His Majesty The Worm: Day of the Newts Masterpost

 

A traveling magic show. A kidnapped actor. Webbed footprints leading into a cave. Churning lava. Sadistic salamanders. A fresh spin on the dungeon crawling genre. All this and more in Day of the Newts

 

Gencon 2026 Recap: Pickup Games

 

I ran two pickup games at Gencon with my friends and played a couple games. My friends wanted to play His Majesty The Worm so I brought some spare character sheets to the convention and ran them through the same scenario from the ticketed event. Later we painted some Delta Green Agents using a Wargames Atlantic sprue I brought to the con, and I ran them through a Delta Green adventure at the airport.

 

Gencon 2026 Recap: Scheduled Games

Special thanks to the free painting table and to my friends for painting with me
 

I ran two ticketed events at Gencon 2026. All the players did a great job and we finished both sessions early, a little over two hours in a three hour slot.

 

Appendix N 2026 Bonus Dungeon: Hung Over and Harassed

 

In His Majesty The Worm there are a lot of city events that, if taken seriously, would be an entire adventure in themselves. The book chides the reader not to play out these adventures because it could turn the campaign into a “town game”.

Guess what we’re doing today?

His Majesty The Worm: Day of the Newts Playtest

Traveling mountebank Bartoc the Orc and his wife Mary the Alchemist woke at their camp site to find Mary's mother, Salamandra "Sherry the Mage" Hakkapeliitta, missing. In her place were a set of webbed footprints leading into a fissure in the nearby rock face that definitely wasn't there last night. They thought about retrieving Mary's father Lorikeet "Larry the Mage Hakkapeliitta and her sister Tansy Hakkapeliitta from the nearby town where they were staying. They decided to err on the side of speed and went into the cave after mom.

 

Undercroft: The Wastes

Martin

The Wastes are a place where negative energy intrudes into the dungeon from the plane of death and undead. Superficially they’re not all that different from the rest of the Undercity. The Devils help set them apart.

Undercroft: The Mines

Parker

 

The mines beneath the City were officially closed long ago when they ran dry, and when buildings began to collapse. The opening of the Underworld has filled them up with dungeon monsters and ignited a gang war over the remaining treasure.

Undercroft: The Weald

 

Diefenbach

The Weald is a place where the natural world thrives in the lightless depths of the Undercity, defying physical laws that demand sun and rain for things to grow.

Undercroft: Dungeon Builder and The Weird

This is a dungeon builder for His Majesty The Worm. You use it a bit like the City Builder in the corebook, but for the underworld. It’s based on the one from Esoteric Enterprises, my favorite dungeon builder ever.

His Majesty The Worm Monster Mash: The Triplets

 

The Triplets are a pair of Dark Elf twins raised in a Church orphanage and a Brain Spider who “adopted” them after they aged-out of the program. They like the dungeon because nobody charges them rent or makes them perform religious rituals, and if someone hits you you’re allowed to hit them back. They’re like the Guild, completing Contracts while pursuing personal motivations. They’re tough and confident adventurers but lack emotional maturity.

 

His Majesty The Worm Monster Mash: Cave Hulk

Cave Hulks are enormous burrowing mantises with a confusing gaze attack. They straddle the line between endurance and ambush predators. They burst out of the wall when you least expect it and attack you. If you’re on your guard they follow you, burrowing out of sight and waiting for a moment of weakness. Their favorite time to strike is during the Camp phase, especially after following you and building up an appetite.

 

His Majesty The Worm Monster Mash: Dark Creepers

Dark Creepers are dungeon thieves who live to steal magic items. Dowries of arcane treasure are an essential part of Dark Creeper marriage proposals. Creepers who don’t steal are condemned to bachelorhood/spinsterdom, giving them a powerful incentive to rob adventurers. Turn out the lights, grab the goods, run as fast as you can.

 

Undercroft: Books and Papers

Grutzner

 

Draw from the Major Arcana to get a book.  

 

Number, title,  

author

language, media, 

description.

Undercroft: Small Change

Knaus

More treasure tables for His Majesty The Worm. This list is here to fill lesser dungeon room and the pockets of low level slobs. For big ticket items use the previous Undercroft tables.

Undercroft: Treasures For His Majesty The Worm

Lagrenée

 

I'm working on an Esoteric Enterprises style dungeon generator for His Majesty The Worm. In order to do that I made some treasure tables for stocking the generated rooms.

 

THE TABLES 

In the below tables, a single card drawn from the Minor Arcana list yields either a magic item, a magic weapon/armor, or treasure worth 90ish gold pieces. Use that to calibrate when/how often you want to draw when filling up chests, hiding things in rooms, filling the pockets of the scariest monsters...

 

His Majesty The Worm Monster Mash: Deep Dwarves

No true Dwarf would allow the sun to fall on his head. That’s the philosophy of the Deep Downers, a disaffected youth subculture of Underfolk who shun the surface entirely. The movement was never popular in the City due to the sheer impracticality of urban life entirely underground. That changed with the discovery of the underworld. In the ensuing gold rush a number of Deep Downer expeditions disappeared into the dungeon, vowing never to return. The bulk of them met grisly fates and came back as undead. 

A handful survived.

Against Surprise?

I've been thinking about surprise attacks in RPGs. Rather than making up caricatures and laundering my opinions through imaginary critics, I'll go straight to listing some games and how they handle the subject.

Gencon 2025 Recap: Pickup Games

I ran two pickup games at Gencon 2025 for some friends. One was a familiar game and scenario, one I had never run before.

Against Torches

You ever tell someone you don’t like [food], and they tell you “no you just haven’t had GOOD [food]”? So you go to the restaurant they tell you and order the thing they tell you and, surprise surprise, you still don’t like it? 

That’s me with tracking torches. For years I’ve considered it a waste of time. And whenever I tell anyone this they say “torches are good, you just have to make tracking light matter!”

His Majesty The Worm - Pile of Blades Masterpost

Pile of Blades is a city and undercity I wrote for His Majesty The Worm. I played through it in seven sessions, about one for each realm of the Undercity.