Coffee, Code, and Chronicles

My guest post, Rolling for Initiative , for the A-to-Z Challenge 2026 is up on the A-to-Z homepage, wherein I look at 40 years of TTRPG gaming and how it can be a catalyst in your narrative fiction writing, with or without friends, or in "soloing," a.k.a., "journaling." I want to thank the moderators of A-to-Z for the recognition and the opportunity. I'll be in the comments there if you have any questions. But I'll look for comments here on my dice driven fiction What the River Owes here .  Prost! 🍻

The mud of the washed-out road clung to the wagon wheels like thick, wet mortar. Jost threw his shoulder against the timber. His boots slipped in the muck, and his chest heaved until the axle finally tore free with a wet, sucking lurch. Beside him, Volkmar let out a colorful string of curses that bled into a breathless, exhausted laugh. They rolled on from the Strutting Cock with the wagon bed crowded by fish crates and the Handler family. Jost walked and rode by turns as their bargain demanded. His spear hand rested near his belt, and the ache in his back served as a dull reminder of the road's toll. In the back of the wagon, wedged tightly among the cargo, Gretchen slept against her mother’s shoulder. The girl was worn paper-thin by a week that had demanded too much of her. Janderke would wait for the repair to the boat, then take the boat on the swollen Stir to Gersdorf and meet them there. Jost knew it that trip would carried its own dangers for the young man, but sensed Jander...

The Strutting Cock Jost winced as Heidi's voice cut through the stale air of the common room. “The room can wait! Take me to him now." Heads turned; eyes watched. Discretion was already dead. Josef, the innkeep, stopped mid-sentence and simply sighed, waving them toward the back. “Go on, then. Pit's not going anywhere." Before they breached the yard's threshold, Jost caught Janderke’s arm. “Keep your hand on the axe," Jost murmured, his eyes sweeping the muddy expanse, the stable shadows, the inn's rear door. “Take nothing for granted." Whatever rotted in that pit was one thing, but the dark around it was another. Caution cost nothing; carelessness cost everything. Jost hung back, watching the reunion unravel the family. Emmerich Handler’s pale hands seized the rusted bars before his cracked voice could form words. Heidi didn't just kneel; her legs seemed to give out, dropping her into the freezing mud. Gretchen peered down into the gloom. “Daddy...

The Stir wanted to carry them the entire way. Kessel's repair held, but the river itself seemed to possess a spiteful sentience: swollen, black, and running faster than Jost had ever seen it. It carried heavy storm debris down from the deep country, battering the hull. An hour in, a half-submerged snag caught the bow exactly where the fresh pitch sat. Jost felt the skiff list hard, his stomach dropping as Janderke swore and leaned his entire weight on the tiller to correct them. They fought to keep the skiff straight between them, wrestling the oars to keep the re-damaged bow pointed downstream, minimizing the water intake to a slow, dark trickle. What should have been a straightforward ride on a fast current stretched into five hours of agonizing, white-knuckle rowing just to steady the boat. Jost’s shoulders burned, the muscles spasming in the cold, while the oppressive, bruised sky of Talabecland offered no encouragement whatsoever. Jost used those grueling hours to tell Janderk...

The journalling work for What the River Owes  is grounded in mechanics found in Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Second Edition (WFRP2). These mechanics directly influence the narrative and influence the characters over time. It may help for readers to see the character details being used in the mechanical decisions. You don't need to play WFRP2 or any TTRPG to get the basics.  WFRP2 is a percentile driven system: roll equal to or under the number and calculate a success or failure margin, “degrees of success or failure," for every 10 points under or over. For example, if Jost is presented with a test for Gossip, a Fellowship skill, I would roll two ten-sided dice (one die with “tens" and the other with “ones") and compare to Jost's stated Fellowship characteristic (Fel), 32%. If I rolled a 13 (10 and 3 on the dice) that would be 19 points under 32, or 1 degree of success. The same is true if I rolled 41 (40 and 1), 9 points over, or just a “flat failure," sometim...

