, market them to be much more important to the franchise than they are and then have them pushed to the side.”

Published in 1997, The Black Sands of Socorro came before Finn, before Mace Windu, back when all the melanin of Star Wars could be found in Billy Dee Williams’s singular swagger and James Earl Jones’s distinctive voice. Back then, the most prominent Black actress in the original trilogy was dancer Femi Taylor, who played Oola, the hypersexualized green twi’lek fed to the rancor in Return of the Jedi. Bantam Spectra, the publisher that held the license for Star Wars from 1991 to 1999, had no leading characters of color in its’ Expanded Universe. The first full length Star Wars novel by a writer of color, Steven Barnes’s The Cestus Deception15, would not be published until 2004. Even though the book featured two protagonists of color, they would not be depicted on the cover. At Comic-Con in 2010, I spoke with Tom Taylor, a white Australian comic book writer who tried to make the lead family in Star Wars: Invasion (2009) a Black one, but was shut down during the creative process. The comic instead depicts a family of blondes, because the publishers did not think fans would embrace leads of color. All this to say, the inclusion of melanated characters in Star Wars has been so, so hard fought. It’s incredible The Black Sands of Socorro exists at all. It’s more than worthy of celebration, and I’m floored that more attention has not been brought to it.

Patricia A. Jackson is a smuggler.

This sourcebook was explicitly written to assist fans in telling their own Star Wars stories, and in it Patricia A. Jackson smuggled in emphatic allusions to the Black Panther movement and the trans-Atlantic slave trade, smuggled in commentary on indigeneity and settler colonialism, and smuggled in multiple ways for fans to envision characters of color. Her writing has consistently added richness to the GFFA, and in The Black Sands of Socorro she envisions multiple histories for multiple cultures coded as non-white. She ensured the existence of not mere tokens, but flourishing societies of people of color in Star Wars.

The coda for The Last Jedi again shows how perilously close to tokenization characters of color, particularly Black characters, are in modern day Star Wars. In this film, the franchise returns to itsprevious exploration of slavery with the depiction of enslaved children on Canto Bight. The last speaking lines of the film are from Oniho Zaya (played by Josiah Oniha, a young Black British actor) who recounts Luke Skywalker’s heroic exploits to the other children. The film then closes out by showing that one of the downtrodden children is Force-sensitive—a future hero in the Star Wars mythos. In a film where every single Force-user depicted is white, the next generation kid with the potential is, again, a young white boy. Once again, the Black character can only serve the narrative in a supporting role. A franchise depicting a colorblind fantasy continually reifies racial and gender hierarchies in America. With The Acolyte, scheduled for release in 2024, it’s possible the franchise may finally be shifting past hyper-tokenism. In the meantime, fans of color and our erstwhile allies will continue doodling in the margins.

In the end, the sequel trilogy left the Canto Bight plot line (and the overarching slavery plot line started in Episode I) unresolved. I’d like to think the Black Bha’lir strafed Canto Bight and grabbed those kids. It seems like something they would do. Out among the stars, Oniho Zaya is adventuring with Drake Paulsen, and his story does not bracket another characters’; he is central. The Black Sands of Socorro is a launching pad for stories like that. It represents how fans of color have always carved out pieces of Star Wars for ourselves.

[miidnighters]

I came back to RP in October of this year and I honestly have just been blown away by the community that's still here - I'm so lucky to have connected with this community of people who not only write excellent things with me, but put other excellent things on my dash for me to devour.

I just wanted to say a little thank you and shoutout for making re-entry so easy and enjoyable <3 I love you all and I cannot wait to have a million threads apiece with each of you because I'm so greedy and I'm just looking at you all with little grabby hands. I want to like every starter call you ever post and send in every meme but also. Don't want to be a lunatic you know.

@whileurmine

Writing with you makes me so happy! I really enjoy each of your characters and this interwoven storyline they all have together - how you can reference other characters and have them drop in and out and still be 'canon'. Love it.

