In December 2023 we presented the all-new Trophy Bundle featuring Gauntlet Publishing RPGs of psychological horror and tragic ends. In Trophy Dark and its standalone sister game Trophy Gold your obsessed treasure-hunters explore ancient forests and ruins that don’t want you there. Through desperation and sacrifice, you may reach your goal, face the monstrous entities that guard it, and – maybe – escape alive. But unless you gain enough treasure to pay your debts, you’ll face certain death back home. The Trophy games combine fast and flexible push-your-luck rules, player-driven gameplay, and jaw-clenching suspense.
After its 2018 debut as a short feature by designer Jesse Ross in The Gauntlet’s Codex magazine, followed by a big January 2020 Kickstarter campaign, The Gauntlet’s generous System Reference Document spawned many community-produced games and Incursions (adventures) Designed for Trophy. In an October 2019 blog post, publisher Jason Cordova talked about “Trophy: A Community-Driven Project“: “Trophy is Jesse Ross’s game, no doubt, but it was developed with The Gauntlet’s publishing philosophy in mind, which is that no single person is an island of creativity. The Gauntlet’s design culture has always been very community-oriented. […] Through Codex and Trophy, we are not only able to publish new folks, but we can do so in a way that really honors their work, with slick graphics and layout, dev editing, and line editing. And, even better, our platform is big enough to get people to play their stuff.”
This all-new offer presented both Trophy corebooks, the Loom campaign setting, and several Incursions that show the range of these popular indie RPGs. There were four titles in our Dark Collection (retail value $42) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete Trophy Dark core rulebook, plus the original Codex: Dark 2 magazine issue where the Trophy rules debuted; the standalone afterlife game Candlelight; and the Weird West Incursion Devil, Aim For Me.
Those who paid more than the threshold (average) price also got our entire Gold Collection with five more titles worth an additional $48, including the complete standalone Trophy Gold rulebook, the campaign setting Trophy Loom, the unusual campaign Incursion The Academy Chrysalis, the beach-horror crabfest The Alluring, and a much-needed rules expansion, Trophy Golf.
Ten percent of each payment (after gateway fees) went to this Trophy offer’s designated charity, the Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program. Each year, the Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, amplifies the voices of up-and-coming game designers by featuring them during an expenses-paid visit to Gen Con. The global Emerging Designer Program focuses on creators from marginalized communities.
