The Muppet Show

The Muppet Show started 50 years ago, making life a little weirder in a good way

September

New academic year, new games at the club!

I should probably think of something.

RPGaDAY 2026 overview

RPGaDAY 2026

These are always fun, seeing responses far and wide, especially on Bluesky this year. Got some inevitable New Bremen nostalgia in with the Vampire talk, also a fair bit of Mage as is active and long-running and a few others like supers and Star Wars. What will I be doing and talking about next year? We shall see!

New Bremen venues, what if

I was briefly imagining what a game chat like New Bremen would have looked like if we had players self-select into soft play and hard play characters, but stayed within the same setting. We had "unmoderated" chats where people went off and did whatever, but some of those folks might have stayed in the main community if they could soft play. I think the tag would need to be a clearly marked longterm choice, meaning no convenient ripcording out of hard play the moment something went wrong. Probably the Storytellers could have focused mostly on the hard play parts of the game if only because those required the most adjudication. Anyway, just idle thoughts about what could have been. Maybe subconsciously prompted because I ended up wearing an old Vampire T-shirt today.

Conrad Hubbard

And yes, I know some players effectively already did this by holing up in locked chat rooms.

--

RC

I feel like this would have addressed some issues.

One of the things I wonder about was also just a significant ratio of players to STs - where I wonder if there were enough people offering content to satisfy the intense demand. For some of the most popular venues - it would seem there was players present to consume content all hours of the day and no way to be able to reasonably have content ready to go for enough of them. As a consequence - for idle people who aren't against stirring the pot, they'd go off and cause a ruckus

Cassie Workman Is Witchy AF

Cassie Workman is Witchy AF, a comedy history of the occult, coming September 16

Via EP Lilly Wachowski

Update:

8o

Happy 60th birthday Shirley Manson!

Halsey, The Girl In The Tower

Halsey, The Girl In The Tower concert film

Tim Curry

"The way the world is, I think a silly evening in the theatre is a good thing, to take our minds off terror."

Vampire: The Masquerade V6 alpha

If that's what it comes out like then it will be okay after we houserule out about half the new ideas.

Dolly Parton

And I will always love you.

Spooky Cowboys

Am I thinking of doing a light spooky cowboy WoD game because of the light spooky cowboy band I just heard for the first time?

Bridge City Sinners

... Maybe.

Or, Mage session where Didi and Michael have to form a band to defeat the Crossroads Devil.

Lore from a certain point of view

One of the great joys of running a Vampire chronicle for people who have never played Vampire before is tossing them into a stew of contradictory conspiracies. Vampires love to present themselves as erudite and sophisticated, but they have very little evidence about their own supernatural world.

So far my group has heard...

* Three different creation myths about vampires

* Two different theoretical ways out of the curse

* About the existence of bloodlines, but not specifics

* About the existence of the Sabbat, with some (useless) history

* About werewolves and ghosts

They also heard about wizards ("they died out in the Middle Ages") shortly before meeting a mage, and about unaligned clans ("mostly weirdos who have very limited power") before running afoul of a Follower of Set/Ministry vampire.

They met a vampire who can survive sunlight at dawn

They met a mortal who can just see through Obfuscate. No idea why

They ran away from mortal hunters wearing FBI jackets, who were obviously not real agents

They have failed several gambits to get blood, and are coming to grips with the fact that they will have to do some questionable things

They discovered that animal blood is not very satisfying, then met a Kindred who feeds on animals exclusively

They heard that the Prince is Malkavian, then met her and the coterie's Malkavian immediately clocked that she is not

The Malkavian learned to aura read and has no idea how to interpret it

Everyone seems to be having a great time. It's a World of Darkness where there is lore, there is history, there are societies, but a rule is only a rule until it's broken. Supernatural things work the way they do because of magic, and symbols, and metaphors, not because of science.

Soon they'll get introduced to Gehenna, the End Times, Gehenna cults, and the mythology of the turning of the age. Probably hand-in-hand with crossing paths with actual Sabbat, an Anarch Revolt in their city, and thin-bloods looking for a place to survive.

