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HOLLOWS - TTRPG Boss Fights Done Right

Created by Rowan, Rook and Decard

Plunge into the nightmare realms of Hollows and slay other people's personal demons. Hollows' unique tactical combat system allows for dynamic positioning and tactical gambits, and makes combat spectacular.

Latest Updates from Our Project:

Intermission: Backer Preview PDF Ready NOW!
9 months ago – Fri, Sep 05, 2025 at 03:34:36 PM

Good evening, Hunters.

A simple missive tonight:

The backer preview PDF of the core book is ready.



THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT THE PREVIEW

Text is 100% complete. This is it. Final version, pending your feedback - and we would really like feedback. A lot of it will happen as conversations in our Discord (link at the bottom of the email), but we also really appreciate feedback in an easy-to-collate feedback form, especially if you've got a nice, straightforward typo to report. You can find it here:
 
https://forms.gle/NEDpqEM44a5fcBns9

We are, as we are wont to do, still fiddling with bits of the layout. For the most part, what you see is what you get, but don't be surprised if some pieces of spot art appear or move between this and the final release, or some colours change slightly. We've got a sidebar to add.


HOW TO GET YOUR PREVIEW 

Depending on the precise order of events on our end, it may already be in your inbox - look out for an email from Backerkit about new digital downloads for Hollows. 

To download your files, either follow the link in the email, or: 
  • Go to backerkit.com
  • Click your profile icon in the top right corner of the homepage
  • Go to Your Pledges and Surveys
  • Find Hollows and click on it
  • Then go to View Order, under Surveys on the right hand side of the page
  • Click on Get Your Digital Downloads, near the top of the order page
  • Download your files

WHAT TO DO AFTERWARDS

This is really up to you. Get excited? Run some Hollows? Come and join us in the RRD Discord and ask us, and the rest of the player community, questions?

https://discord.gg/HQfnyMms

The world is, or in this case The Isles are, your oyster.

Post-Campaign Update 12: A Ghastly Flowering
10 months ago – Thu, Aug 28, 2025 at 10:19:08 AM

In which the Entity that is Hollows mutates a little further, but we corral it and herd it towards its ultimate fate: the printer.

MANUSCRIPT

Firstly: I promised you a manuscript preview in mid-August. Several astute backers have observed that it’s nearly the end of August and there has been no preview. Allow me to explain.

We laid out the book. The book was too large, by about 10%. In reviewing it, with an eye to cutting some material and reflowing some pages to use space more efficiently, we have proposed a number of additional changes. (“I have now finished writing Hollows for the tenth time.” - Grant Howitt, August 2025)

I still thought we might get the preview out this week, thereby allowing me to at least do so while it was still August.

Then people got ill. Probably not because of Hollows, more likely from a convention. And, while we are passionate about our work, we also firmly believe that sick leave is sick leave, and have politely insisted that those affected take time off to recover. 

Anyway, long story short, the preview will now arrive at the end of next week. I know this is disappointing, and I know you’ve waited (remarkably patiently) for a really long time. I can only apologise and ask you to be patient for just a little while longer. 

COMPONENT KIT

Still no changes! But remember I said we’d updated some components after seeing the samples? Well, we got new samples, and they’re gorgeous.


We have:
  • Enlarged the design on the tactical grid so the Entity token fits perfectly, instead of merely pretty well
  • Changed the Empty design for the Shotgun token to be closer to the other Broken/Empty/etc. designs
  • Changed the colours of the Capacity holder and tokens so they’re a little darker and grimier. We thought this would be a really fussy, minor change, but it actually makes a huge impact (we think)
  • Most visibly, we have replaced the dice. They were basic and plastic and we didn’t like them. They’re still plastic, but they’re now this rather nice carved bone effect
  • (Oh, and one of the numbers was mirrored on the Curse dice, which is a weird thing to happen, but that’s fixed now, too)

WRETCHED DOMAINS

Maz is now editing these (and, as I type this, they are waiting on me to review a set of edits so they can continue working, so I shall wrap this up swiftly). There’s little else to say here - these are proceeding according to plan.

