Explore the mysteries of a world beyond death. History, mutant madness, and old-school combat meet at the end of humanity.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Update: surveys are coming soon, then PDFs
2 months ago
– Sun, Feb 15, 2026 at 03:38:08 PM
The Danse Macabre Rulebook is nearly done and out to backers
Dear backers, we are So. Far. Along. We spent the winter woodshedding—researching, writing, editing, laying out, illustrating, designing, mapmaking, and proofing.
At this point, the Danse Macabre Rulebook (DMRB) is done pending final backer names in the credits.
You can see videos of the initial printed proofs of the DMRB and Guide on YouTube and Instagram. The paper quality and printing are excellent, 10/10. We are adjusting the binding to be more reader-friendly, and then these books are ready for the mass print run.
Below are just a few preview spreads from the DMRB. We expect to send the full PDF to backers within a couple of weeks.
(In the spreads below: writing by Chris Pickett, map by Chris Pickett, art by Ethan Gould and Chris Pickett, design and layout by Tony Grasso, editing by Wythe Marschall and Jedd Cole.)
Guide to the Abandoned World is *also* nearly done and out to backers
Likewise, we are done with the Guide—eight settings and the Solo Rules—and we will send that to backers soon, too. This book has likewise been physically proofed, and we are very happy with the print quality. Expect a PDF within a couple of weeks.
Here are just a couple of preview spreads from two different chapters, Provence and the Pacific Northwest.
(In the spreads below: writing by Chris Pickett and Michael J. Cohen, art by Chris Pickett and Michael J. Cohen, layout by Wythe Marschall, design by Tony Grasso, editing by Wythe Marschall and Jedd Cole. Maps in the Guide by Sunaree Paiwong. Thanks to Alex McGuigan for help with some of the history.)
Unsunken and Reliquary are written and laid out
Both the fantastical item zine, Reliquary (which will be useful to GMs and players of Borg games, OSR games, and D&D-style games as well as Danse Macabre), and the Paris mega-dungeon, Unsunken, are written and laid out. Expect PDFs within a month.
Update re words: Wythe Marschall has edited both, and two extremely smart French speakers, Laura Goudet and Jean-Baptiste Goudet, have read through Unsunken. Jedd Cole is proofing Unsunken now.
Update re art: Tony Grasso has laid these books out and designed them. Michael J. Cohen has designed maps of Paris Abandonnée for Unsunken. Sunaree Paiwong has created relic- and architecture-art for both books. And Christopher Pickett and Ethan Gould are creating illustrations for both books now.
You can tell that bringing this game to life has been a massive team effort. Many thanks to everyone who has played the game with us (shout out to our Discord server, PAXU 2025, PAGE 2026, and Running GAGG 2026!) and of course the team.
Unsunken by the numbers
1 new narrative structure for the game—the Pilgrims can choose to work as spies for hire rather than religious penitents
8 new factions—breaking up the powerful kingdom into a powderkeg of post-apocalyptic tensions
3 new basic rules for underground exploration
2 new classes—the routier (mercenary, sell-sword) and souterrain (underground dweller, survivalist), both offering thematic powers with unique mechanics
20 new encounters inspired by French folklore—including memorable demoniacs reges (intelligent undead)
30 new relics from medieval history
4 strange "dungeons"—regions of the Lutetian Vault beneath Paris (the vast old mines and new secret tunnels)
4 cross-cutting underground quests to play through in any order
100+ named NPCs with relationships to each other and to the factions vying for control of France
12 plothooks in the city above
90 locations above to explore
50 locations below to survive ("rooms in a dungeon")
1 epic setting for your next medieval horror campaign
Expect surveys shortly
All to say—expect backer surveys shortly (as per the headline above). The main question to answer quickly is, how do you want to be credited in the DMRB? Shipping addresses can be updated later, as we're not shipping physical rewards until the summer.
Any questions? See a typo in a PDF (once we send those out)? Enjoying the game so far? Want to share a fun idea or blurb the game? Email Wythe at co [at] stillfleet [dot] com.
Production update: dansing toward print
4 months ago
– Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 02:34:19 PM
A fairly thorough update
Happy winter in the Northern Hemisphere! As I write from South Philadelphia, snow is on the ground, a black cat is enjoying a staring contest with a cathedral, and the world feels palpably apocalyptic. The mood is right for an update about a post-apocalyptic game featuring quite a few cathedrals.
Thanks to everyone for your patience. The whole team has been grinding (perhaps a turn of phrase that would have resonated with medieval blacksmiths) to bring you Danse Macabre quickly. Here is where we stand…
The Danse Macabre Rulebook
The book has been written, edited, and laid out. The page count, all-in, is 220. Most illustrations are done, with a few left to go. We will start proofing in layout later this week. It’s looking amazing, and it's definitely the most orange TTRPG I’ve seen.
