Jon at Handiwork Games
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handiworkgames.bsky.social
Jon at Handiwork Games
@handiworkgames.bsky.social
Scotland-based #ttrpg developer and publisher of #BEOWULF Age of Heroes, #astaterpg second edition, #Maskwitches, Silver Road, Jon Hodgson Backdrop books, #ColdCity, Hot War, #FiveEvil and more

https://handiwork.games
The Black Friday sale @Drivethru is on now! If you've been eying up our PDFs, there's no better time to grab a load of 'em!
www.drivethrurpg.com/en/publisher...
November 25, 2025 at 5:44 PM
Behind the scenes of some fresh nonsense. I think they want their planet back? Me lovely rewilded tufty lads.
November 25, 2025 at 5:28 PM
This is the ideal male body. You may not like it, but this is what peak performance looks like.

The new 'World War Ruins' and 'More Skies' Backdrops Books contributing to reality. #jhbackdrops

handiwork.games/product-cate...
November 25, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Unbelievable scenes!
Writing a scenario pack of @fromthemorgue.bsky.social brilliant #FiveEvil RPG from @handiworkgames.bsky.social, and was shocked to find my writing contains:

A secret bunker!
Cold War experiments!
Dodgy civil servants!
Fungal mutations!

I'm just as startled as anyone by this.
November 25, 2025 at 1:20 PM
This is some weighty stuff, and while it’s hard to talk about enjoying an article about this subject matter, I came away feeling like I had been quietly led to a bunch of questions that will eventually make me a smarter person. Serious content warnings apply.
I don't know how to introduce this one. After three titles about opium peddling, I figured the rest of SDHistCon would be breezy by comparison. I was wrong. The next day, I experienced one of the toughest board games I've ever played. Perhaps *the* toughest. spacebiff.com/2025/11/24/u...
Unnameable
After the first day of SDHistCon, where I played three games about opium peddling, I figured the second would be easier on my stomach. I could not have been more wrong. It has no name. Its designer…
spacebiff.com
November 25, 2025 at 7:42 AM
Weeeeeeeyyyyyy!!!!
November 24, 2025 at 7:43 PM
What a busy day! Haven’t had time to post here - we finished laying out a new book for a client and it’s looking great! But not our story to tell. We’ve been absolutely run off our feet with Backdrop Book orders. Perfect Christmas present, right? Anyway, hope your Monday was ok.
November 24, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Nice.
Sunday #Guardvember post:

What would the Imperial Guard be without its officers?
“Better off!”
That’s the answer you can hear from some enlisted soldiers (but only behind closed doors).

#Nerdlings
#WarhammerCommunity
#JHBackdrops
November 23, 2025 at 8:53 AM
It is time for three more robot kits to undergo THE PROCESS
November 22, 2025 at 6:41 PM
I think I’ve made peace at this point with something that used to bother me - photoshoots using backdrop books where the backdrops aren’t especially visible. But you can’t get from A to B without a backdrop. Anyway - @fenrisgames.com Grendel model in full effect. #jhbackdrops
November 21, 2025 at 7:42 PM
Hey it's the weekend. Want some free stuff? Here's a thread of our free or PWYW stuff. Most of it is fully playable, or great reading:
The Hermit's Sanctuary for BEOWULF: www.drivethrurpg.com/product/3067... ENnie Nommed! Twice!
November 21, 2025 at 5:20 PM
Might do another one this afternoon. We'll see how the time goes.
It's another episode of your favourite 1970s children's animation "The Maskwitches and the hungry dead shivering like flukes through our pine-tar souls".

I'd say I'm sorry to people frightened of the Maskwitches and the teeth stuff, but you'd know I was lying.

handiwork.games/home/the-sil...
November 21, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Screw it, I'll repost myself. If it's a mistake, something good still might happen. Just different than what I intended in the first instance, and that's ok. Good is good.
Thinking a lot about creativity and my own suspected (but largely inconsequential to me) neurodiversity because once again I have been asked to speak to young people about creative jobs. I have been a full time creative for 25 years by blithely fucking shit up & then going "oh wait! A connection!".
November 21, 2025 at 9:38 AM
All the masks that the NPCs wear on the BBC version of “The Traitors” use the same base mask as I used for this. Call me back, cowards.

