Tumulus 06. "Hammer a nail in the coffin." ⚰️
The latest issue of Tumulus is shipping now, packed with game design inspiration and exercises. Vampires, player death, Markov chains, haunted houses, Blood Borg, skeletons, and corpses!
Issue 06. Hammer a nail in the coffin.
Tumulus Issue 6 is shipping out to subscribers around the world!
Tumulus is a quarterly collection of analog gaming inspiration, tools, design theory, and playable content from Skeleton Code Machine. Each issue has a theme such as “Keep the wolves at bay.” or “Kick open the door.” Design exercises are included for you to try what you’ve learned.
Tumulus is creative, thought-provoking, and worthy of a place on your shelf.
What’s inside this issue
The theme for Tumulus Issue 6 is “Hammer a nail in the coffin.” and is focused on vampires, skeletons, ghosts, haunted houses, and the dangerous dead. It’s inspired by my recent reading of Killing the Dead: Vampire Epidemics from Mesopotamia to the New World by John Blair.1
In “The Dangerous Dead” (p. 7), you can read about undead archetypes and the countermeasures to use against them. We explore how death is used as a motivator in games and “Markov chains for restless spirits” (p. 19). There’s also a haunted house generator based on elements from a 2,000 year old ghost story (p. 27). The Blood Borg article includes a three-question interview with creator Adam Vass.2
Finally, “A Place for All My corpses” (p. 48) is an “incomplete by design” playable game about managing a cemetery. It’s broken (on purpose) with design exercises and questions for you to try. I must admit this light-hearted mashup of A Place for All My Books and Graveyard Keeper is quite amusing to me. It might very well turn into a full Exeunt Press game some day.3
Pick your issues when ordering
Please select your preferred issues when subscribing. Tumulus 06 is the current issue and will ship immediately. Tumulus 07 is the next one and won’t ship until June 2026.
If you start a new subscription, your first issue will ship out right away if you select the current issue. Subsequent issues will be mailed to you once per quarter. No matter when you subscribe, you’ll always receive four issues.
Resubscribing? No problem! Just select the issues you want to ensure you don’t get a duplicate issue. Remember that subscriptions don’t auto-renew by design. You’ll need to resubscribe to receive four more issues.
As always, if you have any questions about your order or need to update your address, please send an email to games@exeunt.press.
Back issues are available
Not ready to subscribe just yet? A limited number of back issues are available at full list price.4 New issues are added after the next one has shipped.
Upcoming issues
Curious what’s coming up in future issues? Here are the themes for the next three:
Issue 07. “Slay the dragon.” (June 2026)
Knights, dragons, wyverns, swords, and fire
Includes printed Dragon Pages TTRPG bookmark
Issue 08. “Insert coin to continue.” (September 2026)
Exploring how video games can influence tabletop games
Includes printed Massive Damage TTRPG bookmark
Issue 09. “Ponder the orb.” (December 2026)
Wizards, magic, spellcasting, crystal balls, classic fantasy
What do you think? Which issue sounds the most interesting?
Issue titles and covers are subject to change, but that’s the plan! The two TTRPG bookmarks are already printed and ready to be included with the next issues.
— E.P. 💀
P.S. Subscribe to Tumulus and get four quarterly, print-only issues packed with game design inspiration at 33% off list price. Limited back issues available. 🩻
Skeleton Code Machine is a production of Exeunt Press. All previous posts are in the Archive on the web. Subscribe to TUMULUS to get more design inspiration. If you want to see what else is happening at Exeunt Press, check out the Exeunt Omnes newsletter.
Skeleton Code Machine and TUMULUS are written, augmented, purged, and published by Exeunt Press. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without permission. TUMULUS and Skeleton Code Machine are Copyright 2025 Exeunt Press.
For comments or questions: games@exeunt.press
I picked up Killing the Dead on a whim around Halloween at my local bookshop. Thought it sounded interesting and hoped to get some creative inspiration from it. Didn’t really think about how it’s a 536-page academic tome. And yet, I stuck with it. I now have particularly deep and useless knowledge of historical practices to keep the dead in their graves. I hope this knowledge remains useless for me.
Adam Vass makes games at World Champ Game Co. including Blood Borg, Cybermetal 2012, and Necronautilus.
You can read more about A Place for All My Books at Skeleton Code Machine.
Tumulus Issue 01. “Do not trust robots.” is sold out. This is due to both higher demand than expected and a smaller print run because it was the first issue. If there continues to be demand, I may pull it out of the Tumulus Archive and do another limited print run. If you want Issue 01, let me know in the comments!
I would love to get my hands on a copy of the "do not trust robots" issue if you ever do another print run. 👍