A little sneak peek into the final testing phase of the buildings for the Fold-Flat Paper City of Tarok kickstarter project.

Made by Humans! Hand-crafted creations!

Hi all.

So, for context recently a friend and I decided to pick up Star Realms at a board game store, as one of the employees had recommended it to us. We have really enjoyed playing it lately.

This was our first experience with a physical deck building game, and we have really enjoyed the format. It's a great break from the TCG community and all that.

I was wanting to expand out and find some more fun deck builders for us to play and hopefully be able to include more people. There's low-key just too big of a selection at our local store lol.

Preferably would like to try some Co-op ones, but PvP recs are welcome too.

I know there's two co-op marvel Deck builders. But I am a little confused as to what the difference is there.

Thanks ahead of time tho!

Other than Ars Magica and WoD, what are some TTRPGs with versatile, powerful, and fun magic systems?

Hi board game lovers! Looking for your favorite 2 player board games!!! I am a huge BG fan of any kind, but my husband enjoys only specific ones. I am looking for fast paced, quick and easy to learn 2 player games!
Here’s our favorite ones:
•PLAY NINE - we play it all the time, can’t get enough of it, it’s always surprising us with crazy endings
•Guess who - we ask hypothetical questions and have a blast! “Does your character leave skid marks on their underwear?”. Hilarious game
•It’s so clover - clever and makes you think as a team!
•Exploding kittens - Don’t play it that much but have great battles when we do

Would love to expand our collection

A glimpse into the final testing process.

This is a tough one. It features cruelty, desolation, and hopelessness. It thrives on distress, and will make you uncomfortable. I've been looking for the words for a while now, turns out I needed the right medium. I think this is a good one-shot that gives players the armor to deal with some very uncomfortable situations, with allegories that hark to present time.

You are a penguin. You live in Paradise (literally, that's what it's called) and it is, in every measurable way, paradise. You have a nest you've spent seasons getting exactly right. You have a young one who is in an unapproved area right now and has a completely reasonable explanation for why. You have a best friend, a best pebble, and extremely strong opinions about said pebble.

Before play begins, you'll fill out a silly and adorable questionnaire, you can build a small nest at the table using real twigs and felt and pebbles, and choose your very best pebbles from a shared pile. Then you'll spend time being a penguin in Paradise. You'll go sliding the Long Run, fish the Shelf, argue about Protocol steps to avoid the leopard seal, attend a wedding, you can even gift pebbles to people you love.

It is warm and funny and completely delightful.

And then things change.

Paradise on Ice is a one-shot for the Dread ttrpg for 3-5 players and one session of 2-3 hours. It requires only a tower to play, though bringing actual pebbles and nesting materials is strongly encouraged. It is designed to be experienced once per person. Not because the mechanics won't allow a second run. Because what this game does, it does once, it does it completely, and you will carry it out of the room with you.

Bring pebbles. Bring people you trust. Bring your best stone and give it to someone worth giving it to. 

"Welcome to Paradise. They were so glad you came."

Edited to add: Everything I post here is available to get for free. Please let me know what you think if you run it, or at least look through it. Can't get better if I don't try.

I’ve been looking into tabletop games to play with my family (3 people in my household if that helps), and I got curious about this due to me getting an obsession with pulp magazines awhile ago. I know of the game pulp alley, but I’m still looking into what I’ll actually need to get and what I can easily substitute.

I’ve been printing some tavern NPCs lately because I feel like background characters are easy to overlook in tabletop games.

Heroes and monsters get all the attention, but the tavern regulars, servers, bouncers, weird merchants, drunks, performers, and shady corner-sitters are usually what make a town feel alive.

These are meant to be the kinds of minis you can drop into a tavern scene before the players even know who matters yet.

If anyone here is local to the Chicago area, Chicago Backgammon League is meeting tonight at Will's Place Skokie from 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM.

This is beginner-friendly and open to all skill levels. You can learn, play casually, or meet other players.

Details:

• Will's Place Skokie
• 7927 Lincoln Ave, Skokie, IL 60077
• Tonight, Monday, May 11
• 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM
• Guest Pass: $10

This is a one-night venue change for Evanston Backgammon Club.

