Daniel (@dungeondive) examines Recluse by Maizy Rose, a greatly expanded solo engine for Mörk Borg that traces its lineage straight back through Solitary Defilement — one of his all-time favourite solo systems — to Ironsworn and Powered by the Apocalypse. Where Solitary Defilement keeps things lean with about a dozen moves, Recluse pushes Mörk Borg toward Ironsworn’s territory: far more granularity, structure and procedure for players who want it. It’s 100% compatible with Mörk Borg and its derivatives (he’d pair it with Mörk Manual, his preferred, slightly-less-lethal way to play).
He tours the contents: the 2d20-vs-target-number core with advantage/disadvantage, a neat character blessing system for survivability, six new classes, expanded equipment with a handy one-page pricing guide, and deeply expanded move sets for quests, overland travel (16 moves, structured by time of day), city crawls, dungeon delves, Ironsworn-style connections, and establishing a home base. The print quality is a notch below Mörk Borg’s glossy standard, making some small text harder to read. But the real treasure, he says, is the final ~50 pages of random tables — dungeons, cities, wilderness, NPCs, names — worth the PDF price alone. He’ll graft modules from it onto Solitary Defilement rather than switch wholesale.
Daniel loves how Mörk Borg’s simplicity lets him bolt a few Recluse modules onto Solitary Defilement rather than switch systems. Do you prefer a lean engine you extend piece by piece, or one big toolkit with everything built in?