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I'm supposed to be writing about #Sounders today, but I mostly want to bury myself in dice

It's unlikely we'll see more of the Seattle Sounders' throwback "Orca" jerseys in 2026. That said, I still have a few left in the Etsy store. Go check them out while you still can.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/4378280405/55-inch-seattle-sounders-brick

#MLS #Seattle #Sounders

As a reminder #Sounders fans, you can follow Sounder at Heart at @News on the fedi.

It's currently being used mostly as an RSS feed, but as Ghost continues to integrate functionality we may do more.

The new Seattle Sounders home kit should leak any day now. Maybe you'll love it. Maybe you won't.

If you do, I'll have new kit figures within a few days. If you don't, well I still have 6 of these guys left.

Get yours: https://www.etsy.com/listing/4364296410/55-inch-seattle-sounders-brick-figure

#MLS #Sounders #Seattle

My best of 2025

As seems to be a now-trend, I published fewer articles and stories in 2025 than I did in 2024. That drift towards being a consumer of writing more than a writer is one that challenges me in my soul.

Upon reflection unlike other slow periods of publication this is not because I microblog on social media too much. Instead it is a combination of stressful but wonderful work and helping Aslan recover from a back injury. Our beautiful red lab is now walking again, but it’s taken 90 days to get close to normal and will take a few weeks more.

The biggest win of the year is not something written — my presentation on how to use RPGs as training aids prior to natural disasters. I’ve now delivered it at AIRIP, GSX, the Global Security Briefing and in just over a week I’ll present a version to OrcaCon, a local-to-me gaming convention.

Let’s review my favorite writings of 2025

Full Moon Storytelling

These selections may not be what was most read on the blog. They are what I enjoyed writing the most.

Your players aren’t supposed to die – one member of my D&D campaign passed away last year. We celebrated his life by playing a multi-table, public session of the game he loves in public.

Potential – a personal essay on what it means to be anti-completionist, an essay writer, a blogger, someone with narrative thoughts without a novel.

Art by Dragons of Wales in the forthcoming book Dragons of the Dwindling

Inkling Dragon – when Dragons of Wales offered sketched commissions I had to take part. A goal of mine is to eventually replace every standard D&D dragon in the World of the Everflow with Dragons of Wales’ style of dragons, particularly those from Deep Time. The Inkling Dragon is my dream of what a dragon who works as a writing assistant would be.

The Ferments: A campaign one sheet – my regular D&D group transitioned to me being a player, but we weren’t playing enough. Borrowing from the West Marches concept The Ferments has the action come to the players, who defend their homes from a world with threats like fire tornadoes, earthquake swarms and mud mephit slides. A large part of The Fermends involves Militia Actions, a way to include local forces in larger combats while centering the player characters.

Capturing the magic of the mundane Utilize action – the main campaign still runs with the 2014 5e rules as the baseline, but The Ferments uses a foundation of 2024 with dashes of Black Flag, Advanced 5e and 2014. One thing that’s fun about 2024 is that the Utilize Action can become a Blades in the Dark style clock. My review of the 2024 Player’s Handbook was my most read D&D writing of the year.

Review: Sanguine by Found Familiar Coffee – getting back into cupping at home reminded me of tasting something like 350,000 roasts and origins back in my coffee quality days. I’m doing this without publishing, but if people want me to cup more coffee and share my thoughts I’d love to do it again.

Published again with Homebrew & Hacking

PJ Coffey invited me back to write an essay about how to create backgrounds for the 5e ecosystem, including new creations for Crafting Heritages, Cultures and More: Worldbuilding. The two sports (The Pentiad and Throwing Stars) shared in that book are now my default to how I integrate sports into 5e D&D. They are a divergence from sports as a tool.

Sounder at Heart

My weekly column, the Ship’s Log continues. The nature of a weekly column is that most subjects are only relevant weekly. Four of the newsletters this year felt bigger than that.

Watching them grow up – when Danny Leyva transferred to Necaxa it was a crisp reminder that the young talents that came through Defiance, where I used to work, were teens, but now they are men, full on adults with wonderful path in front of them.

Humanity requires that we care – watching Reign FC lose in the playoffs I cried tears of joy. My home team, another former employer, lost. But I was happy because it was a symbol of the joy available in soccer when the world can be so harsh.

The Campaign of 2025 – of course I did a D&D+Sounders mashup. Similar to what happened the last time Wizards of the Coast released a new set of core books I created the key players for the Sounders as if they were D&D characters.

Factal

Work is mostly leading the blog, writing marketing emails, producing/presenting the Global Security Briefing and managing social (yeah, I’m a marketing generalist who does a little of a lot on a small team).

There are two things I helped write that I want to share with my D&D readers.

I didn’t write Security at the core of Amnesty International’s human rights work, but I was part of the interview and editing process. Factal helps more than 300 human rights and disaster relief NGOs for free. Knowing that we help tell these orgs where they are needed and help keep their people safe gets me excited to start my work days.

