Hello, and welcome to the Campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from The RPG Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 18: The Founding

In our last episode the conflict between Durand and Valius erupted in a near PVP battle. They managed to stop short (just short) of attacking one another after Blaine stepped in and told Valius that an attack on Durand would be considered an attack on himself.

With this temporary cease-fire still simmering under the surface, the true exploration of this city can begin.

As always, thanks for listening.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Michael

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Hello, and welcome to the Campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from The RPG Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 17: Theological Debate

I feel I need to give a warning for this episode. Until now I don’t think any of mine or my players religious or political opinions have really come up in game, at least not in a way that should offend anyone else. This episode, however, we get a bit on a religious kick. It comes out of the fact that Niko’s Paladin Valious is trying to convince Rob’s Cleric Durand that he is doing evil things, perhaps unwittingly. As this religious discussion comes out we start to spill over to real world religion trying to draw comparisons. It was not our intention or desire to offend anyone who holds any beliefs and what we say here was of course exhaberated a bit for comedic effect. If you are sensitive to religious opinion (for or against) then maybe this episode you should skip. You have been warned!

Now, on to the show.

Hello and welcome to the Campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from The RPG Academy. I am michael and this is the Campaigns: A new world: Episode 17: Theological Debate. In our last episode the PC’s, after securing a temporary truce with the slug people decided to go to the upside down forest and gather wood for fire and light. While there they were attacked by Spectral tigers. Just as we left off a large black tentacle came slithering out of the forest depths and was about to attack the 3 dwarven volunteers who had come along with the PC’s. This is where we will pick up this episode as Valius rushes to the aid of his Dwarven brethren, but soon the conflict between Durand and Valius comes to a head.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 16: The Oath Hammer

In our last episode, the Party, along with the Nobles finalized their negotiations with the Slug people and they left to bring back and ‘Elder’ who will be able to solidify their treaty.
The party then moved into the city and began to start their preparations. What comes first?  Food, water, exploration. We pick up this episode with the PC’s deciding on that next move.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from The Rpg Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 15: Roll Call!!

In our last episode the PC’s made their way through the vast underground cavern that the stair case led them too. They passed through an upside down forest and crossed two small fresh water streams and then came upon a massive walled city. The slug people claimed that this city would offer our pilgrims safety and security and in exchange for helping them find this place, they wanted the pilgrims to go into the city and bring back out some of the the slug-o’s that are trapped there.

We pick up this episode as the PC’s and Noble’s are still negotiating with the Slug-O’s and trying to decide if the City is a trap or salvation.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from The Rpg Academy

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 44 – Realm Works. In this Episode Caleb and I are joined by Liz Theis of Lone Wolf Development who you probably know from their program Hero Lab.  Liz is their Community Development Manager which boils down to being a go-to person for interacting with customers, through Twitter @LoneWolfDevel , through Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/pages/Hero-Lab/153378634672359 or forums AND guesting on Podcasts, like our own.

Caleb and I start off the interview by chatting with Liz for a bit and making her feel welcome. We then move on the the meat of the show which is to discuss Lone Wolf Developments new program Realm Works  ( http://www.wolflair.com/realmworks/ ) which is  a complete campaign management program.  Liz was able to get Caleb and I review copies of the program, but because it is not currently available for Mac i was unable to get hands-on with the program.  Caleb did and LOVED it.

If you search Realm Works on Youtube there are plenty of Demo videos available if you would like to see the program in use before you decide if it’s right for you.

Lastly, I asked Liz a question that she could not answer :  “What was the meaning behind the name Lone Wolf Development?”  She got me the answer the next day on e-mail and it’s due to the owner of the company having started the company on his own and was its only employee for a couple years. Thus : Lone Wolf.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 43 N.P.C. –ynergy. In this episode Caleb and I are joined by friend of the show NPC Chris for a Synergy session. Chris is the co-host of one of my favorite podcasts NPC Cast. They do a podcast that covers a broader range of topics about games including, but not limited to RPG’s.

http://npccast.wordpress.com

You can also connect with the guys from NPC CAST on twitter

@NPCchris – The nice one

@NPCAaron – The smart one

@NPCdel – The funny one.

Before we get started on the Synergy though, we talk for a few minutes about 13th Age as Caleb and I are about to start a new game with that system.

We had 2 synergy submission sent in this time from Matthew Parody and Andrew “That One GM.” During the recording we got off topic for a while and Chris and I were geeking out about Podcasting stuff so we went long. For that reason we didn’t cover those two Synergies on the show. After editing we had time so I went back and recorded them. I’m also going to post them here so you can read them as well.