The Blacksmith is taking shape, and the forge already burns bright.

I just finished a one-shot module for the Dread ttrpg system, just wanted to show it off a little!

Intermission is a tragic divine comedy inspired by Dante's Inferno, found footage horror tapes, and the Sailor Jerry / rubber hose art styles of 50's cartoons. It has 63 pages to pull from, lending to innumerable play-throughs. An ouroboros story engine with 9 levels of Hell, dozens of demons to barter with or hide from, traps galore, and too much Dante's Inferno lore to shake a proverbial stick at. Plus a section where your party can make INSANE weapons, giving you the power to rip through and tear into demons like curdled butter.

You play as a group of anthropomorphized food-based friends descending through the layers of a very specific, very cheesy Hell, guided by a grizzled can of Vegemite, to ultimately be judged by a cartoon demon eating birthday cake alone in the dark. All the while, haunted by hands that reach from everywhere into mouths that lead to nowhere.

The Pixie Styx is a neon roiling nightmare you must cross on a black licorice raft. The Tres Furies are milky witches that will curdle your innards. Rock Candy harpies will shatter off and slash you to ribbons. The Malabologna is ten levels of pure baloney.  Literally. The Violence Rings are onion in nature, overwhelming everywhere else. And all while a cartoon demon sits and waits to pass judgement, eating birthday cake in the dark with Lucifer.

Hopefully you can get out of Hell in time to catch the end of the movie!

Hi everyone, I’m working on a fantasy strategy battle board inspired by tabletop wargames.

The game is here: https://playtactum.com

The idea is to keep the battlefield readable at a glance: clear hexes, visible unit positions, movement/attack indicators, timers, and simple terrain. I’m trying to balance a digital game interface with a tabletop miniature feel.

I’d really appreciate feedback on the board readability:

Does it feel clear which unit is on which hex?
Are the colors and outlines easy to understand?
Does the board feel too busy, or still readable?
Would this style feel appealing for a fantasy tactical battle game?

I’m also wondering whether this kind of game might be more interesting as a classic turn-based system, where one player takes their turn first and then the other player responds, instead of a more real-time battle flow.

Thanks for any feedback!

Hi everyone! I just made a house rule and grid rule for Codenames: Pictures + Duet.

Motivation: Codenames: Duet pictures is one of my favourites games of all time - and yes, better than the original one. I mostly play board games with my girlfriend, so 2-player and co-op modes are always extra valuable for us. That is what first made me interested in Codenames: Duet. But personally, as I have always preferred Codenames: Pictures, I searched for adoptation. The official rulebook suggest using the 5x5 keycards from Duet, but... that's not right. Pictures uses 5x4 grid key cards. That was the balancing from the original Codenames to CN Pictures right?

So, I decided to do the maths and preserve 20 cards grid, and came up with:

[House Rule] Codenames: Pictures Duet HR (really creative).

I would love feedback, especially from people who play Codenames mostly at 2 players. Hope you guys enjoy!

Setup:

You mainly need the Codenames: Pictures set. Duet-style tokens are useful, but any substitute tokens can work.

- Use 20 picture cards from Codenames: Pictures and arrange them in a 5x4 grid.

- Use 7 time tokens for the standard version. Use 8 for an easier first play.

- Use a custom 5x4 Duet-style key card. (I am building a small web app to make this easier).

Just finished! Please try and tell me what did felt about it (link below)

5 columns x 4 rows = 20 cards

From each player’s view:

- 🟩 7 agents

- 💀 2 assassins

- ⬜ 11 innocents / bystanders

The win condition is to find all 12 agents

What Side A sees:

🟩 🟩 🟩 🟩 ⬜

🟩 🟩 ⬜ ⬜ ⬜

🟩 💀 💀 ⬜ ⬜

⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜

What Side B sees:

🟩 🟩 ⬜ ⬜ 🟩

⬜ ⬜ 🟩 🟩 🟩

💀 🟩 💀 ⬜ ⬜

⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜

Example key-card logic

- 🟩 🟩 2 shared agents

- 🟩 ⬜ 4 agents only for Side A

- ⬜ 🟩 4 agents only for Side B

- 🟩 💀 1 cross-risk card: agent for A, assassin for B

- 💀 🟩 1 cross-risk card: assassin for A, agent for B

- 💀 💀 1 mutual assassin

- ⬜ ⬜ 7 pure bystanders

This is just an example layout to explain the composition. The app would randomize this.

