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The Furtive Goblin

@furtsburrow.bsky.social

40 followers 16 following 72 posts

TTRPG writer, up-and-coming developmental editor, and professional anxiety goblin from Upstate New York. I blog a bunch about games, and have worked on Book of Gaub, Bridgetown, Sooty Beards, etc. (He/Him/His) linktr.ee/thefurtivegoblin

Posts Replies Media

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop @backwardsttrpg.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

COMING SOON: In prelaunch w/ Violent Delights, another game inspired by Shakespeare: Mousetrap is a cursed game-within-a-game that won’t go back into its box. It’s game night. You and your friends have gathered to play a Hamlet-inspired game manuscript from 1983. But there’s a catch…

kickstarter.com

Coming soon: Mousetrap & Violent Delights

A cursed game-within-a-game that won't go back into its box, and a chess-based RPG about Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

A glimpse into how groups of my more sociable cousins sometimes organize themselves. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2026/09/a-br...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

A Brief Overview of the Goblin Auntie

I've alluded to them more times than I can count, assured you that I'm not yours, and even designed a GLOG class dedicated to them, but I d...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Woot! You did it! They did it! We did it!

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

Designed a mix-and-match humanoid class for Aketon, a game that is both a revamp of original Chainmail rules and a 2d6 system. You could probably zoom out and make them more mongrelfolk by giving them a d66 table with crab claws and scales and junk. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2026/07/beas...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Beastfolk Class for Aketon

A friend recently showed me Aketon , a slimmed-down revamp of Chainmail which is rules-lite enough to count as just the aketon . Besides of...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Indie Groundbreakers was just the beginning! Let's do it!

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop @backwardsttrpg.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

SPINE is nominated for Best Solo Game in this year's ENNIES, and voting is now live: vote.ennie-awards.com/vote/2026/ Please help spread the word and consider giving it a vote. And if you haven't heard of SPINE, here is a thread. SPINE is a dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book... 🧵

You are a researcher who has inherited a strange book from an estranged relative… Image: Print copy of SPINE

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

Finally finished another one of my meandering build-a-character posts, this time visiting Middle-Earth with a mix of TOR 1E and 2E. I ended up quite liking the system, or at least making characters for it. I should be less afraid of proprietary dice. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2026/07/new-...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

New System, New Face: Giving A Child Crippling Anxiety With The One Ring Roleplaying Game 2E

The One Ring has been on my radar for years, but I never really bothered to learn any part of the system until recently. This is because I'm...

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop @backwardsttrpg.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

SPINE's ENNIE nomination is due to the efforts of @furtsburrow.bsky.social, @naladraws.com, and Holly Freiberg, as well as myself. It wouldn't be quite so cursed or innovative without them.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

... Oh, right, I have a blog I'm supposed to write for, don't I. Shoot. Uhh. Let's go with... an orky tribe name generator where you can roll the greenskinz equivalent of Moon-Moon? furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2026/05/hooz... Yeah. That.

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Hoo'z Dat Lot? A d100 Warhammer-Inspired Greenskin Tribe Name Generator

Dere'z some proppa ugly lookin' gitz comin' up da way, boss. I fink it'z da... It’z Da… d100 Furzt Part Zekund Part 1 ‘Ard Arrerz 2 ‘Arda-de...

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The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

Honored to have been a part of this, Asa! Not bad for my first-ever editing gig.

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Charlie Rat Bastard Is Writing About Oceans and Storms @feralcharlie.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

Howdy folks! Dropping a line to say that this week is the week for Mildew and Silver's campaign and (very importantly) the beginning of Old-School Essentials month!

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop @backwardsttrpg.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

UPCOMING GAME ANNOUNCEMENT Violent Delights is a chess-based rpg about Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet. It depicts the masquerade scene in which our lovers first meet. The chess board represents the Capulet’s great chamber, and the players act as a cast of characters who correspond to chess pieces. 👇

kickstarter.com

Coming soon: Violent Delights

A chess-based RPG about Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/12/2025

Technically the holiday's already been going on for a few weeks now and has a few weeks still, but today seems to be a day for well-wishing. So I wish a painless Narblesnard to my dear burrowers and other surface folks. May your acorns be plentiful, and the squirrels too sluggish to catch you.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 21/12/2025

Made a silly little fella for another Troika! jam. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/12/wayw...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Wayward Perchtling Background for Troika! Community Jam: Xmas 2025

Another little entry for another little Troika! community jam , this one holiday-themed. You can find it and my past jam entries on Itch.i...

