When a chatbot says it’s sorry it’s improv When a chatbot says it’s sorry it’s improv You can never change or guilt it Just go find the guys who built it When a chatbot says it’s sorry it’s improv

"Slop producer confuses dumbing down of humanity with 'cognitive amplifier tools.'"

In 2026, we are all Roj Blake. (Also: great show.)

I just published a (free) article to my Patreon talking about where Designers & Dragons has been & where it's going. TL;DR: This is Free Trader Beowulf published, Designers & Dragons Origins crowdfunded, The 10s & The Lost Histories coming soon.

"But actually ..."

The yearly public-domain game jam at itch.io is pretty cool: create analog or digital games based on what went into the public domain. This year: Nancy Drew, the Little Engine that Could, Betty Boop, Miss Marple, Pluto, and lots more.

To celebtrate the New Year, I have my annual look at the year in roleplaying. It was a year of disasters, including tariffs, distributor bankruptcy, and stolen AI art, but there were great successes too, particularly in the OSR and indie sides of the industry, and for Backerkit. Take a look!

Sitting a stewing in frustration isn't nearly as cathartic as just designing a poster. Let's see how often I remember that in 2026.

Jim Wampler announced this morning that we lost Tim Kask, who passed in his sleep on the 30th. Tim was the creator of The Dragon, which set the foundation for what an industry-focused magazine should be. He was an icon and one of the few early founders of TSR still with us.

From Chuck Wendig: "Remember, the AI is fed with the work of actual humans. Why do you think that is, exactly? "If you use it, it means you’re replacing people. "People who could’ve done the job better. "People who actually did the job, and now their work is pilfered and duped."

This sounds amazing. (Haven't watch it yet, since I'm on vacation, but that graphic alone speaks volumes.)

Great post about generative AI. Happy Holidays. Don't say I never gave you anything. anthonymoser.github.io/writing/ai/h...

Got a semi-spammy email from Alberto Dianin inquiring about "potential review, feature, or collaboration" of Gates of Krystalia TTJRPG. Just a reminder that Krystalia's art is stolen via generative AI. There should be more "features" on this. Here's his complaint of "hateful" anti-AI responses.

Dear bluskeeters! I'm doing research with a friend. If you're a Black Author with a speculative book publishing in 2026, could you please pitch and link me, please? This a difficult to sus intersection. Please add your friends' work. Please tag people. Please share

AI sloppers (is that a term?) crying that their prompts are being stolen is more beautiful than anything AI could produce

There are still some community copies of Lighthouse & Wayfarer1.

The digital version of our Dresden Files Coop Card Game was designed by humans, illustrated by humans, 100% coded by humans, and is supported by humans. We wouldn't have it any other way.

You are painting a vision of a future in which teachers create lessons with "A.i.," students complete them with "A.i.," and teachers grade them with "A.i." No learning takes place under this system. The only benefactors of this system are the corporations being paid for the "A.i." products.

Click through to read the thread. Sure, it's got the anti-AI content that I regularly repost in this header, but it's also a thoughtful examination of the cyberpunk genre as you read more.

“‘My most daring idea is to refuse,’ she said to applause.”

"I think refusing is actually the more hopeful, expansive vision of the future than the one that is telling us that the future is already settled and decided. That's my daring idea. Just say no."

Sometimes when I feel my credits list is too short I'll just add more citations---ie: these aren't direct inspirations, but I feel they are fellow travellers, add context, or are otherwise cool to shout out and bring into the convo. In my experience: citation always makes a work richer. 4/4

I am baffled about using these things to generate *ideas* on many levels, but primarily bc idea generation is the cheap, easy, & funtage of the process? Ideas are a dime for 1000, what do they mean they can't even come up w an idea? Use the prompts for YOURSELF not the planet poisoning thiefbox?!?!

Look at that, @sixoneindie.com, the small group who have put together the two-year-old Indie Game Awards had more ethics than the Board of Directors at the 60-year-old @sfwa.org . They not only banned ANY Gen AI usage, but when the WINNER, Sandfall Interactive, was caught lying, they got the boot.

A little holiday gift for you all ... the latest completed cartoon homage from my 50 Years in the Dungeon show. This one was begun the night before Gen Con, and features my hat tip to Megan Lara's gorgeous cover art for the show's program book!

2/2 Nor, when it comes to writing awards, will I nominate or vote to award, a piece of work partially or wholly written by LLM. Awards are for writers who make the effort, not those who offload the difficult aspects of creation to a program mining the work of others. Do the fucking work, people.

1/2 Apropos of nothing in particular, I guarantee I will never write a piece of fiction with the "help" of a large language model because a) I spent too many years developing skills to just fuck off now, b) I don't plagiarize other authors, whether intentionally or by way of statistical matches.

