Review: Back Again from the Broken Land
**Back Again From The Broken Land
Alexi and Leah Sargent**Cloven Pine Games
So before I begin, I want to acknowledge that “Another Powered by the Apocalypse zine that’s a blatant riff on The Lord of the Rings” may not instill an immediate burst of confidence. I get it, and I’m fairly certain games fitting this description are coming out faster than I could ever read them. But if you’ll bear with me for a few minutes, I’ll argue that Back Again from the Broken Land, by Alexi and Leah Sargent, is the rare work that threads the needle between the various Tolkien adaptation pitfalls and comes out the other side as something wholly its own and absolutely worth your time.
As a zine, the game is easily digestible in the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee, and it can be played in as little as a few hours with no prep for GM or players. But don’t mistake this brevity and simplicity for being “shallow;” the economy with which it wields its mechanical and thematic touchstones is frankly inspiring. Every section has been thoughtfully crafted to convey the authors' vision and with careful consideration of how they come across at the table, but three specific elements stand out as indicative of how this game manages to do something new and unexpected with familiar pieces: the Moves, the Playbooks, and the Epilogue.
Moves
Much like the Elves and Dwarves of the fantasy landscape clearly hearken back to Tolkien’s particular vision of them, Back Again makes straightforward use of the Powered by the Apocalypse concept of “Moves” as its major mechanic. Anyone who has played a PbtA game will have no trouble jumping right in, and thanks to the consistency of design and plenty of provided narrative prompts it should not be any difficulty for new players to catch on just as quickly.
While many of the Moves involve the typical “roll 2d6, add stat, find out if you get what you want and what it costs,” it's notable that several don’t involve a roll at all. Gaze Into the Distance gives players a way to solicit help and information from the GM by offering a description of something they find beautiful amidst the broken lands they traverse. Name a Burden simply requires using a quiet moment to unilaterally name any of the unknown Burdens their character has been carrying. While the uncertainty that dice provides is often important for helping the story develop, Back Again clearly understands that some decisions should rest firmly between GM and Player or Player and Character.
Even the “traditional” moves are contextualized in ways that feel fresh and meaningful: when your characters are in Peril, their options become dramatically constrained. Literally, your only options are to Run, Hide, or Make a Desperate Stand. Run and Hide follow the typical “roll and partial success” pattern, and they’re generally what the players will be reaching for when the going gets tough. But eventually, whether from bad rolls or because the fiction demands it, they’ll find the time they’re forced to Make a Desperate Stand. Here, there is no roll they can make to get through it, instead they just get to pick one of a very limited pool of Stories of Doom and tell the table how badly things go.
The other thing that stands out about the Moves is their focus: most of them are interested not in character agency within the world but in fleshing out characters and the world itself. Even the Moves that lead to dice rolls often require the player to tell a story, share a poem, or answer a prompt about how the world has changed. This is not just set dressing, it completely changes the feel of the game. Rather than focusing on the Journey for its own sake, Back Again uses the Journey as an excuse to get players to construct a world: what it was like, what they gave up to save it, and what they hope to find if they can ever make it back where they started. Which is absolutely one of the most Tolkien-ass things I've ever seen in any RPG, period.
Playbooks
Much like Moves, the Playbooks are familiar PbtA artifacts: a memorable “Class” name with a related trope or concept, values for the game’s three stats, a unique Move, and a few prompts to flesh out details about your character. Interestingly, Playbooks don’t provide any mechanical options, Moves to choose among or unlock, or even any health, XP, or other means of progression. The only thing you're likely to write on a sheet during the entirety of your play is adding and naming Burdens. This limited quantity of detail should not be taken to imply a lack of impact: even the “character building” prompts are so thoughtfully integrated into play that all three of my answers became deeply important to how I played my character before the end of a three-hour oneshot.
But the real reason the Playbooks were made so simple is because they don’t want to get in your way and hold you back: your Playbook may help you define your character, but once you start playing you find that your character actually arises from relationships with their companions, and the world, and the experiences you’ve had. And there are few ways to kill that kind of characterization faster than fumbling around with a stack of handouts trying to figure out what Move you have available (and what one you should really pick up next time you level). Back Again gets this and wisely shows an inspirational level of restraint that I'd love to see replicated much more broadly.
Finally, I can’t move on without acknowledging the Oliphaunt in the room here: yes, there are in fact Nine Playbooks. Well played, Alexi and Leah, well played. But aside from being the Proper Number, nine provides a great level of player choice without bogging the players down in minute distinctions. Three Playbooks (Bodyguard, Wayfinder, Burglar) gesture at stock D&D archetypes, but more as an actual profession rather than some "adventurer" who only works 60 seconds a day. Another triad (Shepherd, Stargazer, and Volunteer) offer roles focused less on profession and more on relationship to the party and the quest.
The final three options play with the concept of heroism itself, and deserve a slightly closer read. The Impostor (guest designed by Epidiah Ravichol) flips the “you’re not a hero” premise by adding the wrinkle “...but everyone else thinks you are.” Likewise The Haunted (another guest design by PbtA’s Meguey Baker!) gives a chance to explore a character who is no longer trusts in the rightness of their own decisions. Finally, The Turncoat provides space to reckon with the impact of having fought the battle for the wrong side, questioning what redemption even looks like for those who have fallen.
Epilogue
Back Again from the Broken Land really shines as a one shot or a very short campaign, primarily because of how seriously it takes The Epilogue. Much more than a chance for one final scene to send the characters off, the Epilogue is the beating heart of the story: the chance to see who makes it home and what is waiting for those that do. To give a personal anecdote: when I played this game at GenCon 2026, it was run by Leah Sargent, one of the authors. As we approached the final stretch, she paused the game for a moment and informed us that her husband and coauthor Alexi was literally sprinting through the convention center in order to arrive in time to hear the Epilogue play out. That’s how importantly the designers take this step, and the care and attention shows through the system itself.
Mechanically, the Epilogue involves players taking turns telling Stories from one of three pools: Stories of Growth, Amends, and Isolation. Everyone gets one Story of Growth, a chance to describe one way in which Home is able to move on and find a new glimmer of hope. Any character who successfully named and cleared all their Burdens gets to tell a second Story of Growth, representing how their journey has not only brought them back safely but has given them time and space to come to terms with all that has happened and prepared them to move forward.
Far more interesting, though, are those with Burdens that remain uncleared. For each named Burden, players tell a Story of Amends, describing some action still necessary to heal the wounds the world has suffered. Some of these are sacrifices yet to be made, while others are wrongs that have been waiting for someone able to set them right again. Any Burdens that remain unnamed instead prompt a Story of Isolation, detailing some way in which Home has not quite escaped the damage. Combined, these Stories provide plenty of space for players to bring their story home in a balance of joy and sorry, familiarity and the unknown. All done without need of a a lore book or stable of NPCs, just a couple dozen story prompts and the connections you've spent the past few hours forging.
Wrapping Up
At 60 pages, Back Again from the Broken Land is a tight book that hits everything necessary to have a wonderful handful of sessions. It leverages familiarity with setting and system, while honing in on the themes of journey, loss, and difficult growth in a way that’s refreshing and hopeful without ever feeling too saccharine. It’s a game that gets Tolkien in a way I wish was far more common, and it does so by centering The Scouring of the Shire rather than the more well-known scenes. In a world of crowded tables and busy schedules, the call to find a quiet moment to share a meal, sing a song, and tell some stories together is one well worth heeding:
O sing the tale through hill and vale
Who on a hard and lonely trail
They knew not when they went from home