Fear Fest Winners

My name is Andrew (or Saga) and I am a writer at heart. I have been playing TTRPGs for about 10 years, running them for 6. I am a forever GM and I love it! I also have been running games in a monthly TTRPG book club at my LFG since August 2025.

I started designing in my free time for D&D about 3 years ago and ever since Daggerheart came out, I've moved my games and design focus there. I started homebrewing for Daggerheart at the beginning of this year and have really felt at home within this system. It's one that offers a lot more freedom to try new ideas while still requiring restraint which has me truly made feel like a designer. It's the first time I feel proud enough of my work to share, as I have done with others in the Discord, who have all been wonderful to talk to. I've already started on a lot of projects (adversaries, environments, a new domain and class, an adventure module, and a location). When I saw this event, I was excited that it may finally give me that push to publish something!

I’m a transfemme therapist from Massachusetts who’s been in love with fantasy and sci-fi since I was a kid. I didn’t find TTRPGs until adulthood, but have really valued the way they facilitate creating stories in a collaborative way since I started playing. After GMing for some time and starting grad school, I began running therapeutic TTRPG groups with my clients. I got a lot out of exploring what these games could do for people in a therapy group context and enjoyed tinkering with the games to intentionally facilitate people’s goals related to their social/emotional wellbeing. I’ve been taking a (hopefully temporary) break from practicing as a therapist due to some particular precarity in my life and the world in general. In that time, have become a professional GM on StartPlaying running Daggerheart and trying my hand at more extensive homebrew like custom campaign frames and subclasses, which has been really grounding. I’ve also been planning on using the Belonging Outside Belonging system to make a game intended to help facilitate activists practicing conflict skills with each other in a lower stakes environment. I’m also a huge fan of horror games, so I’m particularly excited about the Halloween theme!

I am DM Dan Quixote, a professional GM of 4 years, having been a GM for nearly 10 years at this point. I have been running games of D&D for friends and clients most of this time, crafting homebrew worlds and stories, but with Daggerheart's release I have been doing more mechanical homebrewing than ever. It’s been challenging but very rewarding, and I want to do more. With the collaborative nature of the game, I want to be able to give things to the community to use and tweak and expand on. And on a selfish level, I want to add another string to my bow by getting to design for games as well as run them.

My name is Derek Rawlings, and I'm a consummate ludophile who's been playing card games, board games, and table-top roleplaying games for about 30 years now. I started with Vampire: the Masquerade and AD&D in home games in Vancouver, Canada, and have since fallen in love with the Forged in the Dark system and other more story forward games. When I'm not playing games, I'm an armchair urbanism/transit advocate, fan of doomed sports teams, and connoisseur of tea.

In the five years I've been designing, I've mostly self-published supplements including "Tales from the Ultraverse" and four other zine-length Slugblaster books as well as "Circles and Assets" (which among other things introduces Circle types to Candela Obscura) at https://dmrawlings.itch.io/. Recently, I was fortunate to get my first published credit through Mythworks' "Slime, Warp, and Solder" (for consultation and contributions).

My current project is "Cast Into Flame", a more classic fantasy Tolkien-inspired Campaign Frame+ for Daggerheart with 60+ adversaries and environments as well as guidance on running a level 1 to 10 campaign. I'm currently in discussion with an artist, and hope to launch crowdfunding in late Fall, 2026.

I'm a biologist by day and a fantasy nerd by night, or so I usually say. The truth is I'm both all the time, constantly weaving my knowledge of biology into what I write and design in fantasy settings. I've been in the TTRPG scene for about five years, starting casually with D&D and getting more seriously into it as a GM over the last three years. It wasn't until recently that I started branching out and exploring other systems like Nimble, Mythic Bastionland, Mothership, and Daggerheart. I loved all those games, but Daggerheart stood out as a nice mix of rules-heavy gameplay with a narrative focus. I was originally designing a custom campaign as a D&D module, but I've since been reworking it as a large Daggerheart campaign frame seeing as this system fits my vision for what I'm writing better.

I grew up withdrawn from social groups, preferring the company of fantasy authors and video games. I'd drift away from friend groups over time, always comforted by a good book or other rich story.

In April 2020 High Rollers launched Curse of Straad Online. I'd always known of TTRPGs and livestreams, but never thought that I could put one together myself. Crafting narratives, maps, monsters, preparing for every eventuality, it seemed overwhelming to my young self. Yet this module was run online, with pre-made material, where physical proximity wasn't required. I reached out to scattered friends across the world, put together my first D&D campaign, and my life was transformed. This was how I could socialise and express myself!

