D&D at Work Archives - Page 5 of 35 - Dungeons and Dragons at Work

May 15, 2026May 15, 2026

Ten Candles on Rottnest: Watching the Light Go Out Together

Group lit by candlelight ready to play the tragic horror game 10 candles

Most of the games I discuss and play are full of story and cinematic moments, but tend to be relatively light.

Ten Candles by Stephen Dewey is not that game.

It’s a bleakly immersive tale of tragic horror played in the dark. For it to work the players must lean into these themes and become emotionally invested in the characters and their fate. Chilling, yes. Emotional, yes. Scary, yes. But, wow is it fun.

What is Ten Candles?

Ten Candles is a collaborative, tragic horror roleplaying game built on a simple, brutal truth: Your characters will die.

There are no hit points to cling to, no clever builds to save you. Instead, the table is lit by ten real candles. As the game unfolds, those candles go out one by one, each extinguishing tightening the noose of dread. When the last flame is extinguished, so are the characters.

The mechanics are elegantly cruel. Dice pools shrink. Characters lose what makes them human. Hope erodes. The darkness, quite literally, closes in. There is no winning in this game. But as the rules point out, you have to play your characters with hope. Hope that everything will work out. Even though we all know it wont.

Martycon 2026: Not Enough Light

We played during Martycon 2026, crammed around a large dining room table, the rest of the house in darkness. Everyone was aware that we were in for an immersive horror game and I think we were all slightly on edge.

We had eight players and Rich, our GM. Too many, really. But to his credit, Rich conducted the game beautifully and kept everyone involved and on the edge of their seat.

Rottnest Island, but Very Wrong

Our session of Ten Candles was set the game on Rottnest Island a location known to all Western Australians as a place of holidays, sun and rest. Rich made a clever move to set the game in a place known to the players. It immediately grounded the game in reality. No magic potions for us. And no guns either. Instead our characters were armed with torches, chair legs and bottles of vodka.

In our version, the island was a trap. Blood soaked the beaches and strange unformed creatures ranged the darkness. The mainland was pitch black and felt impossibly far away. Our only hope: a rumour of rescue from the western edge of the island. A boat. If we could get there. If we could stay in the light.

One of the key premises of the game is that if you Step into darkness, “They” will take you.

“They” were never fully explained. Just glimpsed. A black, roiling smoke. Something that moved with intent. Something that could be breathed in. Ambiguity did the heavy lifting. Our imaginations happily supplied the nightmare.

Meet Jerry (Briefly)

My character, Jerry, was a plump water monitoring technician. Cheerful. And just a little bit manipulative. The kind of man who smiles while quietly steering the boat.

Character creation involved writing a vice and a virtue and passing them to other players. I got joyous and manipulative and worked from there. We also had to write a moment of hope. Jerry’s was that he got to see the stars. Finally, another player handed me Jerry’s brink. Which is how he acts when all hope has gone. He would break down crying.

These four items made up the character and each could be literally ripped up to gain a reroll of any one’s rolled on the dice. Each time the character lost a little of who they were.

Before the game began, we each recorded a short voice message in character. A small slice of life before the end. Jerry’s was simple:

“Hey Sarah… job’s almost finished. I’ll be home soon.”

Joyous optimism for his wife on the mainland. After we had all recorded our messages, some bleak, others frantic, we started to play.

Ten Flames, Then Nine…

The candles were lit and we turned house lights off. And just like that, the world shrank to a circle of firelight.

We began in a small holiday cabin. The town was empty and the sky dark. We argued. We clung to the idea of the boat. Jerry got stomped by a pack of young thugs trying to steal his car keys. Not villains, just desperate people with the same bad idea we had: survive at someone else’s expense.

We got to the car and drove frantically towards the west of the island. We (well Jerry) crashed. Things in the dark began to notice us. One of us got infected. His mouth blackened, like ink spreading through paper. And all the while:

Candles went out.

Each extinguishing was a tiny tightening of the vice. The table grew quieter, more focused, our inevitable doom creeping closer. And yet our characters clung on, believing that escape was possible. By the time we were down to the last few candles the mood was tense.

The End Is the Point

Of course we didn’t make it. Our party made it to the rescue boat, but everyone onboard was infected. The last candle went out as Jerry was splashing in the dark water desperately clinging to the side of the boat.

Total darkness. Just eight people and a GM sitting in the void. Silence for a few heartbeats. Then Rich pressed play.

The Voices We Left Behind

Our recordings filled the darkness. Fragments of lives that no longer existed.

