Updates

In September 2025 I was travelling abroad for a friend's wedding. There were a few quiet evenings where I mucked around with ideas in my phone's notepad, the traditional spawning pool of many a game. It was around that time that I came up with the idea for a high fantasy Belonging Outside Belonging game called Magestar. 

Magestar as it now exists is very different. Somewhere along the way it morphed into a mapmaking game, with Belonging Outside Belonging DNA only visible in the Rest prompts in which the roleplaying element is grounded. But across all those changes the Wizard playbook's core themes have gone unchanged: you learned to do magic by studying the Magestar, and sometimes this is bad for you. 

Backers can see the full Wizard playbook below! 

The poll ended in a tie between the Seer and the Wizard. Rather than me choosing between the two, let's give each their own post. First up: the Seer!

I played the Seer for the first time last week and had a blast. The Seer's Exhaustion feature, which causes monsters to spill from rifts in reality, adds a delicious dramatic element. Backers can view the entire Seer playbook below! 

Hey Backers! There's a new poll just for you. 
Have your say on which playbook gets a proper run-down in the next project update!

Magestar combines roleplaying a character with building a map. The mapmaking element usually comes through most strongly; however, when characters make the Rest move, it's an occasion to spend a moment with them and their experience of the world. 

Each playbook has 3 Rest prompts. When a player makes the Rest move to recover spent energy they also select a prompt to address. 

A few examples:

As Magestar is still in the playtesting phase, these questions are subject to change, but you get the idea of what they're all about! 

We tried out Rest prompts for the first time in yesterday's game. They really add so much to the roleplaying side of things, and provide opportunities to focus on the little things that make a world feel real. 

Sorrows are a feature of Magestar's playbooks that I haven't yet discussed. Each playbook must activate a sorrow after making a specific move: for example, the Wizard does so when making the Rest move.

Sorrows are descriptive features which enhance Magestar's roleplaying side more so than the mapmaking side. Each playbook's sorrows tie into that playbook's core themes. Our Wizard might activate the Arcane Mishap sorrow, and describe how someone was harmed by their latest arcane experiment. Meanwhile the Seer's Future Grief sorrow lets their player describe a vision of an ally's death.