Kala Mandala Playbook

Spices, rivers, magic, gods. 
More gods than people, more monsters than gods. 
And very few shoes. 

Kala Mandala is a 44 pg rules-lite, flavour-heavy fantasy roleplaying game centred on medieval Southeast Asia. 

Featuring:

• Meddling as adventuring: Join a Meddling guild! Fulfill your irrepressible nosiness, monetize your busybodyness. You might even help people along the way.
• Skills as progression: Learn from NPCs you help, levelling up is organic and contextual. Be a dick and you might miss out on some cool stuff.
• Art, Dance, Food and Culture: Actual in-game utility to the Really Big Things in this region.
• Prayers and Rituals: Magic, ghosts and deities are everyday realities in Kala Mandala. Prayers are equally real and important too.
• Lineages and Heirlooms: You are always connected to something — immediate family and extended relatives, personal histories. Heirlooms are physical representations of such connections.

Including:

• Character Creation, Skills, Weapons, 6d6 Spells and more.
• Over 60 illustrations of Southeast Asian fantasy, bringing the world to life

Kala Mandala is a work in progress (V 0.13a) built on the original rulesets of Cairn RPG and Into the Odd. Inspired by Mausritter, Liminal Horror, Runecairn, Maze Rats and Troika.

Foundations of Kala Mandala 

1. Centring on Southeast Asia, leaving Eurocentric fantasy.
2. Exploring the region's shared histories and fluid identities, departing from ethno-nationalist narratives.
3. Bolstering imagination and fun, beyond tokenism and representation.

Writing, Art, Layout
Munkao

Additional Writing, Consulting, Editing
Alia Ali (Food), Elizabeth Gimbad, Mabel Ho