Welcome Back to the Library!
We’re excited to share some opportunities to engage with Taletell Hearts in the coming months! We’ve got Star Wars Weekend, Twitch Streams, and more. Let’s get into it!
Happy Trans Day of Visibility to all of our subscribers! Trans Rights are Human Rights
What’s Happening with Taletell
It’s that time of year again! Star Wars Weekend returns for its second year. Player and volunteer sign-ups are live. We’ve got some great GMs lined up for 2025, so make sure to check the links below for more information on how to join us this year!
Get more info here!
Twitch Streams
We’re continuing to stream on Twitch once a week. Come through for coworking, Stardew Valley, Core Keeper, and more! You might also see some special guests taking over the channel on occasion 👀.
Follow us over at twitch.tv/taletellhearts.
Indie Game Spotlight / Game of the Month
There are only a few days left to check out the games featured in BackerKit’s Pocketopia event! The games here are all tabletop board games, focused on being easy to pick up and portable so you can easily play them on the go.
We’d love to highlight A Land Once Magic by Viditya Voleti as a project to back during Pocketopia! It’s a GM-less world-building game. Armed with a deck of cards and a notebook, you can play this game solo or with a group of friends as you build a post-fantasy world. You will use a combination of paints (core words that will describe the world you’re building) and Touchstones (media from our world that will offer inspiration points to draw from when creating your world).
This game encourages you to think past what we’ve typically seen in fantasy. What are the effects of magic on the world? What happens after the titans who roamed the planet leave destruction in their wake? Answer these questions and more when you pick up A Land Once Magic, but check it out quickly, there are only a couple days left to support this project!;
A Land Once Magic - Pocket-sized Worldbuilding TTRPG
Building a Well-Rounded Player Character
When creating a character for any TTRPG, it’s helpful to think about them fully. Something that I didn’t realize as a new player was how important it was to have a backstory and a goal for the character that I was playing, not just for myself but for the GM and the overall story as well. It’s easy to put stats on a character sheet and just wing it while you’re playing. But that doesn’t always allow you the chance to really invest in the story that you’re telling through your character’s eyes.
Having a well-rounded character means knowing their strengths and flaws and what they’re trying to accomplish. It’s trusting in what they’re good at and sometimes leaning into what they struggle with. Some of the most powerful moments in TTRPGs have happened because a player was willing to lean into their character growing out of their weakness.
The next time you build a character, spend some time reflecting on what motivates them. Ask questions like the ones below, and create a character that you can fully embrace in roleplaying opportunities.
Questions to Ask
- What are they afraid of?
- What brings your character joy?
- What do they do to hide their shortcomings?
- What are they really good at that would surprise their companions?
Transplanar RPG is Top Tier Storytelling!
To celebrate Trans Day of Visibility, we’re excited to highlight Transplanar RPG. For those unfamiliar, Transplanar RPG “is an award-winning, all-transgender, people of color-led dark fantasy TTRPG channel telling poetic stories about flawed characters in an original noncolonial, antiorientalist multiverse.”
We’ve always been incredibly impressed with the depth of storytelling experiences that the cast of Transplanar RPG produces. From THE CHAOS PROTOCOL to Godkiller, the stories and characters that this cast embodies feel real. They will give you hope, make you cry, and make you question the ways that you think about the world.
They’re currently on Arc Three of THE CHAOS PROTOCOL, using the Court of Vampires: an original hack of https://bit.ly/CourtofBlades by a Couple of Drakes. Arc Three will take you to an urban fantasy setting where vampires and werewolves exist and noble houses feud with each other.
Visit their website below for more information and give them a follow on social media to keep up with their work. https://transplanarrpg.com/chaos.
That’s all we’ve got this month y'all. As we close out this newsletter, our team wants to take a moment to remind you about how important our stories are. When we take a minute to create something new, to imagine something different, it helps us as individuals and the community around us see that things can be better. The world is scary right now. Our stories help us imagine a world where we can thrive. So write that idea down, share that story you’ve been sitting on. We need creative works to reinvigorate us. We’re excited to continue offering space for people to tell the stories that matter. We hope that you will continue to join us. <3
Make sure that you check out our Patreon or follow us all over to stay up to date on what Taletell Hearts is up to!
As always, thank you for reading. Take care of yourselves. Tell brilliant, brave stories. We’ll see you around the Library.