Apocalypse World is profoundly important work. It has shaped the landscape of roleplaying games for over a decade, and with this third edition, I'm sure it'll continue to shape it for a decade more. Clever, gripping, and human. There's still a few hours to snag your kickstarter copy!

It took 4 hours for the backlash against @sfwa.org to be so extreme that they reversed their decision to give awards to stories plagiarized via LLMs. The new rules are muddy, at frist banning text partially written by AIs & then banning AIs at any point in the process. Hopefully the latter sticks.

Quite literally, @sfwa.org has lost the plot.

I really hope you reconsider this. SFWA is a writers association, not an LLM association. This is completely unacceptable in an organization that is supposed to support writers, not the tools that plagiarize from them. You're going to lose a ton of members over this, including me.

Wow. Fuck the @sfwa.org . Nebula nominees who used plagiarism-machines in creating their work just have to disclose that fact. They're not disqualified unless the LLM WHOLLY wrote their work. SFWA is purposefully putting it in the hands of voters because they apparently have no ethics of their own.

Here it is. The final 24 hours. You've helped coax banked embers into a steady flame. Tell me, what is one thing you'll bring with you into What-Comes-Next? Seeds? Thread? A good kitchen knife? What will you make of what's left? Together, let's light up the world. www.kickstarter.com/projects/lum...

I always think: "How much better could my art order be if I ran it through a random number generator (RNG) rather than just writing out precise ideas for the artist?"

On the one hand, AI will destroy what we have left of nature. On the other hand, it will also destroy what we have left of culture.

Each dungeon level based on a period of RPG history!? Wow. I guess I need to add the DieRPG to my shelf, next to the big beautiful "DIE Book 1" omnibus

I'm headed out of town next week, as are many of you. I'll be on a plane, and I'll be wearing a N-95 mask on that plane & in airports. I don't want to be sick for the holidays. I also don't want to join 400 million with long COVID. I love my work! If I couldn't do it, I don't know what I'd do!

It's the end of the year, so Garry Snow from @diekugames.bsky.social and I put together our usual end of the year report on the roleplaying field. Diamond. AI slop. Tariffs. WotC. And the industry's successes. Just in case you forgot what sort of year it was! www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bjF...

The first two Secret Passages are great zines. Awesome to see the series coninuing!

"I can't afford art, but I produced my book anyway using AI artwork and ripped off the artist community." is 2025's "I can't afford to tip, but I went out to eat at a sit-down restaurant anyway and stiffed the wait staff."

I have come to the realization as an author that I need to have a no-AI clause in my contracts to forbid the use of genAI in artwork, editing, or anything else related to my writing. I hope @sfwa.org and other folks are getting lawyers to add this to their standard contracts as well.

My 16th annual Games to Gift segment ran this morning on the Public Radio show "Lake Effect" here in Milwaukee. Link to the segment archive, which includes my PDF notes. Over the years I've covered 200 to 300 tabletop games in the segments, with well over 50,000 words of associated text in my notes.

I've heard the story before & trust @benriggs.bsky.social and his scholarship. As people in the thread pointed out, it was likely not rights for Hobbit + Lord of the Rings, because that's always been tied up.

And finally, the assault on Section 230. This is the endgame for independent speech. If you repeal 230, you don’t hurt Google or Meta—they have the lawyers to survive. You destroy the small forums, the independent blogs, the dissenters. You make the cost of speaking the truth too high to bear.

Rob Reiner was one of the key people behind the effort to go to court to overturn California's anti-marriage equality Proposition 8 when it passed in 2008. Working with Chad Griffin, they founded the American Foundation for Equal Rights and got Ted Olson and David Boies to team up to fight Prop 8.

Rob Reiner's first seven films: 1. Spinal Tap. 2. The Sure Thing. 3. Stand By Me. 4. THE PRINCESS BRIDE. 5. WHEN HARRY MET SALLY. 6. Misery 7. A Few Good Men. Good lord. Even Spielberg included 1941 in his first seven. And that was after playing Michael Stivic. I hope this news isn't true. But...

When I interviewed Lee Gold for the backmatter of DIE, one of the things which struck me was her arguing that they played things they considered roleplaying games PRIOR to D&D. So one could argue Theatre Kids have been incredibly patient with everyone else who colonised their hobby.

It's hard to believe that it's only been ten years since UCLA English Lit grad Lee Gold launched her influential zine Alarums & Excursions (named after Elizabethan drama). Its hard to believe, as it's actually 50 years, as it launched in 1975, and she only wrapped it this year.