By: Joe Gaylord (LabLazarus)
Since 2018, I’ve been regularly publishing TTRPG content, supplements, adventures, games, settings, and so on. I can imagine a lot of people in the hobby want to be involved in this side of TTRPGs, but don’t have a clear sense of how to get started. This is part of a series of articles on my process for developing games and other TTRPG content. I highly encourage you to also pick up guides from people like Storytelling Collective and others who have covered elements of this in more detail and who can offer other perspectives on the topic.
As a “Part 0” for the series, I took you through the process of developing Patches, a journal game I developed for a Free RPG Day Jam. I did this to present the whole process together. You can read that article here (https://rpgcounterpoint.com/2026/06/09/patches-a-ttrpg-story/).
In Part 1, I walked through the initial steps of designing a game or supplement. I discussed where ideas start from, how to scope out a project, and develop your team. You can read that article here (https://rpgcounterpoint.com/2026/07/14/session-negative-1-creating-a-ttrpg-part-1/).
In this piece, I’ll pick up where I left off. Please read the last piece if you didn’t already, but if you need a refresher on key ideas, here it is.
I have created a number of games this year, including the following (Not bragging; I’ll reference these later):
- D&D Winter Olympiad, which includes the rules for running all the winter Olympic sports in a 5.5e D&D game.
- BUMP! (full game coming, I promise) which is a story about scouts at a summer camp telling ghost stories that come to life.
- Patches, which is a cozy journaling game about the creation, reuse, and eventual end of a piece of clothing.
- Mythopoesis which is a medieval middle fantasy game where the characters are defined by symbols associated with the legends told about them.
I took the process through all of my pre-work, which means we have:
- A “kick” or motivation.
- A pitch which describes the concept in broad strokes.
- A target audience you’re making the game for.
- A team and community to support you.
- Scoping documents that describe what you’ll write.
All of that means you’re essentially ready to start the process of writing, which is what this article covers.
Inspirations
Blank pages suck, which is in part why this series is coming out semi-monthly instead of biweekly, like I hoped. (Sorry) However, you don’t really need to start with a fully blank page when you begin writing a TTRPG. You assuredly had something that inspired you when you began working on the pitch. You might have an aesthetic or genre in mind. You might be riffing off a game you enjoy. You might even be inspired by something in the real world. Whatever it is, begin by putting that in front of you.
If you’re riffing on an aesthetic, find it, and keep it close. Read the book, watch the show or movie, listen to the music, or make a Pinterest page or collage of the images. You can also check out reviews, interpretations, and fandoms to dig into ideas of what makes things work.
In particular, make a playlist of music, advice I got from Storytelling Collective. This is a great way to keep that inspiration while you write, especially if your energy starts to flag. You can also use it to set the atmosphere while playing the game later.
You can also just steal things. I talk a bit about the idea here (https://rpgcounterpoint.com/2026/02/10/filing-the-serial-numbers-adapting-stories-for-ttrpgs/), but in essence, you can reinterpret or rework a huge amount of cultural content. In particular, you can take mechanics, systems, or concepts from games you like which you know will fit and build them into the game.
As an example of all this, BUMP! draws heavily from the show Midnight Club and classic horror movies, especially Friday XIII. I also built on my days as a Boy Scout, looking up old handbooks and maps of scout camps. I even named the camp after the one that existed in my hometown in the 50s and 60s.
Mechanically, I shamelessly stole worldbuilding mechanics from Kids on Bikes, and the opening scene of the game is essentially a shortened version of Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Von Munchausen.
I made a playlist, too. Here it is, mixing classic rock, campfire songs, and subtly dark overtones. https://open.spotify.com/playlist/61PhbK54xWgTbnpxsg21lB?si=aec36c1c642d4686
Conventions and Conceits
Alongside the specific inspirations, you should understand what genre of story and game you’re creating and that genre’s conventions. These are the main elements that define the genre. In horror, the cracked closet announces a moment of terror and splitting up means someone dies. In a romance, two characters who are trapped together will inevitably fall in love.
TTRPGs have genre conventions as well. There are well-defined roles of player and GM. There are table tools like dice or cards. There are standard mechanics, hit points, ability scores, character types, and random tables. The rhythm of play is well understood.
If you lean into the conventions, it takes some of the burden off you. The players have intuitive understandings of and expectations for how things work. Obviously, you can go too far and have the game feel silly or even like a parody, but I find leaning into tropes is usually worth the risk. If your audience expects something, you should usually follow that.
Opposite from the convention is the conceit. This is the moment where you tell the audience “trust me on this.” Conceits are unique elements of a game which defy expectations by going against the conventions. These can be used to establish something unique about the game, or to break up a “standard” genre by introducing something unexpected.