@briillicnt / @grcveyacd

I love the dynamic we've created with Tristan and Hartley - I really enjoy writing with you and exploring all the little facets of their relationship. I can't wait to do more, especially exploring all the characters on your multi!

@exquisitexagony / @cursedvessels / @distantsongsofjoy

Sami has my whole heart and you know this. I love their characterisation and whichever of my characters they get paired with is absolutely chefs kiss because each pairing has such a unique dynamic that I love playing with. PLUS all the characters on your multi?? All of your characters are exquisite and I love them.

@wildskissed

What can I say about Eve - even before you were writing with me I was reading your other threads and thinking about how cool you were so the fact that we've crafted this relationship between Bella and Eve? It's amazing to me and I love exploring not only their relationship but also the wider universe.

@laidbear / @92328 / @svetlna

I have mentioned before but I'll say it again, each of your characters is so fascinating to me and I love them so much. I am always blown away by the depth and facets of your characters, and the way they interact with mine. Amazing - I could live in your blogs for the next 100 years and never get bored.

@cxldblxxded / @yxkanna

Another set of amazing, multifaceted characters. I think your development and wider thinking about your characters is so interesting and I love reading all of the extra tidbits because it makes all of your characters feel that much more real. Looking forward to hopefully more interactions with Cad & K.

@starlyht

Aaah honestly all of your characters are so good and I love that you think about them not only in a BG3 sense but also in a wider fantasy sense which makes them so fascinating to me. Also, the fact that you will occasionally use real dice rolls to decide what happens in-reply? Iconic.

@mystiika

I love you, I love your characters, I love all the things we've talked about for Flynn and Jamie, and the things we've started putting together for Isaac and Callisto. Writing with you is so fun and I can't wait to explore some of your other characters.

@lcvnderhazed

I am loving what we're starting to build between our girls. Your characters and your threads are so interesting to me - like, how do you come up with these concepts? I also love seeing all of the supplemental content you post like moodboards and other things - just the way you think about your characters? Amazing.

@soulmissed

August is my child now I'm sorry I don't make the rules. i think it's so interesting how you've managed to take a character that by virtue of being young would be undesirable to a lot of writers and make him so loveable. I can't wait to write more with him.

@fangmother

What a woman. What a concept. Such interesting (and well done) writing. I would kind of like to set up shop in your blog and never leave? Also, your goodnight posts about whatever way Rainer's fallen asleep/done herself in that day make my whole afternoon.

@freekzout

These characters are ridiculous and I say that with all the love in my heart. I love the concept of the dual-muse reply where both Ruth and Funke feature and I think that both of them individually are really well-crafted, interesting characters to read and write with. ETA: Aaah I didn't have time to get on my computer and fix this after my Moment this morning but Conrad should also be tagged here not down below 😳😳😳

@littledevilinside / @notladylikes

Okay so I know we only started writing recently but we went absolutely 0-100 with threads and I already love what we have going on with Isaac and Lorelei. Such a good, wholesome dynamic - Lorelei as a character is so interesting and I can't wait to dig a little deeper with her and the others on your multi.

Here are some people I don't write with (as much yet)/am still in the planning-plotting stages with/just plain admire and devour their threads/OC meta every time they're on my dash

@byanyan | @recitedemise | @kxllerblond / @multiimistakes | @ohshadow | @radicalrascals | @tewwor | @nightiingaled | @sorrowsick | @fuckedcowboy | @draconisa | @kurjaks | @hungryyheart | @penddraig | @praybird | @mvnces | @moonromantic

[airic-fenn]

If youre pissed that WOTC is revoking its old ogl, you might be wanting to boycott them go play other games for a bit.

