Groundbreaking RPG Coyote & Crow is pay-what-you-want for Indigenous Peoples Day

Science fantasy tabletop RPG Coyote & Crow will be available as a pay-what-you-want digital PDF today as a special promotion for Indigenous Peoples Day.

Coyote & Crow imagines a far-future setting where the cultures of America were allowed to prosper outside of European colonisation, and creator Connor Alexander is a Cherokee designer who has used the RPG’s success to build up indigenous communities in the US and Canada through free copies, inviting on dozens of writers and artists from various First Nations and other indigenous backgrounds and being a vocal advocate of tabletop games beyond a strictly European lens.

Alexander announced the promotion via Twitter, saying that anyone can download “the full PDF of Coyote & Crow at our webstore FREE, under a ‘pay what you want’ model. We suggest that Native folks pay nothing. Everyone else, pay what you feel is fair.”

Indigenous Peoples Day is a national holiday in the US that celebrates the cultures and history of all indigenous American peoples. While the federal government still recognises October 9th as Columbus Day as well, an increasing number of cities and regions denounce Christopher Columbus as symbolic of the destructive and genocidal period of European colonisation that ostensibly began with his passages to the Americas.

Coyote & Crow is certainly worth purchasing at whatever price you can afford, as Dicebreaker’s preview and its accolades at the very first Tabletop Awards prove. Its post-apocalyptic setting, which follows massive climate collapse, shows indigenous cultures both flourishing and grappling with their own shortcomings in a fully realised world where ritual belief and science hold equal credence in society.

The system supports longer form campaign play and lets the players approach obstacles through several different approaches, some more diplomatic than others. At its heart, Coyote & Crow believes that the tabletop hobby space can accommodate contemporary retelling of indigenous stories while also making room for new kinds of tales that hardly ever find the spotlight in pop culture.

IMG

Coyote & Crow’s digital PDF is available through its official website and will remain pay-what-you-want for at least the rest of today (October 9th). Hero Forge, the preeminent crafter of bespoke RPG character miniatures, recently announced its own special promotion with Coyote & Crow - they’re offering weapons, outfits and customisation options pulled directly from the pages of its sourcebook. If you’ve been wanting a neon-lit hunter brandishing a pair of wicked warswords, now is your chance.