Juhana Pettersson
@juhanaonparas.bsky.social
Writer, roleplaying game and larp designer. Former Lead Developer for World of Darkness releases at Renegade Game Studio, now off to new, as of yet unannounced projects.
www.juhanapettersson.com
www.juhanapettersson.com
Amazing Commissar character power in Only War
November 17, 2025 at 3:57 PM
Amazing Commissar character power in Only War
Loved the arch vampire melodrama of the 2000 anime film Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust precisely because it's so different in style from any of my Vampire: The Masquerade work. It's fun to see cathedrals, immortal romance and high tragedy every once in a while.
October 29, 2025 at 9:10 PM
Loved the arch vampire melodrama of the 2000 anime film Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust precisely because it's so different in style from any of my Vampire: The Masquerade work. It's fun to see cathedrals, immortal romance and high tragedy every once in a while.
The recently released doc The Grim & the Dark is about grimdark aesthetics in games and art, framed as a journey that eventually culminates in a prophetic appearance by the veteran artist John Blanche.
It's pretty good, and who knew that the first stop on the grimdark trip is Helsinki, Finland!
It's pretty good, and who knew that the first stop on the grimdark trip is Helsinki, Finland!
October 14, 2025 at 9:53 AM
The recently released doc The Grim & the Dark is about grimdark aesthetics in games and art, framed as a journey that eventually culminates in a prophetic appearance by the veteran artist John Blanche.
It's pretty good, and who knew that the first stop on the grimdark trip is Helsinki, Finland!
It's pretty good, and who knew that the first stop on the grimdark trip is Helsinki, Finland!
Marina Abramovic's immersive show Balkan Erotic Epic was quite the magnificent spectacle, showcasing various Balkan folk traditions at the confluence of sex and death.
October 12, 2025 at 11:40 AM
Marina Abramovic's immersive show Balkan Erotic Epic was quite the magnificent spectacle, showcasing various Balkan folk traditions at the confluence of sex and death.
Alleys are a genre fiction staple but not at all a standard urban feature. My hometown Helsinki barely has any. New York has just a few. But Manchester has been very rich in alleys!
October 8, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Alleys are a genre fiction staple but not at all a standard urban feature. My hometown Helsinki barely has any. New York has just a few. But Manchester has been very rich in alleys!
Getting ready for the book release party for Maria Pettersson's highly anticipated biography of the Finnish left politician Anna Kontula. I'm proud as hell in my supporting role as the author's husband! It's a great book, a biography quite unlike anything you've seen before.
September 11, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Getting ready for the book release party for Maria Pettersson's highly anticipated biography of the Finnish left politician Anna Kontula. I'm proud as hell in my supporting role as the author's husband! It's a great book, a biography quite unlike anything you've seen before.
John Ford's 1934 film The Lost Patrol is a tightly framed, intense film about a group of doomed British soldiers lost on a patrol in the Sahara desert. It's a very short movie, a little over an hour, and keeps drilling into you with each shot from an invisible sniper.
September 6, 2025 at 3:36 PM
John Ford's 1934 film The Lost Patrol is a tightly framed, intense film about a group of doomed British soldiers lost on a patrol in the Sahara desert. It's a very short movie, a little over an hour, and keeps drilling into you with each shot from an invisible sniper.
After W5 came out, we felt that the line would need a Garou setting book, an enemies book and a spirits book. The Moonlit Path is a Werewolf sourcebook about spirits and the Umbra, developed for Renegade by the excellent Jukka Särkijärvi with some help and writing from me.
September 5, 2025 at 8:20 PM
After W5 came out, we felt that the line would need a Garou setting book, an enemies book and a spirits book. The Moonlit Path is a Werewolf sourcebook about spirits and the Umbra, developed for Renegade by the excellent Jukka Särkijärvi with some help and writing from me.
The second major Werewolf release I developed at Renegade is Wyrmtide. The need for this one is obvious: Werewolf is a violent game where you fight the creatures of the Wyrm, and here's a whole book of them. The enemies book, in other words.