Now Im not a die-hard expert on all the ttrpgs out there, but there are a few that I particularly like and recommend if you dont know where to start:

• Ryuutama

I love Ryuutama so much. Its a lot simpler than dnd and really gives older japanese rpg video game vibes. Its very cozy fantasy with a heavy focus on adventuring and story telling than on battling. The english translation was actually a kickstarter thing, and it’s also in dire need of more homebrew content because there was supposed to be a translation of the supplement but thats probably never gonna happen anytime soon, if ever.

• Call of Catthulhu

No, I did not spell it wrong. Put simply, Call of Catthulhu is Call of Cthulhu but with cats. You all play cats. Dont let that fool you though, it can get surprisingly tense and gruesome if you play it right. You’ll probably love it if you were a warrior cats kid.

• Delta Green (and CoC in general)

“Modern” (1980’s) setting for (actual) Call of Cthulhu. The CoC games are fun if you like mysteries, conspiracies and yknow. cosmic horror stuff.

• Traveller

A scifi rp where you play a dude in space (an explorer, traveller, soldier or trader). This one is fun because character creation is VERY extensive and is part of the gameplay, but before the story starts. You make roles to determine all of the things that happened to you prior to the adventure like, did you go to university, have you suffered any life-altering injuries to your mind or body bc of some terrible accident, did you accidentally get aged 50 years older by getting zapped through a wormhole? Fun stuff like that. My friend calls it the existential crises rpg.

• Pathfinder

I mention it obligatorily because people tell me its the most like dnd without technically being dnd but I havent played it.

Anyway there are definitely so many more games but those are the ones I’ve played (other than pathfinder) and enjoyed. Feel free to reblog with your own additions to the list.

[ignylinn]

TLT and actual science

Some time ago I posted some questions on the first resurrection and science here and had a wonderful discussion with @stranded-cryptid

We got stuck cause none of us knew enough physics :) so if anyone understands it better, I would so like an input or commentary.

But the ultimate question that came out of this discussion for me is:

Can TLT space necro magic be somewhat explained within the scope of our current scientific knowledge?

Or, can TLT be more or less hard sci-fi?

I know it can be so. Simmons explained religion and mysticism through science, and science through religion and mysticism in The Fall of Hyperion. The whole thing looked like err.. abrahamic space fantasy, right until the last part of the second book. And TLT can also be categorized as abrahamic space fantasy.

So, what do we know:

John DID have a scientific explanation for what was going on with thalergy/thanergy. He was going to write down his theory and to get it published. He turned it into a magic and a cult later because of circumstances and pressure. At least, that's what he says in Nona.

Thalergy, as far as it looks, is not directly connected to life. Jod murders completely lifeless planets in Solar system, and still gets his thanergy and Resurrection Beasts.

No thalergy/thanergy comes from moons, no Resurrection Beasts there.

Sun is not involved in thalergy/thanergy, there is no Sun Resurrection Beast. I suspect it applies to all stars and also to black holes.

Thanergy is somehow connected to wormholes (the River, might be also steles)

No necromancy in space. Yes necromancy on a planet.

Necros are able to produce additional mass out of nowhere (constructs made out of a single bone)

It does not add up for me, because I do not have enough knowledge, but what I think:

John and his team were working in cryogenics. I think they accidentally discovered not a solution for cryogenic, but some thing to keep thanergy (and possibly thalergy) within the body, when naturally it just dissipates. Prolonged exposure to thanergy is what gave John his powers. This also might explain why Augustine, Mercy and Gideon became necros - they were working with John originally and for a long time, and Alfred, Cristabel and Pyrrha did not - they joined much later.

I also think that thalergy is connected to gravity somehow. I mean, this explains lifeless planets but not moons - planets are gravitational centres of satellite systems. Stars are either too massive or maybe it is because of fusion in the core, or maybe it is cause stars a results of gravitational collapse, or idk. It also might explain why the Houses have artificial gravity. I mean, John is our contemporary or very close, and it looks like all resources were poured to FTL fleet. I mean, if they had artificial gravity and could build sustainable structures in space, why would they even consider leaving the system. Sounds cheaper to start terraforming Mars or just move to space.

