100 Dark Fantasy Backgrounds is out!

My new book, 100 Dark Fantasy Backgrounds, is out!

100 Dark Fantasy Backgrounds is a collection of backgrounds for your dark fantasy games. There are no statistics or specific mechanics here; this is mostly a collection of ideas.

Check the PREVIEWS, above, to see some examples!

The first part lists 100 dark fantasy backgrounds with some detail – usually two or three sentences, sometimes more. Most with a tragic or dark twist.

The second part is a single page, adapted from Dark Fantasy Characters, with 80 one-word backgrounds (such as actor, beggar, blacksmith, etc.). These are not specifically “dark”. You can use them to add more detail to your characters’ past or choose one of them instead of the dark fantasy ones. You can ignore part one and combine this with part three to generate your own tragedies – but, again, not all characters need tragedy!

The third part is a tragic events generator, a collection of random tables that can generate thousands of different results. You can use them to create your own backgrounds or to add detail to a background from parts one and two. For example, if you roll the “criminal” background in the first part, you can choose which crime using a random table in the second. Likewise, if you suffered some injustice, you can check this part to find a culprit or to find out how old you were when it happened.

Although this is a systemless book, it is especially suited for medieval dark fantasy games, such as Dark Fantasy Basic.