Update - 17/08/2026

Hello, and welcome to another weekly update! I hope you all had a great weekend. I spent mine working like a madman and taking short breaks to play Marvel Champions. Yes, I'm back at it; I don't know what is it with that game, that it's basically the only game I have no trouble picking up and start playing, it's so well designed. I don't even particularly care for super heroes! It's just a great game; they took the best ideas from MtG's Commander format, and ran with it.

In any case, it's been a week of hard work; I've been wrapping up the exploration chapter for Broken Shores 2e and little else. It was supposed to be done sooner, but I had some new ideas for tables and things I wanted to add, so I went back to it and added them. The book is now sitting at 233 pages, and there's still two chapters left to go, plus the introductory region, so we'll be well over 300 pages for sure once this is done. I'm still on schedule for giving you guys the finished book, but the intro archipelago will not be ready for this month, since I still don't know how I want to approach it. It isn't really necessary, as you can start playing the game without it, but I think it's a good addition for new players.

Aside from that, last week I also had that sudden burst of inspiration and came up with a new setting that I am now calling Of Blood & Clay. The poll seems to indicate most of you want me to develop that into a proper game (two thirds of you, to be precise, want it done), so I will do it. But my idea is to not allow this to become a proper distraction, and to turn it into a kind of design exercise for me, to see how light I can make a game while still liking it. I love the setting but after having worked for the last four months on a proper game (Broken Shores), the last thing I want to do is to jump into another monster project and spend the rest of the year writing a wild idea. So I want this to be super basic; essentially, I want this to be my Kal-Arath. I know that's what I said with Machine Gods, and while it is super rules light and simple, this time around I want to do something I can finish in a week or two. So yes, super basic, but with room for growth. I'll keep you guys posted!

In any case, my priority is to get Broken Shores done, as you can imagine. I'm not sure how it happened, but it's looking like the future of Blackoath might sit on its shoulders, because I want to run a big Kickstarter campaign for it and see if I can distribute it worldwide with GamesQuest. I have lots of ideas for stretch goals and to promote the game, so I want to really give it my best. The game is cool, it's tight, and the setting is a fun one, so I'm hoping it will click with people. The shipping situation is really getting out of hand, and it's clear that I can no longer continue shipping books myself. Prices going up constantly, couriers not delivering or picking up packages, new regulations and tariffs... it's honestly an absolute nightmare, and each time I get a new order I start sweating because I know it's going to be a struggle. And Print on Demand distribution works great, but it's also getting very expensive and my margins are disappearing. It sucks to know that I'm selling a book for 50 Euros and only get 3-8€ from a sale... The vast majority of my work benefits other people. I'm super lucky I sell enough copies monthly to survive, but imagine if I had larger margins, I would be able to set up Blackoath as a proper business. So that's what I'm hoping to achieve with the GamesQuest deal.

In any case, I'm going back to work. Oh yeah, cat update: she's doing fine, still scare out of her mind and doesn't want to exit her box, but she loves being caressed and asks for attention all the time, it's eating and slowly recovering her strength. Now to convince her that the apartment is not the dangerous place she seems to think it is...

Have a great week!