River as a wormhole. Might be an actual wormhole and humans experiencing fifth dimension. We are not suited for 5th dimension. Mind just produces some supplement puctures, and that is why everyone sees Ressurection Beasts differently. But death-connected rivers or bodies of water is a very universal picture. Also, River is a cultural convention by this point. Also might explain why John was able to look into the body of other person and to easily change something in it.

Why thalergy is connected to life? Anoher theory I have is that it is connected to complex and developing structures (like, babies have more thanergy than an adult, and cancer is also), and thanergy is connected to enthropy?

Also, on thalergy/thanergy, it looks like thalergy is some form of particle, and thanergy is the decay?

So, all in all it just might look like some poking into fundamental interactions and theory if everything.

[vintagerpg]

This week is about some D&D odds and ends. The first is a big one: Supplement II: Blackmoor. It’s the third D&D product (after the box set and Gygax’s Greyhawk) and an extremely important one. Though Arneson’s name is on it (and his world of Blackmoor was the original D&D campaign setting), there is some debate over who wrote the bulk of this book, but whoever typed the words, the constituent ideas feel very different from what we’d consider the core of D&D, and thus are likely firmly from Arneson’s Twin Cities group.

There’s a hit location system that is never again revisited. The monk and the assassin are introduced here as are a host of water-based monsters, including the classic sahuagin, morkoth and Ixitxachitl.

The main attraction, though, is the very first D&D adventure, The Temple of the Frog. Detailed over 20 pages, it is the first serious look players got at what a D&D adventure could be. It doesn’t really line up with our modern conception of the game — there is a mass combat component, for instance, and a good dose of science fiction (the proportion of science fantasy here reminds me more of Arduin than Barrier Peaks). In a truly bizarre oversight (again, reminding me of Arduin), there are no attributes provided for the frog people who live at the center of the temple.

Most interesting of all, though, is how clearly you can see the path not taken when reading through this book. There’s a whole parallel universe of RPGs in this book.

[oldschoolfrp]

Wizards command great powers from their lofty towers  (Tarantis, Universal Fantasy Supplement for the Wilderlands of High Fantasy/City State campaign, Judges Guild, 1983)

[acre-of-wheat]

Tagged by @spybrarian! Thaaaank you!

1. How many works do you have on Ao3? 

I have 26

2. What’s your total Ao3 word count? 

338,736

3. What fandoms do you write for?

I used to write Clexa, but now I just write Tanthamore

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Network Connectivity Issues (ahead by a lot)

A story I'm deeply in love with writing, due to its closeness to my heart and because of the novel way it's written-- which is live on a discord server whenever the mood strikes. Fanfic is typically serialized work, but this feels like...even closer to that immediacy, and it can be quite electric.

The Pieces

A collaborative collection of one shots in the Kinkverse universe (talked about below)

The Bite

Canon compliant fic about longing and how it can come out in your teeth.

The Stones

Essentially a sick fic with some fun world building

The Test

Long distance edging and denial. The fantasies were some of my favorite things to write.

5. Do you respond to comments?

I try to! Sometimes it takes me awhile!

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? 

Out of finished fics I suppose it would be The Beloved Prey, though I do have a handful of things I've written to continue that.

Unfinished it would be the unpublished sequel to My Own Echo.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? 

I think maybe The Stones. Magic holding and accepting Jade because of Kit's love for her feels pretty happy.

Oh! And Network Connection Secure. The Cam girls having a proposal moment that's distinctly them? Very sweet and I wrote it for Christmas.

8. Do you get hate on fics? 

Not on these ones!

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? 

Yes, yes I do. The majority of my work contains it. I think the weirdest I've written (so far) is probably Spare the Rod.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I'm not really big on crossovers, so this isn't something I've done. I'll go hard on an AU though.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nah.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? 