The huge, sprawling metaplot of the World of Darkness causes some players to pursue setting mastery, to have full fundamental knowledge of the "truth" of the world, so I've made it pretty clear through events that "truth" is highly subjective and context-driven.

Everyone's got goals and agendas, but at the end of the night, it really comes down to, what will you do to survive? How are you going to make it happen? Where are you going to get blood? And who's going to pay the price for your sins?

Jesse Heinig

RPGaDAY 2026

#RPGaDAY2026

31 prompts for TTRPG writing in August.

Introduction, explanation and prompts from founder David F. Chapman.

The Odyssey

The Odyssey is big, beautifully done, sad about the people and the world, doesn't give Penelope enough to do but they never do, shows Christopher Nolan could do horror if he feels like it (the Circe sequence could have been designed to squick me) and could have been two regular sized movies that would both work fine.

Mage: The Ascension - Sunrise City action figures

Mage: The Ascension -  Sunrise City action figures

Sunset City figures

And if we ever figure out a design for fashion dolls those are definitely happening.

Set 1: Arrival

Our heroes meet up for the first time in 1883.

Each comes with a hat, gloved and ungloved hands. Simon comes with an openable umbrella, doctor's bag and book, Michael with his revolvers and Bowie knife, and the ladies with an openable parasol and fan and a reticule purse.

TPO Cara: "Michael's figure gets two guns and a Bowie knife and all we get is a parasol, a fan and a purse?"

ST: "Like you couldn't kill somebody with any of those."

Mage: The Ascension - Sunrise City

Mage: The Ascension - Sunrise City

The further adventures of a circle of mages in San Francisco

Sunset City 1 (not yet called that)

Sunset City 2

Sunset City 3

Sunset City 4

Cara Lawson, Akashayana

In every generation there is a chosen one

Simon Donovan, Hermetic

May have consulted on the new season of The Librarians

Alissa Kwan, Ecstatic

All the pretty girls and all the pretty boys they get dressed up and go out dancing

Michael Lang, Verbena

Cowboy Druid

And last but definitely least:

Didi Duvall, Hollow One

Wants to be Agatha Harkness when she grows up

4A.01: Into The Portal

26/07

Our heroes (and Didi) have been enjoying relative peace and quiet - cut to Cara kicking a ghoul in the face and Simon casting out a demon - when Martin, the master of Time magic who pressed them into rewriting history to save his wife a while back, approaches them seeming tense.

Someone is planning to launch an attack on the city's Tradition Library, the base of the mages on the west coast.

When it was built.

Over a century ago.

It's been well enough concealed that he just detected it.

We go to try and stop the time warping ritual before it activates.

But it's too late.

So Martin throws us back in time to stop it.

At least this time he tells us that's all he can do and gives us a moment to nod before he widens the portal and in we go.

Promising a soft landing.

--

Didi wakes to find herself in a nice bed. In a nice room.

With a couple of women in old-fashioned maid uniforms coming to help her get ready for the day.

II's 1883.

Surprise! Mage: The Ascension - Victorian Age

Didi tries not to look too stoked about getting a wardrobe full of Victorian dresses in mourning colours.

Miss Didi Duvall

Pride And Prejudice And Panic

Writer and cartoonist Trang Le Nguyen reads Pride And Prejudice and Bluskey-s along. A LOT.

Collected doc thanks to Benjamin

Mrs B: Jane is unwell! We must go to her!

Mr B: Yes, certainly. 

Mrs B: And I’m bringing all the girls. 

Mr B: Oh, this is a You project.

1-2-3-4-5-6-6-6

When you want the team to win but you're also wholly supportive of the sermons of Caine and smashing the corruption of the antediluvians (art by Emma Beatrez)

Justin Achilli on Bluesky

Well it took 35 years but I finally have a Sabbat character idea

Me

100 days to Halloween

100 days to Halloween

Halloween

Halloween

100 days to Halloween

Not that I'm counting

Anne Rice's Immortal Universe RPG

Anne Rice's Immortal Universe RPG coming soon from Renegade Game Studios

Interesting. Especially coming from the main recent licensed publishers for World Of Darkness.