Six years later I've played an average of one TTRPG session a week, meeting folk from around the globe, and constantly learning. I'm getting started on StartPlaying, and I'm working independently with a friend on publishing our first illustrated campaign frame. TTRPG design is a medium where I can excel, and I'm exploring it with passion.

I'd love to expand my expertise and network with skilled creators. I hope to someday transition from manual labour into something that I enjoy.

Hi there, I’m Kate (she/her). I work professionally as a Lead Editor and Content Developer at LEGO, but in my spare time I adore all things gaming, including board games, video games and of course, TTRPGs. I’m a forever DM for my D&D homegroup and passionate roleplayer of Daggerheart. It’s a dream of mine to develop published material from the many homebrews I’ve playtested with my different groups over the years, so I was excited to see this opportunity to receive mentorship from Daggerheart designers! I was also particularly drawn to the prompt to design “something revolting” that “resonates with terrifying psionic energies”, as I have recently been playing around with mechanics in Daggerheart for telepathic powers and mind control. I hope you enjoy my submission and thanks for the consideration.

I was born in St. Louis and raised by a poor, single mother who had enough stress from balancing jobs and bills without me adding to it. While I had my share of good friends, I ended up with more than my share of time alone. That led to a lot of time entertaining myself and being lost in my own daydreams. In that time, I developed my own personal world of storytelling that grew into a lifelong passion.

I’ve written for story collections and battled through writing fantasy novels, but it wasn’t until I was introduced to tabletop roleplaying games a few years ago that I found the medium that truly fit. I’m currently working through a Daggerheart campaign meant to appeal to fans of lighthearted fantasy while being accessible for parents who want to play with their kids.

The campaign is my first real foray into writing for roleplaying games and is a jumping off point. As I gain experience and network in the space, I want to build upon it and continue to create content that inspires people to create lasting stories together.

Game designer by Trade (University), Software Engineering Lead by day.
Been running Daggerheart as a GM since August last year, ran many different kinds of one-shots from lv1 - lv10 and several small - mid campaigns, from my folk horror story: Toll of the River to an Age of Umbra campaign.
I've always been one for building and designing worlds and wanting to share them with a community, since finding DH last year, it really scratched that creative and game design skills, I had been itching to flex, so since running a few games, I started publishing my own content, campaign frames, adventure modules, soon some adversary and look manuals and the like, with more ideas constantly flowing.
Horror and Darker themed items, seem to be my natural go-to, so excited at the possibility at joining the Fear Fest!

My entire life I’ve known I wanted to be a storyteller. From a lonely kid battling imaginary orcs with a stick in my Alabama backyard to a proud dad battling them alongside my daughter in Texas, I’ve spent all of my forty-two years creating fantastical places to escape into. I always dreamed one day I’d share them with the world as a professional novelist or a filmmaker.

Instead I got a job in tech.

I never really gave up my dreams. There’s still an unfinished novel on my laptop. There’s still a handycam in my closet that shoots video as well as an iPhone 10. But more importantly, there is still a group of friends at my local game store who want me to tell stories with them.

I’ve been contributing to that endeavor by creating Daggerheart adversaries, environments, one-shots, and (hopefully soon) my first Daggerheart campaign frame! Seeing the excitement on my players’ faces when they connect with a story we’re telling together is the highlight of my week.

Now, I’m hoping to spread that excitement further and finally achieve my dream of sharing my imagination with the world by publishing work on Heart of Daggers!

I'm an aspiring author. I have created a Solo RPG, wrote a few TTRPG Tri-Folds for Candela Obscura, and I'm running Daggerheart via Play-by-Post. Generally, I do love anything and everything TTRPG, and since I found out that Critical Role was creating a system of their own, I patiently waited for it.

Now it's here, and I am pretty excited to both run it, and create for it. Though, the fact that it's easy to write for means that it's also hard to write for it.

But anyway, I do hope that this can be my first step into the Daggerheart space. I do intend to create my own campaign frame once I get to familiarize myself with the system more, and once I finalize what I do want in my frame.

I'm Ross, a queer fan of fantasy and horror from Ireland who loves games and writing. Finding TTRPGs which can marry the two had me hooked instantly.

My background in games starts with video games which is why I'm studying programming, but I've been writing and creating for my home games for 6 or so years now but playing for a decade. I spend a lot of time working with and tweaking the games I love for solo or duet play as convincing myself or one person to try new things is easier than scouting a group of 3 or more. So I've had a lot of time invested in breaking down mechanics and piecing them back together for my purposes.