Why the LA fires have been so hard to respond to – and how Factal members met the challenge – between misinformation, information overload, false alerts Factal’s editors and platform helped those NGO partners and huge enterprise companies keep their people safe.

Factal North America lead editor Joe Veyera was on shift during Factal’s earliest alerts. “Finding information about the LA fires isn’t the hard part, but parsing what’s real and what’s not can be far more difficult. As a team of experienced journalists with experience covering large-scale disasters, we know which sources to trust and our members know they can trust our updates.”

I love what I do, because we are that wonderful intersection of ethical company that does lifesaving journalism. I complete year four there in just over a month.

Finally, I repeat my annual call to get rid of linktree or any of its competitors. Your link in bio should be to a place you own and control.

https://fullmoonstorytelling.com/where-to-follow-me-on-social-media/

#bestOf2025 #coffee #DnD #DungeonsAndDragons #Factal #fantasySports #homebrew #inklingDragon #sounders #sportsInDD

Pencil sketch of a tiny dragon resting on a book. The pointy tail arches over the back with drips of ichor coming out of a feathered tip. The arms seem to be vestigial wings with opposing fingers capable of handling obects

A composite image that includes the Ship's Log branding with a notepad and a quill. There is also a photo of Sounders leadership with the Leyva family holding up a Sounders jersey numbered 75. Below that is a photo of Danny Leyva in a black Defiance top.

This stat on Rothrock has me shook. On $104K of guaranteed compensation, he contributed over ten xG + xA. Only Musovski and Rusnák contributed more

H/T @sounderatheart.com

https://www.sounderatheart.com/2025/12/the-return-of-rothrock/

#Sounders #MLS #FediFC

15 years ago the #Sounders blog I founded held our first gathering. There were about a dozen people chatting soccer in the offseason.

We had no idea that it would become a behemoth of team site that came to define local, independent team-centered media.

Now, we're independent. The staffers make more money than we did under the Vox umbrella and we continue to grow in an era where content is HARD.

A vintage styled black and white photo of a man with his back turned to the camera. He's addressing about a half-dozen other people who are looking at him. There are Christmas lights above the window that is behind the people.

1995 #USOpenCup Final Rewind >> After back-to-back shutouts of A-League teams (Colorado Foxes & Seattle #Sounders), it was the 1st goal El Paso GK Jake Arrambide had allowed since the 1st half of the Patriots’ opening round win over the McCormick Kickers. It was a shutout streak of roughly 309 mins.

Gift guide for nerds like me

Maybe you know some people like me — nerds, happily embracing their hobbies that were once considered abnormal but are now mainstream enough they sell out arenas.

Most who read this blog are here for the dungeons and the dragons. Communal storytelling with dice and friends is what unites us. You probably already have the core elements of the games you love, but your family still wants to get you things over the holidays that stretch from late November to early January. Pass them this guide.

Almost all links are direct to the supplier or to Bookshop.org. When you can, shop locally and/or directly.

Our hobbies and communities grow with support.

For the experienced roleplaying game fanatic

First off, expand their Appendix N. The Tolkien-esque stories that founded fantasy RPGs are well known. There’s so much more available now.

The Hunger and The Dusk volumes 1 and 2 (Bookshop links) tell tales of romance between orcs and humans fighting aliens in a world that’s dying. G Willow Wilson wrote other stories as well, many which fit a fantasy motif, but none apply directly to D&D like The Hunger and The Dusk.

Lev Grossman’s works like The Magicians and Bright Sword take familiar tales (Narnia & King Arthur) and twist them up. Also on my TBR pile are Children of Blood & Bone, The Fifth Season and Brigands & Breadknives.

Expand their 5e games outside of Wizards of the Coast. Your RPG nerd friends already buy themselves the official D&D products they want. But you can help them incorporate wider tales.

Labyrinth Worldbook from Kobold Press as part of Tales of the Valiant a 5e system.
Game Master’s Guide from Kobold Press is one of the best collections of advice and subsystems (so I’ve heard). I don’t have either of these yet.
Worlds To-Go: The Elysians and Crafting Heritages, Cultures and More: Worldbuilding from Homebrew & Hacking both feature sections by me! These focus on A5e as the base rules, but work well in your D&D game, of course.
Making Enemies from Keith Amman is his latest guide to better monsters for fantasy games. As usual Keith focuses on expanding stat blocks into tactics, but in Making Enemies he gets into how to build those stat blocks for several systems.

Try other games! Talk to your friend and see what they already have or where their interests lie. There are a lot of other popular RPGs out right now. While Daggerheart and Draw Steel are supported by some of my mutuals on Mastodon. The one that intrigues me the most is the forthcoming Plotweaver system. It is the engine behind the Cosmere RPG and supports political stories beyond what D&D does.

