Thursday, February 5, 2026

MSJX Blog

Today I want to mention Matt Jackson's MSJX blog. 
 
MSJX is full of fun gaming stuff.  Little games, small maps, compact character sheets, actual game plays.  I always enjoy reading it.
 
Two of my favorite things are the maps of Burrowmoor and Willowford that Matt did.  These maps focus two areas in James Spahn's mini setting Willowford Valley that appears in his White Box Omnibus.  The maps help flesh out the setting in a nice way.
 
The blog is here. 

Sunday, February 1, 2026

Character Creation Challenge 2026 Recap

Well, what can I say?

 

- I did it!  31 characters in 31 days.  I didn't complete the Challenge the last time I attempted it. This time I fell behind once but pulled through.

- I did some prep work ahead of time but even though I tried to stay ahead of the game it wasn't easy.  I pretty quickly chewed through the pregens.  Once or twice I got a couple of days ahead but it didn't last long. 

- Although I did repeat a couple of systems, the majority of the characters were from unique games. 

- My preference for rules-lite games helped.  Most of the games had a simple character creation process. 

- Speaking of rules-like games, I probably could've created 31 character using just The Black Hack variants alone. 

- One of my goals was to introduce people to interesting but somewhat obscure games.  I hope I succeeded.

- I really do like creating characters.  This exercise has reinforced that I do prefer systems where the creation process also aids building the characters backstory. Once again, this is why I love creating characters for Barbarians of Lemuria and the games in its family.

- And thank you for looking at my posts.  Knowing that someone was reading them helped keep me motivated.