Recently I've made more efforts towards work I can publish and Daggerheart in particular feels like a fresh game despite its many inspirations because there's a fast growing community that makes it an exciting play space and space for creating. My group has really taken to it and there's an ease to the creation and experimentation that is just fun and I want to share that with others.

My name is Ross, I'm a queer fantasy and horror fan who loves writing and loves games, I found TTRPGs married those together and I was hooked. My background in games starts with video games which is why I'm studying programming but I've been writing and creating for my home games for 6 or so years now but I've been playing for a decade. I spend a lot of time working with and tweaking the games I love for solo or duet play as convincing one person to try new things is easier than scouting a group of 3 or more. So I've had a lot of time invested in breaking down mechanics and piecing them back together for my purposes

Recently I've made more efforts towards work I can publish and Daggerheart in particular feels like a fresh game despite its many inspirations because there's a fast growing community that makes it an exciting play space and space for creating. My group has really taken to it and there's an ease to the creation and experimentation that is just fun for all of us, I'd like to experience more of that with more people.

Hi I'm Alex, I am an avid TTRPG fan and small time youtuber. I am aspiring to step further into the worlds of game design and narrative writing for games. Currently, I have found Daggerheart to be an excellent system for both playing in and learning bits of design. I have made a few player focused creations on Heart of Daggers; mainly domains (Tact and Honour) and classes/subclasses that utilize those domains. While I do not have much experience with designing adversaries for the game, I am excited for the chance to submit my creation: the Creepy Crawly, as I found the scary prompt to be very evocative.

Thank you for your time looking at my submission,

-Alex

Hey guys me again sorry for my last submission I leaped before I looked. So again I am Aran, been TTRPG player since last year from Asia. I've been into fantasy and myth for a long while. Currently I am trying to create a community for Daggerheart along with my friend.
I’m entering this competition to learn what it means to publish materials to the public and have them be critiqued by more experienced publishers and other folks. I'm trying my best to support and facilitate the building of our little corner of the internet so more players are interested in joining it.

Hey guys my name is Aran, reader, story teller and TTRPG enjoyer. I was introduced to DaggerHeart by my friend a year ago and with it's focus on story telling and easy to learn mechanics, I immediately feel in love. So much so that me and my friend decided to create a community around the system.
My main goal right now is to learn as many skills as I can to facilitate and build upon the path to expanding this community we have made
Thank You

I'm a physicist by trade, and I love storytelling and RPGs. I enjoy Sci-fi, and have published my first ever TTRPG book "The Void Guard" earlier this year on HoD. I've played dnd 3e, 5e, White wolf games like Vampire and Mage, Mutants and Masterminds, GURPS, and Pathfinder. I started playing Daggerheart shortly after its release last year and it has quickly become my top gaming system.

I'm a 42 year old active father and research physicist with a passion for TTRPGs. I've always enjoyed telling stories with my friends and eventually my children. I've played DND 3e and 5e, Vampire and Mage, Mutants and Masterminds, and GURPS. I started playing Daggerheart as my main game with my friends after their release last year, and the system seems perfectly suited to my playstyle. I enjoy those Rule of Cool moments, and being a fan of the party, while also keeping a good layer of meta-currency and Crunch to stimulate my gaming itch.

Hi! I’m Dande (or Anna) and I’m a professional writer and ex-world traveler. Despite my real world wanderings, it took me over a decade to work up the courage to venture into the world of TTRPGs. Now that I’m here, I’m obsessed! Daggerheart has a special place in my heart for how it encourages narrative collaboration and creativity at the table. There’s something about this system that calls to my inner creator, singing songs of wondrous worlds and life-changing stories to share with friends and strangers alike. With so much fun to be found at the table and in the community, I’ve been trying to find ways to get more involved and “pay the creativity forward”, so to say. I’ve made two free one-shot adventures and a handful of homebrew adversaries available on Heart of Daggers. Now I would love to learn more about contributing at higher levels. Thank you so much for hosting this community event and giving me the push I needed to try to level up my creating! I hope to continue making Daggerheart content to share in the future.

I go by Dusty, and I have been a fan of ttrpg's since 2018 where I first got to play D&D 5e. Ever since I have fallen in love. I have GMed for a bit, but I have been a player more. However, I love designing for systems and hoping they get published. I have designed the Void Knight from Kobold Press' Tome of Beasts 3, and the Necrose for Goodman Games' Dungeon Denizens 2. Both of which are for D&D 5th Edition.

