I am running By Endurance We Conquer, it’s a Carved from Brindlewood game from The Gauntlet, written by Harald Eckmüller. As preparation for this, I picked up Alfred Lansing’s book on Shackleton and settled down.
Endurance by Alfred Lansing (1959)
The book reads as a “Boy’s Own” adventure. An amazing feat of human achievement; many actions and events that have not been bested in over a hundred years. Ultimately, Shackleton’s objective, to make the first land crossing of the Antarctic and the South Pole, was met with failure. It must, though, be remembered that Shackleton and his men’s feats to survive are in many ways even more significant.
We start as the Endurance is caught in pack ice, slowly disintegrating as the men plan for its eventual evacuation and an uncertain future. Lansing uses some evocative prose and interleaves diary and interviews with the crew to add a real sense of how incredibly frightening and unpleasant this period was.
The final session of No Love Between Friends, adventure three in Steaming Rock. Cody is badly injured and possibly losing his leg, but with Danny and Diago, they are back in town with their suspect in the murder of Howard Ross, Peyton, slung over the back of a horse. Meanwhile, Winston keeps low, as the Ross boys look for a scapegoat, and Dutch helps Sheriff Fletcher keep order.
Charles Marion Russell, The Cinch Ring, 1909
As the posse enters town, Winston watches from the shadows, and Dutch backs up Sheriff Fletcher as the crowd grows restless. Night is here, and the Ross boys from the New Mexico Mercantile Corp are threatening to burn down the town unless the Sheriff gets them the killer of Howard Ross.
The Sheriff rushes up to Deputy Cody, Cody says Peyton’s their man and then collapses, they call for the Doc, Dr Innes. Cody is sent to the medical emporium along with Danny, Diago, and Dutch; all of them have a little bit of first aid experience to support the Doc.
As part of The Grognard Files Book Club, I’d re-jigged my schedule to line up this book with that meeting. If you’re interested, you can join too. Click the link; it takes place on the first Sunday of each month and is currently a mix of sci-fi and detective novels. It’s relaxed and friendly, and always has a strong bent to how to leverage a book and its ideas for TTRPG purposes.
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
The Big Sleep is set in a decaying, rain-slick, humid Los Angeles of the 1930s, populated by the desperate, damaged and beautiful. It is more of a series of characters pinballing against each other than a strictly plot-driven story. There is a plot, it is labyrinthine and seemingly unknowable, but then that’s because we are alongside Marlowe, down in the dirt, rifling through it and picking out a single nugget of information amongst the detritus. Oh, for a lovely, clean birds-eye view of what is going on, but life doesn’t work that way.
As Kenneth Hite would have it, this is an Ocean of Clues mystery structure. The Big Sleep functions as an ocean of clues because its investigative progress does not depend on any single clue and is instead driven by overlapping, redundant, and often ambiguous information.
Sheriff Fletcher bursts into the clearing, “We got trouble! Them Ross boys are armed and ready to burn Steaming Rock to the ground unless someone's swinging by sundown!”
Cody promises to take up Peyton’s trail and bring him to justice, he may not have done it but he was involved. Dutch volunteers to go back to town with Fletcher.
The others follow Peyton, he’s up on a ridge, Diago struggles to keep Boots, his horse, moving and almost falls. The others eat up the distance to Peyton, spotting him coming down on the other side of the ridge they follow. Diago reaches the ridge and plunges over the other side, a dangerous path but he's got a chance to cut off Peyton.
After missing the inaugural DotB in 2024, I made up for it in 2025 and vowed to return in 2026.
To summarise, it’s rolling dice in a real castle, Chepstow Castle and the weather is ALWAYS guaranteed to be sunny with blue skies, don’t listen to what the amazing organiser Cris Bonhomie says, it’s definitely always sunny in Wales.
It’s a compact & bijou affair, limited to only seven tables, 30-40 attendees, but that is part of its charm, as is the location and Chepstow itself. A variety of games this year across three sessions, including:
I got to Graham Greene’s book via Tim Butcher’s Blood River; he’d mentioned it as inspiration, and I’d been so immersed in Blood River that I picked it up almost immediately. That was a good few years ago; ten, fifteen? Better late than never.
The Lawless Roads by Graham Greene
I didn’t quite know what to expect. I knew it was a 1938 travelogue and that it was commissioned to find out the effect of the Catholic persecution by the Mexican government in the 1920s.