Nope! Translation is an art in itself-- I think I'd find the idea of someone doing that a little daunting?

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? 

Kinda! @swashbucklery, @spybrarian, @commanderbuffy and I have all written pieces in what we call the Kinkverse. It was a brain child of mine that started with The Lesson, but has since become a collaborative writing world. It's been one of the most lovely experiences of my creative life. J has also written some supplemental material for NCI that I adore. @barmaid-anon and I brainstorm deranged plot ideas constantly, and she is my best/worst little gay graphic critic.

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

I'm going to need to say Tanthamore.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? 

I'm not going to speak this into existence. I'll say that there are a few fics that I have agonized over for a very, very, very, very, very long time.

16. What are your writing strengths? 

I think I get to the point pretty well. I keep action and development moving. I think I do some good figurative language. I trust my instincts on where a story needs to go next.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

The Agonies. The connective tissue between important scenes. Not knowing what to have characters do when they're on their own. Run on sentences. Too many WIPs and not enough commitment.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? 

I haven't ever found it necessary? I guess I feel about it the way I feel about captions for another language. You know when captions will say "speaks in a foreign language?" Bane of my existence. Either translate it or get out of here.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Pretty Little Liars. I was a big Paily fan for awhile there. Those live back on fanfiction.net

20. Favourite fic you’ve written? 

The Past feels really good to write because it pulls together all these threads in my brain for the Kinkverse girls, and it feels very unifying for that vision. It's satisfying connecting the dots.

As for who to tag on this: @barmaid-anon, @commanderbuffy, @swashbucklery, @multiplefandommess, @vetiverriver, @onlyshestandsthere, @claymoressword, @kittanthaloselorashield

[study-with-aura]

24/25 Introduction Post

Hello studyblr! My name is Auryn, but you can call me Aura. I turned 15 years old in July, and I started 10th grade this year.

I am homeschooled and have been since 1st grade.

I have an older brother that you may see me write about every now and then. He is going into his second year of university. We play videos games together when we have the chance. He introduced me into gaming, and it is now a hobby of mine.

I train in ballet and I am in Advanced 1 of an adapted RAD curriculum.

I am starting RCM Level 10 in piano this year and will take the RCM Level 9 History exam in December since I want to supplement my study with the Music Appreciation course I am taking over the fall. I plan to take the Level 10 harmony/counterpoint and practical exams in May.

My favorite subjects in school are Literature and History, and my favorite types of books to read are historical fiction and realistic fantasy.

I am studying Spanish, French, and Chinese. I am taking Spanish for school, and I am studying French and Chinese with Duolingo as well as with my mom and dad, since my mom speaks/writes fluent French and my dad speaks/writes fluent Mandarin (as well as Spanish).

I am heavily involved in Girl Scouts. I am a second year Senior along with two other amazing friends in my troop. We are part of a multi-level troop, so we have daisies through seniors (no Ambassadors until we bridge next year). We sometimes have full meetings and other times the older girls meet together while the younger girls meet together. I often work on badge activities solo if we did not decide to include those badges in our yearly planning, but sometimes I do them with my friends virtually and not through scheduled meetings. My mom is one of the troop leaders along with a friend's mom, so we make it work. Our troop is all homeschoolers, which makes it even more fun because we have the ability to do more things since we can utilize the usual school day as well!

I love making new moots and getting to know my moots as well. If you have any questions, feel free to send an ask (or message). I love meeting new people in the studyblr community!

