Concept: “When stomachs growl and there’s no inn in sight …” Content: Mechanics for hunting and whole ecosystems of prey Writing: Macabre imagery and characterizations help flesh out the nature of the Dying World Art/design: Illustrations provide additional character and spark GM interpretation Usability: Clean, straightforward layout supported by color and typographical choices
Concept: “Reason has decayed to shifting madness and only the cold remains.” Content: A jaded intellectual in a heap of ivory rubble Writing: Seethes with crazed bitterness and superiority Art/design: Easy-to-read design and layout; illustration captures a sense of bleak desolation in an apocalyptic atmosphere Usability: Meant for use with The Tablets of Ochre Obscurity
Concept: “What happens when the lore of our world collides with the Dying World of MÖRK BORG?” Content: The first volume of collected FÖLK-LORE Jam entries Writing: Varies by author, see individual entries under the FÖLK-LORE Jam tag Art/design: Varies by entry; single-page entries are well balanced in spreads Usability: Varies by entry, but it’s all Mörk Borg—how tough could it be?
Concept: “With such a large infestation of the little scoundrels, it’s becoming very difficult to figure out which one to snuff.” Content: A quirky, darkly comedic scenario Writing: Sets the tone and provides entertaining depth Art/design: Black, white, and pink create a unique apocalyptic atmosphere Usability: Laid out according to probable narrative flow
Concept: “This dread creature is sure to haunt your players right where they’re safest: In their own homes. During the holidays. Sneering with judgment.” Content: A bitter, cheer-killing wight; includes description, stats, special mechanics, and scathing remarks Writing: Captures the spirit (maybe literally) of an overly-critical matriarch Art/design: Overall, horribly festive with progressively creepy grandmas Usability: Plenty of flavor to really help the GM get into character
Concept: “Brewed by twice-dead druug monks in dank Grift chambers. Imbibed only at funerals or heretical sacrificial rituals.” Content: A Mörk Borg Smoked Stout as black as Nechrubel’s heart.
Writing: Gritty as Gravöl
Art/design: Dark, bold, graven, heretical.
Usability: Stjørdal and Gotlandsdricka malts, foraged juniper, all run through a traditional Kuurna. Available in Cognition's taproom in Ishpeming, MI. Worth a trip.
Concept: “The PCs find themselves buried alive in the vast, ever-changing cemetery of Graven-Tosk.” Content: A macabre, nonlinear graveyard crawl Writing: Relentlessly grim with splashes of gallows humor, especially at the end Art/design: Monochrome with purple highlights set the atmosphere beautifully Usability: Well-organized into sections that include relevant stat blocks
Concept: “Holy Migol Ratipede” Content: You know what a ratipede is, right? Writing: Written to honestly just get worse the more you engage with it. Art/design: Kind of friendly looking for a horrible little many-limbed death-weasel. Usability: A recursive little monster.
Concept: “Ancient god-vessels of cursed skin and soot-black wood, as rare and as valuable as they are blasphemous.” Content: 4 sets of 8 powers granted by dead folk gods Writing: Simple and straightforward mechanically; minimalist but seething with character and tone Art/design: Black-and-white art on black ground beside white text; the graphic design is as maliciously expressive as the visuals Usability: Covers are blank to ensure random selection; red page headings facilitate quick reference
Note: Original run was misprinted the first and last inside pages on the covers
Concept: “Glory, Glory! Their riches come rising!” Content: A brief stint down King Fathmu’s Shaft. Writing: A clever timer in a tide of boiling silver. A problem Fathmu probably shouldn’t learn about. Art/design: Reads as a mining complex with reflux issues. Usability: Think fast, or get smelt.
Concept: “A mini adventure and a callback to Ancient Skin” Content: A desperately venomous little pointcrawl. Writing: Head-turning depictions like, “At night they merge into one giant bird-snake." Art/design: Miserable little trees, a filthy little creek, and a few other happy little accidents. Usability: A quick sketch for an in-media-res forest crawl.
Concept: “Rob a grave. Steal a blade. Kill the Lord of Chains.” Content: A Graven-Tosk digging, Sarkash roaming, Bastion storming, Shadow King’s prophecy averting point crawl. Writing: Energetic and near melodramatic plot sets the tone for a truly torturous adventure. Art/design: Loud when it ought to be, quiet when it counts. Metal throughout. Usability: Self-contained, shadowed, and bound in iron chains.
Concept: “Two devilish hazards every death-defying dungeon delver must learn to avoid.” Content: A living(ish) doorway trap and a melancholic spirit Writing: Adds dimension and depth to concepts Art/design: Illustrations express the monsters’ ephemerality Usability: It’s hard to screw up a Mörk Borg stat block
Concept: “Six unholy monsters from the wonderful roguelike video game” Content: Fundamentally messed up and right at home in Mörk Borg Writing: Provides inspiring descriptions and dynamics Art/design: The videogame’s graphics adapted to Mörk Borg’s aesthetic Usability: Six clearly delineated stat blocks
Concept: “A collection of tables, monsters, items, classes, rules and ideas” Content: Includes a random monster generator, rules for distance travel and subsistence, The Death Ziggurat and Goblin Grinder adventures, rosters of mundane and profane gear, the Grey Galth Inn setting, a gambling minigame, the Black Salt environmental hazard, new character classes (Cursed Skinwalker, Pale One, Dead God’s Prophet, Forlorn Philosopher), and new Powers Writing: Mörk Borg imagery and tone in wide a variety of styles Art/design: Matches content to myriad layout and design strategies Usability: The mechanical and expository elegance you expect from Mörk Borg;the monster generator particularly uses dice in a clever way
Concept: “A zine full of MÖRK BORG stuff. Most of it is created by our wonderful community and will be (or already is) made available for free download on morkborg.com, but there is also exclusive official material.” Content: Generators for cults and curses, feats, 2 classes, black-powder weapons, 2 long adventures, a pair of 1-page dungeons, and a quartet of monsters/NPCs Writing: Varies by author but consistently emphasizes images and concepts that are grim, creepy, and/or outright weird Art/design: Every entry’s layout, graphic design, and coloration are distinct, creating a lot of visual diversity and easy navigability; sweet foil printing on the cover and first page; fold-out covers just to cram as much content into this zine as possible Usability: The only obstacle is deciding what to read first.