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The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 20/12/2025

Put together some observations on porting The Banner Saga to a tabletop setting. Actually writing it as a finished project feels like an impossible task, but writing a blog post about how I WOULD do it is much easier. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/12/thou...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Thoughts on Porting/Adapting/Fudging The Banner Saga to Tabletop

The Banner Saga, or Post-Apocalyptic Oregon Trail Viking Tactics DX as I like to call it, was the first video game I ever saw crowdfunded. ...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

In which I ramble about lumpy dwarves, art history, and a little bit of geology. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/11/an-a...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

An Alternate Universe of Dwarvish Art & Architecture as Glimpsed in MERP's Mines of Moria

Or, a Manifestation of Furt's Guilt Over not Doing More with the Art History Courses He Took in College I've tangled with Rolemaster 's litt...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Another rad project from Asa Donald of Backwoods fame is in the works, and I've had the privilege of working on it with him! If you like solo TTRPGs or the idea of found footage horror in book form, check it out! It'll even let you vent those dark, twisted urges to mark up a book you might get.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 19/05/2025

I was rereading some AD&D 3E/5E fan projects the other day and noticed the clown-haired catoblepas in that old piece of PHB art has a tramp(ier) stamp.

A group of adventurers in a wetland are fleeing from a catoblepas with ears shaped like a clown wig. The artist's signature, Trampier, is displayed prominently upon the catoblepas' lower back.

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Unlawful Games @unlawfulgames.bsky.social · 20/04/2025

Sooty Beards by @furtsburrow.bsky.social and myself has its first live play yall! youtu.be/WoDCuNjubXM?...

Wandering Monster plays Sooty Beards

YouTube video by Wandering Monster

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 06/04/2025

Since there's another bank-bustingly successful #shadowdarkrpg Kickstarter going on, I was inspired to finally take a stab at a class in the game's style. It's more an answer to my own anxiety over the real-time torch mechanic than anything, though. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/04/lamp...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Lamplighter Class for Shadowdark

LAMPLIGHTER CLASS Owl-eyed watchers, jumpy tomb-skulkers, or selfless defenders of the light who use burning oil and grim hope to keep the l...

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop @backwardsttrpg.bsky.social · 02/04/2025

NEW GAME ALERT... What if I told you that you are a mech pilot, doomed to burn out? This deck of cards? It’s your mech’s battery pack. Every time you use your mech, you take one step closer to burning out… Finish your missions before you run out of cards and deplete your battery.

"This is your battery pack." A line art illustration of a deck of cards.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 05/04/2025

I think I've finally concluded my conceptual game mechanics kick by expanding on an experience system taken from a weird old Dragon Magazine article. ... Not sure where to go from here. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/04/earn...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Earning XP Through Community Investment

(Misleading Clickbait Title: Elevate Your D&D Campaign With Orgies, Inc.™!) A few times on this blog I've fiddled with alternate XP systems ...

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Unlawful Games @unlawfulgames.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

Ever wanted an ancient, majestic dwarf-hold mashed together with a dying coal town? Sooty Beards has your back! Check out this grimly whimsical micro-setting zine and supplemental booklet of D66 TROIKA! backgrounds, or some of the other bearded goodies we’re offering! plusoneexp.com/pages/sooty-...

Plus One Experience

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 15/03/2025

Did some salvage and fiddling with the bones of an old draft and tried to hammer alignment into something resembling the 'cosmic battle without [Good] and [Evil] tags' approach from the Elric/Eternal Champion series. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/03/adap...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Adapting Moorcockian Cosmology to D&D

Years ago now I tried writing a post about alignment in D&D, Elden Ring, and Michael Moorcock. It quickly bloated into a messy constellation...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 10/03/2025

Aaand one more post for the day looking at a d100 system for BFRPG, where I looked at some of the merits of an experience system that rewards successful rolls vs one that grants experience for failures. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/03/new-...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 10/03/2025

