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Changelog

Follow new updates and improvements to Friends & Fables.

Patch Notes 26.04 - Grok 4.5, Model Refresh

We’ve refreshed some of the models being used in the backend for newer more intelligent models, a few in particular to note:

  • Gemini 3.1 Pro has been replaced by Grok 4.5: The Gemini Pro models have been underperforming lately after some changes from Google. Grok 4.5 is more intelligent, better suited for role-play, and slightly cheaper at 5 credits a turn compared to 6.

  • DeepSeek V4 Flash has been refreshed to the latest V4 Flash-0731. The latest V4 Flash is much smarter than the previous version and is on par with DeepSeek V4 Pro. Give it a try if you typically use Fenix, this may be your new go to standard model.

  • The models behind turn based combat have been upgraded to newer, smarter models; the combat harness is still the same, but things should run a little bit more smoothly with fewer AI logic errors.

Craft Open Beta & Credit Transfer

Hey Friends,

We’ve had our heads down working nights and weekends for the last six months to get here, but the day is finally here. Craft is now in open beta! We know many of you have been sitting tight, waiting for a F&F update, and we just want to thank you for your patience and understanding.

Craft is in Open Beta!

For those who are hearing about Craft for the first time, we recommend reading the blog article that goes in depth over the improvements and differences here: https://www.craftrpgs.com/blog/craft-a-new-approach-to-ai-rpgs. The tl;dr is that we set out to solve many of the problems that we faced in F&F, but realized to solve those problems, we needed to build from the ground up - solving them inside of F&F first would be too slow as we’d be encumbered by existing data and architecture.

We’re happy to say that we think we’ve done it. With Craft, we’ve built an AI RPG platform where you can create and play any kind of game system you could imagine. Memory in Craft is practically unlimited, and your context can go up to the LLM’s theoretical limit. You can expect the GMs in Craft to behave the way you’d expect them to, and it’s much easier to correct or change their behaviour if you need to. If you hop in the Discord, you’ll see that most players are very happy with the narrative performance in Craft. If you find something isn’t running the way you want it to, the GM’s prompts are fully customizeable. We also think 5e games already run much better in Craft than they do in F&F right now. Worldbuilders from F&F that have moved over to Craft have been loving the new tools in Craft and have been blowing our minds with the content they’ve created. Check out Koinonia’s Skybride, or Pollution’s new official game, Project Sable, or browse all of the worlds here: https://www.craftrpgs.com/worlds.

As part of the open beta launch, we’re also giving away unlimited DeepSeek V4 Flash for free on Craft for everyone until August 15th! If you gave Craft a shot earlier on, we invite you try it again. It has gotten a LOT better in the last month. Give it a try and let us know your feedback in the Discord and subreddit.

Transferring Credits to Craft

For those who wish to transfer their credits to Craft, you can now do so from your F&F account settings. Credit transfers are 1:1, are available until August 31, 2026, and can only be done one time. Only F&F accounts created before August 1, 2026 are eligible for a credit transfer.

To transfer your credits, go to your Friends & Fables account settings and you'll see an option to transfer your credits. Put in your selected amount of credits and your Craft username to transfer them.

So what’s going to happen with F&F?

tl;dr - F&F is staying alive and we’re going to give it a really good update, but we’re cutting the overall vision down to something more manageable.

Part of what makes this tricky is that Craft was born out of the problems and frustrations people had with F&F. The whole reason we built Craft was so that we could deliver on the roadmap that we had originally set out to do with F&F, and to do it in less time. And we think we’ve pretty much done it. But now we have to grapple with the question of where F&F fits when Craft can already do what F&F was supposed to do - there’d be no point in making it just like Craft, because at that point you might as well play Craft.