Here are some draft spreads—thanks to the game's graphic designer, Anthony Grasso:
A spread of rules featuring art by Ethan Gould
An in-progress chapter header
Some goods you can barter for or purchase
Rules for playing a burgher, with art by Chris Pickett
One of the fun things about creating TTRPG books is that you always end up with odd gaps—half-columns of empty space that need something, some miniature graphic or text feature. We are now in the process of choosing which gaps to fill, and how, and which to leave as white space, visual breath.
If you have a second, please reach out to creator Chris Pickett (at-timespace.place on most social media) and say congrats. It takes a truly monumental amount of work to write a rulebook of over 200 pages, make it consistent, and draw a third of the art including the covers.
Guide to the Abandoned World—now including Solo Rules
The multi-author book has been written, edited, and laid out. There are fewer illustrations in this one than the magisterial Rulebook, but there are quite a few maps of different regions in 1390, all of which have been created by Sunaree (Kae) or myself but not yet prettied-up. (Medieval Lithuania was the most involved to reconstruct.)
To be made pretty by the art team
The Solo Rules have been written and lightly playtested. We’ll keep playtesting the big pilgrimage map we created (Cilicia) while we work on the rest of the book, since the Solo Rules appear last.
Eventually, we need more playtestable pilgrimage maps, but we don’t have room to print them in the Guide, anyway. This is a good problem for 2026—and for the community. Tell us what places you want to explore on your solo pilgrimages!
Unsunken: Paris Below
As of today, I’ve written the first four chapters (all of Paris Above) as well as the ninth chapter (the encounters). The “dungeon” chapters, five through eight, and the quest chapter, ten, are heavily outlined, with plenty of writing in some spots and not so much writing in others.
I've tried to mix in weird, dark-fantasy flourishes with the historical tidbits. For example, there are so, so many abbeys, priories, and monasteries! What if a few prominent monastic personages were also spies for various factions? What if one of them was a mad alchemist with a secret tunnel into the sewers?
As I write out the rooms of the dungeons (all of which are mines or sewers, not the oubliettes of chateaux—which were tiny in comparison to the mines), a French friend is reading the book and will hopefully point out any issues with my, ahem, not so bien français.
If anyone else wants to help fact check my non-fantastic claims about France in 1390, email co [at] stillfleet [dot] com.
The VTT bundle with Borough Bound
The team over at Borough Bound—Will, James, and Amber—worked very fast to help us select a set of town maps that worked with DM’s primary historical milieu, Constantinople.
Amber then went in and adjusted the maps to look more spooky, more medieval, and—you know it—more orange. The whole town—a walled one near Constantinople, another possible home base for Pilgrims—looks perfect.
We’ll share the results with our patrons and backers, but first we want to get more art finished and make map tokens for you (demoniacs, Pilgrims, NPCs, relics). Until then, please do check out Borough Bound’s fine work.
Everything else
—will come to life after the above. The OST is coming together, with most tracks in. Chris has their outline for the Reliquary. We owe one raffle winner a Pilgrim drawing by Tony Grasso. And of course we’ll make sure the faux-copper Tusi couple pin (the symbol of the game) looks and feels sufficiently quintessent.
But first, we have to finish the main books and get you the PDFs!
Late Pledges
Know someone who seemed interested in Danse Macabre but missed the campaign? It’s not too late! Late Pledges are open on Kickstarter, and they work the same as ordinary pledges, just with a small price increase (to reward backers with a never-to-be-had-again discount).
If someone is curious to learn more about the game before pledging, they can check out one of our not one, not two, but five exegetic actual-play episodes of DM plus a podcast series—featuring the talents of:
Thanks to these wonderful players, and thank you for backing the game! Stay warm~
Last during-campaign update: VTT assets unlocked! / Shout-outs
6 months ago
– Wed, Nov 05, 2025 at 02:02:59 PM
Nearly 400 backers. VTT assets unlocked. Can we get to the solo rules!?
No idea! I have a few pages of notes toward solo rules for Danse Macabre that I want to test, either way. This is now more of a question of whether the rules are printed in the Guide to the Abandoned World or offered otherwise in 2026.
Having discussed that, let me add a brief behind-the-scenes reflectionas we wrap another campaign: there are a ton of indie RPGs these days. Our sincere thanks to everyone who has backed this campaign and supported our vision of high-quality, human-made, replayable games that invite players to reimagine real social worlds.
Either way, this one is—
Now, to bask in the glow of a couple of final shout-outs…
Big ups to Mechritter
Our friends Laurie O’Connel and Kayla Dice over at Twelve Pins Press have just launched a campaign for Mausritter Month called Mechritter. You may recognize those names, as they played Danse Macabre with Chris and me last weekend!