Another little indulgence in my problematic trashfave, this time welding bits and pieces of OSE together into a couple of Warcraft-inspired character classes. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/03/azer...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Azerothian Kobold & Furbolg for Old School Essentials (Classes & Species)

A lot of the early lore for Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft has become so foundational, or alternatively so transformed and reinterpreted o...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 10/03/2025

Forgot to share this mess I wrote the other day theorizing a better way to do Dragonlance's ambient magic from the 5th Age, using Talislanta's freeform spellcasting as a reference. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/03/musi...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Musings on a Dragonlance X Talislanta Magic System Crossover Nobody Asked For

Notice: What follows is a collection of ideas and guidelines rather than a fully realized homebrew system. It probably would have been faste...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

Spent a few hours ripping apart a PDF for font files and tracking down never-reprinted French edition character art to create a Talislanta 4E archetype with maximum fidelity to the half-page card format. As high-fidelity as MSPaint allows, at least. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/03/khar...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Kharakhan Sage (Archetype for Talislanta 4E)

KHARAKHAN SAGE “Eat something, you’re all skin and bones. Almost short as a Marukan...” Your people are dying out. Your clan knows it, and...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 28/02/2025

This month was very orky for me for some reason, not that I'm complaining. I decided to finish it off with a d20 table of ideas for nonstandard half-orc combinations. If something doesn't logistically make sense, you can probably blame a wizard. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/02/half...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Half-Orc, Half-What?

My previous post converting half-orcs from AD&D to OD&D remound me of the weirdest piece of half-orc lore from the early editions: that the...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

I always liked helping the half-orcs at the end of Shamutanti Hills, so I figured why not give one the opportunity to do some adventuring too? furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/02/vent...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Venturesome Svinn (TROIKA! Background Inspired by Sorcery!)

Your people are the Svinn clan, sometimes called "aggressive-looking man-orcs" by those humans of Kakhabad who have not yet known the modest...

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Plus One Exp @ 🔜 Metatopia @plusoneexp.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

What is Sooty Beards? A setting zine about a fantasy dwarf-hold crossed with a decaying American coal town. People are leaving and things are falling apart. If something doesn’t change– if things can’t change– it’ll become a ghost town soon. Check it out at TTRPG.link/SootyBeards 2/x

Plus One Experience

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Been reading Supplements I-III and decided OD&D could use some playable half-orcs. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/02/conv...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Converting the Half-Orc to OD&D and then Overcomplicating it Again Anyway

The first three supplements for OD&D added a plethora of optional rules that would later be elaborated into AD&D 1E. Supplement I: Greyhawk...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

A quick background inspired by one of my favorite bits of worldbuilding from Sunless Sea and Fallen London, looking at how the Khanate keeps its old sky-worship alive, deep underground. I feel like Sunless Sea is pretty TROIKA!, horror elements aside. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/02/blue...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Blue Priest of the Salt Steppes (TROIKA! Background inspired by Sunless Sea/Fallen London)

The light flickers to life overhead, momentarily blinding you and transporting you someplace else. For just a moment, you imagine it is the ...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 13/02/2025

After a longer wait than usual, my next entry in the history of shamans in D&D is out! This one looks at one of the Mystaran Gazetteers, The Orcs of Thar. You can read along this time, since someone threw the boxed set up on the Internet Archive. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/02/spir...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Spirits & Spookiness: Gazetteer 10: The Orcs of Thar (1988)

Preface Ugh. Alright, let’s get this over with. The Orcs of Thar , written by Bruce Heard for BECMI D&D, is the 10th entry in the Mystara Ga...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 08/02/2025

Learned about the D&D material published in early issues of White Dwarf magazine last night and found a character class that lets you play as a pack of 16 blink dogs. I feel like we need more of this kind of thing. archive.org/details/whit...

A screen-grab of the Blink Dog class, but you can find the full page in the archive link.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

Deep down, I always knew my disembodied head would find its way onto your desk someday. Seriously though I love it. 💚

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

"Looks like meat's back on the menu, boys!" is basically just Girl Dinner with extra steps, isn't it?