It’s important to include some conceits. One is almost certainly part of the core idea of the game, likely in the pitch itself. However, having too many conceits risks making the game feel random and confusing in ways that lose your audience.
Notably, in both conceits and conventions, there’s a need for ludonarrative consonance. This is the idea that the mechanics and story of a game need to work together. In particular, the mechanics should support the storytelling. The better these connect, the better your game will likely be.
As an example:
Patches is a cozy journal game about crafting. I included lots of cozy scenarios and ideas, cuddling up on couches, gifts between friends and relatives, late nights spent sewing. It had a strong sustainability angle, so I labelled different sections of the game using a riff on the 3 Rs: reduce, reuse, recycle. I also had some conceits: the game would be very reliant on a single page of physical paper, to show the wear and tear on the object, and would inevitably end in tragedy. That balance (I think) ended up being bittersweet and meaningful while staying comforting and relaxing.
The Mechanical Choices
As you write, you’ll need to make some choices about mechanics and story. These will usually depend mostly on your own writing style and the kind of games you like.
First, you’ll need to define whether you’re writing a totally new game, using an existing engine or system, or building a supplement to a game. These vary in terms of your flexibility and the amount of work required. A new game is your own creature; you can do what you want with it. But you need to do it all. On the other hand, a supplement has to fit perfectly into the style of an existing game, but the hard work is mostly done for you. I’ll get into more detail on this in the next article.
You should also recognize if you’re creating what I call a “loose” or “tight” game. Loose games are those where rules are open to interpretation, and words are used naturally. Troika and 1000 Year Old Vampire are loose games. Tight games are those where everything is strictly defined and mechanically precise. D&D, especially 5.5e, is extremely tight. As an example, a mechanic might say “you gain a bonus to this while in danger” if the game is loose or “you get +1 to checks if an enemy has attacked you or you’ve needed to make a saving throw since the end of your last turn” if it’s tight.
There’s no right or wrong to either of these choices, but you should make them early, so that you’re not forced to rework a lot of content later on.
Rhythms and Motivation
So, now you’re writing. I imagine I don’t need to tell you how to write, but, in terms of completing a project, you should think about your writing style and how to keep up your motivation.
A critical dichotomy, and one you should consider, is whether you’re a plotter or a discovery writer (a pantser). GRRM has a great analogy for this as architects and gardeners:
Plotters, “architects” for Martin, begin with a detailed outline which they then fill in. They do a huge amount of work before really starting to write. Discovery writers, “gardeners” for Martin, are the opposite. They begin writing and just work, letting the story evolve naturally. That work the plotters do in advance needs to happen on edits and rewrites. All writers are a mix of both, but you’ll probably prefer one or the other.
Rhythms and patterns are also very helpful. You’ll need to find where, when, and how you work best and find it early. The quicker you find a rhythm, style, and place that let you write regularly and find a way to make it a habit and routine, the easier it will be to write.
Accountability is huge on this. Give yourself deadlines and find people from your team, community, or friends and family who will check in with you regularly about the project.
Lastly, I have two thoughts on motivation in writing.
First, you can edit bad writing; you can do nothing with a blank page. If in doubt, put words down, even if they’re bad. You can even put a placeholder. My drafts are riddled with notes like: “[XXX Backstory here]”. Go back and fix the stupid thing you hate later; don’t let them stall you out.
Second, be aware of and ready for the desert. The desert is when writing a thing stops being fun. You’ve written the cool bits, but you’re stuck finishing the parts that bore or frustrate you. Surviving it can mean taking a break and coming back, talking it through, or having a habit of daily writing. Whatever you need to do to get past the desert, do it. It will happen. It is inevitable. Be ready for it.
So, it’s done, right?
Now you have written TTRPG content.
You’ve built your game from a set of inspirations, drawing out the conventions from them and deciding what conceits you’re asking of the players. You’ve picked a system and decided how you want the mechanics to work. And you’ve written, for days, weeks, or months. You kept up motivation and made it through the desert. Now you have a full and complete copy of your game here on paper. You have done it. Good job.
That was the easy part. Sorry.
In the next part of this series, I’ll go over testing, editing, rewriting, publishing, and marketing your game. All the things that you need to do, now that the game is “done,” to have it be, you know, actually done.
About the Author
Joe Gaylord is a TTRPG creator based in Northern Italy, publishing as Lazarus Game Lab. He has been playing TTRPGs for over 25 years and has worked on over 50 titles as an author, contributor, and designer. You can access his work, including Patches, and connect with him here: https://lablazarus.carrd.co/
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