Tracking: study-with-aura

[weaverlings]

i think one thing that's especially awful about the dm fandom is indeed the way so many white fans are eager to play off the racism as like. Just a character flaw or quirk, even when the work does seem to treat it otherwise

these are thoughts i have considered for a while formulated based reading what Black bloggers have had to say and brought on by this post but i didn't want to derail that at all

white fans treating laios' ignorance of toshiro's name as a cute thing. no it was racist. laios just breezed over toshiro's name and maybe he originally did so because he didn't like... adequately listen/understand toshiro, and that was because of the autism. that reason isn't acceptable and certainly not an excuse. laios just brushing over a name with an origin in a (let's say) non-"Common" language is racist.

and marcille's racism is both very real and when it is portrayed, it's clearly shown as a problem... tbh though, i think the fact that the narrative focuses more on how she patronizes falin as a result of the elves' paternalistic attitude toward short-lived races (not that it does this a ton, exactly, but it's more relevant to the story than her racism toward orcs), while her frankly cruel and callous ignorance toward the orcs is contained strongly in a few chapters and addressed in an afterschool-special-y way where she never offers a meaningful apology but more just um. a grudging acknowledgment of the fact that orcs are people? is sloppy handling. that one post about how marcille is conservative is incredibly true and while she starts to learn better, i don't think we get to see enough of that learning process for it to be meaningful. and it's definitely not one of the funnier aspects of marcille's character??

this isn't to say that the work itself isn't racist, or that its approach to racism in the narrative is good. fantasy racism as an allegory is a bad concept, i think - dungeon meshi may do a few things better, insofar as the bar is under the ground.

part of it is simply making all these races actually human, and then making it clear that the distinction between human and non-human sapient races arbitrary to the point of basically being an excuse. number of bones?? however, this also touches on a flaw of the work imo; a lot of these issues are touched upon in canon, yes, but only in supplemental materials as opposed to the narrative proper.

another thing that i perceived is that the oppressed groups actually do not pose nor are they presented as genuinely posing any threat to the oppressors (again a bar under the ground thing, this shouldn't be noteworthy). like, the orcs are painted as violent and malicious by other races in-universe, but it's not like. predator-prey dynamics between them and other humans, or the orcs having ~dangerous powers~ that would supposedly justify their oppression.

and yet. that doesn't make the the presentation of orcs less racist in the context of reality. like using racialized features more heavily on characters who are also depicted visually as more animalistic. the orcs' positioning in the narrative is undercut by this, along with the lack of Black and brown characters of other human races. like yeah there's not literally zero but those that are there are indeed often not drawn/rendered well AND in a narrative work that is evidently trying to think about race, this issue stands out even more. or it should.

i do think dm tries to address the idea of race in the work. ultimately i don't think it succeeds very well. however all of this was originally intended to just be about how frusrating it is that white fans refuse to engage with any of this in favor of laios as autistic blorbo and farcille... i think it's like. even when a story is actively trying to be about race as a social and political issue, this still gets not only glossed over but sometimes even like! actively de-politicized and de-racialized! "there's nothing racist about dungeon meshi" yes there is! just because you relate to laios doesn't mean he wasn't racist! just because the work is thinking about race doesn't make IT not racist. but rather than engage with that at all, we apparently want to pretend it's just Flawless Fantasy Fun

[theresattrpgforthat]

Hi! I'm an apprentice librarian at a university of education, and I'd like to suggest our library get some TTRPGs, ones that are available in print and suitable for school (since our userbase is mainly aspiring teachers), ideally with a German translation (I know that part may be difficult).

Do you have some suggestions?

Theme: Available in German!

Hello friend, so my strategy for this was to find some German websites for roleplaying games and then try to see if they sold physical copies of certain games. This is going to be a bit different from my regular recommendations, mostly because I can’t read German! So I figured I’d send you to these different publishers, and point out specific games that look like potential candidates.

(Also German-speaking followers please sound off in the tags and comments!)

Plotbunny Games @plotbunnygames

From what I can tell, this is a small publisher with a number of indie ttrpgs, and most of these games look to have physical copies. The games that really stand out to me here are Follow, and Miss Bernberg’s Finishing School for Young Ladies. Follow is a game by Ben Robbins, the creator of Microscope, and is a GM-less collaborative storytelling game about going on a quest. I think it would be a great game for collaboration and quick brainstorming sessions. Miss Bernberg’s Finishing School for Young Ladies is made in-house, and is a Firebrands game, which means that it uses a number of small mini-games to tell a bigger story. Great for focusing on narrative over complex characters. There’s also a German translation of ImproVeto, which is a great tool for introducing safety tools, good for any roleplaying group.