However, Daggerheart has quickly become the main game for my groups. I would love to attempt to get my foot in the door and help bring content to this new system I love. I appreciate you reading this, and I hope you enjoy the monster I made!

I've GM'd most of my adult life, predominantly in pathfinder 1e and 2e. As I've gotten older I've moved away from maps and rules fidelity and fallen in love with narrative game engines. Blades in the Dark (Scum and Villainy), FFG Star Wars and finally Daggerheart have got me hooked.
I wish everyone the best of luck!

Hi, I'm Elliott. I'm 21 and from Australia. I've played TTRPGs since around 2015, usually as a GM. Daggerheart has become my goto system ever since I first ran it last year.

I love designing campaign plots, factions, exotic places and enemies for my home games, but I have yet to actually compile any of the good ones into some kind of collection. I really enjoy the process of coming up with things to suprise my tables with, especially ones where the mechanics back up the fiction in a satisfying way.

I'd love to design something for Daggerheart with some of the professionals, mainly just to learn some more lessons from people with that much design experience. I've already taken so much inspiration from Mike Underwood's streams, and I'd love to further my craft under such a mentor.

Hey, everyone! My name is James Bratten and I'm a gamer, GM, and homebrewer of over 25 years. I've thrown a wide net as far interest goes over the years, but overall am known as an evangelist for the TTRPG space, running games for friends, strangers, Cons, and at my FLGSs.

I was interested to Daggerheart during the playtesting days and kept a careful eye on it through its development. Since launch, I have become a Daggerheart-first GM and player, having absolutely fallen in love with the final product. It solves so many of the problems I had DMing for D&D over the years and it fills a creative and social niche for me in a way that other games just haven't been able to. I would love to be a part of its legacy moving forward!

Greetings & Felicitations! I'm Gaurelin, a queer, neurodivergent disabled 54 y/o cis man. I've been a SF/Fantasy geek since 1977, when I was 5, & both saw Star Wars & read The Hobbit for the first time. I initially encountered gaming in 1984, with Red Box D&D. In less than a year, I was running my own games & discovering a lifelong hyperfixation. I've run many different systems, from the highly complex to the narrative & diceless, in a wide variety of genres. I've always been a worldbuilder (since even prior to my discovery of gaming) & homebrewer, tinkering (sometimes extensively) with the games I spend any length of time with. I joined a closed Beta playtest of Daggerheart not looking to like it, but to my great surprise, I found myself falling in love, not only with this particular game, but with gaming itself, all over again. I've spent the past several months working on a setting book for table's decade old, collaboratively built setting for DH, with hopes to either self-publish or crowdfund it before year's end. I want nothing more than to design for this game, and continue to support the community which has grown up around it.

I'm a long-time GM who has experience across a broad range of systems, with Daggerheart being one of the most recent. I've been trying to make progress with designing content, and feel that Daggerheart is one of the more flexible in terms of available design space to work in (genre, content type, and rules space).

Not a ton to say about me, just a guy living in the East coast of Canada who enjoys TTRPGs and is trying to be more creative!
Aside for running and playing TTRPGs of all kinds for a decade and having fallen in love with Daggerheart as a system (and the community), my "claim to fame" with Daggerheart is creating my Clank-Fungril Ranger Detective Tr33, who was selected as one of Heart of Daggers future premade characters (with cool art to boot).
I'm always looking for ways to participate in the community (when I can fit them in my schedule), to learn more about game design, and hopefully create some cool stuff (however small) that can be shared with other people in the community. Plus I like spooky stuff!

I've been GM-ing ever since Daggerheart was officially released and I've loved making homebrew adversaries and environments for my players when I have time between family and work. I would love to contribute to building more of the Daggerheart universe and learning how to make better adversaries and environments in the future, no only for my players but for anyone looking for just the right adversary.

I am a relatively new GM to TTRPG's, who got into TTRPG as a way of getting me and my family communicating more instead of just staring at screens. We only got into Daggerheart earlier this year as our first TTRPG, and have absolutely fell in love with it! As well as regular sessions with our kids (6 and 11), me and my wife also Co-GM a 7 player Daggerhear group at a local club.

As we are using Daggerheart as a way to improve our family live, we want to use everything we learn with others and share anything cool that we create just in case anyone else finds it useful or interesting.