September 4, 2025 at 11:43 AM
The second major Werewolf release I developed at Renegade is Wyrmtide. The need for this one is obvious: Werewolf is a violent game where you fight the creatures of the Wyrm, and here's a whole book of them. The enemies book, in other words.
One of the great challenges of making World of Darkness releases is coming up with titles. They have to sound good, be recognizable, but avoid repeating what has gone before. With over 1200 WoD titles out there, this is difficult!
September 3, 2025 at 10:36 AM
One of the great challenges of making World of Darkness releases is coming up with titles. They have to sound good, be recognizable, but avoid repeating what has gone before. With over 1200 WoD titles out there, this is difficult!
What's great about the titles of these four WoD releases?
They don't have the words "blood" (Vampire) or "moon" (Werewolf) in them!
Eventually, we always end up titling something with one of those words, so to avoid repetition we try to first come up with something else.
They don't have the words "blood" (Vampire) or "moon" (Werewolf) in them!
Eventually, we always end up titling something with one of those words, so to avoid repetition we try to first come up with something else.
September 3, 2025 at 10:34 AM
What's great about the titles of these four WoD releases?
They don't have the words "blood" (Vampire) or "moon" (Werewolf) in them!
Eventually, we always end up titling something with one of those words, so to avoid repetition we try to first come up with something else.
They don't have the words "blood" (Vampire) or "moon" (Werewolf) in them!
Eventually, we always end up titling something with one of those words, so to avoid repetition we try to first come up with something else.
As a W5 book, Shattered Nation was preceded by Scent of Decay, developed by Jukka Särkijärvi with Chant Evans and written by Indrani Ganguly, Jose Garcia, Jesse Heinig, Juhana Pettersson and Rob Wieland.
It presents three stories for the game, because priority 1 is to get people to play.
It presents three stories for the game, because priority 1 is to get people to play.
September 3, 2025 at 9:48 AM
As a W5 book, Shattered Nation was preceded by Scent of Decay, developed by Jukka Särkijärvi with Chant Evans and written by Indrani Ganguly, Jose Garcia, Jesse Heinig, Juhana Pettersson and Rob Wieland.
It presents three stories for the game, because priority 1 is to get people to play.
It presents three stories for the game, because priority 1 is to get people to play.
Shattered Nation is the first major release for Werewolf I developed. It was borne out of the fact that the W5 corebook is light on the setting (you can fit only so much into a single book!), so the goal here was to describe the world a Garou character lives in.
September 3, 2025 at 9:24 AM
Shattered Nation is the first major release for Werewolf I developed. It was borne out of the fact that the W5 corebook is light on the setting (you can fit only so much into a single book!), so the goal here was to describe the world a Garou character lives in.
Renegade's WoD scenarios have been published in a few different ways. Some are FreeRPGDay releases, others were made for the PlayRenegade convention play program, and still others as seasonal releases. On the production end, they all passed through the same process.
September 2, 2025 at 9:48 AM
Renegade's WoD scenarios have been published in a few different ways. Some are FreeRPGDay releases, others were made for the PlayRenegade convention play program, and still others as seasonal releases. On the production end, they all passed through the same process.
The question of how to write, design and present a World of Darkness scenario is not what I'd describe as a solved problem, but in our series of story releases you can see the various ways we and the writers have tried to crack it.
September 2, 2025 at 9:45 AM
The question of how to write, design and present a World of Darkness scenario is not what I'd describe as a solved problem, but in our series of story releases you can see the various ways we and the writers have tried to crack it.
At Renegade, our goal was to make releases for Vampire, Werewolf and Hunter that would be useful when people play these games. Nowhere is that as directly applicable as with the series of stories (i.e. scenarios) we've put out. These were developed by me, but there are many more.
September 2, 2025 at 9:42 AM
At Renegade, our goal was to make releases for Vampire, Werewolf and Hunter that would be useful when people play these games. Nowhere is that as directly applicable as with the series of stories (i.e. scenarios) we've put out. These were developed by me, but there are many more.
