Former Blizzard executives and World of Warcraft directors, Chris Metzen and Mike Gilmartin, are starting a tabletop company, based on their Orange County gaming club, called Warchief Gaming. Critical Role launches their own publishing company called Darrington Press. They have four titles scheduled for 2021 releases including RPG, boardgame, and card game titles. Should Wizards of the Coast be paying attention? Our topic for this week is Gatekeeping, its origins, and difficulties in tabletop games as well as other popular culture.
#criticalrole #blizzard #gatekeeping
Orion Black quits their position at Wizards of the Coast and releases a long statement explaining why. An open letter to Games Workshop is posted as a response to their “Warhammer is for everyone” inclusivity statement and especially the ending ” You will not be missed.” Critical Role responds to a claim fo unpaid employment. Dungeons and Dragons now prints a legacy disclaimer on all of their digital publications prior to 2014. Quest, an adventure game, not an RPG, by The Adventure Guild has been released with ambitions to also create a publishing platform. Will the tabletop hobby see its own “Epic Gamestore” muscle in on DriveThruRPG?
Cast members from the HBO A Game of Thrones series play Dungeons and Dragons for charity. The new boxed set for 9th edition Warhammer 40k, Indomitus, revealed. It is not a starter set but does include the new 9E core rulebook. Wizards of the Coast bans Magic the Gathering cards and not for gameplay or balance reasons. Legends of Vox Machina Series delayed due to pandemic and localization reasons with no new release date announced. Kentucky Fried Chicken announces the “release” of their KFConsole, opportunistically timed to take advantage of the Sony Playstation 5 and new Microsoft Xbox announcements.
Frosthaven, the sequel to Gloomhaven by Cephalofair Games, finished big on Kickstarter becoming the most funded boardgame ever. A well-deserved success. Kickstarter is laying off 45% of its staff due to the 35% decline in active projects on the platform and absolutely nothing to do with their recent unionization. Battlestar Galactica has a space battle miniatures game we will be trying. Critter Hug is a new series by some of the cast of Critical Role. A good thing for the hobby or just good old fashioned payola. Never Going Home by Wet Ink Games is a World War occult roleplaying game set during the Great War with art by Charles Ferguson-Avery. The game mechanics and the setting look excellent. Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History has an great series on World War One if you want some background for this game. A YouTube channel, Filmento is worth checking out if you like movies. Into The Night, a Belgian Netflix series, may provide good inspiration for a roleplaying campaign.
#frosthaven #nevergoinghome #wetinkgames
Some of the most recent cancellations in the tabletop industry. Will GenCon be next? Adam J. Rose is the new head of Grim and Perilous, makers of Zweihander RPG. A list of virtual tabletop software to try in these self-isolating times. Most are offering free access to premium features or a discount for a license. Critical Role played a sponsored one-shot of the Bethesda Softworks videogame, Doom. We are still trying to figure out how they did it. Bundle of Holding is offering a Solo Games Bundle, including the excellent Ironsworn RPG in the Starter Collection. The Farflung RPG may be our next scifi after dark tabletop session. Is it the only system capable of running the TV series, LEXX? With the future of the human species up in the air, we may or may not be back next week. Keep safe and stay tuned!
Rumors of the demise of the Fantasy Flight RPG department, including the Genesys System, Star Wars RPGs, Legend of the Five Rings RPG, Keyforge RPG and Android RPG settings. Spider-man and Star Lord are interested in doing a 5E actual play. Chris watched the Critical Role actual play of Monsterhearts 2. Physical copies of Ironsworn are on the way. Prince August is selling prototype test castings of never-released Heartbreaker terrain. Free League Publishing launches Free League Workshop on DriveThruRPG.com to support the development of content for their Tales From the Loop, Symbaroum, Coriolis: The Third Horizon and Mutant Year Zero. The Alien RPG by Free League is also getting several foreign language editions. Kickstarter employees vote to unionized making them the first tech company to organize.
Altered Carbon is getting an RPG setting and a second season on Netflix. Hot Topic now has Critical Role gear. Mörk Borg by Stockholm Kartell, is being released by Free League’s new boutique imprint. The Love Domain for Clerics in 5E fails miserably and is being retooled. Ironsworn is a FREE TTRPG with co-op, solo and campaign modes. Foreign television dramas with subtitles help immerse you and give you great campaign setting ideas. We have some recommendations.
Feast of Legend appeared in physical form at the New York Comic-con. Critical Role gives the money away from their sponsored livestream to a farmer charity. No apology. Feeling guilty? Reclaimer RPG by Chad Walker Kickstarter apologizes for pitting their creative departments against eachother in their pledge levels. Swordsfall by Brandon Dixon moves to IndieGoGo to support new artwork with Art Booster 1. Games Workshop will make Warhammer comics with Marvel. Okinawa Comic-con dodges the biggest typhoon of the season. Tokyo was not so lucky. #reclaimer #reclaimerrpg #swordsfall
A slightly more salty weekly episode. CMON holds a stealth garage sale in the guise of a campaign to create soundtracks and artbooks for its games. They are actually clearing out warehouse leftovers from previous campaigns. Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers has released a fantasy TTRPG as a well-designed and illustrated 97-page PDF called Feast of Legends. Critical Role held a sponsored livestream and we are all left wondering “Why?” Chris played a session of Girl Underground by Jesse Ross, creator of Trophy. Also tried the Forbidden Lands RPG by Free League.
The first session of D&D 5E playing the Lost Mines of Phandelver and the excellent utility of the 5E Essentials rulebook. Consent in Gaming by Monty Cooke Games (which is FREE but requires you create an account) and suspicions of their motives as well as the actual good a document like this can do. Bitter Reach is the expansion for the Forbidden Lands RPG by Free League (not Bitterlands as was mysteriously reported previously) along with a reprint of the core set. Alien is not Star Trek and other GMing mistakes in the comments.
