* (0:29) The bucket list of games we want to run. * (1:31) Doug’s long-term campaign. * (3:10) Wayne’s Fallout: St. Louis game. * (7:03) Dan’s Battletech: Silver Scorpions game. A Fabian war. * (9:37) Mary’s Castle Ravenloft / Curse of Strahd game. * (12:41) Doug’s western game. * (14:58) Wayne’s campaign based on The Quiet Year. Decuma and Home. * (18:57) Dan’s Hunter game. Dayshift, watchable on Netflix. Judgment: Apocalypse Survival...

* (0:30) An old Apple //c computer and early computer RPGs. * (4:16) Transitioning from video games into tabletop RPGs. * (9:44) The expectations players bring from a video game to pen-and-paper games. * (12:41) The tyranny of choice brought on by a lack of a character-driven path. * (18:05) A lack of clear and connected outcomes. * (19:50) Mixing new and veteran players. * (26:13) Expanding intra-party roleplaying. * (28:39) Asking why someone...

* (0:29) What is your goal for the first session of a game? * (2:10) Who are these characters really? * (6:08) When the person you wanted to be isn’t who you became. * (11:34) A buffet of NPCs. * (16:14) Keeping the first session low pressure and shorter length. * (20:33) The social leader of the group. * (25:30) The flexibility in session one. Using the first game as a test of session zero. * (33:43) Testing the waters as the Game...

* (0:23) Prompts and prepositions. The clockwork circus is coming to town! * (1:40) Wayne’s circus in space. * (4:13) Mary’s circus on the frontier. * (7:53) Doug’s carnival of nightmares. * (8:41) Dan’s carnival of hope. * (13:10) Celestial crystals that grant power. * (14:05) Mary’s crystal preppers. * (16:08) Dan’s crystal entanglement. * (19:45) Wayne’s crystal invasion. * (24:57) Doug’s crystal gift. * (27:05) A whole...

* (0:29) Fear the Con has funded and the sign-up site is live! We hope to see you Thursday, June 20th to Saturday, June 22nd. * (1:58) Getting back to what you love, inspired by Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing. * (5:16) The tyranny of compromise. * (9:54) Wanting the GM to build the world instead of “yes-and” player input. * (15:43) Why Wayne discarded some ideas he was excited about. * (19:06) The passion for sharing stories. * (22:06)...

* (0:29) Wayne has a problem: the Wardens from Dresden Files. Coming up with too many excuses for why powerful organizations don’t care about the characters’ problems. * (7:14) Session Zero can help…or maybe not. * (10:29) There’s always someone bigger, and maybe your allies lack what you need. * (14:42) What if the characters are the backup? Or maybe they’re starting to get a reputation. * (17:41) Not letting it become a chip on the GM’s shoulder. Players that...

* (0:30) What steps do we take to bring a character to life? * (1:49) Ask what’s important. * (6:53) Seeing the good and bad in a single trait. * (8:06) Doug’s personality triangle model. * (10:54) Demonstrating character quirks. * (16:34) Making characters that both have and express personal growth. * (18:57) Taking a hobby, off-topic skill, or development path. Keeping your character in continuity. * (23:11) Practicing a character. *...

Today’s ingredient: The dead are consuming the living. Why and how? Let’s find out! Fear the Con 2024’s Kickstarter can be found here. Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) In defense of technology at the gaming table. Caleb’s setup with Owlbear Rodeo. * (5:13) Dan’s Lion King sing-a-long and Wayne’s Ghostbusters game. * (6:27) The deeper pool of online players, including AIs. Remoting in a missing player for an in-person game. * (14:04) Working distance and distraction into the game. * (17:54) Digital storage and organization. The wonder of CTRL-F. * (25:21) Minimalization of the gaming experience. * (30:01)...

I decided to skip over the Iron GM and go for a Tungsten GM. The ingredient? All broadcasts cease because something won’t let them get through. What’s the game plot? Also, the Fear the Con 2024 Kickstarter is now live here! Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:30) Dan runs a game a bit too literally. * (4:12) The intersection of technology and roleplaying in a way that isn’t required by the game. * (7:32) Why multimedia doesn’t pay-off the way it does in other forms of storytelling. * (13:36) The prep time technology adds, and the stability it takes away. * (15:59) The time spent digging up the right asset on-the-spot. * (20:52) The physical space taken up by technology. Playing “follow the leader” at a...

* (0:29) Why talk about intelligence? The Why Files episode about Cicada 3301. * (9:24) A game takes an unhelpfully long break, only to be replaced by another RPG. * (12:44) The lack of a bottomless “buffet of ideas” in a closed setting. * (14:24) Use minimal starting information to give you room to work. * (18:12) How to run a school (everyone go play Persona 5). * (24:48) Create a wide variety of NPCs and give them their own lives. * (30:38) Keeping...

