Endless Journeys Announcement - DäveBorg Endless Journeys (Patreon)

Hey all!

Thanks so much for your feedback yesterday on Endless Journeys, both in chat and on Discord.

Since I posted v 1.0.4, a lot has happened. 

We finally heard "something" from Wizards of the Coast, and then both Kobold Press and MCDM mentioned that they would be releasing their own systems. I keep hearing of other companies saying they're going to do the same.

After meditating it on a bit, I decided that my initial take might be the wrong direction. With these older publishers getting into the market and making more fantasy rulesets, it doesn't seem like the right move to try to make something that's like Fifth Edition or at least another clone. Because, as a consumer, the question becomes, "Why not just use Dungeons & Dragons?" Or even Pathfinder. Emotions are high now to be anti-D&D/WotC, but they'll eventually fade away.

So that's why I decided to turn to Mörk Borg.

What is Mörk Borg?

If you haven't heard of Mörk Borg, it's part of the "old-school renaissance," which means it's a lot simpler than Fifth Edition. In fact, the rules aren't much more than "roll a d20, add a number, and compare it to another number." A super simplistic system, so it's easy to learn.

The biggest thing that stands out with Mörk Borg is its original art style. 

It's "a doom metal album of a game. A spiked flail to the face. Rules light, heavy, everything else."

Why Mörk Borg?

So some of you might be wondering why I'm moving to Mörk Borg, as it might, on the surface, seem pretty different from Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition. However, there are a lot of benefits for myself and, in turn, all of you.

Learn more about Mörk Borg from the official site. 

It's supported by Free League.

If you don't know Free League yet, they're just amazing. They have a lot of cool brands, such as Blade Runner, Aliens, Tales from the Loop, The One Ring, and more. I've had the opportunity to meet them at conventions, and they're friendly, easygoing, and very accepting of third-party publishing culture.

The license is crazy simple.

Not only does Free League have its own open license for its core games, the Year Zero Engine, but Mörk Borg has a license that's super easy to use, allows you to mark it as "compatible" with a logo, and really doesn't require all the hurdles that even the 1.0a OGL does.

There's already a lot of content for it.

Already, there are a bunch of books out there for it. And a lot of third-party publishers are moving into the space. So you're going to have a glut of content right from the get-go. Yes, the core book is a little hard to read (I had to get a "readable" PDF myself), but I'll probably just rewrite the ruleset anyways to fit with Endless Journeys.

It stands out.

With all the different companies about to release their own rulesets, I have no doubt that all of them are going to look like the same fantasy style that we're so used to seeing—lots of pretty fantasy art, a handful of classes and races, weapons, and so on and so forth. But Mörk Borg stuff is different. Sure, it's got "classes," but they're much simpler and go with the theme of the game.

I can customize the heck out of it (and you'll help).

The Mörk Borg engine itself is very simple. But you can add so much to it. And that's what I plan to do. I want to add new rules, classes, heritages, rules, etc. And since I love getting ideas from all of you, I can make what you want to use. It's hackable, so if you don't like a particular rule, you don't have to use it.

I can still make the same sort of adventures.

Because Mörk Borg runs on a d20 system, the adventures will still be pretty similar. I can create adventures using the same format with the same types of numbers, and they won't look any different. The other bits—new monsters, etc.—will look a little different, of course, but I'll offer guidelines for customizing those.

I repeat: THE ADVENTURES WILL REMAIN THE SAME.

I don't have to stress about building a whole new SRD.

I had a lot of fun writing the Endless Journeys SRD but quickly realized that it's pretty tough to create a ruleset that makes everyone happy. So instead of wasting energy tweaking and iterating a complicated system a thousand times over, I can just start with something simple and create new things for folks that they can add, subtract, ignore, love—whatever—that will make everyone happy. 

Basically, Mörk Borg is the "smartphone," and the stuff I'll make will be the apps for it.

Got questions? Ask 'em below!

I'm sure some of you have questions, concerns, comments, etc. Feel free to ask them below. I know it's a weird time, but I'm pretty happy with this decision. And I think it's going to be a lot of fun for me and everyone else included.

Thanks all!

 - Dave