I am Mallory Spencer. I've been playing TTRPGs for 12 years, and have been Storytelling/Game Mastering and homebrewing both player-facing and GM/ST-facing mechanics for 4 years. Recently, I created a PC for the Heart of Daggers contest that was one of the 10 chosen to be made into a premade character for HoD's character creator (Goldie).
I deeply enjoy the process of alchemizing my players' fantasies and ideas with my language to create a story that emotionally resonates with them, to provide an experience that makes them grateful for spending their precious free time at my table. The main games I play and homebrew for are Vampire: the Masquerade 5th edition, a few Cortex Prime games I've constructed (mainly one based on Sense8), and Daggerheart, which I enjoy for their emphasis on narrative.
I want to design for Daggerheart because I want to provide more tools in the toolboxes of GMs and players to tell stories that emotionally resonate with them. I enjoy the process of brainstorming and balancing mechanical features that reinforce the narrative and the vibes. I love this game, and it's energizing to collaborate with others who share that same love.

I’ve recently come back to role-playing after being away for a while. My background is mostly in less structured role-playing games that are all about ebb and flow of the conversation and the plot, so I greatly value when games provide a starting point and a structure while unleashing imagination and allowing for personal twists.

I’ve never really designed for games before, but while playing Daggerheart I caught myself wondering about what ifs and how certain ideas might play out if given an opportunity to flourish. And if I am having these thoughts living rent-free in my head, I might be better off expressing them in a more tangible form.

From me Daggerheart shines when there is a sense of place and a sense of purpose. I like when environments and adversaries of the world become part of the storytelling. I like when powers and actions create a sense of awe and excitement for things to come, be it for a power fantasy of crushing your enemies or a feeling of impending doom. These thoughts are what I’m hoping to express and entice people to share my excitement about.

My name is Max. I'm a cybersecurity consultant by day and dungeon master by night. I moved to a new neighborhood this year. It's a lively place to live and I’m delighted that a community garden has recently been set up. We’re now planning more events, such as dancing lessons, so that more neighbors can get to know one another.

Since 2018, I have organized over 250 board game events and moderated several TTRPG conventions. People in the board game club would often ask me if we could offer D&D or other role-playing games. Subsequently, the TTRPG events started out as a side project. So, I’ve only been playing pen-and-paper regularly for the past three years.

My role-playing community has decided to put together a local TTRPG zine. The overall aim is to draw inspiration for each article from the town's history. I think Daggerheart is perfectly suited for using historic places as environments and NPCs from the past. That’s why I’d like to learn the best way to design a story with Daggerheart and share my knowledge with the community.

Hello there. Ill get right to it and say I am an avid ttrpg player and all around fan of game design, from board games to video games and beyond. While I have been a big Pathfinder player since being brought into a mutual friends basement over a decade ago, I was immediately hooked on the Hope and Fear system of Daggerheart since last Fall. Ive always crafted homebrew content for a variety of games in my free time as the act of designing itself is something that enthuses me greatly, but I only recently decided to start trying my hand at making a career out of it. And, to that end, I think this would be a fantastic stepping stone towards realizing that dream. I would be honored to be chosen to make something together with you to share with the Daggerheart community.

I'm Michael, the GM and producer for the Daggerheart podcast, The Naturolls. Daggerheart is my first real attempt at making something for a TTRPG, but I've been a storyteller all of my life. When I discovered Daggerheart, I was feeling a little creatively bankrupt, but sitting down and making up stories with my friends has restored my creative spark and given me so much already. I think that making stuff and sharing it with other people is how I work to repay that debt. If the things I create help even one person rediscover their creativity or find a new source of joy, then I've done what I was meant to do.

I was born in raised in the heart of South Africa. My family was well enough off, but I learned young that some things are too expensive for a birthday presents, so I enjoyed building castles in the clouds. I used to get caught up and distracted by ideas for hours. Eventually finding video games, I started learning how they work and how to make them.

For a while, I've been making games as a challenge to myself in Game Jams, a set deadline very soon and a prompt to follow, I enjoyed the creative practice and it helped sharpen my skills. I spend my free time playing board games too, I've made some fan content for a board game called Unmatched, I liked how particular it is with its words. "Up to 2 spaces", meaning anywhere from 0 to 2, "may draw a card" as opposed to "draw a card" which is forced etc. which translates well in game design. I created a spider ancestry for Daggerheart I called Anansi.

As I'm in my early twenties I consider myself a young creative, who wants to make stuff that inspire others and give people a tool kit for their stories.