As part of another book club, I’d enjoyed Graham Greene’s The Human Factor, feeling he inhabited the emotions and turmoil of his characters. This was a very different beast. Greene is a moaner, but one of life’s best moaners. His complaints were eloquent, witty, and, at times, cruel. Take this example of his conversation with a retired US Police Commissioner, “The old gentleman talked at breakfast about his bowels. He said, ‘When I kept you waiting, I thought I only had to do one, but I found I had to do both. It’s eating cereals. They keep your bowels good.’ He ran happily on; it might have been a dog speaking.”
The investigation into the death of Howard Ross continues. Given a last minute switch meant that Pinkie and Silas went to meet Ross and that these boys work for Ellis Rockcliffe, then the majority of the posse head to Ellis’ ranch.
Meanwhile Winston, keeping a low profile due to previous fall outs with Ross, heads to The Homestead Inn to talk business with his partner William Moyer.
I’m a big fan of The Windup Girl and Paolo’s short stories in the same universe.
The Water Knife is mightily prescient; at its heart, desperate misfits try to secure the rights to water across Arizona and Nevada for their masters. The wider background is that the world has a water shortage, and companies will do anything to secure the rights to water.
The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi
Most of the action centres on the Colorado River as various actors secure it, divert it, block it and do anything to keep it flowing for their needs. Angel is the main protagonist, an ex-gang member turned Water Knife. A Water Knife is an agent who secures and protects water rights by any means necessary; legal, covert, or violent. Angel is good at this, working for the ruthless Catherine Case, shutting down small communities, disproving their claims and not adverse to intimidation and murder.
Sheriff Fletcher calls Cody in; he needs Cody to take a lead on this missing person. He needs an answer to where Howard Ross has gone. Fletcher passes over an itinerary of the sites, mines and a logging camp that Ross had planned to visit. He tells Cody that Ross went with a couple of his men, but no one has seen head nor tail of them.
Solo’s Mine
Cody gathers together the group, his informal posse, to help with the investigation. They head up into the Elk Mountains to check off the first mine on the itinerary, and they realise with a shock that it is Daan Solo’s mine. Ross has already tried to buy Daan’s mine. Why is he visiting it?
At first glance, when they reach the mine, nothing has changed. Daan hasn’t had the time or money to work on it, but closer inspection shows the boarded-up entrance has been disturbed. Planks have been removed, and there are traces of blood on the floor. Winston and Dutch head inside, lighting a lantern, and move deeper into the mine. They see a body at the bottom of a shaft. Climbing down, they find a dead Howard Ross, that fall would have been enough to kill him, but there are other marks on his head, scratched knuckles and his gun beside him. Could this be foul play?
We join our party as they look to get paid after delivering the body of a dead bounty hunter to Ellis Rockcliffe. But paid by whom? Actually, Hubb McGraw, on behalf of Philem Quinlivan, is their paymaster, given they have double-crossed Ellis. A deed for the rights of Apache land to the north of Steaming Rock was taken from the body and is in the hands of the party.
Coffin Delivery
The Dead Gunslinger
We begin with a stormy confrontation with Ellis as Dutch, Cody, Winston and Diago present the body of bounty hunter Thomas Vance and his belongings. Ellis gets his men to crowbar off the coffin lid, brushes aside the flies and picks up the saddlebag. Rooting through it, Ellis flings it to the ground in front of the group, “Where is it!?”
We’ve made it to Silver City and met with undertaker Gus McLeary to arrange the transfer of the body of Thomas Vance back to Steaming Rock. Whilst there, it was brought to the group’s attention that Philem Quinlivan wanted to talk to them.
Silver City, New Mexico
They know Quinlivan as a businessman, owner of Blackrock Ventures Limited, a mining company. They do a bit of digging in the paper and try to find out more by chatting to the regulars at Becky’s Tavern, their home for the night. Nothing more comes up on Quinlivan.
The next morning, they breakfast at the Crossroads Hotel and ask the barman for Mr Quinlivan’s room. A brisk conversation and Quinlivan is blunt, a war is coming, and he wants them to choose sides, him or Ellis Rockcliffe. Money comes into the equation, a mighty sum of $500 each if they take the body back to Ellis, but the deeds must be handed to Quinlivan’s man in Steaming Rock, Hubb McGraw. This money seems to be a retainer or wages for future services to Quinlivan.
It comes around so soon and is all the better for that. GrogLove is one half of GrogL, the other being GrogLaw. A TTRPG convention organised in London by Jim, Dave and Alex, with Tash throwing in some scrumptious goody bags! It’s moved around but is now back at Brewdog Chancery Lane, which has the benefit of being dead quiet on a weekend, has some decent beers & grub and wonderful staff.
It’s an hour on the tube for me, a quick walk across the park, and, fingers crossed, there are no tube disruptions, I’m getting off at Farringdon and walking through silent city streets to the venue. The venue is a hubbub of folks, all excitedly catching up, searching bags for dice, admiring various new and old TTRPG rule books, maps and minis.