Matthew’s submission:

Born of the Gods Synergy
The humans of the great-walled city of Theriad have grown lazy and godless.
They rule about their vast (island) kingdom and care only for themselves.
A (bolt(of Keranos)) comes from the heavens.
It destroys a piece of their walls. A warning has been given, and not heeded.
The merfolk fret for the humans so a great wizard(deepwater hypnotist) is called to help reign in the humans hubris.
A great (sudden storm) is called up from the seas to wash away the humans.
Or at least some of them, to ease them back into the right way of things.
The walls are too great.
Alas it fails and only the Minotaur tribe is punished with watery graves.
With the minotaurs decimated the centaurs(pheres-band raiders) see the signs that the gods are giving.
A (great hart) has told them that gods’ fury is coming and the only safety is within the walls of Theriad.
They begin attacking humans and laying siege to the city.
The satyrs also sense the impending doom and the smartest of their kind (satyr wayfinder) sneaks into the city with gifts for the doomed ones.
The (Claim of Erebos) and (Aspect of Hydra) are greedily taken from the wise satyr.
But his words are not.
Finally, a (Meletis Astronomer) from within Theriad sees something gathering in the stars.
With the centaurs almost broken the human gaze up at the evidence of a (Retraction Helix) growing in the sky.
The night is filled with a rain of (Eidolons(Flitterstep, Nyxborn & Shieldmate))
The humans take up arms against this new and growing foe.
They look for help in the merfolk, centaurs, minotaurs & satyrs.
They humans find help is hard to come by…
Their great heroes wield the weapons gifted to them by the (wayfinder)
Suddenly the (Helix) is open enough and then (Phenax, God of Deception) sets onto the island and gazes upon the wounded city…

Andrew “That One GM” Young’s submission :

The Pitch: PCs are sent to Isle DeLan to find the Great Hart and gain the blessing of Heliod (for some endeavor of their own or perhaps for their whole nation). They are shipwrecked and trapped there. They must avoid Ydra and her centaur warriors while they search for the Great Hart. They discover that the only way off the island is to unite the separated and bitter members of the Circle of Five and open the Helix Stair, which will take the PCs home. Of course, Ydra and the members Circle of Five might want to use the blessing of Heliod and the Helix Stair for their own purposes…

Great Hart – A symbol of Heliod which grants Heliod’s blessing to any who can find and approach it; it is currently on Isle DeLan
Ydra (ee-drah) – The human form of a powerful half-dragon hydra who rules the Isle DeLan as a goddess [Aspect of Hydra]
Pheres-Band Raiders – A tribe of warrior centaurs that worship the Aspect of Hydra and live only to slay others in sacrifice to her
Rytas – A cautiously friendly inhabitant of Isle DeLan [Satyr Wayfinder]
Isle DeLan – A small island far from the coast that mysteriously draws lost creatures to it [Island]
Hypon – A cunning merfolk illusionist and conjuror who lives in the bay of Isle DeLan; one of the Circle of Five [Deepwater Hypnotist]
Keranos – A powerful warlock who lives on Isle DeLan; one of the Circle of Five [Bolt of Keranos]
Sobere (soe-beer) – A hidden necromancer and alchemist who lives on Isle DeLan; one of the Circle of Five [Claim of Erebos]
The Astronomer – A sagacious summoner and prophet who lives on Isle DeLan; he has no name; one of the Circle of Five [Meletis Astronomer]
Flitter– A spritely creature summoned to Isle DeLan by The Astronmer; helpful and friendly, but unintentionally creepy to most mortals thanks to its childlike shape and voice [Flitterstep Eidolon]
Xyn – The most advanced and longest-lived of Nyx’s automaton creations; a humanoid bodyguard and expert warrior [Nyxborn Shieldmate]
Nyxborn Eidolon – The spirit of Nyx, a prolific enchanter who lived on Isle DeLan with his creations before his death at the hands of the Aspect of Hydra; one of the Circle of Five
Sudden Storm – A conjured storm that assaults any nearby ships with waves, wind, and sea monsters until it crashes into Isle DeLan
Helix Stair – A portal that leads off of Isle DeLan; this portal is the only known way to leave the island without being drawn back by its powerful mystical forces [Retraction Helix]

I recently posted the new cards for our next Synergy show on Facebook, if you’d like to play along head over there and take a look and maybe give us a “LIKE” while you are there.