Concept: “A five-paneled A5 portrait wall of death” Content: NPC generator, gear & services, basic rules reference, core Powers list, generic enemy stats, weather, and d100 Items & Trinkets; inserts include Tablets of Ochre Obscurity and tables for traps, taverns, and city events Writing: Concise with tones of grittiness and grim humor Art/design: Player-facing side depicts major locations and characters; GM-facing panels are yellow enough to melt your eyeballs (but they’re perfectly readable and have clever, novel layouts for the expanded content) Usability: Includes “photo corners” to hold GM’s choice of additional content on the left and right panels
Concept: “We agreed to make this happen, and things were quickly descending into madness.” Content: “19 MINIATURES + a pile of crap” Writing: Probably needed to occur to make such delicious sculpts happen. Art/Design: Deviously Dynamic.Disturbingly detailed. Usability: Soak in dish-soap overnight. Scrub. Remove any flash. Use instant glue. Misery.
Concept: “” Content: A graphics resistant, plain-text, free version of Mörk Borg Writing: Mörk Borg, just the text please. Art/design: Decidedly un-hostile design. Warning—Contains banging cover art. Usability: Can’t complain about legibility anymore. Still flammable when printed.
Concept: “This horse sized cadaver-like bird moves soundlessly, sneaking into bed chambers at night to inject the sleeping with paralyzing venom” Content: A bird, who paralyzes, and always wins initiative. Writing: Yet more proof that nice names usually denote horrible creatures. Art/design: Screenshot and discord text. Usability: Probably inspired by someone's Elden Ring nightmares.
Concept: “In the dying world of MÖRK BORG your character will probably not last long, so it might be a good idea to print some of these.” Content: The official Mörk Borg character sheet Writing: Includes handy references for carrying capacity, Powers, and Omens Art/design: Well organized without sacrificing ethos and atmosphere Usability: Very
Official versions available in English, Swedish, Italian, French
Concept: “3D Printable Minis” Content: An STL model companion to the Ossarium Vol. 1 Beastiary Writing: Code, in STL file format. Art/design: Full renders of each creature including printable bases. Usability: Sculpts are in continued refinement, feedback is requested.
Concept: “a set of 43 double sided tarot sized cards that contain all the info needed to bring the creatures of Ossarium into your next TTRPG session.” Content: 43 tarot-sized double-sided creature reference cards. Writing: Contains complete stats and lore for the creatures of Ossarium Vol. 1. Art/design: Monstrous depictions in a visually striking yet functional layout. Usability: Rules in the front. Lore in the back. Print and play instructions are included.
But an ongoing mission to seek out each creature.” Content: 43 monstrous oddities to delight and horrify scvm. Writing: Innovated, weird, and storied monsters to hunt and get killed by. Art/design: Disgustingly tasteful use of color highlight gritty illustrations in dynamic spreads. Usability: Digital spreads are of varying width to accommodate sidebars and creatures of significant scale.
Concept: “You are fundamentally other, and belong nowhere.” Content: Adapts the Pale One NPC into a playable class Writing: Artfully unnerving with many strange images and concepts Art/design: Illustration conveys a strong sense of alienness Usability: Includes a table for generating an appropriately bizarre name
Concept: “In space, no one can hear you squeal.” Content: Rules, classes, ships, creatures, gear, settings, tables, generators, and adventures for pigs in space. Writing: A space opera that simply squeals parody, with rules that are fattened up and ready for slaughter. Art/design: A grease-slicked modern layout with illustrations varying from rendered near-3D comic illustrations to positively grimy porcine character portraits. Usability: Reference tables bookend the text, with a clear table of contents to aid in reference. Clear type faces enhance legibility.
Concept: “Targ-Dungel. A festering wound upon a dying world. Time and space warp within the malodorous miasma. … This, cursed walker, is where you must go. Into the blight. Into the cold, damp mire.” Content: A bog crawl and soundtrack filled with sludge, corpses, and brutality; also includes the Gilded Wolf character class Writing: The prose resurrects the core book’s weird imagery and ominous tone; mechanics text is accessible and easy to use Art/design: The Mörk Borg style we know and love, but left to putrefy in a swamp Usability: Places three factions in explicit large-scale conflict, creating a complex backdrop for players to explore and GMs to exploit
Concept: “Kharkrazh the Dying finally fell, and around his withering bones cultists and cannibals dug […] in search of a blade most foul.” Content: A system-neutral crawl through a corpse Writing: Devoted to populating and characterizing the dungeon Art/design: The larger map is very expressive Usability: The secondary descriptive map makes navigation fast and efficient
*Published under CC BY 3.0; not technically Mörk Borg content, but related in theme, spirit, and authorship