* (0:22) Picking out the point we became curmudgeons and what exactly that means. * (4:48) Being too set in our ways. * (11:19) The self-destruction that comes with stagnation. * (21:32) Wii have a solution. * (24:32) Ducking new games while at a convention. Playing The Quiet Year on an airplane. * (32:57) The role of pragmatism. Why expand your horizons when no one lets you go there, anyway? * (38:43) There’s always going to be something...

* (0:29) Reintroducing Julia’s husband, Mike. * (2:24) Lowered expectations, inspired by a post-pandemic world. * (7:25) Being a bit more experimental. * (13:18) Playing online instead of returning to the table. * (19:18) Returning to the table instead of playing online. * (23:58) The commonality of not being able to find an active gaming group. * (31:54) Not lower expectations—just different ones. Hosts: Dan, Mary, Mike, Wayne

* (0:29) Thanks to Eric Van Note for Swole Mole! * (3:15) The value of terrible GMing. * (8:42) Everyone is their own most inept critic. Sojourn Volume 2. * (15:28) The worst possible outcome: something being forgettable. * (22:20) Asking Doug to grade his own game. * (25:35) The value of creating art, simply for the act of creation. * (37:04) A few too many contacts in someone’s eyes. Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Dan prefers affiliated groups, Wayne does not. * (2:15) Cohesion, identity, and help. * (9:35) Affiliations you start with as opposed to those you pick up along the way. * (11:56) The party’s direction and motivation. Affiliating with an ideal. * (20:23) Affiliations create an obvious pool of NPC relationships. * (25:40) External versus internal affiliations, and how they’re not mutually exclusive. * (32:06) Taking extreme positions just to...

* (0:28) An update on the Actual Play. * (4:48) The InSpectres RPG (at least temporarily back in print!) and our AP interlude using its rules. * (8:09) Why play InSpectres as an interlude to the main campaign? Apparently only Dan has heard of Michelle Jenneke. * (12:58) Plus an extra player. * (16:10) The, “yes and,” style of gaming. * (21:31) Assisting new players when they’re stuck. * (26:24) Seeing roleplaying games as a starting point, not a...

* (0:28) Things are getting set for Fear the Con! An intro to RPGs game is available for newcomers. * (2:03) A shared Minecraft server. You can find more information on Discord. * (5:52) Realigning your game with a mid-campaign session zero. Special thanks to Gaming with Gage. * (8:46) Making the case to have one. * (12:59) Remembering the times we did this during the Skies of Glass campaign. * (16:38) Reusing or reviewing the exact same work you did in...

* (0:29) Julia ruins everything. * (1:35) Things are getting set for Fear the Con! An intro to RPGs game is available for newcomers. You can also announce your games on Discord. * (9:03) Coming out of a period of deep fatigue. How one game still never missed a week. * (16:18) Spoons and other finite resources. * (20:06) Why it might be best to bite off a bit less. You may not be gaming as much as you think, anyway. * (26:41) Does gaming with strangers help...

* (0:28) Running a game when someone else knows the setting a whole lot better than you do. * (2:07) The lack of pronunciation guides in most games. * (3:16) Narrowing down the task by asking what’s important about the setting to the players. * (7:59) Getting the essence or feel of the setting right. We need a Thug Notes recap of BattleTech lore. * (12:53) Start small and work outward, learning just what you need for each step along the way. * (21:15) Tell...

Show links… * StartPlaying Games * Bite Size Tales * Gaming with Gage Hosts: Chris, DJ, Josh, Wayne

* (0:29) The Kickstarter for Fear the Con 2023 is live for one more week! * (1:56) The wonderful confusion new players and GMs bring to a roleplaying game. * (16:59) An imagined internal-consistency is sometimes more fun than an intended one. * (22:17) The burden of your own expectations. * (28:29) When contradictions aren’t actually contradictions. The Law of Non-Contradiction. * (35:16) The emotion of Muscle March. * (36:22) The ideas that mistakes...

* (0:31) The Kickstarter for Fear the Con 2023 is live! * (1:04) The new fiction podcast, Bite Size Tales. * (3:09) Game mechanics we’re particularly fond of. * (4:54) Rerolls and other roll-modifying mechanics. * (10:13) A close relationship between skills and attributes. * (15:46) Life paths in character creation. * (24:48) Using all the dice. * (30:12) Injury instead of a simple health pool. * (38:08) Lots of randomness. *...

* (0:28) The Kickstarter for Fear the Con 2023 is live! * (1:12) Things a Game Master has done to make a world seem a little more alive (with credit to JoshB for the topic). * (5:46) Plot hooks, substories, and unanswered questions about my character. * (9:16) Allowing characters to have goals, ambitions, and projects. * (13:32) Giving me things I can trust that won’t betray me or become a vulnerability. * (19:52) Investing the players in world-building that...