Twilight:2000‘s update is a fun read of the classic post-nuclear exchange apocalypse game that helped me consider the Army. Song of the River Prince is a more cozy fantasy. With light mechanics and tales quite different from the high fantasy of D&D.

You can always get your geek new dice (Artisan Dice are my dream) or support a mapmaker (Deven Rue or Dyson Logos are two I enjoy) in their name. Or order a custom map. Someday the World of the Everflow, Telse and The Ferments will get custom maps. My favorite dice box maker is Elderwood Academy. A gift card to Hero Forge works too.

There are other options, but those are some of my favorites.

For the newbie

While the Tales of the Valiant Starter Set is below $15, get it. Or, stick to the WotC products because your nibblings or friends’ kids don’t want the off brand stuff. I grew up with the Odyssey video game system and Gobots. I get it — sometimes finances mean support how you can.

But when the price isn’t significantly different get;

Stranger Things: Welcome to the Hellfire Club if they are into Stranger things.
Heroes of the Borderlands Starter Set for those that aren’t. Both of those are designed to welcome new people to D&D.

The battle boards from Beedle & Grim’s look great for a not-quite newbie or someone who consistently plays the same class. I’m currently running an Artificer, and Rogues are my second most played class.

And for those who want to be a newbie DM, Return to the Lazy Dungeon Master is the best collection of simple advice to focus on the players, their characters and empowering their story options.

Those shopping in the Renton area should support Shane’s Cards & Games, Wizard Keep Games and Mox Boarding House.

For flavor dorks

My preferred geeky coffee is Found Familiar. My current favorite is Fae Magic. My preferred geeky tea is Friday Afternoon Tea. It helps that they’re local-ish too. A friend recently tried Many Worlds Tavern. I’m looking forward to a flavor report.

For coffees in the South Sound area, I recommend Campfire, Bluebeard, and Boon Boona. I swing by Macadons and Common Ground for sweets.

Beer people should head to The Brewmaster’s Taproom. My go to wine shop is All Things Wine and when in Walla Walla I support Tempus (we’re in the club), Sleight of Hand (also in SoDo), Balboa and Echolands. If you ever tour the dub-dub send me a message. It’s a fun town for those that love flavor experiences.

For finer liquors I enjoyed a taste of The Dalmore recently and would love more. It was a rare scotch that my non-peaty-preferring wife would enjoy with its softer, luxurious mouth feel.

Straightaway cocktails are the best packaged cocktails for people who want smaller servings on hand.

For soccer fans in the Puget Sound

If your soccer friend doesn’t read Sounder at Heart they must. It’s another place I write. There’s a special on annual support right now at 20% off.

Reign tickets are cheaper than Sounders tickets and you’ll be supporting the best women in the world. For the Sounders fans that don’t have tickets get the two-pack. Avoid getting Men’s World Cup tickets at the current pricing unless your budget is quite a bit bigger than mine.

Not from the local area? 1996 Designs makes excellent large brick people of your favorite American soccer teams.

For being prepared without being a Prepper

Working around emergency and crisis managers is reminding me of a few ways to be prepared.

Have a plan when the emergency happens. Know your neighbors and the organizations that will help when disasters happen, because they will happen. A communications system that involves receiving alerts from multiple sources is vital — that should include a radio, as well as your local alerts system and free services on social media. Have backup power, even light solar for portable devices is helpful. You need at least three days of food and water, but if your budget of money and space allows a week or two that’s better.

SHARE AND HELP OTHERS as part of your plan.

Portable Emergency Weather Alert Crank Radio – ER50
65W Power Bank w/ 15W Solar Panel by Grid Doctor
Costco emergency food kits
Support active NGOs with a history of success that empower locals — Team Rubicon and World Central Kitchen for example.

I also keep an Amazon list for my family that lives well away. People can also decide to support the website.

None of the above products or services pay me except Sounder at Heart, the website I founded and ran from 2008 to 2019 and rejoined in 2022, Factal (and those linked resources are free to the general public) and the two supplements mentioned in line paid me a one-time commission.

#coffee #dnd #flavor #giftGuide #giftIdeas #reign #renton #sounders #wine

Is the MLS calendar change something that's been discussed and I missed it? This seems like it's out of the blue, but I haven't been in the loop since cancelling my season tickets.

#Sounders #MLS #MastadonFC

@jeremiah.sounderatheart.com LOL

Best news I've had since the #Sounders could not get it done despite every advantage.. Portland lost. I'll take that as a silver lining.

and I don't really mind Vancouver repping the PNW in the playoffs.

#soundersfc #sounders #mastodonfc

Losing in penalties is meaningless. Season was solid. Bummer to let St. Clair and Minnesota get bailed out by a crossbar, but we beat Messi and his crybaby buddies in a final, so I'm not upset about this year at all. #Sounders