Twelve Pins' games are always smart and fun, and this sticker-driven mice + mecha experience looks no different. So good: "Mech pieces always break before the mouse inside does." Check it out.
Shout-out to Hallowed
I've been chatting with indie artist Kyle Stück about his latest fantasy-horror comic, Hallowed. The international team behind this one is hoping to fund it, and the concept is pretty cool: there are pilgrims, templars, witches, etc., all imagined as beast-people. Blurb:
Hallowed is a good old-fashioned horror story set in a mysterious and haunted forest. Think Kingdom of Heaven meets Brian Jacques’ Redwall series plunged into the weird and fantastical work of Robert E. Howard’s horror. The overall premise? A desperate band of deserters find themselves lost in a mysterious forest, hunted not only by their sins and the religious zealots pursuing them… but the very woods themselves.
That's all for now?
Naw, there will be more Danse Macabre. But we will have to move into a focus on production soon, especially after running many games at PAX Unplugged. So expect fewer updates later this fall/winter.
Rough timeline (estimate)
Soon – Figure out Late Pledges; note, prices will go up a bit, so if you're planning on backing and have the means, please back now, don't wait!
End of 2025 – Send out PDFs of the Rulebook and Guide (hopeful we can hit this goal—no guarantee, but I think we're moving well)
End of February 2026 – Send out all PDFs (realistic); send all files to print (realistic); update backers re shipping costs (realistic); move to developing new, short content for Danse Macabre to help Pilgrims and Chroniclers jump into the game (variable)
Late spring 2026 – Start shipping rewards (hopeful, depends on tariffs and other logistical nonsense)
By summer 2026 – Bring Danse Macabre to stores and run more games in person! (hopeful)
How's that sound? Let us know if you have any questions, want to join or start an ongoing game, or have ideas for future rules or settings. Otherwise, we'll be heads-down as we build out Abandoned Constantinople 🏰
Thank you, and good night!
Final 48 hours! / Shout-out: 100 Strangers / Delving into Unsunken
6 months ago
– Tue, Nov 04, 2025 at 09:18:07 AM
Final 48 (well, 46ish?)
Quick thoughts. We are so. Very. Close to unlocking the VTT Asset Bundle with Borough Bound. Can we get there today? Who knows!?
Shouting-out Adam Station’s 100 Strangers
I'm a big fan of Station's work, which works well with Stillfleet. His new project is…
100 Strangers is a collection of unique misfits, outcasts, weirdos and normies for your sci-fi misadventures. In this fully illustrated zine, you'll find no dashing pilots, rugged resistance fighters, or space wizards.
Instead you'll meet a motley assortment of the folks generally left out of many sci-fi universes, such as a washed-up pharmacist, a kitbashed salesperson, a fugitive beauty contestant, and 97 others.
Each character is memorably illustrated by Roque Romero, and is sure to add a dash of the wild and strange to your games.
Content preview: un peu about the Paris campaign and setting book
Further production thoughts: Chris is still tweaking rules in the Rulebook, thanks to extensive playtesting; mostly, Chris and Ethan are on art. Tony is laying out the Rulebook. Kae is of course holding down our core marketing tasks (social media, video, cat pics). And I am starting layout on the Guide while continuing to write the Paris book, Unsunken.
It's all thoroughly outlined and roughly half written, although the actual writing goes much more quickly once we have outlined and playtested sections of the whole.
With that, here are some “dungeons”—underground areas dull of danger—I'm currently fleshing out (pun intended) for Unsunken:
The Royal Vault – What is the chief engineer for the young, mad king plotting deep below the prison cells that make up the basement of the Palais de la Cité? Who is this Secret Magister…? What is "La Tarasque?"
The Roman Baths and Sewers – People say that when a sinkhole swallowed the ancient Roman baths, they became connected to subterranean rivers and a vast dark lake… But these are just rumors, right? Surely, there isn't a "draconic" noblewoman living down there?
The Quarry – Beneath the Left Bank, shafts and halls for mining limestone—some pre-Roman, some brand new—link natural cavities, the peasants’ great mushroom farm, and the Viking-haunted (!?) Pit Bizarre…
The Temple Cellarium – In the northeast of the Right Bank, the lower levels of the great fortress of the New Templars connect to gypsum mines. What vile practices are the hyper-zealous New Templars hiding?
That's all for now! More tomorrow!
Final days! / Shout-out: The Sickest Noon-Day Witch / A guide to the Guide
6 months ago
– Mon, Nov 03, 2025 at 12:54:59 PM
2.5 days left to get Macabre
Real talk, the game will be available via Late Pledges after the campaign ends, but: a) it will cost more, and b) backing later won't help us spread the word nearly as much as backing now.