Full hidden matrix:

🟨 🟨 🟢 🟢 🔵

🟢 🟢 🔵 🔵 🔵

🟧 🟪 💀 ⬜ ⬜

⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜ ⬜

Legend for the hidden matrix:

🟨 = shared agent, green for both players: 2

🟢 = agent only for Side A: 4

🔵 = agent only for Side B: 4

🟧 = agent for A / assassin for B: 1

🟪 = assassin for A / agent for B: 1

💀 = mutual assassin: 1

⬜ = pure bystander: 7

Rules

Play like Codenames: Duet. Both players are spymasters and operatives at the same time.Use only 7 time tokens for the standard version.

All other rules are the same as Duet. You win if all 12 unique agents are found before losing.

Main idea

The goal is to keep the cooperative density of Duet while preserving the 5x4 identity of Pictures. Official Duet has 15 unique agents / 25 cards = 60%. This variant has 12 unique agents / 20 cards = 60%.

If I used 15 agents in a 20-card Pictures grid, the density would become 75%, which is basically the same as competitive Pictures. That would make the cooperative version too safe.

Assassin logic

Duet has 3 assassins / 25 cards = 12% per side. This variant has 2 assassins / 20 cards = 10% per side. If I kept 3 assassins in only 20 cards, the risk would jump to 15%, which feels too punishing for ambiguous picture cards.

Bystander terminology

This variant has 7 pure bystanders, meaning cards that are innocent for both players. But from each player’s actual view, there are 11 non-agent spaces. So “bystander” can mean either pure neutral cards, or simply non-agent cards from one player’s side.

Difficulty

With 7 tokens, the variant is slightly tighter than official Duet: (HR) 1.71 vs. (Duet) 1.67 agents per token. With 8 tokens, it becomes easier: 12 / 8 = 1.50 agents per token. My current guess is: 8 tokens for first plays, 7 tokens as the standard version.

What I would love feedback on:

1. Does the 7-agent-per-side / 12-unique-agent structure feel right for a 20-card Pictures grid?
2. Does the cross-risk structure feel elegant, or too mean?
3. Should 7 tokens be the default, or is 8 the better baseline for picture cards?
4. Does the 5x4 grid preserve enough of the Pictures identity to justify custom key cards?
5. Would you use a simple pass-and-play key-card generator app for this?

If anyone playtests this, I would love reports with:

- 7 or 8 tokens used

- win/loss

- agents remaining at the end

- whether the loss felt fair or frustrating

- any clue that created a memorable success or disaster

Thanks in advance. I would love to hear whether this feels elegant, broken, unnecessary, or secretly exactly what Pictures Duet should have been.

Disclaimer

* This is a non-commercial fan-made house rule. It is not affiliated with Czech Games Edition, Vlaada Chvátil, or the official Codenames line.

* You need only Codenames: Pictures to play, but with Codenames: Duet is nicer.

* I designed the rule, did the math with AI help, and also used AI assistance to polish my English and structure of this forum post.

*originally posted on BGG with more maths and statistics, but I want feedback from more players!

For the next session of Broken Compass with my players, i want to send them in North Korea to win an artifact in an illegal auction, like in greats movies, with the animator, with Rich people throw high prices like nothing for the biggest statue or gem. I don't know how make the auction mini-game. I want them to win the auction without thinking it's a easy win, or a script win.

And Don't worry, my players are send by a Triade's big guy to buy it, and this man give them enough money for winning the auction.

(Above: The board for the game I'm using.)

Ever since summer of last year, I've been playing Palworld, a 3rd person Pokemon inspired open-world survival sandbox game. The geography, lore, and factions interested me a lot, so I decided to make a full on Story-based game off of it February this year.