Hopeful. Ordinary. Human. Made much more poignant by the harrowing ordeal they had just experienced.

No one spoke.

For what felt like an eternity we sat in the dark, lost in our thoughts of the game and what had transpired.

Lights On, Breath In

When the lights finally came back on we all stared at each other for a moment and breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Then there was laughter and incredulous sharing of our favourite moments. We’d just shared something strange and intimate. A kind of collective ghost story where we were both the storytellers and the ghosts.

Of course, Ten Candles is not a game to be played every week. Rather it’s an experience. A ritual, almost. Something you step into, knowing it will be a unique and unsettling experience

With eight players, it was a little crowded. With four or five, I suspect it would tighten into something even sharper. More personal and possibly even scarier. But even as it was? It was unforgettable, an absolute highlight of the gaming year and one of the best gaming sessions I’ve ever played in. A big shoutout to our GM Rich who did a masterful job of running a new game, while keeping the atmosphere and tension at an all time high!

Would I play again? Most definitely. I would also like to try my hand at running a session and I have some ideas already beginning to percolate. Should you give it a go? 100%! Just make sure your group is on the same page with creating and maintaining the atmosphere. And of course remember:

The light goes out. What matters is what you do before it does.

May 8, 2026May 8, 2026

Why Hero Leadership Really Fails

There’s a particular story we love to tell about leadership.

One person stands at the front. They have the answers. When things go wrong, they step forward, make the hard call, and save the day. The team rallies. The credits roll.

It’s a great story. It’s just a terrible way to run a Dungeons & Dragons party… or any other organisation.

The Myth of the Hero Leader

Hero leadership is built on a simple idea: progress depends on a single exceptional individual. The hero leader is decisive, charismatic, endlessly capable. When the dragon appears or the quarterly results dip, they draw their sword (or pen) and fix it.

In D&D, this often shows up as the “main character” syndrome. One player dominates planning, talks to every NPC, solves every puzzle, and lands the killing blow. The rest of the party becomes a supporting cast, present but rarely essential.

In business, the same pattern plays out with the superstar manager or visionary executive. Decisions funnel upward. Problems wait for approval. Success is attributed to one person rather than the system around them.

In both cases, things may appear to work… for a while.

What Actually Happens at the Table

At a D&D table, hero leadership creates subtle damage long before it causes a wipe. Other players disengage. Why contribute if the paladin always decides the plan? Why risk a creative idea if the wizard will override it? The game becomes quieter, flatter, less surprising.

Worse still, the party becomes fragile. When the hero is absent, stunned, or simply wrong, everything collapses. A single failed saving throw can derail the entire session. D&D is designed around distributed competence. Different characters shine in different moments. When one player tries to carry the whole narrative, the system pushes back, usually with teeth.

The Workplace Version Is No Kinder

Hero leadership in business produces similar cracks. Teams stop thinking ahead. People wait to be told what to do. Initiative dries up, not because people lack ideas, but because they’ve learned those ideas won’t be used.

Decision bottlenecks form. The “hero” becomes exhausted, then indispensable, then overwhelmed. When they finally step away, the organisation discovers it hasn’t been developing leaders at all, only dependencies.

The scariest part? It often looks like success right up until it doesn’t.

Heroes Don’t Scale

A single hero can slay a goblin. They cannot sustainably run a campaign. Both D&D parties and businesses face complexity, uncertainty, and problems no one person can fully understand. Trying to centralise leadership in one figure reduces the system’s ability to adapt.

When leadership is shared, something different happens. People take ownership of their piece of the problem. Information flows faster. Mistakes are caught earlier. Success belongs to the group, not the loudest voice.

In D&D, this is when the rogue scouts ahead without being told, the cleric speaks up about risk, and the fighter suggests a plan that isn’t “kick in the door.”

In business, it’s when team members make decisions within their remit and feel safe doing so.

The Real Alternative Isn’t Leaderless Chaos

Rejecting hero leadership doesn’t mean abandoning leadership altogether.

It means shifting from “the leader has all the answers” to “the leader creates the conditions for good answers to emerge.”

In D&D, the best leaders are often the ones who ask questions:
“What do you think?”
“Who hasn’t spoken yet?”
“What’s another way this could go wrong?”

In business, strong leaders do the same thing. They clarify intent, set boundaries, and trust their teams to act within them. They step forward when needed and step back just as often.

Shared Leadership Creates Better Stories

The irony is that hero leadership actually makes for worse stories.

The most memorable D&D moments rarely come from flawless heroes. They come from messy plans, unexpected teamwork, and someone stepping up who wasn’t supposed to be the star. The same is true in organisations. The strongest cultures aren’t built around legendary individuals, but around teams who know how to think and work together under pressure.