So we’ve decided we’re shifting the vision of Friends & Fables - rather than aiming for a perfect replica of 5e, we’re thinking of it as more of a 5e-like experience. And instead of thinking of all these new features we could add, like music or a mobile app, we realized that many of you are already playing it for what it is today and just want the campaign experience to be better. So we’re going to focus on the feedback we’ve gotten from all of you and focus on making the memory, storytelling, and state updates better by bringing over what we’ve learned from building Craft. Brand new features that go beyond improving what already exists, like music or an AI world building assistant are unlikely to be coming to F&F - if you want those, we recommend you check out Craft because those features are already implemented there. As for timeline, we need a few more weeks to wrap up some things with Craft and then we’ll be turning our attention back to F&F - it is hard to say how long it will take for us to implement the update but we’ll let you know once we have a better idea.

Given these updates in direction, for anyone who purchased an annual subscription to F&F, we’re offering prorated refunds for any remaining unused months so you are not locked in to the year. Just email support@fables.gg and we’ll get you taken care of.

All that being said, our ultimate goal is to deliver the best AI RPG experience possible. The reason we made Craft is because we heard so many issues, not just with F&F but with other AI RPGs and we thought we could solve them. Craft isn’t perfect yet, but feedback from our current players indicates that the experience is much better than F&F and anything else out there. If you’ve had frustrations with F&F, we highly recommend you give Craft a shot.

Updates to the Feedback Portal

As a company, we’ve been reducing our use of third party software as it’s expensive and we weren’t getting much value out of it compared to in house solutions. So please don’t be alarmed as we turn off the Featurebase feedback platform which hosts the portal and the roadmap. Please use Discord for any feedback or bug reports. This is how we’ve been doing it within Craft and it has been going well so we’ll do it for F&F as well.

Craft Enters Closed Beta

TLDR: Craft is entering into Closed Beta today and players will be allowed in waves into the beta. If you are an active Friends & Fables subscriber or ever subscribed in the past, go to your account settings and join the Craft Subscription code list by June 7, 2026 to ensure you get access to your 1 month free promo code on Craft! Read below for more details.


Today, we’re excited to announce that Craft is officially entering closed beta, and we’re inviting the first wave of beta users.

Here’s what you can expect:

  • Invites will roll out gradually. We’re starting with an initial wave of ~50 players, and each wave will get larger from there. Over the coming weeks, we expect to be inviting hundreds of players at a time.

  • You must be on the waitlist to receive an invite. This means joining either through your Friends & Fables account settings or through the Craft landing page at https://www.craftrpgs.com.

  • Closed beta is meant for early adopters. Craft is still an early beta product, so you should expect bugs, rough edges, and things that may not work perfectly yet.

  • Multiplayer will not be available during beta. We plan to add multiplayer later.

  • Other core systems should be operational. Aside from multiplayer, the systems we’ve discussed in previous posts should be available in beta.

  • The platform will favour builders at first. In these early days, Craft will be best suited for people who are excited to roll up their sleeves, experiment, and figure things out. Players who prefer jumping into polished, existing content may find that the platform has limited content for now.

  • Games may need tuning. Some games may not behave correctly right away, and builders may need time to adjust their game master instructions before things feel smooth.

  • The alpha NDA is lifted. We will not be using an NDA for closed beta. Players are free to talk publicly about Craft.

  • Guides and tutorials are coming. For builders and players diving in headfirst, things may feel challenging at first as we all learn the platform together. We’ll be adding more guides, tutorials, and documentation in the coming days.

Craft Pricing Plans

As we explained in the previous blog, Craft will not have an unlimited plan. Please read through the previous blog for all the details if you haven’t yet, but a summary is provided below.

In Friends & Fables, we were able to offer an unlimited plan because we controlled which LLM you could use and how much context was sent with each turn. Craft works differently. We give you the freedom to choose from a wide range of LLMs with very different costs, and you also have control over how much context you send each turn.

If we offered that level of flexibility with unlimited usage, we would not be able to run Craft sustainably.