One of my favorite Vampire books to have worked on at Renegade is In Memoriam, developed by Freja Gyldenstrøm. It's about vampires old enough to have lost connection o their old human lives, ancilla in other words. It expands the types of playable characters to those permanently alienated by time.
September 1, 2025 at 11:47 AM
One of my favorite Vampire books to have worked on at Renegade is In Memoriam, developed by Freja Gyldenstrøm. It's about vampires old enough to have lost connection o their old human lives, ancilla in other words. It expands the types of playable characters to those permanently alienated by time.
The third big release for Vampire I developed at Renegade is Gehenna War. A lot of different streams flowed into this book: The Gehenna War itself as a V5 era setting concept. Action-oriented play. Noddist mysteries in the setting. How to survive when the Blood Gods rise and walk the earth?
August 30, 2025 at 11:08 AM
The third big release for Vampire I developed at Renegade is Gehenna War. A lot of different streams flowed into this book: The Gehenna War itself as a V5 era setting concept. Action-oriented play. Noddist mysteries in the setting. How to survive when the Blood Gods rise and walk the earth?
The second big Vampire release I developed at Renegade was the starter chronicle book The Crimson Gutter. I saw someone post online about how hard it was to start a Vampire game because you needed to create so many NPCs and locations and I thought... Let's make a book that'll help out!
August 29, 2025 at 10:05 AM
The second big Vampire release I developed at Renegade was the starter chronicle book The Crimson Gutter. I saw someone post online about how hard it was to start a Vampire game because you needed to create so many NPCs and locations and I thought... Let's make a book that'll help out!
Blood-Stained Love was the first big release I put together for Vampire at Renegade. It was born out of a very simple observation: Vampires and romance go well together, and this has historically been somewhat neglected in the World of Darkness.
Plus I personally like to play fucked up love stories
Plus I personally like to play fucked up love stories
August 28, 2025 at 9:42 AM
Blood-Stained Love was the first big release I put together for Vampire at Renegade. It was born out of a very simple observation: Vampires and romance go well together, and this has historically been somewhat neglected in the World of Darkness.
Plus I personally like to play fucked up love stories
Plus I personally like to play fucked up love stories
I laughed
(From the Book of Hungry Names)
(From the Book of Hungry Names)
August 25, 2025 at 8:46 AM
I laughed
(From the Book of Hungry Names)
(From the Book of Hungry Names)
When I was in high school in the late Nineties, Ultra Bra was absolutely everywhere. You didn't have to be a fan to know all their songs. Ambient exposure was enough. Just saw their reunion gig at the Helsinki Olympic Stadium and it was super nostalgic!
August 23, 2025 at 8:14 PM
When I was in high school in the late Nineties, Ultra Bra was absolutely everywhere. You didn't have to be a fan to know all their songs. Ambient exposure was enough. Just saw their reunion gig at the Helsinki Olympic Stadium and it was super nostalgic!
Lud-in-the-Mist, by Hope Mirrlees, is the only book about the fae that I've read to reach The King of Elfland's Daughter's level. It's beautiful, melancholy, funny, all about people with all their foibles touched by magic... Whatever magic stands for.
Making a queer reading is very easy.
Making a queer reading is very easy.
August 20, 2025 at 9:51 AM
Lud-in-the-Mist, by Hope Mirrlees, is the only book about the fae that I've read to reach The King of Elfland's Daughter's level. It's beautiful, melancholy, funny, all about people with all their foibles touched by magic... Whatever magic stands for.
Making a queer reading is very easy.
Making a queer reading is very easy.
Fontaines D.C. had a great gig at Flow. I went to see it on a random rec and I'm glad I did! Rich, sometimes melancholy music...
August 10, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Fontaines D.C. had a great gig at Flow. I went to see it on a random rec and I'm glad I did! Rich, sometimes melancholy music...