In honor of Chris joining us I also stole one of there segments, the “What we are excited about” segment.  This week I am excited about a Kickstarter Campaign for a Movie called Autumn Moon. This is a old-school horror movie with practical effects. The main reason i’m excited about it: it was written by a High-school friend Michael Spivey.  If old school horror and particularly Werewolves are your thing, check them out:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/323811890/autumn-moon

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 14: Divine Asian

In our last episode Blaine and Jack exposed Slugo-Mavin as an impostor in front of the other nobles and then killed him. Before he died, that slug created, mistakenly thinking Blaine was going to let him live, mind melded the location of where they needed to go to be safe from the new invaders.  Those new invaders were just outside where Valius and Durrand were holding them off.

In this episode we pick up just as Treydak is following a wisp, Blain is rallying the civilians and Durrand and Valius are trying to hold off the invaders.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 42 – Death & Dying.  In this episode Caleb and I start off talking about making combat encounters more difficult without making them less fun. We then transition into our main topic concerning PC death. This topic had come up on a couple podcasts I that I listen to recently and it’s got me thinking about the role PC death plays in the game.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 13: Blaine Could Care Less

In our last episode The PC’s realized that Treydak (the Druid) while in animal form had the ability to detect the slugo-creature doppelgangers by scent. Using the fact that Blaine had already been summoned to an Noble Meeting to discuss the unauthorized voting box that had been set up for him, Blaine snuck Treydak in animal form into the meeting so he could sniff around. Blaine, Jack and Treydak walked around the tent until they got to Mavin where Treydak alerted Blaine that Mavin was a slug-o.

In this episode we pick up just there as the Pc’s deal with the revelation that Mavin has been replaced. We also move back a bit to see what was going on outside the tent where Valius and Durand are waiting.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 12: How About A Turkey Vulture?

In our last episode The PC’s rushed to the aid of Treydak and were able to run off the creature that had taken his form, but they were unable to revive Treydak from his comatose state.  We pick up this episode after the PC’s had returned to camp with Treydak and are trying to revive him when the creature that had taken his form stumbles back into camp.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 41 Law & Order. In this episode Caleb and I tackle playing the GOOD GUYS vs playing heroes’. We talk about playing Lawful Stupid – I mean a Paladin and then wrap up with a quick example of a game I played in where all the PC’s were Law Men.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 11: Save Vs. Dictionary

In our last episode Treydak was being attacked by Fred & George, the rangers he had been working with. They lured him out into the forest to show him some “husks” they had found and when he was alone, attacked him.  In the meantime Mavin the Noble Jack pretends to work for, called Jack to a meeting and told him that the camp was being infiltrated by impostors and gave him salt water to use as a detection method.  Durand’s Zombie-bird familiar alerted Durand of Treydak’s being in danger and Durand rallied the troops and rushed to help.

We pick up just there as the group has discovered that the Treydak they are speaking with, is not actually Treydak.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 40 Roll20.NExT. This week Jared joins Caleb and I to discuss the recently leaded D&D 5e release information and the Roll20.net Virtual Table Top.

www.Roll20.net

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael

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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 10: There’s Always One!

In our last episode Valius confronted Duran on being a Necromancer having found out his familiar is a Zombie.  Duran then spilt the beans bout brining his dad’s demon infested body with him to this new world. Before that confrontation could resolve a cry rang out and Blaine rushed to find that Julius-Balore had apparently exploded from the inside and the ledger books containing the names of the 5 impostors is missing.

We pick up just there but jump over to find out what Jack and Treydak have been up too.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 39 – The Not So Great Escape. This week our first returning guest

Matthew Parody (Co-host of the ProbablyQuestionable podcast) joins Caleb and I as we discuss the use of Prison as a setting in your D&D or RPG game.

We hit this a couple different ways:

1. Starting a game in prison. Do you use this just to get the band together or is there a challenge/puzzle tied into the prison.

2. Setting the game in a  prison.

3. Using a prison as part of a longer on-going game.

Stick around after the show for some Nazi talk – always a good time.

Please check out Matthew’s podcast page and other info by following the links below.

http://ipacomedy.com/
https://www.facebook.com/IPAComedy
http://carpegm.net/
http://probablyquestionable.com/

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is The Campaigns: A New World: Episode 9: Box Full of Demons!

In our last episode we learned that neither Blaine or Durrand had been nominated but Abram had. The reveal of which, might be my favorite moment ever in any game. It was priceless.  In this episode, the PC’s begin to conspire and learn that the threats of this world are not just giant things, but there may be something devious at work inside of camp.

