# Wilderfeast Wilderfeast is an ecological fantasy TTRPG about mutated monster-hunter chefs tracking frenzying creatures, cooking what they kill, and changing themselves to protect the One Land. ## At a Glance Monster-hunt eco-fantasy | 2-6 players + Guide | d8/d20 dice-pool tests | Free quickstart, paid core book | Best for hunt-driven campaigns ## Why It Fits Wilderfeast fits tables that want fantasy play to revolve around a specific, repeatable loop of tracking monsters, hunting with the pack, cooking what they bring down, and letting those feasts permanently reshape the characters and the campaign. ## Fit Facts - Players: 2-6 players + Guide - Session length: 120-240 minutes - Prep: Medium - Price: Paid ## Facets - Genres: Fantasy - Mechanics: Campaign, Classless, Exploration-Driven, Narrative-Driven, Survival - Themes: Environmental - Decision tags: Award Winning, Rules Medium ## Scores - Complexity: 3/5 - New GM Fit: 3/5 - Roleplay Focus: 4/5 - Combat Focus: 4/5 - Tactical Depth: 3/5 - Campaign Depth: 4/5 ## Best For - Groups that want monster hunting, cooking, and mutation to be the actual campaign loop instead of side flavor - Players who like fantasy progression tied to creature parts, bodily change, and pack identity rather than only gear and levels - Tables looking for ecological fantasy with a stronger point of view than generic pseudo-medieval adventuring - Campaigns that want teamwork, creature behavior, and recurring hunt structure to matter every session ## Avoid If - You mainly want a generic fantasy sandbox or dungeon crawl that can ignore the game's food-and-mutation premise - Your group wants low-commitment pickup one-shots more than an evolving hunt-and-change campaign - Monster butchery, cooking, and bodily mutation are themes your table would rather keep offscreen - You want crunchy build optimization or grid-first combat to be the main attraction ## Explorer Notes [Wilderfeast](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product-category/roleplaying-games/wilderfeast/) is best for groups that want fantasy campaigns built around tracking dangerous creatures, cooking what they hunt, and letting those meals permanently change who the characters become. It stands out when the table wants ecology, teamwork, and progression to be the same conversation instead of separate subsystems. It is a weaker fit if your group mainly wants generic medieval adventuring, low-commitment pickup sessions, or a fantasy game where monsters are only things to kill. Wilderfeast has a welcoming surface, but its core identity is specific: you are playing wilders whose relationship to monsters, food, mutation, and community is the game. ## What the game is [Wilderfeast Core Book](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book/) is a standalone fantasy TTRPG by KC Shi, published by Horrible Guild. Players take the role of wilders, monster hunters and chefs in the One Land, where creatures driven into destructive frenzy must be tracked, confronted, cooked, and understood rather than treated as ordinary wandering enemies. The pitch is unusual but coherent at the table. Wilderfeast is not just about hunting monsters for loot. Hunting, preparing food, and eating what you kill are the progression engine, the worldbuilding lens, and the clearest expression of the setting's ecological values. The result is a fantasy campaign game that feels more like a ritualized hunt-and-feed loop than a dungeon crawl. ## Publication history and current line The current line centers on the core book and an official [Quickstart PDF](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-quickstart-pdf/). Horrible Guild's current Wilderfeast line also includes a Guide Screen, reference decks for the Trail, Hunt, and Techniques/Conditions, a combat tracker, an event timer, a journal pack, and character-sheet downloads, which makes the game feel like an active product line rather than a one-book experiment. The current core-book product page describes the game as a 316-page hardcover with six Tools, eight Specialties, forty monsters, a travel guide to the One Land and the Sen Coast, and The Last Chamig, a four-scenario introductory arc that can also function as an early campaign backbone. ## What you need to play The lowest-risk start is the official [Quickstart PDF](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-quickstart-pdf/). It teaches the setting premise, the dice logic, and the basic hunt loop well enough to tell whether your group actually wants Wilderfeast's flavor instead of only liking the cover and premise. For full campaign play, move to the [core book](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book/) or the [digital edition](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book-digital-edition/). If the table sticks, the official play aids matter more here than they do for many fantasy games, because the Trail, Hunt, Feast, conditions, and monster-part handling all benefit from good table reference material. ## Core rules and play structure Wilderfeast uses a dice-pool approach built around a key identity split: humans use d8s, monsters use d20s, and wilders can lean toward one side or the other depending on what they are doing. Review coverage and the official quickstart both emphasize that this is the clean conceptual hook that makes the system readable. The game is not especially interested in simulationist granularity; it wants the rules to reflect whether a character is acting from discipline, instinct, or monstrous force. The practical play loop is more important than the raw dice. Wilderfeast revolves around phases such as the Trail, the Hunt, and the Feast, with freer play around them. That means the game naturally creates rhythm: track the creature, learn how it behaves, confront it with pack tactics, then decide how eating and transforming will change the group going forward. ## Characters, packs, and advancement Characters are not class-based in the usual fantasy sense. The core book uses six Tools and eight Specialties to shape a wilder, then layers mutations, traits, and pack connections on top. Official copy stresses that characters begin with ties to the One Land and to each other, which matters because Wilderfeast works best when the pack feels like a functioning hunting and cooking crew rather than a stack of independent builds. Advancement is one of the game's strongest selling points. Progress comes directly out of the creatures the group hunts and prepares. The game's signature question is not only whether you survive the monster, but what taking it into yourself does to your body, your capabilities, and your relationship to the wild. ## Signature mechanics The standout mechanic