OZ ORC

10/02/2026

Oz ORC 2026 #1 is officially done - and we couldn't be prouder of how it turned out. It was fantastic to see so many new faces and to meet so many of you in person.

While putting this event together was no small effort (thank you to everyone who helped, big and small), it truly wouldn't have been possible without our amazing GMs and Players. So, thank you all. We knew it was going to be a fun day, but we never expected the level of success it reached: 14 tables, 80+ seats filled and around 50 different people taking part.

Our goal with Oz ORC is to be more than just a convention. We want to introduce players to new and different gmes and build a welcoming community that grows the old school roleplaying hobby. So please get involved, we have more events to come this year and would love to continue talking and playing through out.

We have one order of business - announcing the winner of our Ozzie the Orc contest - the winner is Steven's fantastic entry (we'll be in touch regarding the prize) an honourable mention also goes to Shaun for his Dragon Bane stat block (both pictured).

Enjoy some actions shots of the day, hopefully it will encourage others to come check us out in the future.

P.S. I sent an email to the attendees and have been told its ended up in peoples spam, so please check and have a read. Thank you all again.

Fight On!

06/02/2026

Oz ORC 2025 is TOMORROW! We have 14 games across the day (almost) fully booked with around 50 players!

I've got my bag packed ready to play and run - what do you use as a GM bag and what do you pack? Did I forget the snacks?

A huge thank you to everyone who signed up - we're so excited to see you all there. It's going to be a blast!

Fight On!

https://ozorc.com

12/01/2026

MEET THE GM!
Riley is an organiser and GM at Oz ORC, who loves Old School Roleplaying.

While he’s still technically young (for now), Riley is bringing the OLD to Old School by running 1974 Original Dungeons & Dragons. At Oz ORC, he’s running an adventure that asks the important question: Would the Fellowship actually survive Moria if it were a D&D game?

That session is currently full — but if the other evening games also fill up, more seats may appear. Riley has run for large tables before, so keep an eye out 👀

Outside the convention, Riley writes a small blog, records a podcast, builds tools to help run games, and publishes adventures — all of which you can find at:
👉 https://www.dungeons-and-datums.com/

Check out the reviews in the comments — or give it a read yourself and leave one!

11/01/2026

GLOG at Oz ORC – Curious? You Should Be.

One of the sessions at Oz ORC (Feb 2026) is running GLOG — and if you’ve never played it before, that’s not a problem. In fact, that’s half the point.

So what is GLOG?

GLOG (the “Goblin Laws of Gaming”) isn’t a single rulebook. It’s a loose, modular OSR framework that grew out of the blogosphere

Fast to learn, brutally practical, and endlessly hackable. Think classic D&D bones, but stripped back, reassembled, and tuned for creativity, rulings over rules, and strange character concepts.

Here is one of the original posts: https://goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-glog.html

This session also leans into the idea of the Fantasy Heartbreaker — a term for games that passionately rebuild D&D from first principles, often fixing exactly the things the designer found frustrating. GLOG embraces that spirit unapologetically: weird classes, custom magic, dangerous choices, and mechanics that exist because they do something interesting at the table.

And here is a really old post about fantasy heartbreakers:

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/9/

Written more than 20 years ago - before the days of DriveThru RPG, Crowdfunding and Print on Demand - its more accessible that ever to get your hearbreaker out there....

If you like OSR, but enjoy seeing how far the edges can be pushed or if you’re curious about the design space between “classic D&D” and “DIY innovation” — this table is for you.

Seats are limited in fact only ONE spot left. Sign up via Warhorn:

https://warhorn.net/events/oz-orc-adelaide-feb-2026/schedule/sessions/deffed52-df72-45ca-934d-7ff8d2c87822

10/01/2026

What's a "Quantum Ogre"? This was a topic of discussion among the GMs on our discord the other day, first time some of us had heard of it! How do you handle choice and player agency at the table?

08/01/2026

One of the sessions running at Oz ORC (Feb 2026) is “Into the Mansion of Baron Thrasp”, a fast-moving heist adventure using Swyvers — a game about criminals, opportunists, and bad decisions in worse places.

Baron Thrasp and his retinue have left the city. His mansion is largely undefended.

Naturally, every swyver in The Smoke has noticed.
Your gang has one night to get in, grab what you can, and get out again — preferably alive. The estate is a maze of puzzles, traps, hidden dangers, rival crews, and rumours of a truly legendary treasure. You won’t be alone, and you won’t have much time.
This is a medium-sized dungeon crawl framed as a competitive urban heist, where speed, planning, and knowing when to cut and run matter more than heroics.

