Each February, Kickstarter holds a month-long celebration of tabletop RPGs referred to as ZineQuest, that includes all types of crowdfunded zines. What’s a zine, you ask? It is a brief, self-published e book, on this context often an journey, a complement, or a small, self-contained sport.
They are usually a bit scrappy and peculiar, permitting creators to run with wild and area of interest concepts you may not see in full TTRPG books. This yr’s no exception in that regard, and there are many nice alternatives to boost your cabinets with one thing uncommon and inventive.
You’ll be able to take a look at the complete record of ZineQuest tasks by a search of the ZineQuest tag on Kickstarter, but it surely’s so much to sift by. To save lots of you a while, I’ve picked out what I feel are among the most promising zines on provide this yr—learn on, and see if any take your fancy.
This one-shot situation for wonderful sci-fi horror TTRPG Mothership entails a disaster at a subterranean jail, the place gamers should take care of each a malfunctioning laptop system decided to not allow them to escape, and a quickly spreading and oddly clever toxic gasoline leak. You are in secure palms with this one—creator WacoMatrixo has beforehand labored on one-shots for Mothership referred to as Aurora and Decagone, each situations that had actually attention-grabbing and inventive twists on the sport’s regular formulation. They’re additionally recognized for making nice animated movies providing play recommendation and home guidelines.
A stand-alone sport about mutant cartoon animals attempting to outlive in a world the place each humankind and the ozone layer have disappeared. The tone of this one is slightly muddled—it is like Looney Tunes with physique horror, and I am undecided the 2 themes gel completely, at the least within the free quickstart. But it surely’s bursting with persona, the artwork is good, and I like its bizarre tree of mutations gamers can progress alongside, so I reckon it deserves the good thing about the doubt. Plus, I actually loved the type and allure of creator Anthony Grasso’s earlier venture AMMU: An Eldritch Extermination.
Generally all an journey wants is a good, easy hook, a village beneath assault by an evil skateboarding lich is definitely that. This journey for D&D 5e not solely provides you a skatepark-themed dungeon to battle by, but additionally a magic merchandise, the Board of Skateomancy, that if claimed will mean you can “forged gnarly spells by doing methods”. Radical.
With Hole Knight: Silksong nonetheless nowhere to be seen, we should flip elsewhere for our bug adventures. Beetle Knight stands able to fill the void. It is a stand-alone sport the place you play as an insect hero on the planet of “Litterfall”, a forest flooring the place flies, mantises, fireplace ants, and extra kind kingdoms and factions to work together with. Additionally included are two full adventures and even guidelines for taking part in solo.
Designed to be simply tailored to your TTRPG system of alternative, this trilogy of adventures will be run as one-shots or linked collectively into a brief marketing campaign. The stark art-style may be very interesting, and I like the old fashioned vibe—notably with the combination of conventional dungeon fantasy with unusual sci-fi components. Should you miss the times when it was completely regular on your D&D group to discover a wrecked spaceship and choose up a laser pistol, that is the zine for you.
I like the burly barbarian aesthetic of this dungeon-crawler—like a mix of Conan the Barbarian and that one episode of Journey Time the place everybody cannot cease rough-housing. Mechanically it seems like an attention-grabbing twist on outdated school-inspired gaming, the place levelling is changed by a system the place you rise and fall in muscle mass by succeeding or failing at mighty feats of power. Additionally included is a megadungeon that includes, amongst different issues, magic snails, hallucinogenic toads, and a water gun axe—the right place to place a celebration of meatheads by their paces.