is the Feast itself. Public review coverage repeatedly points to it as the subsystem that makes Wilderfeast feel genuinely different from adjacent fantasy games. Cooking and eating the monster is not flavor text pasted onto a combat game; it is the place where victory becomes change. The hunt structure matters too. Wilderfeast's monsters are built to be approached as creatures with bodies, parts, weaknesses, and behavior patterns, not just hit-point containers. The result is a combat style that can feel more like coordinated pursuit and problem-solving than fixed-position tactical attrition. ## What play feels like At the table, Wilderfeast feels energetic, strange, and more communal than its monster-hunting pitch first suggests. There is action and there are boss-style confrontations, but the mood is not default grimdark slaughter. The game cares about protecting communities, seeking harmony with the natural world, and deciding what kind of monsters the wilders themselves are willing to become. That gives it an unusual emotional tone. It can handle spectacle and body-strangeness, but it also has a restorative current running underneath it. Feeding, healing, and understanding are not side notes to the game; they are part of the pitch. ## Running the game The Guide load is moderate, not trivial. Wilderfeast gives you a clear loop, but it asks the Guide to present compelling monsters, make the world feel alive, pace the Trail and Hunt well, and support the consequences of every Feast. A table that treats the game like ordinary fantasy encounter prep will miss the thing that makes it worth choosing. The good news is that the core book appears designed to help onboarding. The official line highlights safety guidance, player-empowering tools, monster and region creation advice, and an introductory four-scenario arc. That makes Wilderfeast easier to recommend than many beautiful-but-opaque indie games, especially for groups willing to let the system teach its own rhythm. ## Campaign fit Wilderfeast is strongest as a short-to-long campaign game. The core loop becomes more satisfying as the pack develops history, accumulates mutations, and defines its relationship to the world and to each other. The official scenarios mean it can start cleanly, but the real payoff is seeing repeated hunts reshape the group. It can still support a first-session trial or convention-style introduction through the quickstart and early scenarios. The important distinction is that Wilderfeast is not only selling a monster fight. It is selling a campaign identity built out of repeated, meaningful consumption and change. ## Reception and awards Wilderfeast has strong signals for a newer standalone fantasy game. The [2025 ENNIE Awards winners page](https://ennie-awards.com/2025-winners/) lists Wilderfeast by Horrible Guild, authored by KC Shi, under Best Family Game / Product. That is a useful external trust signal for a game that otherwise might be dismissed as a niche curiosity. Independent review coverage is also encouraging. Mephit James's two-part review on WordPress praises the game's originality, its hunt structure, and especially the Feast as the clearest expression of the system's identity. The recurring caution is that Wilderfeast is not a generic all-purpose fantasy chassis: groups need to want its specific loop and tone, or the game's best ideas can feel like overhead instead of payoff. ## Where it is strongest - Groups that want monster hunting to be the whole campaign loop, not just a recurring encounter type. - Players who enjoy character growth through mutation, food, and embodied change rather than only through gear and levels. - Tables looking for ecological fantasy with a stronger point of view than standard pseudo-medieval adventuring. - Campaigns that want teamwork, creature behavior, and table reference tools to matter in play. ## Where it can frustrate groups - The premise is specific enough that it can bounce tables who mainly want a more generic fantasy sandbox. - Body mutation, butchery, and monster cooking are central, so groups uneasy with those themes should not treat them as optional color. - It is more structured than a purely freeform story game, but less optimization-driven than crunchy combat fantasy, which can leave some tables between expectations. - The game works best when players buy into the pack and setting ethos instead of approaching every hunt as a detached loot run. ## Content and safety notes Expect monster hunting, butchery, cooking sentient or semi-sentient creatures, bodily mutation, ecological damage, frenzy or contagion themes, wilderness danger, community threat, and fantasy violence. The official core-book page explicitly calls out safety guidance, which is appropriate because even Wilderfeast's brighter tone still plays with ingestion, body change, and predatory violence. ## Best starting path Start with the [Quickstart PDF](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-quickstart-pdf/), then move to the [core book](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book/) if the table likes the Trail, Hunt, and Feast cycle. Use The Last Chamig as the first real on-ramp if your group wants a guided early arc instead of building everything from scratch. After that, add the Guide Screen or reference decks only if the group is sticking with campaign play. Wilderfeast is already playable without a large accessory buy-in, but it is one of those games where the right physical aids can noticeably improve table flow. ## Research notes Last checked: July 9, 2026. - [Horrible Guild: Wilderfeast line page](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product-category/roleplaying-games/wilderfeast/) - [Horrible Guild: Wilderfeast Core Book](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book/) - [Horrible Guild: Wilderfeast Core Book Digital Edition](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-core-book-digital-edition/) - [Horrible Guild: Wilderfeast Quickstart PDF](https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-quickstart-pdf/) - [2025 ENNIE Awards winners](https://ennie-awards.com/2025-winners/) - [Mephit James: Wilderfeast Review, Part 1](https://mephitjamesblog.wordpress.com/2025/02/04/wilderfeast-review-part-1/) - [Mephit James: Wilderfeast Review, Part 2](https://mephitjamesblog.wordpress.com/2025/03/18/wilderfeast-review-part-2/) ## Links - Explorer page: https://www.ttrpg-games.com/item/wilderfeast - Agent JSON: https://www.ttrpg-games.com/api/games/wilderfeast.json - Publisher or official site: https://horribleguild.com/eu/product-category/roleplaying-games/wilderfeast/ - Reviews or retailer page: https://horribleguild.com/eu/product/wilderfeast-quickstart-pdf/