Have your The Yellow King Roleplaying Game players grown complacent battling gargoyles, vampires, and riot dogs? Do you have a reality horror mystery crying out for a fresh and bizarre villain to drive it? Legions of Carcosa: The Yellow King Bestiary solves your problems by helping you create some for your Belle Époque art students, […]

Hunger, Hatred, Domination, Oblivion, and Ruin. The world is dying, poised on the brink of falling to one of these great dooms. Factions pursue their own interests, as likely to be the heralds of the world’s destruction as they are its saviours. Horrors – monstrous abominations that defy logic, science, and nature – roam the land. Bands of hunters follow bold leaders, seeking out and destroying Horrors, gaining fame as word of their deeds spreads amongst the desperate survivors. Rival bands compete for prestige, clash over ideology, and pose as much of a threat to each other as the Horrors they hunt.

“Fighting the Machine is like fighting the ocean. You literally cannot hurt it. Doesn’t matter how much poison we dump into the ocean. We’ll only kill the things in it. We’ll never kill it. Same with the God-Machine. Kill angels, traitors, stigmatics, cultists, cryptids, whatever, you’ll never hurt the Machine Itself. No, that doesn’t mean we stop trying. You stop trying, you drown. Screw that.”

—Mr. Bliss, Guardian Inquisitor

Today, FlamesRising.com is pleased to host a special preview from Monarchies of Mau, an upcoming game published by Pugsteady and Onyx Path Publishing. Monarchies of Mau uses a customized version of the 5th Edition rules from the world’s most popular fantasy RPG. It’s been redesigned for streamlined play, with an emphasis on cooperation and action […]

Dark Eras: Beneath the Skin

There is a face beneath this mask, but it isn’t me. I’m no more that face than I am the muscles beneath it, or the bones beneath that.

—Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

Ahuitzotl sits on the throne at the height of the Aztec Empire, overseeing his sorcerer-priests’ sacrifices and the endless flower wars his jaguar and eagle warriors carry out in his name to keep the altars well-supplied with victims. The gears of the Aztec Empire turn smoothly and inexorably, but not everything is what it pretends to be. Skinchangers take the shapes of animals to run the wilds or bring down human prey, the Unchained cobble together identities from stolen lives, and stranger things still lurk in the deserts and jungles beyond the walls of Tenochtitlan.

In Lee Murray’s most recent novel, Into The Mist, we follow the exploits of Sergeant Taine McKenna’s squad of professional soldiers, responsible for the safety of the group of geologists and biologists sent out to follow up on tantalizing news of the discovery of a large gold nugget. The squad is assigned to baby-sit this group of civilian scientists as they wander into the bush in search of the site where the gold was discovered. To make matters more complicated, shadowy corporate entities are interfering with the expedition, hoping to get the jump on their competitors and claim the mineral rights for their own firm. Tuhoe separatist rebels make an appearance as well, and they show up at a most inopportune time as the scientists and soldiers are struggling for their very lives against not only the elements and the rough terrain of Te Urewera National Park, but also against something more sinister — and hungry: a creature that seems hell-bent on picking them off one by one, and that shows a level of unnatural patience and cunning in hunting them down.

Today, FlamesRising.com is pleased to present you with a preview of the Eel Hounds, a monster from the Wrath of the River King published by Kobold Press.

Wrath of the River King is a Pathfinder Roleplaying Game adventure for 4th- through 6th-level characters is full of hijinks and trickery, and fits nicely into any campaign setting in which fey are regal. Their courtly plots are dangerous and will test bold adventurers’ skills to the limit!

Today, FlamesRising.com is pleased to present you with a preview of Punch the Maker-Killer, a monster from Arc Dream Publishing’s Puppetland by John Scott Tynes. The PDF is on sale now, and the hardcover edition will be available in October.

Puppetland is a storytelling game. You play a valiant puppet who speaks aloud every word you say. You speak for your puppet and the Puppetmaster says the rest. You surprise each other at every turn, collaborating moment by inspired moment to unlock your own creativity and find the puppet within. This lavishly illustrated edition of Puppetland has been significantly revised and expanded. It includes a grim storybook fable of the Maker’s foul murder; the true story of the creator’s life in Puppetland; and new Tales ready to be played, written by a brilliant collection of authors.

Over the years, I’ve worked on (and have played) a lot of games with folks from every corner of the industry, but I’ve never had the opportunity to write for Dungeons and Dragons. Battle for the Undercity (5E) is a release that changed all that thanks to dmsguild.com. Today, I’d like to share with you my process for designing this adventure.

The first thing I did was review the adventure structure. Having played D&D 5E, I understood how important that was but, at the same time, I wanted to put my own twist on it. After I read the DMs Guild Creator Adventure Template and refreshed my memory by referencing Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Rise of Tiamat, I came up with a plan. I wanted to design a location and fitting monster variants that could be used in any Forgotten Realms campaign, in part because of my own experiences playing D&D. By tapping into the two elements every city tends to have which, in this case, was the undercity (sewers, worked tunnels, etc.) and a tavern, I felt DMs could use Battle for the Undercity as a break between campaigns or intense sessions.

Matt Forbeck has been a bit busy over the past year. He started a series of Kikcstarters to support and promote a crazy idea: that he could write and prepare for publication one novel a month for twelve months. I caught up with Matt recently to ask him about one of the most recent books in that series, Monster Academy 1: I Will Not Eat People.