The fire had begun to earn its keep by the time Josef reappeared with bread and bowls of something dark and thick. Jost had claimed the hearth without asking permission. His boots were off, his cloak steamed, and he had added three logs to the coals before anyone could object. Beside him, Janderke shifted his weight, his eyes tracking the innkeeper as if chewing on a question. “Herr Haarig," Janderke finally said, when Josef set the bowls down. “The men said there's a prisoner here. Some outlaw?" Josef's whole posture changed at the question. He straightened, wiping his hands on his apron with the particular pride of a man who'd been waiting all evening to be asked. “That's right. Heinz Gerber himself, locked up out back near the privy. A bounty hunter brought him in. Lars, he calls himself. Been raiding this stretch of the Stir the better part of four months, that one." He glanced between them. “Roadwardens come in two days to see him hanged proper....

The River Stir in Spring. The color of manure, swollen from rain and runoff, an odor of rotten vegetation, and thick with heavy debris floating on it or just beneath the brown-green water. Jost convinced his young friend, Janderke, to go fishing. Janderke owned a small row boat and often took it out on the River Stir for a small fee. Many locals in Tauer on the river would hand over a few pennies for time fishing. Janderke stood a half head taller than his elder Jost. Besides fishing, the both of them had something in common: formerly rich, and dead, relatives. But Jost had made his living fishing for more years than he cared to count and a small inheritance just made what accounted for his small vices more accessible. The day was cloudy and the dark clouds to the east suggested a lot of rain upstream. Thunder could be distantly heard. Janderke rowed the boat out to “ trunks," a collection of just above the surface rotting tree trunks downstream of the docks of Tauer. The “trunks...

I am currently editing the prologue for a new adventure serial here on the blog. This piece serves as a prelude to my upcoming guest post for the AtoZ Challenge in September. While that guest post is already drafted, I realized it would benefit from a practical demonstration of a creative process driven by the friction of randomness using Tabletop RPG (TTRPG) mechanics. While this method is not new, I hope to introduce it to writers looking to leverage externalized prompts to resolve story outcomes. Set in the grim “Old World" of Warhammer, the prologue introduces Jost Oberholtzer, a fatherly fisherman, and Janderke “Jan" Steuben, a young boatman. Jan owns a small rowboat on the River Stir, frequently taking Jost to well-known watering holes near Tauer, their small village on the border of Talabecland and Stirland. When severe weather forces them on a week-long journey nearly 100 miles from home, Jost must guide and mentor Jan as the young man is thrust into the cutthroat, da...

The Escapist, in 2018, created Read an RPG Book in Public week . The event details follow: Read An RPG Book in Public Week is an event that happens three times a year, during the weeks surrounding March 4, July 27, and October 1 (starting on the Sunday on or before, and ending on the Saturday on or after). During these weeks, roleplaying enthusiasts are encouraged to take their favorite RPG rulebooks out with them and read them in public - on the bus, in the coffee shop, at lunch, at the park, or anywhere (as long as it isn't disruptive to work, school, church, or any other functions). I try to honor this event every year, so I thought: I know ICS, I can tell a machine to create an ICS calendar file for sharing. I asked Claude, specifically. It adds the calendar for the next 20 years, or 2046. Felt about right. God willing, I'll still be playing or running Warhammer with or for my grandchildren. Why these three weeks? March 4 was designated as GM's Day in 2008, and was coi...

I'm honored to be picked as an A to Z Blogging Challenge Winner for 2026. As a decade-plus participant, I've won a couple of awards, but this recognition is equally as special. The first award I won was in 2011 from The Altdorf Correspondent .  The TAC  was the Warhammer blog of Magnus Seter, I won the 2011 Best of Fans award for my A to Z participation on my old blog, Another Caffeinated Day (archived, but not live). I often would say in many online profiles after that recognition, “I may introduce myself as ‘Award Winning Blogger and Gamemaster...'."  With this, I may again add it to my bio. For 2016, I started my journey with one goal and quickly pivoted to working from different source material. This was mostly to maintain a “work-life-blogging" balance. It was a struggle a few times as I did not pre-write or schedule posts. Many of my entries would be after 8 p.m. Some may have noticed. It was just much easier to dip into the well of active play rather than ...