If you want a campaign that lasts, or a business that survives its own success, retire the hero.

Build the party instead.

May 1, 2026May 1, 2026

Bullets, Bandannas, and Beautiful Nonsense: Playing 80’s Action Dudes

There are roleplaying games where you carefully track encumbrance, calculate modifiers, and debate the tactics of which spell to cast first. And then there are games where you kick down a door, fire an assault rifle one-handed, and shout something so gloriously ridiculous that reality slaps your back and gives you your hit points back.

80’s Action Dudes, created by my mate Marty, lives proudly in the second category.

Welcome to the Jungle (Bring a Soundtrack)

From the moment we sat down, the tone was locked in harder than a flexed bicep in a sleeveless vest. An 80s rock soundtrack blared in the background, all electric guitars and swagger, the kind of music that makes you feel like you could outrun an explosion purely out of principle. Marty had curated the perfect soundtrack with bands like Poison, Whitesnake and Boston, that had us all ready to play before we even created our characters.

It only took Marty 2 minutes to explain the system of 80’s Action Dudes, a clever hack of Cthulhu Dark by Graeme Walmsley. Different dice for different guns (D4, D6, D10) and the dice didn’t tell you if you hit. No way. They told you how many people you took out of action.

We came to kick ass and chew gum, and we were all out gum. Oh and we had three hit points.

Character Creation: Maximum Velocity, Zero Brakes

Character creation was also quick and easy. You needed:

A cool name
A main weapon
A one line description
Some special kit

That’s it. Vibes and testosterone.

Enter my character:

Rusty MacGregor
Ex–French Foreign Legionnaire. American as fuck.

Armed with his trusty assault rifle, razor sharp machete, and a tin of chewing tobacco, Rusty also sported a stars and stripes bandanna across his ruggedly handsome brow and was ready for action.

The Action Dude Team… you get the picture

The Crew: The Action Team

Our team was exactly what you’d hope for:

A Chinese ninja who moved like a shadow deadly throwing stars at the ready
A bare-knuckle fighter built like Van Damme with mad nunchuck skills
A mad radioman “Giggles”
Two M60 armed musclemen Rip and Butch.

Together, we were dropped into a jungle with one mission:

Take out a camp of commie insurgents. No diplomacy. Just kicking ass and shooting guns.

Mechanics That Punch You in the Face (In a Good Way)

The genius of the game wasn’t just in its theme, it was in how the mechanics fed that theme. Marty had got the balance just right.

Grenades? You didn’t roll for them. You physically threw balls into a bucket. Missed the bucket? Bad luck. That grenade is now someone else’s problem. Hit it? Boom. Cue cheering, high-fives, and a slow-motion dive.

We even had a proper mud map laid out in the garden adding to the immersion of our grand tactical planning.

Mud map ready for our Action Dudes to plan their assault

Now here’s where the game transcends even further. When you took wounds, you didn’t just sit there and sulk like an unpatriotic man baby. You earned them back the only way that matters:

One-liners.

Drop something suitably punchy, and you’d claw back your health.

Something in the spirit of Arnie and Stallone, like:

“I eat Green Berets for breakfast. And right now, I’m very hungry!”

Alternatively, you could clasp hands with a teammate, lock eyes like long-lost brothers, and bellow:

“SON OF A BITCH!”

Instant recovery to full hit points!

Scenes That Shouldn’t Work (But Absolutely Do)

What followed was a cascade of moments that felt ripped straight out of an Expendables fever dream:

Rusty leaping from a creek firing into enemy reinforcements
The ninja appearing and disappearing like a lethal magic trick
Grenades arcing through the air with varying degrees of success and panic
Entire squads of enemies being removed from existence in single, glorious dice rolls
The ammo dump exploding in a tongue of flame
Rusty dying in a blaze of glory at the helm of a Russian attack helicopter (dont ask)

It was loud, chaotic and deeply, deeply … fun!

Why It Works

At its core, 80’s Action Dudes is a masterclass in one simple idea:

Commit to the bit.

The rules are light, but laser-focused. Every mechanic pushes you to be louder, bigger, and more ridiculous. There’s no room for hesitation, only escalation. And because everyone understands the tone, the table becomes a kind of shared action movie, where each player tries to outdo the last in sheer action-hero bravado.

The result? Eight grown adults laughing like lunatics while throwing pretend grenades and inventing increasingly terrible one-liners.