Jennifer Finch

I had a feeling, but man this sucks. Fuck cancer. The only good of any of this is she had some fraction of an idea of how much she meant to people. Goodnight Jennifer Finch, and thanks for helping kickoff a revolution.

Dr. Damien P. Williams

In this blistering heat

Thanks to World Goth Day

"Summer is actually the gothest time of the year because it is the time that we goths suffer the most, which is goth"

200 posts in the new blog

And by the power of Photoshop, another present!

So you know that girl

She's new in town

But you better be careful

She'll put you down

She's an evil chick

Said she's a witch

Garbage

This is the noise that keeps me awake

My head explodes and my body aches

PUSH IT

Well, my feet ache anyway. :D

Birthday!

DVDs! CDs! Books! Cake! Ice Cream! A gig tomorrow (unrelated but still nice)!

(Ready Or Not 2! Interview With The Vampire 2! Nine Inch Nails! Horror novels!)

And balloons from Google...

250 years

Happy Independence Day, US friends!

All the best for your national future.

July

Happy Canada Day to anyone it's relevant to!

Dark Shadows

Dark Shadows animated series? Maybe.

Designs by Abigail Larson? YES NOW PLEASE

Up to date

YES

The Hunger by Annie Wu

Catherine Deneuve as Miriam Blaylock, by Annie Wu

Midsummer

Midsummer! Hence only wearing three layers.

Disclosure Day

Disclosure Day: Steven Spielberg comes back to aliens and UFO lore, the result is a fun ride, like if The X Files didn't have to worry about making more stories later but that's not a bad thing, and there's one of his fantastic big action bits.

Anthony Head

Gig guide: The Vampire Lestat, Death Valley

Like a lot of people, I was really looking forward to The Vampire Lestat's first live appearance, and I have to say I was severely disappointed.

The crowd was a good one (and while star-spotting I think I saw the lead from Type O Negative there, as well as Paul McGann!) although with all the walking around I missed the support band completely. I don't know who they even were.

But anyway, it started great with the man (ahem, "vampire") himself flying down from the rafters (nice bit of wireflying) and launching into Slept So Long, but then after like forty seconds of the second song, a bunch of other "vampires" flew up to the stage and there was a big wire-fu stunt scene. Cleverly done, granted - unseen wires, probably some back projection, and having the band run off in a panic was a clever touch - but then some half-naked chick bursts out of the stage and pulls Lestat to her and they fly off.

And no matter how much we clapped, they wouldn't play an encore.

My advice: wait for the Unplugged video.

The Vampire Lestat Live

The Vampire Lestat Live

Better show than last time in Death Valley when he only got through two songs before he flew off to avoid a stage invasion.

(Reviving this gig review from Queen Of The Damned)

J: They were a good two songs though

Me: Yeah, but getting our parking validated after, yeesh

Reuel: You got your parking validated? #NotARealFan

Me: 8O

June

It's June, so happy Pride Is A Riot Month!

Vampire: The Masquerade V?

Vampire: The Masquerade 5.5 or maybe 6 on the way, depending how playtests go.

Panel video, wobbly camera, timestamped at The Question

Cue the fandom panic!

J: I really liked V5, but I'm sure it'll go the way of Requiem

WGD 2026

So I spent World Goth Day seeing Baby Yoda's Big Day Out, which was not the most relevant option but was a lot of fun.

My favourite TTRPG classes

My favourite TTRPG classes:

1: Angsty Vampire

2: Princess

3: Protective Hero

4: Spooky

5: Comedy Sidekick

World Goth Day

And just like that, caught up on four years of reverse engineered blogging

The WOD MMO looks like a game I'd have loved some of

Justin Achilli on social conflict in the WOD MMO

Ha ha ha, out of nowhere this reminded me of the WoD MMO. Early prototyping had the combat system in place (of course) and an source of endless disagreement was how the game would systemically model social conflict, which always just defaulted to combat but with reskinned actions (BOO TO THAT).

At one point we were having an off-site and each little teambuilding group had to do a skit in front of the other groups. The skit with the Programming Director was a mission with a quest-giver requesting the PC, "I need you to kill OR SEDUCE 20 victims."