Valius goes off searching for something and finds it in an unexpected place.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Michael

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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 8:The Tusks of Justice

In our last episode, Valius (Niko’s Dwarven Paladin) led a search party of scouts into the woods to look for survivors of the attack that occurred while the PC’s were out.  Once out there his group was attacked by the Siren’s Song and a couple of the scouts tried to walk into the woods.  Valius was able to save them and get the group safely back to camp. They also found 2 more of the ‘husks’ on the way back.  We pick up this episode right as Valius returns and tells the other PC’s what happened.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to Dungeon Talk, the General Advice and Discussion podcast from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 38: Synergies of the Multiverse

On today’s show, we broaden our horizon’s a bit and talk about a game that is not an RPG: Sentinels of the Multiverse, one of Caleb’s ( @TheCalebG)  favorite games.

SotM

We then have a creature feature: Bugbear (Spoiler: it’s neither bug, nor bear)

We then have a longer session of Synergy. We had a suggestion of cards sent in by Friend of the Show Matt Parody  ( @Mattparody )

Here is a link to the cards we use if you want to see them:

CARDS FOR SYNERGY

We then finish up with a discussion about the game Whitehack as suggested by Olaf.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 7: We Should Go Back

There is a session missing between episode 6 and 7, there was also about a 2 month gap between those episodes so I do a longer intro at the beginning of the game which should cover all the important details. The one thing I did leave out, was what happened with the Godzilla-ish creature that roared at the end of ep 6.  In the session that’s missing, Nick’s character Treydak turned into a bird and flew at the creature, buzzing around it’s eyes to distract it. It breathed fired and set some of the tree tops on fire and these giant snake-like creatures fell dead to the ground below.  The creature then walked through a purple/black portal just like the one that brought the colony to this world.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael

 
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Hello and welcome to Dungeon Talk, the General Advice and Discussion podcast from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 37: Combat, the Angry way! Pt 2.

EDIT: Hello, so i screwed up – shocker, I know! and uploaded a segment for the last podcast and not the entire file. I’ve corrected it. I did it fast though, so it is less ‘edited’ than usual (might notice a few more Uhm’s and a few longer pauses). I also didn’t add the intro, so it just starts.  SORRY!!

This is the second of our two part episode where Caleb and I discuss combat with (in)famous TheAngryDM.  I’ve bookended this longer combat discussion with some shorter topics Caleb and I had covered separately so in this episode you start with the second half our our EPIC combat discussion with Angry (combat N-Z)  and then Caleb and I discus a Table Topic from a recent FAE Game (Spoiler alert, the things we discuss happen in a FAE: DEADLANDS Game that hasn’t been released yet) and focus on making decisions that make the game better and not using things like alignment to justify being a dick!

If you don’t already, you should be following the AngryDM on twitter and please check out his blog where many of the topics we discuss on this podcast Angry has written about (at length).

AngryDM.Com

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 6: The Tursharktopis Conclusion

In our last episode, the PC’s were present as the Nobles, led by Jacean Winters, began to interrogate Valius, the Beardless Dwarf stowaway, as to his connection to the fire that broke out in the Holds. During the interrogation a cry of alarm was raised and the PC’s, along with Valius, went to fight off the first real sign of life on this world, a creature that could only be described as a Tursharktopis. We ended our last episode mid-battle. We pick up this week in that same spot with the PC’s trying to kill or run-off this highly resistant creature.

Once that is concluded, there are some great RP moments (in my opinion) and we end with . . . well, let’s just wait and listen, shall we?

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hello and welcome to Dungeon Talk, the General Advice and Discussion podcast from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 36: Combat, the Angry way! Pt 1.

This is the first of a two part episode where Caleb and I discuss combat with (in)famous TheAngryDM.  I’ve bookended this longer combat discussion with some shorter topics Caleb and I had covered separately so in this episode you get Caleb and I talking about the ROLE of combat in a D&D game and then the first half (combat A-M) of our EPIC nuts and bolts combat discussion.

Part 2 (combat N-Z ) will be out next week.

If you don’t already, you should be following the AngryDM on twitter and please check out his blog where many of the topics we discuss on this podcast Angry has written about (at length).

AngryDM.Com

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael

E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 5:  It’s a What?

In our last episode, the PC’s continued to examine the holds in an effort to find out what caused the fire. They found evidence that an Alchemical Substance called FLASH may have been used to ignite the fire in multiple locations. Sandra an NPC that Rob’s Character Durrand had spent some time with during the trip out to the portal was asked to help the investigation. She explained that if the aim was to ignite the NITRO then it would have been much easier. The PC’s now think the fire was just a distraction, but don’t know by whom or for what purpose.