I can, however, show you this charming art for Jinn Hermiston's Hollow. Jinn is the writer we brought in to replace a Wretched Domains author who unfortunately had to withdraw. The Hollow they created is a rotten, verdant place of vengeful forests and uncanny game birds. The illustrations here are the map of the Hollow in its entirety and two of the Entities: The Gamekeeper (shotgun in hand) and The Royal Fern (also pictured: one of its luckless victims). The borders you can see are by Arborwin McJanda, and are a crucial piece of this Hollow's graphic design.


IN CONCLUSION

May the Old Gods become aware of my existence if I’m wrong, but it looks like we’ll send everything to print in October. I continue to be uncomfortable with providing hard deadlines for things like locking orders and sending out books, because this is a big and complicated fulfilment situation and, as you’ve already seen, Hollows has a way of expanding through time and space.

As a parting gift, please enjoy these nasty little symbols our graphic designer, Mina, made for the Malignancies. Pleasingly unpleasant.


Until next month! 
- Chant

Post-Campaign Update 11: Through Parting Shadows We Approach
11 months ago – Thu, Jul 24, 2025 at 07:50:44 AM

In which the time of our Hollowing impends, and we feel our own Malignant majesty bloom within. (We’re most of the way through layout.)

MANUSCRIPT

The tech edit is complete! Maz is typesetting the last section even now, as I write these words to you. The rest of the book is in layout, and the to-and-fro of “that spacing’s a bit funny”, “move that box up a bit? No down a bit?”, and “can we ram another bit of art in there?” is well underway. (Dear Mina, I am sorry for everything.)

It may not come as a tremendous surprise, given all the extra writing, revising, testing, and refining that we’ve done that the book is very big now. We were expecting a svelte 320-page artifact. We’re… not there. A lot of the to-and-fro with our graphic designer, Minaerva McJanda, is over ways to conserve space while still making the text clear and easy to read – and still leaving room for all the special treatments we want to do for, say, Weapons, Entities, and rules sets like The Refuge. 



Overall, we’re pleased.

Once that last section is laid out, we’ll share the complete PDF with you for your review and interrogation – and I really do mean interrogation. This will be the last chance to correct typos, clarify wording, and tell us if something’s just weird before we go to print. Expect a PDF sometime in mid-August.

COMPONENT KIT

No changes to report here. We made a couple of small changes to designs based on the production samples (remember those? Beautiful things.), and our manufacturing partner’s ready to go.

I’m not pushing the big red button until the core book’s ready too. See above for how close that is.

WRETCHED DOMAINS

We have not been idle on this. Chris Taylor and I have been giving the Entities in these Hollows a final pass, ensuring they still work with the updates to the core rules (broadly: Entities have become nastier and more punishing since the first drafts of these scenarios were written!). Maz will then edit them to a high shine, Mina will lay them out, and they’ll go off to print. This should all happen while you’re enjoying the core PDF, so everything’s falling into place nicely.

SUNDRIES, AND A PODCAST
The other pieces of the Hollows puzzle are small: we have some enamel pin badges to order, and a metal Entity token. These designs are ready, and mainly in need of some packaging design. We also committed to a “Making Of…” podcast. Now we’ve made the game, we can make the Making Of. 

Is there anything you’d like to know about Hollows or the process of conjuring it from the depthless void of Grant and Chris’s nightmares? Come and ask it in the comments, and I’ll make sure Maz, Grant, and Chris see it before the podcast. I can’t promise they’ll answer it, or that they’ll answer it seriously, but Grant once asked an interviewee what the sexiest polyhedral die was, so I think it’s only fair that you throw him some tough questions here.  

- Chant


Intermission: Updated Quickstart Available
12 months ago – Fri, Jun 20, 2025 at 09:05:23 AM

No updates for nearly 6 weeks, then two in one day?

When I sent this morning's update, it was supposed to include the promise of an updated quickstart PDF. It has new graphics, reflected the final designs of our token set, and updated rules, Entities, and pregenerated characters in line with the tech edit.

It's overall cleaner, clearer, and most importantly it reflects the current state of the game.