Swyvers is designed by Luke Gearing, whose work is well known to fans of Mothership. Like his science-fiction material, Swyvers focuses on pressure, consequences, and situations that spiral when plans collide with reality. The rules are lean, the tone is uncompromising, and the game assumes the world is hostile, unfair, and already in motion before you arrive.

If you enjoy OSR-adjacent play with a strong heist focus, urban grime, and the constant question of “can we carry any more before this all collapses?” — this table is worth your attention.

Register via Warhorn:

https://warhorn.net/events/oz-orc-adelaide-feb-2026/schedule/sessions/4aa5c522-9d84-4478-9107-1ce81a7bf5f1

The mansion is open. The clock is ticking. Other thieves are already inside.

06/01/2026

We have ONE month to go before the convention! The Oz ORC team and GMs are pumped and very much looking forward to the event. Some of the sessions are now booked out completely, but we do have some free spots available through the morning, afternoon and evening sessions!

If you have registered on Warhorn for the event, you still need to sign up for the individual games, so make sure you select your games so you don’t miss out!

We have a couple of fun competitions on the books as well – one is something like a poetry contest - the boxed text competition! Prepare your best GM voice to read out a randomly selected boxed text from an OSR adventure, and be judged by your peers on your dramatic flair!

It’s shaping up to be a fun day, so don’t delay and get registered 😊!

02/01/2026

CONTEST AND GIVEAWAY! DETAILS BELOW!!

Drum roll…. Please meet Ozzie the Orc!

We are very excited to introduce our mascot, Ozzie the Orc! Admire his double thumbs (did you know koalas have two thumbs)! Ozzie was drawn with love by our very own who has done a superlative job bringing him to life. I think he channels Blinky Bill, Mad Max and Conan in equal measure!

To celebrate his arrival, we’ll be having a monster description/stat block competition!

We want to know all about Ozzie the ORC, and his special abilities! Get your creative juices flowing. Have a crack at writing a monster description and stat block, with some witty and appropriate special abilities. Where does he live, what is his habitat, his habits, and his favourite saying?

How to enter: Post the stat block here on the post! If you are a bit shy you can also post it in the Discord channel ⁠ozzie-the-orc-contest! thread.

Criteria: Stat block does not have to be for a particular system, but something d20 based and easy to port into your favourite OSR style campaign!

Entries Close: Entries close on Saturday 1 February 2026, one week before Oz ORC convention.

Winners will be announced at the con by a panel of judges comprising the Oz ORC organising crew. Please note, you do not need to attend the con to enter, happy to canvas entries from all over the country!

First prize is a $100 voucher for DriveThru RPG!

25/12/2025

We have another classic style Swedish RPG on the schedule for Oz ORC. GM Tim will be running a session of Forbidden Lands from Free League Publishing! This game has won four Ennie awards in 2019, and Table Top Magazine had this to say about it:

“It’s like somone took hazy childhood memories of a classic D&D game and mixed them with a dash of bleak Scandinavian darkness.”

There are still seats available at this session if you want to sign up!

Rogues & Raiders in a Cursed World Forbidden Lands is a new take on classic fantasy roleplaying. In this sandbox survival roleplaying game, you’re not heroes sent on missions dictated by others – instead, you are raiders and rogues bent on making your own mark on a cursed world. You will discove...

23/12/2025

Meet the GM - Doug Irwin is another Oz ORC organiser, and a massive fan of (and regular contributor to) the Basic Fantasy Roleplaying Game. This is an open source project to capture and publish an open source and free version of the classic style D20 games we all love! It has been around for quite a long time (nearly 20 years!), and has a strong following and is now into it's fouth edition.

Doug will be running two sessions at the con using the system, Whats with the Goblins and the AD&D classic Against the Cult of the Reptile God.

If you're interested in checking out the vibe of this classic style of play, sign up for a session, although Against the Cult of the Reptile God is already booked out!

22/12/2025

Meet the GM! Dallas M is one of the organisers and a GM for our upcoming con! He will be running Old School Essentials, a very popular D&D retro clone providing a cleaned up and very well organised derivative of classic B/X/AD&D!

If you are interested in giving it a try, he will be running "The Harvest of Sommerton" - the introductory scenario to his Silver Swords campaign.

The players seek to join the "Caryoptic Rangers" who defend the Caryoptic Plains against Chaos warband incursions from across the Wisterwal Ranges. Defend the Village of Sommerton against agents of the enigmatic Sorceress-Queen Adastra - and worse!

Dallas is a massive Appendix N fan, so I am sure there will be some classic old school vibes in this session!

He also has a Website with some of his creations and musings, make sure you check it out: deathanddrek.com