Obscurati

Obscurati has two games that I recognize: Tiny Dungeons and Into the Dark. Tiny Dungeons is made by Gallant Knight Games. It is very streamlined, and has a lot of supplements for you to customize your setting. Obscurati appears to have a large number of physical Tiny Dungeon components, including a hardcover book. If you want traditional fantasy, this is probably worth checking out. Into the Dark is a Forged-in-Dark game by Off Guard Games, and is a dark-fantasy dungeon delving game that gives you character playbooks, tables for adventure generation, and a streamlined game system. I’m generally a fan of Forged in the Dark games because they give you some easy-to-understand mechanics that can carry a story really far. (This game is also in hardcover!)

Ulisses Spiele

Ulisses Spiele looks to be a pretty major publisher, with D&D, Warhammer, and Pathfinder all in one house. I'm assuming you're probably familiar with them. If you want a big-name roleplaying game, this is the place to be. Many of the games from this publishing house are pretty crunchy, so they’re more suited for folks who want to go through the traditional process of complex character creation, and specific rules for things like range, inventory, specific types of damage, etc.

If you’re looking for games that hearken to popular media, Dune and Tales from the Loop both come from Modiphius, a games company with a pretty good reputation for mechanically sound games, although they generally require a lot of bookkeeping. World of Darkness is the game system I’m most familiar with in this list, using dice pools of d10s, although much of the subject matter in these games is rather dark - especially since the bulk of their WoD catalogs appears to be Vampire: the Masquerade. I’m actually really intrigued by Die Schwarze Katze, of which I’m not entirely sure there is an English equivalent, and appears to be a fantasy game with cat characters!

Truant Spiele

Truant has a number of games that I am unfamiliar with, although I may have heard of their names before. Kult is labelled as an adult roleplaying game, so if you want something child-friendly, I’d stay away, and The One Ring has not received many friendly reviews - but Warbirds is a fantastical-historical game about fighter pilots and aerial combat, which looks pretty lighthearted, although this looks like a game that can have winners and losers. There’s also The Witcher RPG, a class-based system all about fighting monsters in a well-loved world based on that of the video game. The Witcher looks to be a bit on the crunchier side of things, so I’d see it as a better candidate for long-term campaigns rather than quick pick-up sessions. Finally, they carry Cyberpunk Red, which I’ve heard rave reviews for, with pre-generated enemies, a giant swathe of lore, and plenty of player support.

Fiasco

There’s a physical German version of Fiasco on the Pro-Indie website, along with a number of supplements. Fiasco is a game about a making a terrible movie using card stock and dice, and is great for lighthearted games and ridiculous stories.

Now, for some digital runners-up.

Pegasus Digital looks to be a German version of DriveThru Rpg, with a smaller catalogue but a lot of resources for Cthulhu 7, Shadowrun, and Avatar Legends. If you get folks who want to see what else is out there, this might be a handy website to direct them to.

Hero Kids is a game that only has a physical version in English, but it has a digital German equivalent! This is a great game for young role-players and folks who want a kid-friendly style of role-play.

DURF is a minimalist fantasy game with a number of different translations, including a German one. It isn’t available in print, but the game itself is small enough that printing copies of the game for yourself and fellow players shouldn’t be very expensive. DURF is based in OSR style play, so expect very small character sheets and an emphasis on your inventory.

Brindlewood Bay is only available in English and Polish, as far as I can tell- but there is a collection of play materials available in German! This game has such a big following because it has a reputation for being easy to teach, and it has a really wonderful mystery system, so I think it might be worth checking out.