S4E7: 16 Candles Region 3v14(Empire Strikes/Mom) Listen now | Featuring Joe Wack & Keith Marsteller

I'm a guest on the latest episode of "The 80s-est," talking #EmpireStrikesBack - the80sest.substack.com/p/s4e7-16-ca...

Gary Con 2026 Last week, I drove to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin for my seventh trip to Gary Con. I’ve made the journey every year since 2018 except for 2020 and 2021, when there was no in-person convention. It&…

How I Spent My @garycon.com 2026: johnboothwrites.blog/2026/03/27/g... #ttrpg

The Hidden Smithy of J.J. Popp & Son: New Beckets, Further Studies by JohnBoothWrites An RPG supplement offering details on five magical rings and other items.

I had a fantastic @garycon.com and will be writing more about it, but in the meantime, here's the 'zine I took with me, expanding on the one I did last year: johnboothwrites.itch.io/the-hidden-s... #TTRPG #dnd #garycon

Here's my bottom line:

Much of what they are doing is bad.
Much of what they are doing is unpopular.
Pushback is working.
We are winning.
Keep fighting.
Be creative.
Push for what you'd want.
Allow for insiders and outsiders.
Realize that change takes time.
Reduce harm in the meantime.

Exterior of a McDonald's featuring a vintage fiberglass sculpture of an "apple pie tree" character - a tree with a cartoonish face and it's branches laden with apples and fried pies.

Meant to tag @bastionland.bsky.social . I love tabletop RPGs so. very. much.

Two players at a table covered in RPG dice, books, and character sheets.

Learned to play Mythic Bastionland tonight in a fun one-shot. First time for everyone at the table and I loved it. #TTRPG

This reminds me of watching @jonathanhliu.bsky.social & our friend Dave learn Robinson Crusoe at Gen Con 🤣

Well, *I* read the whole thing and it made me miss sitting down & talking with you!

One thing to add: Democrats really shouldn’t fear to be anti-ICE. It’s specific, unlike “defund the police.”

If asked, say “Of course I support enforcing the law. ICE isn’t doing that. They’re breaking laws—really important laws, like the Bill of Rights—not enforcing them, which why I oppose ICE.”

To folks in Minnesota: In Nov., District 20b has a chance to be represented in the statehouse by a truly qualified, decent, and committed person who I'm proud to call a longtime friend. Whether you're in the district or not, please let people know about Hutch: vote4hutch.com/issues/

The book is a delight and you should seek it out! I'm a big fan of the all the earliest Star Wars "beyond the screen" stories.

Mark Corcoran's art for #StarWars: The Mystery of the Rebellious Robot is far too underappreciated.

Close up of a can of WD40.

I am 'the rubber band broke and now I lost the little spray straw' old.

It's true that most Cleveland-area Gen X'ers seem to have a Trent story. 😂 (My less mundane encounter with him is declining an invitation to hang out after a show because I had to drive back to Bowling Green since I had an early class. 💯 true. Also I am a big dork.)

I said hello to Trent Reznor in line for the Blue Streak at Cedar Point.

I've been a Numenera fan since its creation. It's the first game I ever GMed, and it's still my favorite system and setting, so yeah, of course I'm in already. :)

Those YES & KNOW books were a must-have on long family road trips.

These are mine and I did all this damage having the best times and I will never get rid of them.

A pencil sketch of a Mandalorian helmet with a Cleveland Guardians C and a Kyle Manzardo moustache.

As Cleveland Guardians fans check out the newly released promotional schedule, it's important that I share this goofy thing I drew last summer. 😂

I saw this after I posted. Still excited!

Will this be fully standalone like the original (which I love!), or will I need to buy the new 2nd ed. Cypher core book to play?

Footprints leading through about a foot of snow across a driveway and yard to a back porch.

My neighbor and I have started almost every work day with outdoor back-porch coffee since spring 2020. It's a bit, and we are fully committed to it.

Joseph "Frostgrave" McCullough?

My 2025 in writing Last year, I kept track of how far I ran (miles), how much I wrote for fun/free (words), how much time I spent playing RPGs with friends (hours), and how many books I read. Bluntly put, 2025 was no…

My 2025 in creative/personal #writing: johnboothwrites.blog/2026/01/22/m...

From Senator Chris McDaniel: “Lately, some folks have taken to calling ICE “the Gestapo.” It sounds fierce. It feels righteous. But it isn’t true, and it isn’t harmless. The Gestapo was a secret police force. No warrants. No courts. No lawyers. And no appeals. People vanished in the night, not because they broke the law, but because the law no longer meant anything. The knock on the door was the sentence. ICE isn’t that. Not even close. ICE is a public agency enforcing laws passed by elected officials. Its agents file reports. They seek warrants. They lose cases. Judges stop them. Lawyers challenge them. Some detainees go home. That’s not tyranny. That’s bureaucracy, for better and worse. You can hate immigration policy. You can argue enforcement is too harsh, too sloppy, or too broad. You can work to have the law changed if you wish. That’s a republic doing what it’s supposed to do. But when you call ordinary law enforcement “the Gestapo,” you cheapen real evil. You turn history into a slogan and suffering into a metaphor. And once every badge is tyranny, no tyranny is left to recognize. In Mississippi, I was raised to believe words should earn their weight. This one hasn't yet. It throws around the language of dictatorship while living under a system where courts still rule, lawyers still argue, and the government still loses. That difference matters. Because the day enforcement becomes secret, unchecked, and answerable to no one, we won’t need to borrow names from history. We’ll know exactly what we’re dealing with. And we’ll wish we’d kept our words honest.”

“ICE isn’t the Gestapo. The Gestapo was…” (proceeds to describe qualities that apply to what ICE is currently doing)

My 2025 in RPGs Last year, I kept track of how far I ran (miles), how many books I read, how much I wrote for fun/free (words), and how many hours I spent playing tabletop roleplaying games with friends. The Monda…

My 2025 in #TTRPG: johnboothwrites.blog/2026/01/11/m...

(Also, I get it: I am back to CDs in the car and we bought a basic turntable over the holidays.)

FWIW, our "home stereo" is the Blu-Ray player, which I just tested on a 30-year-old CD and plays peachy.

The Twin Heads of Avarice by Reverse Ettin Games A heist scenario set in the lost world of Azor.

And a little #selfpromosaturday action: THE TWIN HEADS OF AVARICE is a system-neutral tabletop #RPG scenario, cowritten by myself and @forgeofice.bsky.social , set in his Lost World of Azor. An Ocean's 11-style heist in a sword-and-sorcery milieu.

reverse-ettin-games.itch.io/the-twin-hea...