Thursday, March 21, 2019

Greatsword of Bashing - Weird Magic Item #26

Inspired by the incredibly excellent Weird Magic Item generator over at Donjon.bin.sh, I've been coming up with a few of my own system agnostic weird magic items to put in the many games I run, be they 13th Age or Beyond the Wall...

Eventually I want to try and put them into a randomizer, but I need to generate a few first. I'm going to try and post one every other Wednesday. Please let me know if you end up using an item I've created in your own game. You can find the entire series here...


Greatsword of Bashing


The legendary berserker, Hjördís Bonebreaker, commissioned this sword after helping a band of adventurers clear the crypts of the Marrow King. During her time in the crypts she was frustrated by the need between to switch her preferred great sword and a maul that would better damage skeletons and other bony undead, so she asked a wizard to enchant her sword so that it dealt bludgeoning damage in addition to slashing. Hjördís christened her original greatsword Marrowdrinker, but since that time several more have been crafted as other berserkers and warriors ask mages to enchant weapons well suited to both cleaving goblins in twain and smashing the skulls of skeletons.


Friday, March 15, 2019

Music to Game to: The Bug vs Earth - Concrete Desert

I listen to a lot of music (over 41 days worth in 2018 according to last.fm) and I find that few things help me keep the mood of a game foregrounded in my mind like a good soundtrack. Plus, I’ve discovered that when I’m playing music to a speaker via Bluetooth, I’m less likely to be on my phone, lest my players hear any stray sounds, letting me better model engagement during a game. To that end, I want to share some of my favorite music to game to; the albums that inspire and inflame my imagination and that I’ve found work well as background music for games as well. I’ll do a mini-review and cover the basics of what mood it helps me set.

The Bug vs Earth – Concrete Desert

I’ve featured Earth before, with my very first Music to Game to highlighting the two album epic Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light. On Concrete Desert, Earth’s Dylan Carlson collaborates with The Bug, dub/electronic producer Kevin Martin, for an album inspired by Los Angeles in particular and America more broadly. The result is a vast album, where the empty spaces of the American west meet a dystopic futuristic sound. A ghostly menace fills the tracks, which bear names like “Don’t Walk These Streets, givng them a bit of neo-noir flavor, making this album a great soundtrack for a modern, sci-fi, or post-apocalyptic game.


  • Vocals?...Yes, but only on the bonus tracks
  • Music Genre(s)… Doom, Electronic, Dub
  • Perfect for… Modern or post-apocalyptic games set in vast, empty spaces or crumbling cities.
  • If you only grab one track, make it... the epically haunting “American Dream” which features an eerie guitar melody that seems to wander a wasteland of drifting sand and broken promises.

Wednesday, March 6, 2019

Amalia Sebara’s Fire-breathing Coin Hog - Weird Magic Item #25

Inspired by the incredibly excellent Weird Magic Item generator over at Donjon.bin.sh, I've been coming up with a few of my own system agnostic weird magic items to put in the many games I run, be they 13th Age or Beyond the Wall...

Eventually I want to try and put them into a randomizer, but I need to generate a few first. I'm going to try and post one every other Wednesday. Please let me know if you end up using an item I've created in your own game. You can find the entire series here...


Amalia Sebara’s Fire-breathing Coin Hog

Originally developed by the legendary wizard, Amalia Sebara, this small coin purse shaped to look like a pig is stitched out of the hide of a red dragon. There is a coin sized slot on the back which is used to insert coins of any size into an extra-dimensional space within. The owner can whisper a command word and amount into the tiny ear of the ersatz hog and the amount will spill out of the hog’s mouth, provided the coin purse contains the amount. The extra-dimensional space can hold up to a million coins of any size, but will accept no other objects. It will also not accept counterfeit coins or coin shaped objects that hold no value. If anyone but the attuned owner of the coin purse attempts to steal the purse or open it, the pig opens its mouth and targets the thief with a burning hands spell. The owner can give the purse as a gift, however, and the purse becomes also becomes un-attuned 2d4 hours after the death of its owner, so those are the two most common means of obtaining one of these magical purses.

The Saltmarsh Register - Vol 1.18 & Vol 1.19

The Saltmarsh Register is the in-game newspaper I invented for the Ghosts of Saltmarsh game I run online every other Saturday. It is reprint...