That version of the game eventually gave way to better iterations, but the thing that got me was the fungible nature of the quest; hey, player, go inflict yourself on 20 different interactibles, and it's not really important how.

We had some UI problems during preproduction as well. Total Wild West situation, just stick whatever feedbacks or hotbars you needed wherever; it’s all good. One of the engineers doodled up this sticky by way of comment and I still have it, 15+ years later.

Erin LeCount

Don't You See Me Trying?

Hell yes

Mage: The Ascension Action Figures! (not really)

Mage: The Ascension group photo led to ST making fake toys with computer... and then spending hours making the packs match and the accessories scale together.

Yes I want the whole set.

And the followup Halloween Formal fashion dolls.

Set 1, based on the photoshoot

Didi comes with different hair and higher heeled boots because I couldn't think of anything.

Didi's mischievous / evil smile fits the group photo but not the figure set, so a variant with a more neutral expression. Still adorably life-ruining but maybe 30% less obvious about it.

--

Set 2: Halloween Formal

And like many real toy lines the accessories aren't 100% episode accurate. Nobody used the weapons included - Cara had to fight wrathful spirits with a hairpin - but we did use the wraps and purses and Simon definitely looked in a book.

Sunset City photoshoot

Mage: The Ascension: Sunset City

The visual references for the player characters from Mage: The Ascension - Sunset City
Michael (Luke Grimes), Didi (Ksenia Solo), Cara (Holland Roden), Alissa (Paris Berelc) and Simon (Rupert Evans)
together by the power of photomanipulation

My background-selecting hand hurts

And the Halloween formal last season. Should have thought "hey, don't have a background that matches somebody's hair"...

And for the Goth gig 4.19

Bloodhunt

Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodhunt was a great looking fun game that I played on and off and never came close to winning a match. Sad that it shut down, but a free game that ran for four years is pretty impressive.

New Bremen

20/4/2000

When I was

a young geek

White Wolf dot com

took me into the city

to see Godzilla fight

Josie And The Pussycats!

Happy 25th anniversary to the best movie ever

To the Moon and back

Artemis II crew back safe!

Easter

Happy day of eggs and bunnies and that as applicable!

8/5

Big egg opened because why not

11/5

Complete

J: I believe in you

Artemis II

Fly true Artemis II.

April

Have a safe Internet Bullshit Day!

Funny VTM AP?

Funny VTM AP? Eh.

16/4

Have now seen the first minute. That was plenty.

Ready Or Not (2) Here I Come

Ready Or Not (2) Here I Come is pretty fun, though it makes a big retcon its emotional core and can't match the "wait, what?" original. And one scene that really made me wince, intercut with a funny one. But it has Sarah Michelle Gellar as a surprisingly un-comedic villain along with some funny ones.

Buffy

Hulu turned down the Buffy revival series.

Hurts.

Snow Art Art

"My local park is full of hundreds of snow sculptures and someone has been adding museum labels"

Alysa Liu

Gaga monsters REPRESENT

Mage: The Ascension - Sunset City 4

OH YES

Mage: The Ascension - Sunset City 4

Sunset City 1 (not yet called that)

Sunset City 2

Sunset City 3

The further adventures of a circle of mages in San Francisco

Cara Lawson, Akashayana

She is beauty, she is grace, she will stab you in the face

Simon Donovan, Hermetic

The token like a wizard type

Alissa Kwan, Ecstatic

She can dance if she wants to, she can leave your friends behind

Michael Lang, Verbena

Into weird old magic with sticks and stuff

And last but definitely least:

Didi Duvall, Hollow One

Hell-o boys

4.01: Nightmares

2/1

It's been a quiet summer -

Simon banishing a spirit, Cara fighting a pack of ghouls, Michael investigating a spooky old mine, Alissa leading a tai chi class, Didi cheering at a gig

- but now people around the city are having strange dreams...

Happy New Year as and when it comes, if applicable.

Did an in town thing for the day, which was nice. (Bands and choirs and shows and things.)