Zharr-Naggrund, “City of Fire and Desolation," is the heart of the Chaos Dwarves Empire on the Plain of Zharr in the western Dark Lands beyond the Black Mountains. Scholars state that no chronicle of Zharr-Naggrund is reliable as the Chaos Dwarves are ruthless slavers and all outsiders would die in the furnaces and forges of the Chaos Dwarves. Only servants of the Ruinous Powers and the warriors of the chaos gods themselves would be given audience in the city and permitted to leave. Any accounts of the city are from slaves left for dead on battle fields, unreliable statements by chaos sorcerers tortured by witch hunters, from the heretical books and accounts of the same in their dealings with the Chaos Dwarves, or from last testments of often mad and blasphemous members of chaos cults seeking weapons and spells for the Chaos Dwarves. Atop the ziggurat of Zharr-Naggrund is the great Temple of Hashut, the bull headed “Father of Darkness", worshipped by all Chaos Dwarves and sou...

The Ynyr is not a singular thing, but possibly a dark honorarium given to the fodder of Chaos hordes from the Chaos wastes and frozen mountains of Norsca. The Ynyr are often mentioned in "heroic poems" spoken, and sometimes found in scholarly texts written about such oral histories. In all theso poems, the faceless Ynyr march first into battle, on the shieldwalls or in waves of sword, club, and pike wielding men, screaming oaths to their dark gods. Each seeks to find favor though the bravery of such charges and the death delivered for the gods and the mortal generals at the head of the hordes. To live with no kills is dishonorable, Ynyr will cast themselves on their swords or the sword of their leader to reclaim honor. 

Xhotl is a fallen Temple-City in Lustria. Lustria is largely spoken in the Empire and the wider Old World as a mythical place beyond the horizon of the coastlines. Only fools chase the legend of great jungle bound ruins filled with gold and gems. As the gods are manifest, so to are many legends and myths. Finding the truth of these one must muster bravery, folly, and coin for ships, rations, and loyalty (for mutiny often befalls these expeditions!).  In Xhotl, the Slann Mage-Priests, an ancient race of reptile-like beings that worship and wield magic itself, can feel the shifting of the winds of magic caused by imbalances between Law and Chaos. The ruins of Xhotl are often the site of desperate defenses against Skaven, a mad race of rat-like creatures that infest the sewers of the Old World, or Chaos invasions seeking to steal ancient “Old One" artifacts of the Slann while the world’s attention is turned north to the Chaos gates in the expansive Chaos Wastes.

While Karl Franz holds the throne in Altdorf, the “Wolf of the North," Graf Boris Todbringer of Middenheim is the undisputed ruler of the “City of the White Wolf," Middenheim, the Duchy of Middenland, and protector of the non-electoral province of Nordland, Boris represents the fierce, Ulrican spirit of the northern Empire: shaggy, grizzled, and perpetually addressing the grievances of the Cult of Ulric regarding the Cult of Sigmar. Boris is recently a widower. With two sons, a bastard, and the eldest, Heinrich, and the younger, a literal drooling idiot, and “the Princess." Boris dotes on his daughter Katarina.  His state functions are strained by his relationship with the Emperor in Altdorf and the Emperor's ties to the Cult of Sigmar. As an adherent of Ulric, though possibly mostly ceremonial, the Graf has taken particularly visible and vocal positions in direct opposition to the Emperor, such as the Emperor's recent declaration: There are no such things as mut...

Lying above the delta of the Howling River in the Border Princes are the Varenka Hills. The Varenka Hills are north of the Dwarf Karak ("Hold") of Barak Varr, an elaborate trading port literally embedded in elaborate and highly secure cave system. The hills have become something of a refuge (depending on the Old World timeline).  In the years leading up to and during the Storm of Chaos c. 2522 IC, many fleeing the invasion from the Chaos Wastes, fled over the Black Mountains through Winter's Teeth Pass or Black Fire Pass. The Varenka Hills were a heaven compared to the Greenskin raiders of the mountain passes, the hordes of horrors in the Hvargir Forest, or still more Greenskin hordes on the tundra between the Khyprian Road and the Old Silk Road. The River Treblecz offers no refuge, only shoals, rapids, and falls. The refugees trade extensively with Barak Varr and the Dwarves are known to provide arms and training for defending and defeating the goblin and orc tribes that...