Review by Steven Dawes As a reviewer, I make it a point to not give out any spoilers if I don’t have to. However, after reading issue Department of Monsterology Issue #2 (and #3 once I finish this review), a few spoilers tidbits will have to start coming out. If you don’t want to risk […]

THE LAST WAR HAS BEGUN

Demons feed on innocent souls while angels obliterate cities. Humans are caught in the middle: possessed, devoured, judged, damned.

The world needs a hero. Unfortunately, there aren’t any, so what the fuck, you might as well give it a try.

You’re a Disciple, a supernatural warrior on the front lines. Wielding bizarre magics like Sexpletive, Death Panel, Photobomb, and Gunfetti, you must hunt down these merciless predators and rescue innocent civilians without losing your grip on the tattered vestiges of your humanity. How far will you go to destroy your enemy? Will you resort to cannibalism? Are you certain? Listen, don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.

Pandemonio is available now at the Flames Rising RPGNow Shop!

The character of Stompadon was invented by performance artist Kelsey Wailes as part of a competition called Super Art Fight. Wearing a massive mask, gloves and a tail, Wailes became the bug-eyed dinosaur that drew, creating mad-cap murals in a 25-minute time limit.

Stompadon is now taking on a life of its own, with a plush toy. Plus… truly fancy pieces of art and a weapons-grade adorable children’s book, written by Stompadon’s dad and illustrated by Stompadon.

Find out more info about Stompadon and back this project on Kickstarter.com!

Edison T. Crux is an author whose first novel, “Tale of the Wisconsin Werewolf” debuts on December 15. The author will be attending an event at Pegasus Games

“Deep beneath the waves, a creature named Grue broods. He no longer wants to eat lusty beachgoers, no matter how their hormones call to him. A chorus of crabs urges him to reconsider. After all, people are delicious! But this monster has changed. Grue found Shakespeare’s plays in cola bottles and, through them, a new heart. Now he yearns to join the world above.

Rising from a brine of drive-in pulp and gentle poetry, Jonathan Case’s debut graphic novel Dear Creature is the love story you never imagined!”

How in the world did I miss this book when it came out? Inside of the covers of this book, lies a story that blew me away and artwork that melted my eyes out of their sockets. The visuals were so GORE-Geous, and they were only presented in black and white. The real kicker though was the way that Case was able to show expression through facial features and body movements.

Flames Rising recently put an open call for essays and articles on the topic of “How to run Horror RPGs” and we received several great submissions (hint you can still send yours in too). We’re starting off with this post from Stygian Jim…

Horror is the genre of fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of the monster lurking just out of sight, fear of the dead rising again with a hunger for human flesh. Fear is very personal, and horror can be as much an internal struggle as a reaction to an external source. Fear is a huge motivator, in gaming it can be a great motivator for heroes and villains alike, but how does one cultivate it at the table? Horror games can be much harder to craft than your standard sword & sorcery delve. Also, it can be difficult to inculcate your players to the kind of thinking that the genre entails, when they’re used to kicking down doors and busting heads. There are some advanced techniques as well that you can use to build a sense of tension in your players, and make the story an even more eerie experience. Lastly of course you can use props, sound effects and lighting to set the mood for your own tales of horror.

This remarkable journey through the Hammer vault includes props, annotated script pages, unused poster artwork, production designs, rare promotional material and private correspondence. Hundreds of rare and previously unseen stills help to create a rich souvenir of Hammer’s legacy, from the X certificate classics of the 1950s to the studio’s latest productions.

Written and compiled by the official Hammer Films historian Marcus Hearn, and featuring exclusive contributions from the actors and filmmakers associated with the company, this is the most lavish book ever published on the legendary House of Horror.

From aliens to zombies, historian W. Scott Poole ventures deep into the darkest shadows of American history in search of witches, sea monsters, and serial killers. Both a masterpiece of scholarship and a heartfelt homage to horror films and literature, Monsters in America is one man’s journey into the violent truths the rest of us prefer to ignore.

Jeremy L. C. Jones stops by Flames Rising to talk with a self-professed “lifelong horror nerd” about America’s dirty little secrets and our sordid part in the cover up.

The 1974 television series Kolchak: The Night Stalker never got rave reviews from critics. Only twenty episodes of the show exist, plus two TV movie/pilot episodes: The Night Stalker (1972) and The Night Strangler (1973). The special effects, even by the standards of the day, were cheesy and unremarkable, though the stories themselves were interesting and provided a wide variety of paranormal beasties from folklore the world over instead of rehashing zombies or vampires week after week. Unfortunately, the TV movies proved vastly more popular than the TV series they generated.

It should come as no surprise that a graphic novel treatment of Kolchak might spring into being as well, and at that before the reboot of the series. Enter Moonstone Books with their long-running Kolchak series, and lo, Kolchak has been brought back from the dead, like many of the creepy entities he faced as a reporter with a nose for the paranormal.

Flames Rising is pleased to announce the latest release in the Instant Antagonists line. The Creepy Cottontail author, Monica Valentinelli (and Flames Rising project Manager) shares some notes on the design and writing process that went into this product.

Having conducted a lot of occult research for my writing — both game-and-story-related — there’s a particular concept that always stands out in my mind. Performing a ritual (both real and/or imagined) is work, but the end result of that “job” doesn’t always yield the same results every time. Take a basic love potion for example. Do you have any idea how many different types of love potions there are? In many cases, not only do you have to get the ritual down pat, but you also have to worry about backlash, timing and the integrity of the materials. Even then, there’s no guarantee that magic will function the same way twice because there’s one-too-many factors that you cannot control.

The “cost” of doing magic is something I feel is often overlooked because some view it as an obstacle that gets in the way of a story or a game. I look at it as a characterization of a protagonist or… in this case… Instant Antagonist.