Reports To: CTO
Department: Engineering
Position Type: Independent Contractor (Fractional)
Travel Expectations: 1-2 days/week onsite in Saint Paul, MN
Location: Saint Paul, MN (Hybrid)
Date: December 2025
Role Summary
We're building something special for the TTRPG community—a platform that understands the magic of bringing people together around the table. This fractional contractor position is responsible for implementing the backend services, APIs, and infrastructure that power The Keep's event platform. You'll build the resilient, scalable systems that handle everything from user authentication to real-time event processing, ensuring game masters and organizers can focus on what matters: creating unforgettable experiences for their communities.
We have an aggressive roadmap ahead of us. You'll work directly with the CTO and collaborate with other engineers, Product Management, and UX Designer(s) to ship features weekly—if not daily. This is a high-autonomy, fast-paced environment where your work powers real events for real people. If you love building elegant, event-driven systems and thrive on seeing your infrastructure enable (tens of) thousands of gaming sessions, this is your table.
Tech Stack
You'll be working with modern, production-grade technologies:
Primary Responsibilities
01 | API Development and Implementation
Design and implement RESTful APIs using AWS Lambda and API Gateway, following established architectural patterns for authentication, validation, error handling, and response formatting. This matters because well-designed APIs are the contract between frontend and backend, enabling reliable feature delivery. Success is frontend developers shipping features confidently, users experiencing instant responsiveness, and zero API-related production incidents.
02 | Microservices Development
Build and maintain serverless microservices that handle discrete business logic domains within our event-driven architecture. This matters because properly scoped microservices enable independent scaling, faster feature delivery, and system resilience. Success is services running reliably at scale, clear domain boundaries that accelerate development, and minimal cross-service coupling.
03 | Event Consumer Implementation
Develop Kafka event consumers that process asynchronous events, update data stores, trigger workflows, and maintain system consistency across services. This matters because event-driven architecture enables real-time responsiveness and decoupled system components. Success is zero data loss, sub-second event processing, proper error recovery, and the ability to replay events to reconstruct system state.
04 | Data Modeling and Database Management
Design and implement DynamoDB data models optimized for access patterns, ensuring efficient queries and appropriate use of indexes. This matters because proper data modeling directly impacts application performance and cost efficiency in a NoSQL environment. Success is consistently fast queries regardless of data volume, efficient cost scaling, and data models that evolve cleanly with new features.
05 | Infrastructure as Code
Maintain and extend infrastructure definitions using Terraform in our fully automated, 100% IaC environment where all changes are made through code—humans do not have direct access to control planes. This matters because infrastructure as code enables reliable deployments, environment parity, disaster recovery, and prevents configuration drift. Success is deployment reliability, infrastructure that documents itself, seamless environment provisioning, and zero manual infrastructure changes.
Secondary or Additional Responsibilities
01 | DevOps and CI/CD
Contribute to continuous integration and deployment pipelines, ensuring automated testing, builds, and deployments across multiple repositories. This matters because efficient CI/CD reduces deployment friction and enables rapid iteration. Success is pipelines that just work, deploying multiple times daily with confidence, and reduced time from commit to production.
02 | Monitoring and Observability\
Implement logging, metrics, and tracing using the LGTM stack to enable proactive issue detection and debugging. This matters because visibility into system behavior is essential for maintaining reliability and diagnosing production issues. Success is catching issues before users notice them, diagnosing problems in minutes instead of hours, and having the data to optimize performance continuously.
03 | Container Management
Maintain and deploy containerized services using ECS where appropriate for workloads that don't fit the serverless model. This matters because some services benefit from containerization over pure Lambda functions. Success is containers running reliably, efficient resource utilization, and proper orchestration that scales with demand.
04 | Security and Compliance
Implement security best practices including IAM policies, encryption, secret management, and API authentication/authorization. This matters because protecting user data and platform integrity is non-negotiable for community trust. Success is zero security incidents, passing security audits, adherence to least-privilege principles, and users trusting us with their community's data.
Key Competencies, Skills or Abilities
01 | Architectural Pattern Execution
Ability to implement backend services following established event-driven and microservices patterns without requiring constant oversight, and work effectively within a fully automated, IaC-first environment where all infrastructure changes are made through code. This matters because mid-level engineers must execute independently within defined architectures while the CTO focuses on strategic technical decisions.
02 | AWS Serverless Proficiency
Strong working knowledge of AWS Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, and related serverless services. This matters because our entire platform is built on AWS serverless technologies and efficiency with these tools directly impacts delivery speed.
03 | Event-Driven Architecture Understanding
Demonstrated experience building systems with message queues, event streams, or pub/sub patterns. This matters because our platform is fundamentally event-driven and engineers must understand asynchronous processing and eventual consistency.
04 | Problem Decomposition
Ability to break down complex features into discrete services, APIs, and data models that fit within the existing architecture. This matters because proper decomposition prevents monolithic services and maintains system modularity.
05 | Debugging and Troubleshooting
Strong analytical skills to diagnose distributed system issues, trace problems across service boundaries, and implement fixes independently. This matters because distributed systems introduce complexity that requires systematic debugging approaches.
06 | Asynchronous Communication
Effective written communication and ability to work asynchronously with distributed team members across multiple repositories. This matters because fractional contractors must coordinate efficiently without daily face-to-face interaction.
07 | Launch Mindset
Comfort working in an ambitious, fast-paced startup environment with evolving requirements, aggressive deadlines, and the thrill of shipping to production weekly. This matters because we're live with real users and an expansive roadmap—we need engineers who thrive on momentum, adapt quickly, and maintain quality while navigating ambiguity and moving fast. If you get energized by building systems that enable thousands of gaming sessions, seeing your APIs process real events within days—or even hours!—of writing them, and knowing your infrastructure decisions directly impact community experiences, you'll love it here.
Experiences: Required
Experiences: Nice to Have
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