After a brief chat and a coffee, I settled down to my morning game.
Lafcadio Hearn was a 19th century interpreter of Japanese language and culture. He arrived in Japan during the Meiji era when the country was modernising rapidly. He became fascinated with folk beliefs, ghost stories, rural customs and the atmosphere of “old Japan”. Here he collects a series of ghost, or more specifically supernatural tales of memory, duty and emotion.
Some Japanese Ghosts
There are 20 stories across a 100 or so pages, so very short 4-5 page stories. The interesting elements are the focus on culture and Lafcadio’s little side notes on his thoughts on each story or a bit of historical or cultural background. Helpfully he focus on specific language and terms for which in English there is not a literal translation. I particularly like his assessment of one story, where clearly the husband of a wronged wife should be punished, “A morally unsatisfying story.”
Lafcadio, he’s a one-eyed wanderer (having lost his sight in one eye as a child), half-exile, half-scholar, quietly collecting his stories in lamplit rooms, romanticising and translating Japanese culture through a ghostly Western lens while the modern world kept knocking on his door.
Halfway to Silver City and the party has committed to young Apache Góyąń to find her parents and, if needed, rescue them.
Góyąń
Winston tracks two on foot and two horses up a trail into the hills around this area. The going is tough, unseasonably hot and pushing through wild, untamed brush.
A shot rings out, and Diago quietens the child. The sound echoes around the hills, but they think it comes from two tall peaks or between the peaks.
Inspired by the release of Paul Baldowski’s Nordic Noir RPG Cörk Børd, I decided to delve into the start of the Harry Hole series. So Scandi Noir, it’s morally ambiguous, it explores the rotten underbelly of seemingly “civilised” societies, it shines a light into the psychological darkness of the protagonist as well as the criminals. It is bleak. It is slow and unshowy. It is cold, damp and above all, it showcases a range of chunky knitwear that no other genre can compete with.
The Bat
Except, The Bat is actually not the most representative of Scandi Noir, set as it is in Australia - no cosy cardigans. His bosses have sent Harry to support the investigation of a Norwegian national who has been murdered. Harry has a lot of baggage, and it feels like he is a fish out of water, with his blunt, unemotional front, surrounded by the boisterous, piss-taking Aussies.
He teams up with an Aboriginal Police Officer, Andrew Kensington, who shows him around, acting as his de facto tour guide during the investigation, as well as mentoring him on the cultural and local traditions that affect the case.
I’m back. A new reading challenge, I’m being softer on myself this time, just 26 books in 2026, so one every two weeks and maybe a review. Oh plus audiobooks and a book club, so not that soft.
I’ve thrown in a few collected comic series this time, the first of which is The One Hand <pause> and The Six Fingers.
Ciphers
I fairly randomly chose this book just before Christmas. I got a special signed edition from Forbidden Planet, though I can’t make out the signatures, so it could have been signed by one of the staff there. But I did like the premise; noir, cyberpunk-ish and two different authors for two different series, hence the dramatic pause above!
A new Grogmeet and the first at the Brickhouse Social. I’d missed 2025, adjusting to the new Jan slot, post Christmas, winter weather, but put in the organisational efforts to adjust family, work and other events to make it happen. Storm Goretti did its best to scupper things, but in the end, my first dry Grogmeet, well, I had a few pints but no drizzle, mizzle or slothering.
The party is travelling south, a 100-mile trip from Steaming Rock to Silver City, to pick up a corpse and belongings. But first, they have to navigate the wilds of 1870s New Mexico.
Silver City, New Mexico
The plan was simple: Diago and his wagon, pulled by “the worst horse”, Boots, would be accompanied by Cody, Winston, Daan and Dutch. A ten-day trip to Silver City, pick up the body of bounty hunter Tommy Vance (not that one) and return it to Steaming Rock, so that Tommy’s “best friend” Ellis Rockcliffe can give him the burial he deserves.
On the second day, the sun again beat down, skin blistered, and sweat pooled. They found the perfect campsite, secluded, up in the hills, but with a good source of water and the opportunity for catching some game. Only Cody was uncertain; he’d heard and seen subtle signs that someone was watching them, following them, but they were good, they’d kept hidden all this time, but still.
Welcome to 2026. I hope the holidays have treated you well. So, on to a look back at my gaming in 2025.
Dicing in 2025
Firstly, most of my Gaming took place on the Raspy Raven Discord; you can see the link to it below, and you are very welcome to join us!
I occasionally escaped to conventions around the UK and to what is seemingly becoming a monthly excursion into London, mainly at The Arcanist’s Tavern.
