The Glatisant: Issue #72
Lore Blocks, Spellbooks as Encounters, and Talking to the Dungeon
Sales
DriveThruRPG has a big sale on all things Dragonbane, with all of the core books 50% off.
Lots of RPGs on sale at Humble Bundle, including PDF megapacks of Forgotten Realms, Shadowrun, Fallout, and The Witcher.
This Month at Questing Beast
At Questing Beast, I reviewed the Cairn boxed set, Mythic Bastionland, the Nimble RPG, and the Games You Can Play In Your Head, By Yourself series (available here), which turned into the surprise hit video of the month.
I’ve also continued working on the Maze Knights RPG, my squad-playing follow-up to Maze Rats. Version 0.0.18 is up on Patreon now, and at the end of this newsletter for paid Substack supporters. Changes include streamlining character creation (thanks to my patrons for feedback on that), fleshing out 12 Rogue Guilds and 12 Fighter Schools to help differentiate PCs, changing modifiers to advantage/disadvantage, expanding on how feats work, and more.
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Have an upcoming Kickstarter or an RPG project you want to promote? Advertise in The Glatisant (23k subscribers) using this form or on the Questing Beast channel (119k subscribers) using this one. If you want to send me books for review consideration on Questing Beast, mail them to Ben Milton, 6446 E Central Ave #127, Wichita, KS, USA 67206.
Reviews
Ten Foot Pole give “The Best” to two adventures, Bergummo’s Tower and Fly Me To the Moon. From the second review:
I like this vibe/theming a lot. It’s consistent. And it provides interactivity for a party willing to mix things up. As a view of the moon, in terms of theming and encounters, I would be hard pressed to believe someone could do better. . .
Experienced murder hobos are gonna have a field day.
Justin Alexander reviews Brindlewood Bay. I played this last year, and although I enjoyed the theme and the characters, I did find it frustrating being in a mystery that didn’t really need to be solved, but instead needed to be written.
Quinns Quest reviews Public Access, a creepypasta RPG.
Valeria Loves reviews Daggerheart.
News and Gaming Culture
The 2026 Bloggies have come to an end! Check out the top three blog posts in each category here, or go read the five winners: Writing Rooms in Pairs, How Jennell Jaquays Evolved Dungeon Design, Random Encounter Tables as Adventure RAM, Why Medgadungeons?, and Mapping the Blogosphere (which also won best overall post).
Dungeon Masterpiece forecasts the future of the tabletop gaming industry (regarding tariffs) using his background as a geopolitical strategist.
Prismatic Wasteland starts a new blogging bandwagon: The Map is Not the Territory But It is the Topic
Patrick Stuart has released Queen Mab’s Palace, his new sci-fi/medieval novel.
Dreaming Dragonslayer has created a Mythic Bastionland Syllabus, collecting resources for the game from around the internet and hosting them in one place.
GGNORE releases a new episode of their RPG advice column, Dear Gary.
Chris McDowall announces the playtest of Intergalactic Bastionland. Check out the files here.
Theory and Advice
Mazirian’s Garden: The Sacrament of the Minotaur
A Knight at the Opera: Navigation Games
Goblin Punch: Be of Good Cheer
Failure Tolerated: Talking to the Dungeon
The Graverobber’s Guide: Tell, Test, Twist
Knavelands: Treasure in Knave
Detect Magic: Stealth Damage
Blog of Forlorn Encystment: The Player-Drawn Dungeon Map is a Fast Travel Hack
Bastionland: Threaten Me with a Bad Time
Cryptic Keyway: Class, Ancestry, Background — Choose Two, Drop the Other
Explorer’s Design: Designing Lore Blocks
Gordian Blade: If You Haven’t Tried Group-Based Initiative, You’re Missing Out
Worldbuilding
Goblin Punch: Gender Among the Elves
Vaults of Vaarn: Seekers of Eyeless Wisdom
The Novel Game Master: The Time Tuner - An Adventure Location
On Unnamed Horizons: Cities, Circles, and Venn Diagrams
In the Company of Monsters: Trophic Encounters
Beneath Foreign Planets: Calendar-Weather/Weather-Calendar and d30 Months of Weird Weather
Cavorting Whorl: Soviet Baztiumstan
Dungeonfruit: Chemic Red (6 Magic Colors)
Ponder the Goose: Spellbooks as Encounters
_nubmark: Empire Army Showcase
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