They also found Valius, a Beardless Dwarf (Niko’s PC) Under a stasis spell hidden inside a barrel. The Nobel’s Mavin and Gunther believe him to be the arsonist and he being questioned as we begin this episode.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and welcome to Dungeon Talk, the General Advice and Discussion podcast from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 35: “HOO  – HOO – RWARRR!! where we discuss the majesty of the Iconic Owl-Bear and let Special Guest Porter cover the in’s and outs of Play by Post games.

https://www.tavern-keeper.com

https://www.obsidianportal.com

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=3

https://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4dreye/20120516

https://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/4dreye/20120606

This is the second half of the longer discussion Caleb and I had with Porter. The first half can be heard in DT 34.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 4:  Investigating the Holds

In our last episode, the PC’s used some creative uses of spells and a fortuitous tidal wave to get their scuttled ship into ground.  However, this is not the world they left.  They have set up camp at the edge of the great sea and a vast primeval forest made up of trees 600 feet tall.  The small beach they are on ground is the footprint of a beast larger than anything they could have imagined.

In this Episode the PC’s continue to investigate the fire in the holds, bringing in a an expert and finding their first suspect.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and welcome to Dungeon Talk, the General Advice and Discussion podcast from DnD Academy. I am Michael and this is Dungeon Talk Episode 34: A Podcast 3-Way  Caleb and I recorded a version of this podcast a few weeks ago but when I got around to editing it, the sound was horrible.  We decided, rather than just have me over-edit it, and try to make it work, we would just re-record it. Then, we worked it out so Porter (@Rzrstrm) was able to join us so we didn’t just rehash the same conversation.

This is the first part of a longer session, Episode 35 will be out next week with the rest of our 3-way conversation.

In this Episode we start off by talking about Inspiration. Where can you cull ideas for encounters, games, adventures or whole campaigns.

We then move on to a session of Synergy where Caleb and I run through a pack of MTG Core 2014 cards and each come up with a campaign idea from those cards. Porter didn’t get the cards early enough to come up with his own but at the end he throws out a little something-something on the fly.

Here are the cards we used and I’m including my initial thoughts from each card to compare to what I thought and how I ended up using them. We’d love it if you would send us the campaign idea you would have come up with using those same cards.

We take a divergent tangent off of Synergy and talk a little about Social Combat or Skill challenges from DnD 4e.

Next we discuss starting levels for new games / Campaigns and I take another Tangent to discuss the game i’ve always wanted to run. This sparks Porter to talk about a setting he read about of the Aftermath of the Ragnarok.

http://atomicovermind.com/main/games/

Lastly we finish up with me apologizing to Olaf for taking so damn long to get around to reviewing Whitehack. Still haven’t reviewed it, but I wanted to let him know I hadn’t forgotten about him.

A secret has been stolen

Something crashes or has crashed (maybe the location of that thing is what was divined?)

A monster to overcome or the pet of an NPC?

Winged horse, or magical ability to fly?

(I didn’t end up using this at all)

A temporary animal companion. Something fights for the PC’s

A curse is causing people to lose their senses (touch, taste, hear, etc .)

The big bad guy is a traitor

The death of an NPC brings something to light

A cursed magic item causes magic users spells to fizzle – have to get it removed

The curse is tied to a Vampire Lord?

A hero of legend is reborn. maybe an Actual Angel is involved?

Divison between two nations – Vampire/Angel?

PC’s have to fight an Ice Hydra on the wall of frost.

Acolyte of angel religion, can turn undead/vampires.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 3: Butt Cheeks

In our last episode, the PC’s managed to put out a suspicious fire that had started in the holds of their ship.  Evan’s character Blaine is the only one that knows (As far as they know) that another ship exploded. They suspect an arsonist is on board, but their most pressing concern is getting their ship safety aground. The ship is without a sail or a mast and the acidic waters of this ocean are slowing dissolving the ship. Can they find safety before it all falls apart?

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

This is episode # 33

In this Episode Caleb and I discuss several topics:

NPC’s, how to make them feel different than PC’s. Do you build them the same as PC’s?

Making Squad’s for mass combat or ships run like NPC’s. Allow PC’s to alter their stats to show impact.

We discuss a bit about names of PC’s and tone of the game.

and we finish up with a discussion on giving players narrative control so that they don’t miss their “MOMENT”

Thanks for listening. As always, comments and feedback are welcome.

~Michael

Hello and welcome to the campaigns, the Actual Play Podcasts from DnD Academy.

This is A New World: Episode 2: Arouse the Ship

In the last episode, the PC’s began their journey of traveling to A New World through a magical portal. Things did not go well as right off the bat, one of their ships exploded. They then found themselves in the midsts of a terrible storm.  This episode picks up right where we left off.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

~Michael

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Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

This is episode # 32

In this Episode Caleb and I discuss the announced release of DnD Next. We talk a little about what it should be called and then a bit more about subclasses.

