LexTenebris
lextenebris@social.vivaldi.net
<p>Writer. Podcaster. Game designer. Game enthusiast. Journalist. You know, all those terrible things that personalities can develop.</p><p>Creator of the digital garden Grim Tokens, discussing solo/co-op tabletop RPGs and wargames.</p>
Posts
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#TTRPG #Ironsworn A Bactrian camel answered a security guard with extreme prejudice, and now it has an Ironsworn stat block for its trouble. Rank: Dangerous. Do not grab the reins. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/The+Bactrian+Camel
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#TTRPG #scenarios #characters Money, purpose, education. Every adventurer runs on at least two of them, and the missing one is why somebody else is at the table. Bring the wrong two and you&#39;re not the hero. You&#39;re the NPC. That&#39;s the whole game. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Adventures+Are+Expensive
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#TTRPG #Loner Still shopping for the one scenario that fits the people you already play with? Put the catalog down. Two characters with reasons, a few tables, an Oracle — then play to find out. No scenario required. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/No+Scenario+Required
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#TTRPG #DnD The theater kids and Critical Role make a great scapegoat, but they never killed the hobby. The only game that actually died was Dungeons &amp; Dragons — and its own grognard fans dug the grave. Break a leg, everyone: the show goes on. https://grimtokens.garden/Articles/So+Let&#39;s+Talk+About+Critical+Role+and+Theater+Kids,+Then
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#TTRPG #Community Membership in the old guard isn&#39;t about agreeing with it. It&#39;s the club you&#39;re in when you&#39;ve spent decades watching the same problems walk the same circle. I got in by tenure and trouble, not doctrine. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/For%20Good%20or%20Ill
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#TTRPG #AI The machine scaffolds, edits, indexes, and announces. Judgment is a human quality. For now. Step right up: the whole pipeline, drawn out to the breaking point. (The title alone should get me VC funding.) https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Automating+Workflow+in+an+RPG+Pseudo-Journalistic+Publishing+Architecture
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#TTRPG #GameDesign Ron Edwards said system matters. Aaron Marks said premise does. Both are right, and both go wrong the moment they make it the most important thing. Everything matters. https://grimtokens.garden/Articles/Everything+Matters
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#TTRPG #ArsMagica Keep Calm and Rego Corpus. Three posters, two Arts, one very specific kind of night. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Keep+Calm+in+Ars+Magica
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#TTRPG #Discourse A scenario is a starting point, not a contract. The scenario author wrote that page; the players get to rewrite it. Death by citation is not a rule I run. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/The+Author+Is+Not+at+the+Table
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#TTRPG #Bastionland #Starforged How, with what, where, to what end. Four questions that turn &quot;I attack&quot; into an action, plus a Starforged scene that puts them to work. https://grimtokens.garden/Articles/I+Attack+Is+Not+an+Action
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#TTRPG #Ironsworn #ShadowDark &quot;When iron meets iron, the reckoning is swift. One man rises. One man falls. I do not choose. I only remember.&quot; A year off, and the saga comes back in screenplay form, told by the man who remembers. https://grimtokens.garden/Game+Play/The+Solofull+Fane/Sessions/SoloFane+005+-+What+the+Skald+Sang
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#TTRPG #Ensemble #Loner November 6th, Ensemble&#39;s Second Edition gets leaner on philosophy and heavier on play. The philosophy isn&#39;t lost, it&#39;s published: the Fiction Engine Framework, in the designer&#39;s own words. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Discovery+-+The+Fiction+Engine+Framework
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#TTRPG #RPGaDay2026 #Continuity Regret is the price of a game where what you do actually sticks. If the table leaves you with nothing to regret, it left you with nothing at all. https://grimtokens.garden/Articles/RPG+a+Day/2026/RPGaDay+2026+-+26+-+Regret
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#TTRPG #RPGaDay2026 #Ironsworn Distance hides in the oddest gaps — between places, between years, between people. And then you find it under a hill, measured one stone at a time. https://grimtokens.garden/Articles/RPG+a+Day/2026/RPGaDay+2026+-+24+-+Distance
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#TTRPG I don&#39;t normally jump on the meme train, but the Hot Takes RPG grid was too good to pass up, in part because I got to do the graphical layout. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/About+Me+-+Tabletop+Game+Template+Edition
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#TTRPG #XP Tired of the mindless &quot;number go up&quot; grind? See how games like _Ironsworn_, _Loner_, and _Wushu_ prioritize actual narrative depth over the hollow dopamine hit of a stat increase. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Character+Progression+More+Lateral+Than+Vertical
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#SoloRPG #Accessibility #TTRPG #Loner Check out how rules-light systems like Loner offer a seamless, low-barrier entry point for visually impaired players to dive into the world of solo and classic RPG adventuring. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Solo+RPG+for+the+Blind
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#TTRPG #Starforged #StarWars Having trouble coming up with Iron Vows for scoundrels? You don&#39;t have to be a good guy to swear. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Scoundrel+Vows+in+Ironsworn-Starforged
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#TTRPG #play #Initiative #liveplay Last night I went out to watch my local community theater do a session of D&amp;D live on stage. I have some thoughts, not unpleasant ones. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Initiative+-+Meet+the+Cast+at+the+Aurora+Theatre
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#TTRPG #Shinobigame #Japan I finally get to say I&#39;m big in Japan, and I get to talk about a discovery of a game that I haven&#39;t picked up yet. Shinobigami looks promising. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/The+Japanese+Leakage+-+Shinobigami
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#TTRPG #GMing #advice #facilitator #GMless Stop being the &quot;dancing monkey&quot; for your RPG group and discover how GM-less systems and decentralized play can turn a burnt-out Forever GM into a lifelong Player of Games. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/The+Forever+GM
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@HolosDiscover looks -- interesting. It can follow on as far as I&#39;m concerned. If I didn&#39;t want my stuff to be public knowledge, I wouldn&#39;t post it in public.
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#TTRPG #DungeonCrawlerCarl I couldn&#39;t stay quiet after seeing that disastrous Dungeon Crawler Carl RPG promo, so here is my take on why the game looks like a hot mess and the tabletop alternatives you should play instead. https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/Dungeon+Crawler+Carl+May+Be+Best+Left+in+Space
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#TTRPG #4DRoleplaying #gamedesign How is it that the mainstream tabletop RPG hobby reinvents the wheel every five years when we&#39;ve solved a problem 20 years ago? https://grimtokens.garden/Thoughts/4D+Roleplaying+-+WTF+Mate
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I suppose it&#39;s time to actually show people my work. *Running Breathless* is a game about being chased and dealing with problems along the way, sometimes not even your own. https://squidlord.itch.io/running-breathless Maybe you&#39;re a psychic kid who&#39;s escaped from the hospital or the school for unusual talents. Maybe you&#39;ve made the heist of your life. Maybe you&#39;re the worst kind of criminal scum. Maybe they&#39;re right behind you. Catch your breath...