You should have received an email from Backerkit with a download link. If for any reason that email doesn't arrive or the link doesn't work, you can download directly from our website:
 
https://rowanrookanddecard.com/product/hollows-quickstart-the-sins-of-grisham-priory

Until next time! 
- Chant

Post-Campaign Update 10: Measure by Measure, We Advance
12 months ago – Fri, Jun 20, 2025 at 04:41:14 AM

In which we feel the Seed stir within and the omens of our grim purpose steal over us. In other words… we’re getting there.

MANUSCRIPT

Last time we spoke, we thought we were just about done with the technical edit; that turned out to be not the case. Hollows is easily the most technical game we’ve created, and we’ve been taking the time needed to make everything as robust and watertight as possible. We’ve been working through the feedback on abilities, Entities and campaign play from our playtest - thank you to everyone who took part and took the time to give us your thoughts! - as well as ongoing playtesting discussions in our Discord (thanks to everyone there, too; Maz would like to shout out hierotelephony in particular, whose questions prompted a full review of combat action sequencing). 

So we’ve now fully reworked the entire Weapons chapter to bring everything into a specific set of standardised language. We’ve also got new sections in the rules to make it easier to understand what happens in what order, and how to cope with strange edge cases. Most of the changes we wanted to make in response to playtest feedback have now been fully integrated.

Meanwhile, Grant has finished writing up new material on the nations beyond the Isles, and that’s also been read and discussed with our sensitivity consultant; it’s now being adopted properly into the setting chapter where it belongs.

All of which is to say: progress has been slow, but when we’re in a position where we have to choose between doing something fast and doing it properly, we’ll choose properly every time. I will need to give you an updated timeline, but I’ll do it once we’re finished with edits and firmly into layout.

When I say we’re thankful to the Discord and our playtesters, by the way, I mean we’ve significantly overhauled sections of text to address the very sensible questions they asked. This introduction to using Weapon abilities is a great example: 

Using Abilities

Both Hunters and Entities have access to a variety of abilities, including generic manoeuvres available to all, and other abilities that are unique to the Weapon wielded or the Entity being hunted.

There are a variety of ways that abilities can be triggered or activated. Ability text usually includes at least one of the following:


  • Limits, like “once per round” or “on your turn”.
  • Conditions, like “while you are in Ranged” or “while you hold Focus”.
  • Triggers, like “when your turn starts” or “when you inflict damage”.
  • Costs, like “spend Resolve” or “place Threat on your area”.

In general, if you fulfil all the requirements to use one of your abilities, you may choose to use it but do not have to.

Entity abilities often also specify targets or target areas, like “all Hunters in Close” or “one Hunter in a Flank area”. There must be at least one target who matches the ability’s target description in order for it to be triggered.

Some ability effects are automatic, while others depend on a dice roll or on additional conditions. Generally the ability text will say what happens and when, and sometimes multiple abilities on both sides of the fight can trigger off each other. If there’s doubt about what order things should happen, the GM decides.

UPDATED GLOSSARY

All that work on the technical detail means we’ve been able to bring the rules text closer to its final form, so we’ve also spent some time applying all the edits to our player-facing glossary. You can't quite run Hollows straight from this document, but it's not far off.

Check it out here.

And if you think this is good, you should see the 10-tab spreadsheet we've got behind the scenes.

ARTWORK

We are now officially art complete! Last month, Sam Lamont was still working on the slipcase. He’s finished, and it’s beautiful. The idea is that the yellow areas will be cut out and you'll see the hideous, roiling interior design on the back cover of the Hollows book through them.


COMPONENT KIT

We’ve received our production samples! Look! Look at them! BEHOLD!!!


Obviously, the box won’t be white in the final version, and nor will the cardboard dividers inside it. We’ve got a couple of small tweaks to make - the ones you’ll notice most are replacnig the dice with a sort of bone effect, and making the capacity holder and tokens darker, more gunmetal and brass than the silver and gold of the samples. This is progressing very nicely and we’re well on track.

It’s about time to start ordering our challenge coins and faction pins, so there’s a good chance we’ll have some visuals to show off there next time, and we’ve also got a delightful set of page backgrounds for the scenarios.

Soon. Soon. 

- Chant