Final Thoughts: Explosions Optional (But Encouraged)

What this game proves, more than anything, is that you don’t need complexity to create something unforgettable.

Give players a strong theme.
Give them permission to go all in.
Add a few clever mechanics that reinforce the fantasy.

Then stand back and watch the magic happen. 80’s Action Dudes wasn’t just a game., it was a riot. And Marty was an absolute legend for pulling together such a memorable game.

April 17, 2026April 17, 2026

Bad Behaviour at the Table? Sort it out

At some point in every long running campaign, bad behaviour at the table happens. A player goes rogue. Not in the charming backstab-the-dragon way. But in the rules-lawyering, spotlight-hogging, eye-rolling, group-fracturing way. The table energy shifts. Shared fun begins to ebb.

If you run games long enough, you will face this moment. If you lead people long enough, you will too.

The parallels between managing bad behaviour at a roleplaying table and leading a team in the workplace are surprisingly tight. Both require the courage to act before the whole party wipes. Here are three stages to handle it, whether you are behind the DM screen or at the head of a meeting table.

Stage One: The Quiet Word by the Campfire

In the Dungeons & Dragons Player’s Handbook, there is an implicit social contract. The game assumes cooperation. It assumes you are not actively trying to ruin the experience for others. When a player starts derailing sessions, dominating decisions, or treating fellow players like NPCs, your first move cannot be a thunderbolt from the heavens.

It is a quiet conversation. Private. Calm. Specific.

“Hey, I’ve noticed you’re interrupting others a lot during planning scenes.” This is preventing them from getting involved.
“I’ve seen some frustration when rulings don’t go your way.” This slows down play and creates a bit of a weird atmosphere with myself and the other players.

This is not an accusation. It is feedback. You are describing behaviour and explaining impact.

At the gaming table, most problems live in the land of misunderstanding. Someone may not realise they are hogging spotlight. Someone may think the aggressive banter is funny when others find it draining.

The same is true in the workplace. As a leader, stage one is informal and early. You do not wait for the team to fracture. You address behaviour before it calcifies into culture. Make your expectations clear. The impact must be understood and the request for change cannot be ambiguous.

Most people, when treated like adults, respond like adults.

Stage Two: The Formal Warning Scroll

If behaviour continues after the informal chat , you have to escalate. At the table, this might mean a more direct conversation.

“We spoke about this last month. It’s still happening. If it continues, you may not be able to stay in this campaign.”

Now the stakes are visible.

In a group where you are all friends this can be a difficult conversation to navigate. But it doesn’t have to be confrontational. Reiterate the way the group likes to play and that the problem players style is different and not gelling.

In leadership, this is where structure matters. Documentation. Formal performance conversations. Clear consequences. Alignment with policy. Compliance with employment law. You are no longer just nudging behaviour. You are protecting the team.

In both spaces, the key elements are:

Clear examples of behaviour
Clear expectations going forward
Clear consequences if change does not occur
A genuine opportunity to improve

You cant escape the fact that this stage is uncomfortable. It requires backbone. Leaders often avoid it because they fear conflict. But avoidance is not kindness. It is deferred damage. Every time you fail to address ongoing bad behaviour, you send a signal to the rest of the group that this behaviour is is acceptable.

And that signal causes more damage than you would imagine.

Stage Three: Removing the Player from the Table

Sometimes, despite every effort, the behaviour does not change. At a gaming table, the final step is simple in principle, but very difficult in practice:

You ask them to leave the campaign. You do not do it lightly. Keep emotion out of it. Do it because the health of the group matters more than the comfort of one individual. Ultimately, it is a leadership decision.

In the workplace, this stage becomes formal performance management that may result in termination. This must comply with employment law, company policy, and procedural fairness. There must be evidence, the employee must have an opportunity to respond. There must be consistency.

But the principle remains the same. A team cannot thrive if one person consistently erodes trust, morale, or performance.

Letting someone go is not failure if you have:

Communicated clearly
Provided support
Given reasonable opportunity to change
Acted fairly and consistently

Sometimes the most responsible act of leadership is protecting the many.

The Deeper Lesson

Whether you are running a dungeon or running a department, leadership is not about avoiding conflict. It is about stewarding the experience. In a roleplaying game, you are safeguarding fun, safety, and shared storytelling. While in the workplace, you are safeguarding culture, productivity, and psychological safety.

Both require:

Early intervention
Honest conversations
Escalation when necessary
Courage to act

Ignore bad behaviour at the table long enough and it becomes the campaign setting. Unchecked and your game will stop being fun, players will leave and it will eventually implode. Ultimately, following the adage that no D&D is better than bad D&D.

