It isn't often a game makes me genuinely hopeful about the kind of work people do in the fantasy genre when it comes to ttrpgs.

When so much of the landscape feels dominated by wotc related products, it can be hard to feel like there are alternatives to chaotic campaigns dedicated to violence.

Stewpot is a refutation of all of that while still drawing from the same lineage of games. The iconic fantasy roles are all there, the history of these characters could represent any number of well-known cliches.

And yet, Stewpot rises above that by asking one question: what happens when the adventure is over, when the conflicts are done and the story no longer asks for violence in the same way?

Stewpot is a treasure, a rare game I have been blessed to play and tell stories of people healing from adventure, of growing and becoming new people as they lead old lives behind. Even if the same chaotic mess continues in Stewpot that other similar fantasy games had, it never feels like an excuse to just be selfish or do violence.

Stewpot starts and ends with community ties, with making characters grounded in a town and world they build together and then asks you to think about their new everyday lives. As boring as that can sound to some folk, it honestly has some of the best discussion prompts and minigames ive ever read. Everything in this game makes me smile and more people should be aware of it.

Buy this game. Support the playtests. Share more stories of what happens when the weapons are holstered and now it is time to live your own life again.

Stewpot is a blessing and I'm grateful to have played it.