The Bloggies have concluded for 2026! Congratulations to this year's winners. You can find the results (and a whole slew of awesome blog posts) here: www.explorersdesign.com/bloggies-2026/

good trio of posts. I agree with nearly all of Pedantrius's arguments but disagree with his nearly all of conclusions, while I agree only a few of Natura's arguments but also disagree with nearly all of her conclusions

Sam (@samsorensen.bsky.social), Walid (blissfully off Bluesky), and I have launched a podcast! Dead Letters, after the NYC-based TTRPG collective of the same name, is live with 3 episodes released. Join us for close readings, academic analysis, and unhinged takes. baatag.blogspot.com/2026/02/dead...

Last 24 hours for my escape room wizard tower A Familiar Tower! Hop on now if you want a puzzle dungeon inspired by Zelda and 80s fantasy. puzzledungeon.com/tower?ref=bsky

It's hard enough to get people to read your stuff on purpose and you're telling me you wasted time telling the reader they didn't have to?

not now kitten daddy has to talk about diegesis in hyperniche discords

which tabletop RPG ruleset works best for competitive player vs. player play? looking mainly for combat rules but would be intrigued if there are really novel PvP rules for non-combat stuff, too

as the Founder of the National Centre for Tabletop Games, I cordially invite you to peruse the NCTG's beautiful, curated collection of Premium Blogs. There is one blog. this one. nctgdotgov.bearblog.dev/against-abst...

The snow slowed us down, but we're back this Thursday, February 26th at 7:00 for another edition of RPG bookclub! Stay warm with us and lets talk about Crooked Moon, the setting guide out of Avantris Entertainment! Poster by @samsorensen.bsky.social

PATREON LAUNCH!! By pledging, you get to use a bunch of my art for personal/commercial usage! You also get my zines for free! If you just want to support me, there's a lower tier, too! Thanks for any and all support! Likes and reposts are much appreciated :) www.patreon.com/c/chaoclypse

to be a dissenting voice (shocking i know) i think turning this into a more fixed schema undermines the power of just describing things in natural language and trusting the GM to be able to interpret that mechanically for their table - if you're not going to just give em numbers anyway

book club! this Thursday! we're reading a monster 5e book by Avantris Entertainment called THE CROOKED MOON! I have read this book very thoroughly and have lots of things to say about it!!!

I'm begging you to stop using Bungee and/or Pirata One in your designs and layout.

over a dozen years later I can say that like fully 95% of my thinking about roleplaying games is downstream of this video

one my favorite bits in Gary Alan Fine's "Shared Fantasy" (1983), an ethnography of early RPG dorks, is when he's like "yeah every table likes to say 'We're not like those other table, our group is different, we're soooo crazy and weird'"

Could Wolves Upon the Coast be the answer?!

And finally, the Meta bracket's winner is: "Mapping the Blogosphere" by Among Cats and Books elmc.at/mapping-the-...

The Advice bracket's winner is: "Writing Rooms in Pairs" by Failure Tolerated. www.failuretolerated.com/writing-room...

It's done. The Bloggies Tournament, and the first half of The Bloggies, are officially complete. It was a tight race, but the winners are... 🧵👇 (Thread attached) www.explorersdesign.com/bloggies-bre...

oops! my diegesis conveniently reflects the abstract ruleset I already intended to write! silly me!

We're in the final round of The Bloggies gladiatorial arena. You can find the results (with pie charts!) and round 4 voting form in the link below. There was a significant uptick of votes this round. Neat.

THE TIME HAS COME. WRITING ROOMS IN PAIRS IS ASCENDANT. JOIN ME AND VOTE FOR THE GREATEST BLOG POST OF ALL TIME.

wolves upon the coast is the bundle of holding btw lol bundleofholding.com/presents/Wol...

this is definitely why they scare me at least!!

