Happy Saturday, all!

Today we thought we'd share a backer preview of content—and plan on sharing a few more before the campaign is through...

Ekphrasis is one of the oldest forms of writing—it's the craft of describing visual art in language so vivid it becomes an experience of its own. Homer did it with the Shield of Achilles. Keats did it standing in front of a Grecian urn. It's writing that not only references an image—it enters it, inhabits it, and comes back with something new.

This is the engine behind Mörktastic Beasts. We took the ekphrastic method and pointed it at the tabletop. Each of our illustrators creates original artwork with no brief, no creature name, no lore—just whatever crawled out of their subconscious. Then I reverse-engineer everything from the image: the creature's name, its history, its abilities, its place in the world. 

For this today's preview, Jeremy Hush painted a ghostly figure in a bronze mask sitting in what looks like a tomb and handed it off to me—without name or additional comment. I sat with it for a while, then went for a walk in the nearby woods. Over the next hour or so I let my mind wander, and when I got back to my desk I wrote out a secret order of necromancers who pledge their lives and their deaths to a serpent lord, undergo a 29-day living entombment, and rise as spirit-possessed masks bound to bring about the end of time... 

Then Max takes it from there, using his extensive experience playing and designing games for MÖRK BORG to translate these wyrd visions into game mechanics, making sure the lore doesn't just read well—it plays well.

This is one spread in a book that's now over 220 pages, and every creature in Mörktastic Beasts was made this way.

~Janaka

Backer-only content: the full spread is below. Take a look at the Disciple of the Morningstar in all its necromantic glory!

Thank you to everyone who has backed this so far! We have already been able to expand this so much because of your support and hitting our stretch goals. Keep spreading the word about these horrors!

We have had some questions come in about the stats and about how beholden we are to the original 5e stats in the first book...the answer to which is, "not at all."

When I write stats for multiple systems or do "conversions," I generally disregard consistency across systems. Instead, I design for the system in which it will be played.  I don't see any need to let the 5e stats influence the Mörk Borg stats. This isn't to say I don't reference them. I do. But my general rule is that I create all stats/mechanics from scratch and design explicitly for Mörk Borg.

I have written stats for about 50 of these creatures so far. My process has been to read the lore, stare at the art, and envision the creature murdering characters. Then, I get to writing. I try to capture the essence of what makes the creature stand out. Then I reflect that back mechanically, doing what I can to express that essence in a way that will provide an interesting gameplay experience.

Many of you may know some of my previous work already, such as Abyss of Hallucinations, my Mörk Borg setting. I have been creating Mörk Borg content for at least 5 years now, and I am so damn excited to get back to writing more creature stats for all the additional artwork coming in via the stretch goals!!

I put together a sampler PDF so you can take a look at a few of the creatures. Please keep in mind that this is a draft and hasn't been edited yet! That also means you are welcome to leave any feedback. If there is something you see that you love, hate, or think I should consider, then please feel free to drop us a comment! Better yet, join our Discord server and chat about it!

That's all from me today. I hope you find some time to stare at the moon.

By Night,

Max Moon

The book now gets the binding it deserves. A silk ribbon marker and color-coordinated headbands and footbands are being added to every copy of Mörktastic Beasts. We love these kind of details every time we pick up a book—and for a book that's now over 220 pages, you're going to be picking this one up a lot!

Justine is an illustrator whose work lives in the space between detailed, obsessive line work and unhinged psychedelic color. She's illustrated for Magic: The Gathering, Kobold Press, and self-published her own horror comics. Her creatures have this quality where they feel both meticulously rendered and slightly feral—like she's channeling something she can barely control. She's a perfect fit for this book and I can't wait to see what she makes for it!

Help us get there. Share the campaign, tell your friends, drop the link wherever people care about this kind of thing. Every stretch goal we unlock before the campaign ends means a bigger, stranger, more beautiful book.

—Janaka

Five stretch goals deep and the book just keeps getting bigger and meaner. Eight more pages of Caustic's grotesque creations are now in Mörktastic Beasts, which means the book has crossed 220 pages! For those keeping score, that's more than double the length of the MÖRK BORG core rulebook. This thing has taken on a wild and strange life of its own.

Next stretch goal — $25K: Physical Upgrades. The book has earned it! We love the silk ribbon marker bound into the MÖRK BORG rulebook, and since Mörktastic Beasts is now twice as long as that book, we figured it deserves one too. We'll also be adding color-coordinated headbands and footbands. These are the kind of details you feel every time you pick the book up, and the kind of thing that elevates a book to an artifact.

You know the drill by now. Share the campaign, tell people about it, help us keep unlocking stretch goals so we can keep making this thing better for everyone who backed it!

—Janaka

You all are making this book into something truly monstrous in the best possible way.

Six new pages of content inspired by Johan Nohr's art are now part of Mörktastic Beasts. Johan Nohr is of course the artist and graphic designer behind MÖRK BORG itself. His style is immediate, violent, funny, and unforgettable. A collision of screaming color, ink-dripping filth, punk graphics, and apocalyptic fantasy. He's also the artist behind the black light poster in our reward tiers (and available as an add-on), so now you know whose vision you'd be hanging on your wall.

Next stretch goal — $22K: Even More Art by Caustic! When we saw this first illustration that Caustic created for the book before launch, we knew that we were going to have to double-down if the project took off... No next up we'll be adding eight additional pages of grotesque content illustrated by Caustic to the digital and physical editions.

We keep unlocking these because you keep sharing the campaign. Don't stop now! Tell your friends, post it in your groups, link it wherever people care about weird and beautiful things being made by hand. The more stretch goals we hit, the bigger and meaner this book gets for everyone.

—Janaka