Address the behaviour with clarity and fairness, and you show your players that they are important and that the game matters.

Quick Note: checking bad behaviour at the table doesn’t have to rest on the shoulders of the DM. Rather it can be dealt with by any player. Remember, having fun is a shared responsibility.

April 10, 2026March 31, 2026

My First Bolt Action Tournament

I’ve recently got into Bolt Action a WW2 wargame and am absolutely loving it. Before too long I found out that one of the local Perth clubs, Outpost 6030, was hosting Bolt Action at it’s Skulls 2026 tournament in March. I’ve never been particularly competitive gamer, rather enjoying the stories at the table than the results. However, playing four games in a day and getting to meet the wider community was too good a chance to pass up.

There is something nerve-wracking about your first tournament. You spend weeks painting models, tweaking lists, reading scenarios and imagining strategies. Then suddenly it is 0730 on a Sunday, you are standing in a hall full of strangers, ten beautifully laid out tables, 17 competitors, and your carefully assembled 1100 point force is waiting to march onto the battlefield.

I took a British Royal Marine Commando army with 12 order dice (not very many order dice as it turned out). I had spent plenty of time thinking about my list beforehand and honed it over a few practice games with Jake and Richard (thanks guys!). The event itself was run brilliantly by Dan. He kept everything moving smoothly, while maintaining a sunny disposition throughout. Four games between 0800 and 1700 is a proper marathon, but the day rattled along at a surprisingly fast pace.

Dan patrolled the tables answering rules queries and making sure we knew how much time we had left for each game. He also seemed to just love the atmosphere and getting into the hard fought games at each table. Every time he told me the time, I think a look of panic would cross my face. No poker faces in my side of the table.

My commandos sneaking up to an objective

Game one was against Marco and his Japanese army. This was my first real lesson of the day. I played far too cautiously, sitting back and trying to preserve units instead of throwing myself into the objectives. The result was that the end score was very one sided. Marco wiped the floor with me. These games were moving fast, and with four games packed into one day you had to get yourself into a winning position within three turns or simply run out of time.

After that first match I realised I needed to change my approach. From that point on I became much more aggressive and mobile with my commandos.

Game two was against Mark and his American force. The scenario involved hunting an informant and I felt much sharper in this game. I had a clear plan, moved more decisively and generally played far more tactically than I had in game one. The strategy itself was sound, but the dice gods decided to laugh in my face. My reserves stubbornly refused to arrive and secure the left flank, which allowed Mark to roll up that side of the table and march away with the informant and a convincing win. A fun game, though and I really felt on the edge of my seat the whole way through.

Lunch was a classic sausage sizzle and a quick chat, talking tactics and straight back into it.

Game three was against Martin and, yes, another Japanese army. By this point I was starting to wonder if every Japanese player in the state had decided to attend. This scenario focused on destroying objectives rather than simply shooting each other. It created a very different sort of game because instead of trading fire across the table, both of us were racing to damage key targets.

Martin had a very rough run of luck with his dice, while my army stuck to my plan nicely. My commandos moved quickly, focused on the objectives and managed to take out most of them. At last, my first tournament win. It may not have been the most heroic battle of the day, but it felt great to get one on the board.

The final game was against Dave and, somehow, yet another Japanese force. The scenario focused on eliminating a specific unit. I made a few mistakes early, lost momentum and Dave completely outplayed me. I couldn’t get anywhere near his unit while his airstrike and mortars battered my army from turn one.

My brave commandos being strafed by an enemy fighter

One thing that really helped me through the day was preparation. Before the tournament I had printed out the scenario pack and written a rough strategy for each mission. That turned out to be incredibly useful. Instead of staring blankly at the table trying to invent a plan on the spot, I already had a basic framework in mind. It freed up brain space for reacting to what my opponent was doing and kept me focused on the scenario.

Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the day was not the result, but the people. Every opponent I played was an absolute gentleman. Everyone played fairly, kept things friendly and had a good laugh along the way. I also had some great conversations with the other players between rounds. The WA Bolt Action community felt very welcoming, which makes a huge difference when you are walking nervously into your first event.

At the end of the day there was a prize giving. I think I finished 11th out of 17, which I was pretty happy with for a first event. I also won some extra order dice and an exclusive Gus March-Phillipps model, which felt like a proper little treasure chest at the end of the day.

Most importantly, I came away with four fun games, a better understanding of how tournament Bolt Action works and a few offers for future games. Not a bad haul for one Sunday. One thing’s for certain, I’ll be signing up for the next one as soon as I can.