WRITING ROOMS IN PAIRS CONTINUES TO DOMINATE. VOTE NOW AND WE CAN RULE THE BLOGOSPHERE TOGETHER

www.kickstarter.com/projects/see... Ok I did a kickstarter after all. Just a very small one.

ALSO, gamers, remember to vote for LISTS of RULES, including both the in-universe DIEGETIC RULES and the even-more-in-universe HYPO-DIEGETIC RULES, and watch as the RULES OF TABLETOP RPGs clarify themselves before your VERY EYES

we're still in it, and I need YOUR help to defeat my SWORN NEMESIS, @sean.tuesdayknightgames.com!!! remember to vote for not just one useful tidbit about dungeon rooms, but TEN MANFUL, MUSCULAR, POWERFUL TIPS about WRITING TABLETOP ROLEPLAYING GAME BOOKS

Also, a GM doesn't need to be anywhere *close* to as good a designer as someone putting out a game to improve that game for their table, because they have the titanic, overwhelming advantage of actually being at their table.

Bloggies PSA! Round 1 of all 5 initial Categories is open until 7 AM EST. Not just Advice. Advice: forms.gle/LApoXPh7cVhy... Critique: forms.gle/5Qvwxxsvyhq8... Gameable: forms.gle/WjPxMyQunpPZ... Theory: forms.gle/VSa1fwjYLcrk... Meta: forms.gle/R26nY7qm7DaA... Vote for your favorites. PSA over

important memetic information www.explorersdesign.com/bloggies-2026/

I need more people to vote in the categories not labeled "advice."

okay gamers it's time to vote for yours truly. remember to vote for a half-gross of writing pointers you cannot touch, two gross of in-universe and in-in-universe strictures, the notion of "acting real slick," and the triptych of classification considerations

designed a shirt for myself, just ordered it based on MANDOG by @gromb.bsky.social , best adventure i ran last year

okay gamers it's time to vote for yours truly. remember to vote for a half-gross of writing pointers you cannot touch, two gross of in-universe and in-in-universe strictures, the notion of "acting real slick," and the triptych of classification considerations

Bloggies voting has begun! This week is the tournament: the Thunderdome of rpg blogs. If you're thinking to yourself, "This is a lot of reading." I've got bad news: you're already running out of time. Here's everything you need to know for this week... 1/4 www.explorersdesign.com/bloggies-2026/

The most important step in making a TTRPG that does a given thing is making the users believe it does that thing.

I've also come to realize I like games (board, ttrpg, etc) where the possibility exists for a kind of bad, boring, underwhelming session. The possibility of a wide open, surprising, unpredictable narrative space basically requires the possibility of a kinda mid game sometimes. See: all sports.

holy moly a banger

Wrote a bit about making a dungeon book and how I'm starting to view dungeon crawls as a conversation between the dungeon and the players. And what that kind of storytelling means. www.failuretolerated.com/talking-to-t...

holy moly this is awesome

Last year, @samsorensen.bsky.social developed Over/Under, a @mothership.bsky.social-inspired megagame. When he asked @lincodega.com to be one of the bosses, they had no idea what they were getting into. But they knew that they needed to write it down.

why do they say "tactical grid-based cinematic small-team skirmish action with deep customization" instead of "crunchy-punchy"

a nominee bailed from the bloggies awards list so now this post is up for a bloggie in the Theory category—it's so insightful, go read it!!!

The Bloggies Nominees are here! We are 1 week away from voting, so I need everyone's help spreading the word. Congrats to all the nominees and blogs submitted—this last year was incredible. Forming the lists was equal parts rewarding and painful. www.explorersdesign.com/this-years-b...

found the #OVER/UNDER girlies

blark dungeon blark dungeon halforc.itch.io/dungeon-of-t...

It's been a week of me running my zimo kickstarter. I order to drum up hype I have made an appendix N bingo! I unfortunately didn't have that many inspirations for this so I fucked it up. www.kickstarter.com/projects/von...