Ruin of Reputation A one session beginner puzzle dungeon adventure for Cairn, Ruin of Reputation has 10 rooms and should take around 3.5 hours.  It is easily converted to any other OSR system of choice, and supplementar...

You can now purchase physical copies of Ruin of Reputation by @orchardmartin.bsky.social on the Cairn Store!

store.cairnrpg.com/products/rui...

Counter-example: A certain Irish sitcom writer's direction of travel in the last 10 years

Striking contrast with what aive seen "on the ground" at the Bristol meetup over the last 3 years (with the exception of Call of Cthulhu)

We had one person try to run V:TM but nobody signed up, most of the others have only been occasional one shots.

I think there's a quasi-third way in addition to both of those poles - users who have established communities spend 80%+ of their time within those, which are increasingly (Discord, Whatsapp, Telegram etc) private and not publicly searchable.

Continuing last night with my Cairn 2E playtest, alongside Dragonbane, Mothership, 5e, Numenera and Grant Howitt's Reverse Beastmaster

(Been using the little battery tealights to track torches recently and they're great)

Search history from Cairn module writing today:

"teeth marks or tooth marks"
"list of subsistence trade goods"
"is gin flammable?"
"history of concrete"
"pterodactyl wingspan"

Yeah I think the venue is key as most places would rather fill their tables with TCG players (or failing that, 40k) but I'm really pleased to hear it's been going so well for so long.

Would be interested in what systems are/aren't being played, and feel free to drop a promo link for our server

Ah yes, I've seen your website! - I think your approach of (if I've understood it correctly) acting as a sort of matchmaker of games to players across multiple nights is really interesting. Without an equivalent venue in East Bristol it wasn't really practical for me, but there's clearly demand!

I have more detailed data if anyone is interested in a comparison, but I think the actual answer would be the trends are governed by the tastes of ~12 regular or semi-regular GMs, who are in turn influenced by media etc.

Oh whereabouts in Seattle? I'm there occasionally and one of my inspirations was playing Fiasco at the Storygames Seattle meetup in ~2012

A: It's all GM-driven, they post ads and players sign up. Took some encouragement from me occasionally to get people to run things, but it works.

We run 6-10pm, although in practice I'd say that most sessions are 6.15-9.30/45. And of course some systems will include character generation as 10-15mins of that time.

@johnharper.bsky.social got plenty of people realising that they could, in fact, follow the fiction

@leylinepress.bsky.social Salvage Union lead to the formation of the group that are still close friends 3 years later

@chaosium.bsky.social Call of Cthulhu has still got it after 40 years

@rowanrookanddecard.bsky.social Spire and Heart have been played multiple times, and of course @gshowitt.bsky.social one page RPGs!

@mothership.bsky.social remains the easiest sell to players of all experience levels (and great for one shots)

@cairnrpg.com is the perfect introduction to OSR play

Only fair to highlight publishers and systems that have worked so well over the last 3 years:
@melsonian-arts-council.itch.io Troika onboarded many new people (and playtested an official module!)
@jasoncordova.bsky.social Brindlewood Bay and others have been our most-played narrative games

60 systems and 600 sessions. 3 years in the life of a TTRPG meetup. - Pointless Monument I found 436 people who wanted to play TTRPGs in-person near me. Here’s how I did it and the 10 tips I learned along the way. In late 2022 I moved

Blogpost: I've often mentioned the local meetup I run in conversations on here and elsewhere. Now, after 3 years, here's an overview of how I did it and what we've been playing.

pointlessmonument.blot.im/60-systems-a...

Ruin of Reputation by Pointless Monument A one session beginner puzzle dungeon for Cairn 2E

Come get your free Cairn 2E module, prose in the front, bullet points in the back. Something for everyone! Tables? It's got them. Numbered lists not formatted as tables? It's got those as well.

Also, pictures. But wait, there's more! A map, also.

pointlessmonument.itch.io/ruin-of-repu...

Behold, the choices of a man who has never owned a console

my9games.com

Going into the one in central Bristol to find the Post Office at the back just before Christmas was an interesting contrast of late capitalism in the former followed by decline of the state in the latter

It is honourable for the defeater of Pitcher Plant to go on to greater victory.

The Bloggies: Theory Round 1 Welcome to The Bloggies. You're currently voting in the first round of the Theory bracket. What's in this category? This category is all about systems, mechanics, gameplay, and more. What are The Blo...

Cast your Theory votes here:

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Norgad was kind enough to credit one of my blogposts as inspiration for this, and as it happens you can vote for it in The Bloggies (link below)

pointlessmonument.blot.im/tumbling-dow...

The Bloggies 2026 A yearly celebration of blogging in tabletop roleplaying games.

The Bloggies' page has updates!

1. "We Read the Bloggies" A fan-made podcast is live and linked!

2. A new submission has been nominated, "Book [Verb] Play" in Theory. The other post was removed on the author's request.

3. I've redesigned the page to keep things short and sweet.

Happy reading!

This year's Bloggies Nominees Over 90+ blog posts. And a surprise category for 2026.

The Bloggies Nominees are here!

We are 1 week away from voting, so I need everyone's help spreading the word. Congrats to all the nominees and blogs submitted—this last year was incredible. Forming the lists was equal parts rewarding and painful.

www.explorersdesign.com/this-years-b...

Sadly you just missed out on appearing in the Mail over the weekend

A Fistful of Feathers by Pointless Monument A pointcrawl for Cairn - how far will you go for a comfy night's sleep?

With respect to my adventures, Fistful of Feathers has the light tone and clear objective, but it's a pointcrawl without a dungeon.

pointlessmonument.itch.io/a-fistful-of...

Tannic by Amanda P. A pastoral forest adventure for old school roleplaying

As much as I want to suggest my own stuff for Cairn, I think you want Tannic by @weirdwonder.bsky.social

The 3hr requirement is tough, and rules out Sharky and Black Wyrm as being too long.

weirdwonder.itch.io/tannic

I Ran: Brackish (Using Mothership) - Pointless Monument Watery graves, inspiration from an iconic indie videogame *and* an accurate representation of water pumps? Read on to find out what I thought of

Brackish is very good, and my players really embraced sketching their camera shots, to the point that I included their sheet in my review:

pointlessmonument.blot.im/i-ran-bracki...

40+ participants of Indonesia's LFGcon SESSION 1!

Brochure that the organizers made as a gift for the participants!

My Call of Cthulhu table!

Behind my Call of Cthulhu Keeper Screen

Yesterday the local Indonesian Tabletop RPG community that my friends and I have been growing since Q4 2025 held its first convention!

Call of Cthulhu, Nobilis, DURF, Mothership, Daggerheart, D&D 5e. 40+ participants.

Hopefully this will inspire the local scene to keep on growing!

It is unfair of the media to report on my work in progress hexcrawl in such a negative way