That said, our goal is to be as generous as possible with AI chat while still building a sustainable business. We’re making a game, and we want people to actually be able to play it. A plan would not feel good if you paid $20 and could only play once a week.

Over time, we expect these plans to feel better and better. As models become better and cheaper, our goal is to make it so that daily usage limits become something most players barely have to think about.

Energy and Credits

Craft uses an energy and credit system. Energy and credits can be used interchangeably for AI generations but they accrue differently.

  • Energy comes with your subscription. Subscription plans give you more total monthly usage than buying the equivalent amount in credits. For example, the $20 credit pack gives you 2,050 credits, while the $20 subscription gives you a monthly maximum of ~ 3,000 daily energy (~50% more!).

  • Energy usage resets daily. Your subscription energy is divided into a daily allocation. On days when you are unable to play, a portion of your unused energy, up to a percentage of your daily allocation, will roll over to the next day.

  • Credits are stackable and do not expire.

  • For daily play, we recommend a subscription. If you expect to play regularly, the subscription will usually provide better value.

  • For occasional play, we recommend credit packs. If you only play one or two sessions a week, credits may be the better fit.

So how much usage do energy and credits actually get you?

It depends on the models you choose, how much context you use, and what you are doing in the app. We’ll have more accurate numbers once more beta testers are using the platform, but based on alpha, here is what we currently estimate for the $20 Starter plan:

  • Around 100 images per day, or about 3,000 images per month, on z-image-turbo at 1 credit per image.

  • Around 50–100 turns per day on Minimax 2.7, our default model. Alpha testers have reported being able to play for at least a few hours per day on this model.

Subscriptions

These will be the Craft subscription plans at launch in the beta. These may be subject to change and be adjusted as we learn more throughout the beta period and additional plans may be introduced in the future.

During the initial Beta period there will be no free tier since F&F subscribers will get a free month, but a limited free tier will be introduced later in the future.

Credit Packs

Free 1-Month Subscription for Friends & Fables Subscribers

In many ways, Craft is the spiritual successor to Friends & Fables and wouldn’t be possible without the support of F&F. As a thank-you for your patience and support, we’re giving every eligible Friends & Fables subscriber a free one-month subscription to Craft.

Here’s how to redeem it:

  1. Sign into your Friends & Fables account and go to your account settings.

  2. If your account is eligible, meaning you currently had an active subscription as of May 22 2026 or ever had one in the past, you’ll see a section about Craft promo codes and a button to join the code waitlist. Friends & Fables subscriptions activated on May 23 2026 or later will not be eligible.

  1. After clicking join, or if you already signed up for the Craft waitlist on the Craft site, you will be on the list and will be later notified by email when your subscription code is ready.

  2. When your code is available, you’ll receive an email to come back to the account settings and redeem your code. You can choose to redeem this code at any time, but once you click “Redeem” it will generate a code that is valid for only 30 days. You can then use this promo code at checkout on the Craft site for 100% off your first month.

Since this is a subscription, please make sure to cancel after checkout if you do not want it to renew and charge you the following month.

One other important heads-up: if you choose to upgrade while a 100% promo code is active, Stripe charges the full cost of the new plan instead of only the difference between your old and new plans. Unfortunately, this is how Stripe handles upgrades, and it is not something we can adjust on our end.

Here is how the Craft codes are assigned:

  • If you are a Friends & Fables Starter subscriber, you will receive a code for Craft Starter.

  • If you are a Friends & Fables Pro subscriber, you will receive a code for Craft Starter plus a code for a 1,000-credit pack to make up the $10 difference between plans.

  • If you are a Friends & Fables Legend subscriber, you will receive a code for Craft Plus.

  • If you are not currently an active subscriber but subscribed at any point in the past, you will receive a code for Craft Starter.

To receive a code, you must join the waitlist before June 7, 2026.

Thank you again to everyone who has supported Friends & Fables and Craft. We’re excited to finally start bringing players into the closed beta and to keep building this with you.

Earlier updates