Anyway, goodnight.
#maskwitches
November 20, 2025 at 10:57 PM
Reskeet with a time you looked cool

(This was right after a young man tried to tell me that I probably didn’t even play dnd when I was wearing my dnd t shirt on a train. “Well I did art for 3e, 3.5e, 4e, the core books for 5e, & I’ve played it since I was 11 which is probably twice your lifespan?”)
November 20, 2025 at 9:02 PM
With the new More Skies book we're offering 32 versatile sky backdrops which are closer to "photographic" than the original Skies Backdrops, but which remain stylish and stylised. Here we see a Fenris Games Rubble Adventurer in a collection of Fenris Rubble and the mighty troll bridge,
November 20, 2025 at 4:07 PM
The World War Ruins Backdrop Book is out now! 32 pages of ruined cityscapes to level up your miniatures photography. Here we see a rewilded robot kit exploring the ruined world into which it has awoken.

Browse the selection of Backdrop Books in A4 and A3 here: handiwork.games/product-cate...
November 20, 2025 at 10:52 AM
Reposted by Jon at Handiwork Games
If anyone wants advice on how to make games with no money and no time, hmu. Flattening the perceived Player > GM > Designer hierarchy and demystifying the processes is something I love about Edinburgh Indie Gamers, #NaGaDeMon, and @groundhogplay.bsky.social.
November 20, 2025 at 10:22 AM
I always feel bad if I just repost without commentary, but this stuff is just interesting innit?
I'm putting together a short presentation on how RPG designers use historical primary sources for @luciejones83.bsky.social, and I'm swithering about including the fake documents from #ColdCity 2nd ed. I mean, they do look great.
November 20, 2025 at 9:09 AM
Found these old friends. Always thought these were ok. The aim was always to stop doing black and white art, but in getting there there was a phase where I’d done a lot of it and had a handle on it to some degree. From the Dragon Warriors RPG line as republished by Magnum Opus Press 2008ish.
November 19, 2025 at 9:06 PM
Reposted by Jon at Handiwork Games
Oh, this also applies if you read my article on games and the Cold war in issue 7 of @wyrdscience.bsky.social - the survey is open to anyone who has read my stuff, heard one of my talks, watched a video I've been involved it, etc.
2) What also important to me is archiving and analysing the responses to my work. That's why I've asking if readers would kindly take the time to complete this short survey about my work. This is super helpful for the project as a whole.
forms.gle/VKhMCyS2uBGp...
Role-playing games and the Cold War research by Malcolm Craig
Hello, and thanks for taking the time to complete this survey! If you're reading this you'll have attended one of my talks at a convention, watched one of my YouTube videos, or read an article (in mag...
forms.gle
November 19, 2025 at 5:53 PM
Look what arrived and got photographed in some kind of weird midnight at the oasis/The City from a|state mashup, which pretty much describes the author it's only MUM CHUMS by @floaker.bsky.social and the crowd goes wild
November 19, 2025 at 6:46 PM
A thread on rpgnet asks: FiveEvil - has anyone picked this up?
forum.rpg.net/index.php?th...
"it's a really engaging premise and clearly a labour of love from its creators." TRUE STORY
November 19, 2025 at 1:09 PM
Nice.
Good boys and girls and enbies get @badsquiddogames.bsky.social minis and @handiworkgames.bsky.social backdrops, and so do I!
November 19, 2025 at 11:07 AM
Late pledges are now open for official Trench Crusade Backdrop Books! With the new plastics incoming, now is the perfect time to secure your copies! www.kickstarter.com/projects/han... #trenchcrusade
November 19, 2025 at 10:24 AM