#cthork borg

[sprintingowl]

Never Stop Calibrating

So I released a tabletop rpg a little while back. It's about 1920s occult horror.

The core book's about a hundred pages, and I've kind of released seventeen or so supplements for it as well, so it's getting up there in page count.

I've also been playtesting it, playtesting the supplements, running demo games, making corrections when I find something broken, and somewhere in this process I foolishly assumed I polished all the bugs out.

The thing is, even games that are as old as history, games like go and mancala that have been polished smooth by the river of human interaction, can still be tweaked just a *little* bit. Optionally, of course. To better suit a specific group of players.

And ttrpgs as an art form are (probably) younger than go and mancala, and are way rougher around the edges, and yeah I found some more stuff in my game I wanted to adjust.

I think this is kind of just the process, though. I think as long as people are playing ttrpgs, they're changing them. This happens at the micro level all the time, with GMs making house rules and tables agreeing to play in particular ways (lines and veils, discouraging or encouraging pvp, steering towards or away from romance and drama.) But it also happens at the macro level. There's a whole old-school revival about bashing 1e into increasingly refined or increasingly alien shapes. Heck, 2e's probably due for its own renaissance soon.

And the outcome of all of this is that a game is never really done. Sure, I'm doing active updates for this thing, but even if I weren't, all it would take for the game to change would be for someone to pick up and play it, maybe make a houserule or two, maybe scribble a fanhack in the margins.

And that's kind of sweet, honestly.

The folks who designed go, mancala, chess, final fantasy, punch out, the quiet year, gubat banwa, beyond the fence below the grave, have created these little perpetual motion machines that grow and change for as long as we do.

[sprintingowl]

Solo Survival Horror

It has, admittedly, taken me years, but there are now solo rules for playing Cthork Borg.

Cthork Borg is a tabletop roleplaying game about occult horror in the 1920s. I've been releasing rules expansions and scenarios for it for... uh... a while, and it only took me one week and 52 pages to get it geared up for single player.

It's not a conventional journaling game. Even played solo, there's d20 combat, but it's somehow even more laser focused on conserving resources and making sacrifices than the core game, so maybe I did something right.

If you'd like to check it out, there's free community copies for both Dreary And Isolated and the core book on the other side of the link. Also for the seventeen or so other supplements. Basically help yourself if you want 'em.

[sprintingowl]

Cthopen Cthource

This week's game release is support for making and selling third party Cthork Borg material.

I'm pretty much always happy in general to see people writing stuff based on my games, but specifically if you want to make a commercial product based on my Cthork Borg stuff, go for it.

Cthork Borg is already a hack of Mork Borg, and Mork Borg has a very generous third party content license, so if you're not interested in 1920s cosmic horror roleplaying you could just hack the Mork Borg engine directly instead.

And if you *are* interested in 1920s cosmic horror roleplaying, there's a link to the Cthork core book off of the Cthopen Cthource license, and there's free copies available.

[sprintingowl]

Cthork Borg

A few years ago, in a fey mood, I wrote a 120 page Mork Borg hack.

This happens to me sometimes. I try not to let it happen too often.

Anyway, Cthork Borg runs on a simple d20 system with quick-but-deep character building and tells stories of Jazz Age cosmic horror.

Apart from my fishing simulator, it's probably my most successful game, and I've released fifteen expansions for it.

There's LOTS of good cosmic horror tabletop rpgs (let me know if you want reccs!), and I understand that it's a crowded ecosystem, but the high notes here are:

-Pulp tones -Resource management -You can play as creatures and it doesn't change the tone -Downtime and character development

In particular, Cthork Borg's designed to enfranchise characters without stepping too heavily on the toes of the horror. Your protagonists are frail but powerful (and sometimes powered by their frailty).

Also everyone gets a big heap of rerolls at the start of each scenario, and you have to try and make them last until the end.

Nearly all of my games are free if you click the Community Copies button, so please grab a free pdf if you'd like one.

I'm working on more support for it as well, so there should be a pack of five scenarios due out soon.

[sprintingowl]

Sprinting Owl TTRPGs

Hi all. I'm a ttrpg writer/designer/publisher, I've written way too many games, and this is a quick guide on how to find them.

Rod Reel And Fist is a feature length 280 page TTRPG about fishing.

Sunderwald is about a world where the best technology is pulled out of an extremely haunted forest... and it's also a game that you change as you play, and you write new rules, classes, species, and monsters into the book, permanently making your own version.

The Dawnline is about vampires and humans that have both domesticated each other and are migrating through the desert, trying to stay ahead of the sun. The core book includes strategy game mechanics for managing your caravan of humans as well as more conventional rpg mechanics for exploring as your vampires.

Cthork Borg is a 1920s cosmic horror pulp adventure, with 120 pages and 10+ published supplements. It's atmospheric and lethal, but it gives the players detailed toolkits for surviving what the world throws at them.

Also, if you're looking for something shorter, weirder, or less graphically refined, I have 100+ other ttrpgs, supplements, hacks, and experiments on itchio. Train giant beetles, steal chicken from The Farm God, visit a cyberpunk restaurant, competitively race slime molds, lunge out of lakes and eat travelers, and more!

[sprintingowl]

Mork Borg 2: Bundle Of Holding

For the next 21 days (4/3/23 - 4/24/23), the Mork Borg 2 bundle of holding will be running.

It contains a whole bunch of rad Mork Borg dungeons and adventures, as well as 11 of my Cthork Borg titles. Cthork Borg is a standalone game that runs on the same engine, and is used to tell stories of cosmic horror.

A portion of all profits will be going to the charity Direct Relief, which provides medical equipment and critical medications to health workers.

Also, any purchase of the bundle above its threshold price gets a copy of Bork Borg, my supplement that adds powerful and mysterious dogs to Mork Borg.

[sprintingowl]

Cthork Borg Presents: Summer Horror

I'm hosting a game jam!

Cthork Borg Presents: Summer Horror is running from May 2023 through to the end of July 2023.

It's non-ranked. There's no payouts or prizes. It's just a chance to make a spooky summer thing and publish it.

The jam is theoretically to make stuff for the cosmic horror game Cthork Borg, which has a free download linked off of the jam page, but making Cthork Borg stuff isn't required, and anything that fits the theme is welcome.

You can make a TTRPG, or a video game, or an art pack, or a scenario or supplement or something else. Go nuts and make something you're passionate about.

One game has already been submitted, but it's day two of the jam and there's plenty of room to add more.