In fourth grade, I told my mother I wanted to study mythology. She was horrified and still is a little bit, but what I really loved was stories - ancient tales explain the world and tell us who we are. When I wasn't reading, I was playing Warhammer Fantasy with friends or writing narrative battle reports of our tabletop exploits.

After degrees in literature, classical languages, and a stint teaching writing, I realized what I loved was dying. Gathering to share stories is an ancient tradition that has developed empathy and grown communities. Play is how we learn as children and how we learn best as adults. Yet, increasingly, we find ourselves isolated and overworked. To fight this, I made time to play games and mak stories with friends, this time with a variety of TTRPGs.

None of those TTRPGs emphasize the imagination like Daggerheart. Its emphasis on shared world building and storytelling ensure everyone is contributing, imagining, and working together. Hope and Fear set the tone for encounters, ramping up tension almost like a soundtrack. Daggerheart’s draw is inevitable for me, because it encourages what I love. In Daggerheart, in human communities, in my own interests, stories come first.

As someone with ADHD I have always struggled to focus on reading. But I have always loved stories. Enter TTRPGs. A means for me to not only tell fantastical stories with friends but live them! It wasn’t long before I began homebrewing my own materials and exploring how to push the game systems that I loved so much. D&D, Pathfinder, Cypher, Kids on Bikes, all types of PBTA games, I’ve played and homebrewed a lot. But I’ve never had the courage to try to publish anything. I’ve had aspirations, but never pulled the trigger. It would be a huge honor to be able to develop something for Daggerheart and learn from Mike and Carlos to provide new materials for this fantastic community.

I'm a software engineer who only recently (in the past year or so) started GMing for my friend group. D&D was always something that I really thought I would enjoy but struggled to get into when I played. When I learned about Daggerheart shortly after its release, I fell in love with it for its free-flowing and intuitive combat and narrative focus. I have been GMing and playing (mostly GMing) Daggerheart (and even other TTRPGs!) ever since.

I homebrew a lot of the adversaries and environments I pit my players against in Daggerheart. Admittedly, "a lot" isn't all that many so far, but I greatly enjoy the process of playtesting and fine-tuning my creations and have often thought about posting them on Reddit or designing a more coherent collection of them as a small supplement on Heart of Daggers. As of yet, I haven't had the nerve to do either, but I am very curious to know if my adversaries hold up for a wider audience, eager to improve my design skills, and would love to start contributing to the community of the game that kicked off my passion for TTRPGs.

I'm a games enthusiast from Texas that has loves finding interesting and obtuse ways to utilize systems at the table and in online games. With a background in both the medical field and technology, I'm always creating customized plans and solutions, and I believe that creativity has always extended to my hobbies as well. In my free time, I have been a rotating GM and player for my friends in Daggerheart and D&D for a handful of years. I thoroughly enjoy finding ways to marry mechanics to narrative, and over time it's led me to explore worldbuilding, creating my own characters and adversaries, and trying to go the extra mile to engage my friends with my creations. Although I've kept my ideas mostly private until now, one of my favorite parts of being a GM and player has always been to make my friends laugh by pushing the bounds, and I'm excited to start sharing my ideas and creations with others to make them laugh too.

I was introduced to TTRPG's in college by my Computer Science friend. I started in Dungeons and Dragons 3.5. Daggerheart, and watching critical role has opened my eyes to how roleplay and listening to a players wants and desires in the narrative can spice up and open up potential in the collborative story being told at the table.

Born and raised Texan recently moved to New Orleans, I have been mainly a board game player with occasional video games thrown in all my life. I have always had a passion for game design work, but seriously pursuing it has always eluded me thanks to the chaotic lifestyle of the restaurant industry which I just left and my own personal anxieties surrounding presenting a product to people.
While toying with my own board games and expansions has been part of my life for 20+ years, only recently with the release of Daggerheart have I fully taken the plunge on TTRPGs. It was the first game make it click for me that RPGs could truly offer something that board games and video games could not with the emphasis on collaborative storytelling and world-building. I have mustered dozens of pages of Daggerheart homebrew just for the fun of it, as the system feels like it is begging for it and the handful of different resources and slightly crunchy but still very freeform style allow for near infinite creative expression for interpreting whatever fantasy you desire, while still giving enough limitations to keep it interesting.

I'm Caleb Smith, a Los Angeles native and long-time lover of narrative RPGs. I've been GMing, homebrewing, and developing material for FFG/Edge’s Star Wars and Genesys RPGs for a decade and have self-published supplements for Genesys on their DTRPG page, the Genesys Foundry. I have also worked on a few community projects for Genesys, writing and producing the zine BOOST.