To that end, major thanks to everyone who has backed. And please help our tiny company keep going by getting the word out to the history/horror fans in your life.
To that end, reminder: we are running a Pilgrim art raffle! Shout us out online (here are some shareable graphics), let us know you did, and you'll get a chance to have your character illustrated by artist and designer Anthony Grasso (Blister Critters, Mad Borg).
Also: we heard from the community and adjusted the stretch goals! We're now unlocking the VTT bundle with Borough Bound at 25K and solo rules by Wythe at 28K. Can we reach these goals? What do you think?
One other reminder: we have been very fortunate to run some amazing Danse Macabre actual play with friends, new and old, including—most recently—three brilliant game designers we're fans of.
This one is a wilderness crawl through the Armenian Highlands that involves some great character development, tracking, chasing, ruins-exploration, giant zombies, wine-tasting… all of the things you'd expect from a medieval adventure!
Shouting-out Under the Shadow of the Noon-Day Witch
We want to keep the shout-outs a-flowing, because we love indie TTRPGs, full stop, and we have made some great connections in this tiny industry since launching Stillfleet a few years back.
Currently, our friend John McGuire over at Ham & Egg Publishing is running a campaign to fund a new witchy adventure for Sickest Witch. This is an absolutely brutal, unapologetically pro-witch game built on a Borg chassis but doing its own body-horrific thing: for one, your witch uses stolen body parts for magic. It's like an A24 horror movie about a witch who just wants to help the peasants…
Here is the pitch:
Under the Shadow of the Noon-Day Witch: A Dark Folk Horror Adventure for Sickest Witch RPG
A standalone tale of political intrigue, fire and brimstone, and the brutal machinery of medieval torture
Under the Shadow of the Noon-Day Witchcomes from Ham & Eggs Publishing, the creators of the 321RPG system. It’s the newest third-party adventure for Sickest Witch RPG. Run using the Severed System, this standalone tale brims with political intrigue, fire and brimstone, and the brutal machinery of medieval torture, all driven by Purity Rose in their crusade to cleanse the world of witches.
At its core is the Severed System. Witches harvest body parts to cast spells, growing stronger piece by piece. Magic flows through a shared pool called the Cauldron, forcing your Coven to debate every desperate choice.
Content preview: a quick guide to Guide to the Abandoned World
To close things out, a quick update: the Danse Macabre Rulebook is being laid out. I am about to start layout on Guide to the Abandoned World, which now has a draft introduction about how to bring any given region into the Abandoned setting of the game.
The meat of the book, of course, are our eight chapters by the Stillfleet Studio team and guest writers. The campaign page lists these, but I wanted to share a little bit more about them. (Every chapter features a region map, by the way!)
Mamluk Egypt by Albert Bassili – Rules for mummies! Secrets buried deep beneath the sands! Includes factions, plot hooks, and encounters.
Venezia: The Serene Republic by Ethan Gouldini – Fight against a proto-capitalist, demoniac-weaponizing Venetian Empire of shipping and commerce! Includes factions, relics, plot hooks, 6 full encounters, and a complete quest. Plus illustrations by Ethan Gouldini!
Provence by Christopher Pickett – The palace of the anti-pope! (Yes—there was a real, historical anti-pope!) This was the original setting of the game, back when Chris started writing it!
Abandoned Albion: Southern England by Leonardo Andrade – Bohemians, Appellants, and New Brythons vie to control the fate of the nation! Includes factions, plot hooks, and encounters.
Lithuania: The Land of Journey’s End by Konstantine Paradias – The indigenous faith of the Druwi is threatened by the militant Teutonic Order in the last pagan culture in medieval Europe! Includes factions, plot hooks, new maleficia, and NPCs.
Sukhothai by Sunaree Paiwong – Explore multiple beautiful and demoniac-haunted wat (Buddhist temples) on the outskirts of one of the great capitals of the Thai-speaking world in 1390! Includes plot hooks, relics, and 6 full encounters.
Muromachi Japan by Wythe Marschall – Take on work for the shōgun or one of his rivals as a yōkai hunter (monster hunter, ghost hunter) or wakō (pirate, privateer, sea-citizen)! Includes 2 new classes, new useful items, relics, plot hooks, and 6 full encounters.
The Land Out There: The Far Northwest Coast of Turtle Island (the Pacific Northwest) by Michael J. Cohen – Explore the ways that the Didene/Tahltan nation deals with the Abandonment! Includes 8 new maleficia and a new way of using maleficia (animal aspects), new useful items, and 2 full encounters. Plus illustrations by Michael J. Cohen!
That's it for now. As we enter crunch time, expect more quick updates. Please let us know if anyone has questions.
