The GROGNARD Files

I dreamed I sailed to the mirrored edge

Of that murky world for an iron bell

That dragged me down to the ocean bed

And rang to mark where my shadow fell

The Bell in the Sea – Marillion 

Bud from Bud’s RPG Reviews, died suddenly on August 10th following a short illness. For many, Bud was best known for his hugely successful videos. That lilting, calming voice offering thoughtful commentary, accompanied by the distinctive sight of his hands leafing through the featured book or boxed set. His reviews were never first impressions; they were thorough, inspiring, and well-researched deep dives. If you haven’t experienced them, his back-catalogue is a treasure trove, from his explorations of the finer details of Glorantha lore and his reviews of Delta Green supplements, to his epic, five-hour study of Masks of Nyarlathotep.

We both started producing online content at around the same time and, crucially, we both began our RPG journey with RuneQuest, specifically the Games Workshop box set. He once told me, “I even had someone message me to say, I hold you and the GROGNARD files responsible for getting me back into it.”

That shared story always felt like a kinship, a common effort to celebrate playing role-playing games.

His own origin story was one he included on his the ‘First, Last and Everything’ feature, and it’s a perfect picture of how so many stumbled into this world. He described his first exposure being “in the place I grew up in in Liverpool, Norris Green’s Woolworths at the age of 12. I had a voucher for my birthday and while I was perusing the latest releases, a book cover caught my eye – The Seven Serpents from the Steve Jackson’s Sorcery series. I promptly bought it and dove head first into a world of fantastic creatures, deadly traps and a spellbook of three letter words.”

We chatted online for a while, but we didn’t meet in person until UK Games Expo 2018, when he played in the PSI World game I was running. It was, incredibly, the first convention game he had ever played, and I don’t think he ever recovered from the anarchy of it all. He joked, “we had a climatic plumbing roll, and I can honestly say it’s the first time I’ve ever heard that.”

After that, he became a regular fixture at GROGMEET. He would jokingly complain about some aspect of the organisation every year—there’s a list somewhere—and his grumbling became a affectionate ritual.

It was at GROGMEET that he ran a playtest of his best-selling Viral scenario for Call of Cthulhu, written with Alex Guillotte. Everyone who played gave one of those looks that revealed it was a unique and unsettling experience. Bud was an excellent GM, capable of creating a vivid, palpable mood and delivering explanations of horror unfolding with an unsettling precision. He GM’d the first game of Delta Green I played, and I still haven’t quite recovered.

He was justifiably proud of Viral, and when we featured it in one of our book clubs, he talked in detail about his creative process. His description of the entity at the heart of the horror was pure Bud: imaginative, grounded in a weird reality, and utterly chilling. “The idea is like, have you ever seen a viral bacteriophage? A real one. They look like something alien, horrific looking. Imagine one of them 50 foot tall, pulsing with cysts and have like a halo of flies around its head, and you’ve got yourself a kind of a mythos entity, haven’t you.” He found the uncanny in the everyday and translated it into unforgettable gameable material.

Beyond his creativity, Bud was generous. Both at the table and beyond. Now, I’ll always cherish the Crown Royal dice bag and dragon metal dice set he brought back for me from his first celebrated trip to Gen Con.

Bud was a valued contributor to the GROGNARD files in so many ways.

I’m going to miss his imaginative insights, his dry humour, and yes, even his grumbles about the chairs at GROGMEET.

Gone too soon. My thoughts and love are with his family and all who loved him.

Bud, out.

But never forgotten.

– Dirk the Dice