In 2023, I graduated from a year-long creative writing and RPG design course called the Adventure Writing Academy, taught by prolific RPG freelancer Keith Kappel. This course taught me to work under a deadline, practice various design skills, and receive and apply feedback on my work.

I’ve GMed professionally since 2023, working for Edge Studios to run Star Wars, Genesys, L5R, Arkham Horror, and Dungeon & Kittens at GenCon and PaxU. I also run games (primarily Play-by-Post) on StartPlaying.Games.

Daggerheart speaks to the creative, free-style ethos I lean towards in GMing and designing, focusing on telling a good story and building on what the players bring to the table while incorporating interesting mechanics. I strive to become a credited freelance RPG writer, working towards this goal by developing my own Daggerheart material for self-publishing.

An avid TTRPG and video gamer for the last 30+ years, I enjoy any medium to tell stories and get people's imagination going. I have written novels (finished but unpublished), made video games (mostly small hobby freeware), and worked on board and card game ideas and variants to existing ones for most of that time.

I primarily was drawn to Daggerheart due to its narrative driven focus but the loose-but-familiar nature of its rules. It had just enough "meat" to get lost in detailed ruled discussion but enough freedom to create almost any kind of story or world I wanted while still staying within the confines of the game as designed. I've posted free supplements for the game in the past but nothing official and nothing requiring payment, though I hope to change that soon with some of my upcoming ideas.

Hi! I'm Hakan, I've been a ttrpg player for about 7 years, mostly as a GM. I'm part of a group that streams actual plays called Kafa20 and a professional GM on Startplaying for the last 3 years. I started playing TTRPGs by designing my own system for a magical school adventure because that was the only way I could convince my friends to play. So designing and homebrewing and adjusting systems are at the core of how I approach the game itself. Ever since my first Daggerheart session, I've been in love with the system. I'm a story-first sort of GM, which works well with DH especially when it comes to Hope & Fear mechanics and the concept of Stress. I'm currently running multiple campaigns using DH on Startplaying where I continuously create new adversaries and environments and even domain cards and campaign frames. I would love to continue creating with more of an understanding of the underlying design principles and mechanics.

I have been playing and running TTRPG’s for almost 10 years now, and since the beginning I have always had the knack for tweaking and reskinning creatures to fit my stories. Over time, that has cascaded to nearly fully homebrewed campaigns. For a while now, I have been curious about putting my own creations out there and have often been too fearful to follow through. A competition like this, offering potential mentorship, was far too good to pass up. However, I must apologize for going over the Feature word count; I couldn’t find any more fat to trim for the Hart of the Hallowood.

Hello! I'm a game designer and an educator. As a designer, I work primarily with RPG companies and publishers, but I'm looking to start publishing more independently. As an educator, I use board games and TTRPGs as a medium for workshops and activities, collaborating with schools, colleges, and libraries.

For me, the two roles are deeply connected, because game design shapes how we experience play, and play is one of the most powerful tools we have for learning. Over the years, both have greatly enriched me, professionally and personally.

Hello there, I'm an amateur designer originally from the UK, but currently living in Tokyo, Japan. I've been playing TTRPGs about a decade and a half now, mostly D&D but now very much playing, enjoying and running Daggerheart games for friends I've made here. I've long since been a fan of homebrewing and have some things across systems and campaigns I'm really proud of, and when I GM I certainly like to tinker and both surprise and entertain my players with new, exciting mechanics. Daggerheart especially I've had lots of fun with, and I see so much potential in it already as a system for really engaging mechanics, even with it being so new.

On a personal level, I've long since wanted to actually publish something, if only for the love of the hobby and to share my passions with others and hear how they might use what I've made- but have always had just a bit too much anxiety or doubt to do so. I'm hoping that this competition might help me to actually get something out there, or at least inspire me to try get a further along that path, as cheesy as that may sound.

Growing up halfway between liberty and steel (Philadelphia and Pittsburgh), I developed a love for fantasy and sci-fi genres, which landed me squarely in the social environment of nerdom. Moving to Los Angeles, I continued my descent into geekiness by becoming an avid board gamer and running my own tabletop roleplaying campaigns.
In these adventures I found immense joy in the creativity and challenge of developing homebrew monsters, campaigns, and rulesets. It helped me recognize that I thrive when presented with a combination of creative and thought provoking projects.
However, amidst all of that joy, I found myself burning out on the mental load it took to prepare each new game.
I was lucky enough to demo Daggerheart at a FLGS and immediately fell in love with the system. The emphasis on group narration removed my burnout and my favorite part is coming up with prompts for my players to create and develop their own character moments in the world. Our homebrew campaign in Daggerheart is coming up on its first year, and I would love an opportunity to hone my homebrew and provide more fun adversaries, environments, and moments, not only for my players, but ones I'll never meet.