We then discuss Plot Vs. Situation.

Thanks for listening. As always, comments and feedback are welcome.

~Michael

Hello and Welcome to Dungeon Talk. The General advice and discussion podcast from DnD Academy.

This is episode # 31

Special Guest host @TheCalebG join me and Extra-Special Guest Matthew Parody (Co-host of the ProbablyQuestionable podcast) as we discuss improvisational techniques you can use in your games.

Yes, And

Truth

Want.

I then go on a short rant about some edition war bullcrap I heard on another podcast.

We then briefly discuss drawing RP out of players

Encumbrance and ammo tracking. Necessary?

Using Props in the game. Effective or gamey?

And finish up with a chat about secret info.  What do you do, when only one or some PC’s find info out?

Please check out Matthew’s podcast page and other info by following the links below.

http://ipacomedy.com/
https://www.facebook.com/IPAComedy
http://carpegm.net/
http://probablyquestionable.com/

Thanks for listening. As always, comments and feedback are welcome.

~Michael

Hey guys, here is Dungeon talk episode 30.  We discuss a House Rule about mental hit points.  Michael had an idea about NPC’s or maybe PC’s too, having a mental hit points count that you could “attack”, in order to convince them of something.  It wouldn’t kill them, just maybe reduce their ability to resist persuasion.

As always, thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael
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Hey what’s up guys.  Dungeon talk 29 here called I Won, I think.  Tonight’s discussion was about one topic only.  Winning.  Some of the things we tried to discuss were, is it possible to win at d&d?  What is winning?  What are some moments when you might feel like your winning?  Should d&d be thought of as a game you can win.  And finally, if someone asked you how you win, what would you tell them.  Hope you enjoy the show!

As always, thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
~Michael

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Hello Everyone,

Very excited to bring you this extra-special episode. We had the privilege of sitting down (well, on Google Hangouts) with Richard Baker and Stephen Schubert of Sasquatch Game Studio and talk about their recently Kickstarted product Primeval Thule.  Thule is a campaign setting in the vein of Conan vs. Cthulhu, low magic, where the world is a dangerous place and the cities are no safe haven.  If you haven’t heard of it yet, take a look at their Facebook Page, Website and Kickstarter page.

I want to thank Richard and Stephen again for giving us some time to discuss Thule and hope you enjoy our conversation.

Topic 1- Primeval Thule

End- bloopers
Thanks for listening!!

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello everyone,

Here is this weeks Dungeon Talk.  First let me start by saying we screwed up the intro and said the wrong number.  This on the heels of a website meeting where we discussed how to make the podcasts better.  We spend the first 20 min talking about the website, where we want to go with things, and getting feedback from listeners.  We wanted to discuss a mail question but did not have time.  Our Table topic is about inner party conflict between players because of their PC’s.  Hope you enjoy and stick around after the ending music for some more funny stuff.  Oh and if you want to get to the meaty table topic it starts at 20 min.

Topic 1- Website meeting

Topic 2: 20:00 – Player conflict between PC’s in the game

End- bloopers
Thanks for listening. As always, comments and feedback are welcome.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello.

In Dungeon talk 26 start out with an issue that came up from our most recent game. Dealing with distracted players. The way I started the last game contributed to the lack of engagement from the Players early on. I was able to finish the game strong but I was concerned and needed some therapy with Evan.

We then discussed a question sent in by Andrew through the Facebook page (I say discussed because I don’t think we actually answered anything) about playing in a rules light game vs. a rules heavy game.

Finally, we introduce our new Council of Elders segment. We’d love to get some feedback on this one and get some grievances from your tables we can use.

A pirate-y intro

Table Topic # 1: distracted players

16:00 – Mail bag, rules light vs. rules heavy.

35:22 – Council of Elders

End- bloopers

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello All,

Here is the second Episode of our Savage Worlds Play Test. We pick up right where we left off, which a bunch of Ghouls surrounding us:

As you can see, our small band of hero’s suddenly found ourselves confronting a horde of Ghouls.  A perfect situation for my Overconfident halfing to do something stupid. And I did.

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcome

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is the first of 2 extra-length BONUS episodes.  This is from a session that we thought we had lost the recordings of.  We had already decided to move on before we found this recording so these will be inserted in to the correct space by numbering them 24.1 and 24.2

So, listen to these Episodes and then go back and listen to 25’s intro and see how close I came.