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 24/01/2025

Found a tantalizingly incomplete character class in an old BECMI zine and felt the overpowering compulsion to fix it and make one of my own. I say "fix", but it's not actually trying to be BETTER. Maybe just a little more, ya know, playable. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/01/shep...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Shepherd Class for BFRPG

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon Dragonsfoot's old OD&D and BECMI fan zine, OD&Dities . In addition to realizing how close I came to ripping ...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 16/01/2025

Get ready for dying coal towns and drunk canaries!

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 11/01/2025

I was reading the 3E Underdark book for Forgotten Realms again and noticed that thanks to their 2 starting levels in monstrous humanoid, the eyeless and completely blind grimlocks have Spot as a class skill. I love this kind of jank.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

I was inspired to jam on the Thoul a bit, and ended up turning that hobgoblin/troll/ghoul/typo monster of old into a character class for OSE Classic. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/01/rene...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Renegade Thoul Class for OSE Classic

Freak. Mutant. Abomination. Thoul . You've heard it all by now. It doesn't phase you anymore. You don't even bother snarkily correcting thei...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 04/01/2025

Reject dwarfmanity and return to insec in another one of my weird Norse-inspired classes for GLOG, this time with more flies but just as much hating on the gods. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2025/01/pupa...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Pupating Dwarf (GLOG Class)

"[...] Next the gods took their places on their thrones and instituted their courts and discussed where the dwarfs had been generated from i...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

Guess I lied when I said that was going to be the last of my posts for the month. So have some gryphons, gryphon-riders, and a random diss of Pliny the Elder just for fun. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/12/gryp...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Gryphon-Rider of Riphaea (TROIKA! Background & Creature)

According to Pliny the Elder , savage gryphons and a tribe of one-eyed Scythians battle endlessly over gold in the mountains of Hyperborea. ...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 26/12/2024

Needed to round out my blog posts for the month and decided to make a cozy Troika background inspired by a pun. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/12/hob-...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Hob-Goblin (TROIKA! Background)

Hob Noun ( archaic ) The flat projection or iron shelf at the side of a fire grate, where things are put to be kept warm. Hob-goblin Noun Th...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 25/12/2024

A Blessed Narblesnard to my dear Burrowers, and also all the normies. May your acorns quell the ravenous squirrels until spring, and may you find a moment in the quiet stillness.

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 18/12/2024

I elected the way of pain and wrote a handbook for an obscure class from one of the more egregious 3E Gold Rush books that is nonetheless near and dear to my tiny beige heart. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/12/mast...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Mastering the Runes: A World of Warcraft d20 RPG Class Handbook Written in the Wrong Decade for No One

A wizened old dwarf chisels symbols of power into her ornate hammer. A defiant orc beats his fists together until his body is struck through...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 30/11/2024

Two more posts for my history of shamanism in D&D mini-series, in which I cast some shade on Gary and wring every last bit of content out of the BECMI core boxed sets that I possibly can, respectively. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/11/spir... furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/11/spir...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Spirits & Spookiness Interlude: Basic & Advanced D&D Split (1977)

Admittedly this post isn't actually going to be about shaman classes, but it is valuable connective tissue in the history of D&D that I didn...

Reposted by The Furtive Goblin

Charlie Rat Bastard Is Writing About Oceans and Storms @feralcharlie.bsky.social · 12/11/2024

To be fair, @unlawfulgames.bsky.social @furtsburrow.bsky.social have given me COPIUS inspiration to draw from. Sooty Beards is almost done with layout and art!

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 09/11/2024

Something silly for those who need it right now. I made a background and creature stats for Troika inspired by the Shoopuf of Final Fantasy X. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/11/ride...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

Ride Ze Shoopuf? (TROIKA! Background & Creature)

Shoopuf Driver You are one of the froglike Hypello, clammy and laidback in the extreme. So laidback in fact, that when the river decided to ...

The Furtive Goblin @furtsburrow.bsky.social · 04/11/2024

Another year, another ponderous look through a Dragonlance spinoff series. Seems I've gone and gotten myself invested. furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com/2024/11/the-...

furtivegoblingaming.blogspot.com

The One Where Furt Reads a Second Dragonlance Novel in as Many Years to Quell the Gnashing Anxiety in the Back of His Head and Then Ends up Summarizing it Again

Late last year I wrote at length about my experiences trying to read a book for the first time in ages. In typical Furtive fashion I laid b...