Hi, i'm Niels aka Coffee. I'm a hobbyist with an interest in writing ttrpg supplements. I've been gm'ing DnD5e since 2018 and recently switched to Daggerheart. I've fallen in love with Daggerheart because it encourages collaborative storytelling through its mechanics in a way that really resonates with me.

I especially enjoy how Daggerheart makes use of motivations and personal goals to determine what features an adversary or environment might have, and uses them to interact organically with the players to foster roleplay and in-character descision making.

In the future, i want to publish my designs because i want to inspire people's imagination much like how i've been inspired by other publishers. I want people to look at my work and feel excited to bring these designs to their table and use them to have fun and tell an interesting story together.

I have little experience outside purely designing, so i want to meet people who can teach me about the legal aspect, marketing, finances, and distribution. I'd also love to meet new people and make friends who are intersted in publishing and exchange ideas. I also occasionally draw and would like to feature my art in these publications.

I’m a 39-year-old Brazilian who has been playing and GMing TTRPGs for nearly 30 years. It all started when my cousin and her friends needed a warrior for their all-female AD&D group, and I’ve been hooked ever since.

These days, I’m playing Daggerheart as an Emberkin Assassin in a setting that blends medieval fantasy, the traditional American West, and the northeastern Brazilian cangaço (armed outlaw bands that challenged local elites and authorities). I also play a variety of other characters and systems as side-gigs.

I have a little bit of experience in game design for video games, and I’m a huge nerd when it comes to game mechanics and RPG-related topics. Lately, I’ve been feeling ready to share some of my homebrew content publicly, get feedback on it, and continue growing as both a GM and a player.

I love collaborative storytelling and being the number-one fan of my friends’ characters. I hope you enjoy some of my ideas and have fun using them.

I've been a forever DM for home groups for a little over a decade with Dungeons and Dragons (2e, 3e, 5e, 5.5e). During that time I've seen gaming do amazing things for people and create amazing friendships lasting years later. Over the years I fell in love with different parts of the whole hobby. Working on mechanics, plots, fun games for people to let their imagination navigate and what I've found is that Daggerheart really is the place for Players to have fun with both playing in the world and create it. It's reignited my passion and I want to do something with that. The way the world is right now, I've just come to believe that if there's ever a chance I can work on something that makes people's lives a little bit better or tolerable, then that's a success with Hope.

I love scary horror and dark fantasy because I feel a group of people shine brightest when they realize their efforts and hope can amount to something, even if the odds are terrible. I plan on starting to run games professionally, eventually publishing. Thank you for reading this and considering my work.

My name is Steven Loung. I'm a 38-year-old professional sportswriter based in Toronto, and have been playing TTRPGs for over 15 years. I immediately jumped in on Daggerheart when the game was first released and have been GMing a campaign for my home group for the last six months.

Though I've never done game design before, I have done homebrewing in Daggerheart and other TTRPGs before. I'm interested, specifically, in trying to get something published professionally for Daggerheart because of my love for the system, and its narrative-first approach.

As I mentioned off the top, though I may never have done anything within the table-top industry before, I am a professional writer. If you Google my name you'll likely find my byline on various outlets I've written for as a sports journalist.

On social media you can find me on Bluesky at @stvloung.bsky.social and I lurk on Twitter at @loung_s. I don't really use social media much these days outside of using it to help with work.

Hi, I'm Toni, a young student from Spain, an enviormental scientist and future science teacher. I love nature, stories and game design. I've been writing stories since I was a teen and in the last years I have discovered a passion for game design, specially doing it alongside my partner.

For many years I wanted to play TTRPGs, but I didn't have an opportunity until last year. Since then, well, it has been my new obsession. First with DnD, spending hours with my partner making homebrew and discussing how to "fix" all the problems we had with the system. And now with Daggerheart, a system that I've totally fallen in love with, and which is so fun and easy to desing for. Having an opportunity to design DH content with professional support sounds so cool to me and an awesome opportunity.

When I saw Fear Feast I didn't consider submitting an entry, as my English is a bit clunky and I'm still quite new to Daggerheart. But I had an idea I think it was cool and, well, here I am.