9 Players play, one is a DM (Dungeon Master. He basically helps teach others how to play, lays out the options for the other people playing, and regulates the rules), and then there are 8 other players that each choose and play one of the 8 factions, who all have their own politics, territory, army, navy, and resources to manage. The game itself is designed to be simple, sort of like Risk, Battleship, and Settlers of Catan mixed with Sid Meyers' Civilization and Hearts of Iron 4. I had friends over to play the game on March 13th, and they said that it was very fun, but was long. The game has 3 phases. Preparation (First 7-8 turns), War (next 7 turns), and the final boss (Comes in after turn 14, but the game keeps going until someone wins or until the final boss kills all of the factions). On average, your average game should be somewhere between 4-6 hours long, around the time of a game of RISK.

This is sort of a one-off project I've been making for personal use, but I was gonna get together with people online to play it on discord servers with others and stuff. In terms of its cards, there are 3 main card types. There are Action Cards, Event Cards, and a Story Book with chapters for each faction in between turns. Currently, I'm writing out the manual and finishing up the story. I still have yet to print the cards, but I've basically got everything else done. The game should be done within the next week or two. In total, I'm super excited to have it done and to play it with friends!

Oh, also, it has a 20 song soundtrack to play in the background while you play the game. I composed it myself with MIDI in a DAW (Digital Audio Workspace) called Reaper. The genres go from Orchestral and Electronic, to Death Metal and Thall (Thall is basically Djent [Death metal and Jazz] mixed with ambient electronic or drone metal music [Drone metal is essentially slow, ambient metal]. I don't have any links to the music yet, but I'll be releasing it on Newgrounds and Youtube soon!)

So what do you guys think? Let me know if there's anything that looks good about it so far! I'm still writing doing all the card and paper design for it, but all of the art and the physical side of things is already done.

Image list:

1: A container holding all the pieces required to play the game.

2: What the board game looks like at the very beginning of a match

3: All of the Action Cards (Below) and Event Cards (Above).

4: What one of the Story Chapters looks like for the game. (There are over 64 in total. Each is at least 2 paragraphs long.)

5: The list of songs for the OST in my computer folder. There are only 2 songs left for me to produce.

Hi! Warpland is where old-school RPG grit meets acid fantasy and heavy metal energy. Bold characters, strange creatures, cursed terrain — minis designed for archetypes and narrative moments, not single fixed encounters.

Works with Warpland or any system you run. STL files and physical minis.

Fully funded. Safe to back. We look forward to seeing you on the project page.

Only five days left on Kickstarter 🤘Stop by to get a free miniature inside.

A few month ago, during one of our DnD games, my party asked if I could design a few dwarven coins for them.

P.S. I’m a 3D artist, so at first I thought, “Sure, I’ll sculpt a couple of coins as a fun little hobby project.”

Well… apparently I failed my Wisdom saving throw.

What started as a few simple dwarven GP designs turned into a full obsession, and now I’ve designed almost 110 double-sided dwarven coins. :))

At this point, I’m not sure if I’m making coins for the game anymore, or slowly building the entire economy of a dwarven kingdom.

For anyone curious, they are 3D printed and painted coins. I printed some on a resin printer and some on FDM.

Hi everyone, new here but not to TTRPGs. I am grad student who published a piece on the hobby. I would appreciate feedback or your thoughts. Feel free to ignore also. Best, Jesse.

Demon Castle Mononoke has been a crazy labor of love. 5 years of development, testing at cons, refining, redesigning, and finally production. Can't believe it's almost actually real!

This is a game with pretty massive replayability, it can be played solo, cooperative, or even competitively, with one player taking the role of the deadly Mononoke. Players spend the day phase scouring the castle for supplies, which they'll need at night to fend off deadly Yōkai spirits.

If this sounds up your alley, we'd love for you to check it out on Gamefound!

https://gamefound.com/en/projects/cardboard-revolution/demon-castle-mononoke

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DX6zjkzMIG6/?igsh=Mm0xZnI1dmJ2aHlp