Comments and feedback are welcome and appreciated.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello,

In Dungeon talk 25 we start out by talking about FATE (again).  We drafted some characters and then ran through a little scenario that was meant to lead to some kind of encounter.  We talk about FATE for quite a while so if you’re looking for DND material you might want to skip ahead.  Later we get into dealing with players who are standing there ground on decision making from other players perspectives.   I like the conversation we got into here and think we had some fun.  We wrap up with a mail bag question on how to deal with a player who has drafted a character concept, but is not sticking to it when playing the game.  This one is more from a DM’s perspective.  Stick around at the end of the podcast for some bloopers.

Enjoy!

Beginning- the usual, and then FATE

19:00- Table topic 2, players with different perspectives

41:50- Mail bag, a player who doesn’t stick to their character concept

Here is part two of our discussion.  We cover a mailbag question about DM’s and players working together to create environments.

Enjoy!

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
Follow us on twitter @TheRpgAcademy
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Support our show by becoming a Patron at www.Patreon.Com/TheRpgAcademy 

What’s up guys, in this weeks Dungeon Talk Michael, Niko, and myself sat down with character sheets from DnD Next, 13th Age, and FATE.  We created characters in each one just to see the differences and then played around with them in a few combats.  It was very interesting and we discuss the differences between them.  In part two we cover a mailbag question about collaboration between the DM and the players when creating the world of a game.

Enjoy!

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 21 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.  This is a very special episode (no, not like an ABC after school Special episode) in that we have the entire group and we do a Post Mortem on The Campaigns: Made Men. We discuss the Campaign as a whole and the last session/episodes specifically.

Would love to have any listeners weigh in with your thoughts either on on Forum page or our recently active

FaceBook Fan page.

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcome

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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In part 3 we start with what our next game is going to be.  Michael put a pole on the website and 13th age was the clear winner in votes for what we should play next.

We finish with a discussion about an idea Michael has for our current game involving a prestige or influence score.  We are in a new environment where our relationship with the larger group is going to have an effect on the direction we go.  Michael has an idea for sort of an in game meter to keep track of what npc’s think of our characters.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Ok, so part two begins with a mail bag question about how to get a player more involved with the game when he’s sitting back and only gets excited to participate during combat.  We’ve discussed things close to this before but this question comes to us from a listener who sounds like he’s really interested in getting the most out of his players experience.

At 30:30 Niko brings up DM criticism and we discuss how the three of us share critiques with each other when we think the game isn’t going well.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello all, so last week we did not have a game do to scheduling conflicts so myself, Michael, and Niko sat down to record, and boy did we ever.  We got pretty long winded and ended up with a 2 1/2 hr Dungeon Talk.  I’ll put in time stamps so you can go straight to something if you want to hear it.  In part 1 we cover,

Table Topic-  Character decision vs role playing.  Even though I was taking part in this discussion it was a little confusing for me.  The topic stems from an incident at Gen Con when Michael and Jared were playing in the same game.  It sort of relates to how someone builds a character concept and then applies it to the game.

33:26

Table Topic 2- Gen Con.  We give Michael the mic for a while and he recaps some of his best and worst moments from Gen Con.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Well, this is it.  The end of our first Actual Play Podcast Campaign.  Can’t say that it’s the ending I expected, but all in all I think it’s a good one.
We pick up this episode right were we left off last time; finishing up the Demon Horde battle.  The whole back half of the episode is just role playing / planning. There are two places where I make hard edits just to cut out 45 minutes and 35 minutes of discussion, respectivaly. I tried to leave enough so you’d know what you missed without making you sit through all of it (trust me, it’s better this way). I hit on the idea of adding our voices at high-speed after I made the cuts so the sound bite isn’t the actual discussion, I just added that for comedic effect.  If you slow it down (I figured someone would) it’s unedited Dungeon Talk 23 audio.

Anyway,

I really appreciate all of you who’ve made it to the End with us. I hope you’ll stick around for A New World which we’ll start posting soon.  As always, thanks for listening and comments and feedback are welcome.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hey guys, Dungeon Talk 22 is here!  Did  you think we were done?

Well it’s been a while since we recorded a dungeon talk.  Our schedules have been pretty full but here we are and hopefully we can get back to a regular posting of dungeon talks.  Michael is headed out to Gen Con this week so we won’t be playing, but I’m sure he’ll be having the time of his life without us.

So to knock the rust off this week we talked about Michael’s new campaign that he is running for us.  I think we’ve played three sessions so far and I’m loving it.   We’ll get into that a little bit and then we’ll go into our second table topic/ mailbag question which is about handling players searching a room where an item may be hidden.