Untergard. Home of “tax cheats!" Former home of “tax cheats." Untergard, as the Graf Sternhauer knew the settlement on the River Taub, was founded by villagers running from the Graf's “unjust taxation." The settlement grew quickly and soon expanded across the river, building a robust hub of commerce with “fair tolls" to cross the river. Unfortunately, Untergard was besieged in the Storm of Chaos in 2522-23 IC. The bridge made it a strategic prize for the forces of Chaos marching toward Middenheim. Imperial forces were victorious, but it left one half of the town destroyed and the other half in ruins. The surviving residents attempted to rebuild, but soon abandoned what remained to the forest and the roving Beastmen hordes of the Drakwald. Today, Untergard's western ruins on the Taub is home to river pirates, Beastmen, and mutant “communes." The pirates, Beastmen, and mutants have taken to worshiping a “god" in the form of an idol made of wyrdstone...

Flowing out the Grey Mountains on the western edge of the province of Reikland, the River Teufel runs red, literally, through the city of Übersreik and then north where it meet the River Reik at the Castle Reikguard. The color of the river is thought to be the result of the great deposits of iron ore in the mountains, mined by the dwarves at the river's source. It is most commonly thought to be the blood of great dwarven losses in their unceasing battles with the Greenskin hordes that besiege the dwarven holds. Which is superstition and which is fact remains debated. The river's confluence at Castle Reikguard is thought to be the most dangerous part of conducting commerce on the Teufel from Übersreik. It is often braved over the toll of the Grünberg Canal, the banditry on the roads that follow the river through town and village, or the creatures of the Reikland Forest.

The mysterious Schmitterling is the leader of the Red Triangle, a cult of the chaos god Tzeentch. He has only been seen by the Company in the distance and spoken to through his corrupted followers. The Schmitterling makes no secret of his goals. They are in his name: The Butterfly. From cocoon to larve to beauty: change embodied in nature.  Change.  The very change in nature shows the beauty of Tzeentch’s perfect goal for the world.

Of the sanctioned cults in the human realms, Ranald is not widely worshiped. Shrines and places of worship are hidden in dark alleys, snugs of “shrine clubs," and other quiet out of the way places. Priests and Initiates of Ranald are, simply, thieves and trickster. Most are wanderers, many are adventurers, and few still publicly known. The “priest" Pit van Karrs of Übersreik and proprietor of the Bricks Keller is an example. Known to the underground and well connected, his initiates run a wide reaching congregation from the tavern. The most publicly known center of worship is in Marienburg, a charter city-state, separate from the Empire. The temple to Ranald is a grand house of worship, rivaling the greatest temples to Sigmar and Ulric in Altdorf and Middenheim, respectively, with a grand, golden chancel and altar and towering vaulted ceilings. Ranaldans will often say a prayer with their index and second fingers crossed. The symbol is used not just in prayer but to invoke Ra...

Quentin is the crank, kook, quack, eccentric, and inventive craftsman of the Institute. Quentin's gadgets are largely useless, but make a big show, and the show often results in an unmitigated disaster in the moment, but an equally unparalleled success that makes for Quentin's impeccable reputation. Recent devices included: The “Throat-Singer’s Deceiver" A stiff leather collar with a hidden reed-and-bellows mechanism tucked under the chin. The agent twists a small knob to activate it. It’s supposed to perfectly mimic any voice the wearer has heard that day; ideal for impersonating a guard captain or seductive noblewoman during a whispered conversation at a feast. How it actually works is the first twist makes the collar emit a loud, wet QUACK like a startled goose. Every subsequent word the agent tries to speak comes out as a ridiculous, warbling mix of their own voice and farm-animal sounds. The “Nightwalker’s Deception" Soft-soled leather boots with a heel-mounted c...