WORK 01
MAYFLY
A quick roleplaying game about orcs
Today is the first, last and only day of your life. A storm gathers in the cold wet light of dawn. You’re hungry. You crest the brow of a hill and see a town about an hour away, across a valley of long grass and ripe wheat. Ahead of you there is a heavily-laden wagon, and people on the wagon are watching you with deep suspicion, hatred and fear, which is normal, because you’re orcs.
Nobody likes orcs because orcs don’t believe in tomorrow, or yesterday. Orcs believe that we exist only for today, already fully formed and hungry, young, old or something in between, right now. Ridiculous! Except that for the characters in this game it’s actually true.
The purpose of this game is to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes. You already know that orcs are irresponsible, reckless, smelly, dirty, raucous and wild. Now discover why.
Live without a future or past, and let’s see what you do. Just for one day.
Get MAYFLY here
WORK 02
Death & Undeath
Life and other pleasures during a medieval plague of ghouls
Ghouls—self-actualising corpses, with
no magician creating them or directing them like zombies. My particular ghouls are the product of a medieval plague.
They make more of themselves by biting people, but also pop up spontaneously as reanimated corpses of people that died otherwise. They are foetid, and increase exponentially. They’re fearless and fairly mindless.
Sometimes you open a cupboard, and there’s one in there for no logical reason.
This collection of essays was originally written to be in an expansion of the excellent roleplaying game The Darkest Age, written by Eric Staggs with Rob Gee. Unfortunately that expansion project didn’t come to pass, so here we are.
This material is still complementary to that system, but I hope will also add to any other game that features medieval times, or a plague of ghouls, or preferably both.
Get Death & Undeath here
WORK 03
GURPS
Goblins
Life in London is nasty, brutish, and short.
So are you.
GURPS Goblins is set in a city where every square inch has been trodden by one and a half million pairs of feet. Ruins and dungeons are far from uncharted – the only creature who never explores them is the landlord who rents them out. The magic is dubious. The technology isn’t astounding.
There are, however, plenty of monsters – in every conceivable shape and size. They live in the characters’ houses, eat their food, and buy groceries at the same market. Many of them are relatives. The characters of GURPS Goblins roam well-worn, familiar streets in a sea of unwashed, diseased rogues and villains. The characters are unwashed, diseased rogues and villains. They seek the same elusive treasures that all do – gin, glory, and bags of money.
Get GURPS Goblins here“I’m a difficult person to impress with RPG supplements. Usually even the well-written ones are received with a nod and an ‘it was fine.’ However, the reason I keep buying them is to look out for the handful of ideas that might spring out of the pages and ask to be stolen away. I hope to be not only pleased, but absolutely delighted. Usually that doesn’t happen.
This time it did.
GURPS Goblins is a tour-de-force.”
Jo Hart – RPG.net
MCCD 