I am so stoked to finally get the newest Samhain: Hearth & Horror Beta update into the hands of the Agranak Cult Patreon supporters.

This one is substantial!

The game has now grown to 190 pages, and this update does more than simply add material. A lot of the work has been about tightening procedures, clarifying rules, improving usability at the table, and making the book feel more complete as an actual game rather than a collection of ideas still being assembled.

So, what is in the new Beta?

• A revised Character Sheet, including spaces for Background, Expertise, Knack, Gift, Hearths, Marks of Horror, and Samhain Scars.
• Character Creation at a Glance, providing a clear nine-step process for creating a character.
• Updated Target Numbers, with TN 10 as the standard Moderate difficulty outside combat. Combat remains primarily TN 13.
• Expertise, Knack, and Gift advancement, earned at 3rd, 6th, and 9th level.
• Refined Hearth & Horror rules, making the progression of fear, Hearths, and Samhain Scars clearer during play.
• A simple Perception procedure for determining whether characters notice something they are not actively searching for.
• A non-lethal Knockout rule for characters who want to incapacitate rather than kill an opponent.
• Expanded combat guidance, including Dodge, pushing damage through HIT wagers, Armor Integrity, and melee and ranged Critical Failure tables.
• Updated Denizen combat rules, giving more powerful creatures additional actions per round and helping dangerous encounters move with a little more bite.
• An expanded Harvest Master section covering the creation and running of folk-horror adventures.
• New folk-horror tools, including building horror in layers, showing signs before revealing the creature, threatening Hearths without abusing them, isolation, and settlement encounters.
• A d20 Customs, Taboos & Traditions generator for creating local beliefs, practices, and consequences right at the table.
• A Collection of Tables at the back of the book for faster play, including Trinkets, Magical Backlash, Critical Failures, Scars, reactions, encounters, weather, and more.
• A fully linked Table of Contents and PDF bookmarks for much easier digital navigation.
• Separate Player Character and Harvest Master reference sheets included with the Beta download.

This has become a pretty substantial update, but what excites me most is that I now have a much more complete game to reference during play.

There are still things to test. There are still rules that may change. That is what a Beta is for.

But Samhain: Hearth & Horror is starting to feel less like a game I am building and more like a game that actually exists.

And that feels damn good.