To finish up we discuss something that a DM from a podcast Michael listens to uses to speed up his games when the players are taking to long.  He puts an egg timer on the table and sets it for a time limit! Can you believe that?  Anyways, I hope you enjoy this weeks podcast and have fun!

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Thanks!!

Hello all,

Here is Episode 26 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  Yet again, I have to say we lost a session. I apparently did a save as wrong and lost it. The good news is that I have since bought an external HD and will be saving original recordings to it. We also just recently lost a session of our new game A New World because the computer upstairs stopped recording and we didn’t know it. For that reason we’re going to start a redundant recording with my laptop and the old Blue Yeti so we SHOULD not have any further issues.

On a quick side note, Evan ended up finding the previous game session we thought we lost. So i’m going to edit those down and hope to post them as ‘lost episodes’ in the near future so anyone who’s behind might be able to hear them in order.

As for this episode, I start out this session with a recap of the game that we lost so there isn’t a whole lot more to catch up with. I do about a 5 min intro where I discuss the main points of the missed game.

Grexil is in the pits, fighting gladiatorial style against monsters.

We introduced a new player/character (Nick / Ralph aka Rasputin) who is a member of the resistance group Jalzira

Jalzira is named after their founder an ancient Tiefling who knows what Evan’s brother/Ser Accues/The King is up too and wants to stop him.

What he’s up to is trying to raise a demon army and then go back in time to fight the Ghisstarians.

Jalzira knows this is crazy and wont work.

The PC’s decide to Kill the King (to keep him from opening the portal) and then go back in time (cue Huey Lewis and the News) and stop the King from enacting his plan and setting the time line straight.

We pick up the actual game (in case you want to skip my intro now) with the Pc’s about to attack the King as he’s standing by the pit watching Grexil fight down below.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 25 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  There was an issue with a recording and we lost a session (boo!!) the good news is that not much happened in it (yay?) in terms of moving the story forward and even better I did a recap at the beginning of the next game (this episode) that pretty well covers everything in the missing session so I’m confident you guys will be right on track.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
E-mail us at Podcast@TheRpgAcademy
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 24 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  In this Episode the PC’s continue to discuss theories as to what has happened to them or the city while they were in the Wastelands.  They eventually make their way back to Yomi’s place to see if has changed the same way Grexil’s did.  They then decide to meet with Alicia again.

In terms of story, not a lot happens this Episode to move things forward, but I thought it was a lot of fun and there are some good character moments.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 23 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  In this Episode we conclude the battle we started last episode. The group continues to track down clues to what has happened to them or to the city while they were gone.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 22 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  In this Episode, Zaine (being controlled by Me as an NPC – Evan was out this week), gets some shocking news from Grexil as one of his big secrets gets revealed.  Yomi learns just how dangerous the sewers can be and Zaine gets grappled by a Red Arm Guard who uses an as of yet, unknown ability on him.  Had a hard time finding a good cutting point, so this episode just sorta ends and we’ll pick up at the same spot in 23.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 21 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast.  In this Zaine and Yomi make their way back out of the City, after having met with Alicia. They then try to sneak Grexil in so that he can speak to Alicia and she can tell him she’s pregnant.  In this Episode Zaine finds out just how different the City Guards are.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

***UPDATED**** 06/302013 – I was informed through the forum that the volume on this episode was really low. This was not an intentional Meta-joke based on the title. It was a mistake on my part. I went back in and did a quick and dirty Amplify through Audacity.  It’s still not where it should be, but it is louder. Sorry for any inconvenience. A big thanks to Azgarod for the heads-up!!

Here is Episode 20 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode the PC’s make their way back to the City of Mairhaposa and find that it has . . . changed. The Bazaar where they met Sallah just days before looks to have been abandoned for years. Stranger yet, Sallah doesn’t seem to notice. This is but the first of the oddities the PC’s encounter.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 19 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode The PC’s find out that Quarian can read Magic Runes and finally discover what was up with those symbols carved onto the Princess’ and those other girls’ bodies.  They make their way back to the city to find that things are a little different now, and Grexil comes face to face with a the consequences of his actions.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 18 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode The PC’s decide to head back to Marhiposa, but along the way find a landmark that Quarian recognizes. This revelation is what leads to the title quote. Listen to find out what happens when Grexil see’s true magic for the first time.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 20 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.  For this Episode we were joined by Niko and Rob and a Special Guest James (@Massimo_53). James runs the DnD Encounters games at a local game store here in Cincinnati. He’s been playing RPG’s for a while and has a lot of experience with Savage Worlds, which we wanted to discuss. I thought he did a great job and certainly added to the discussion.

Here are this week’s segment topics:

James’ Introduction – 0:00 –  6:00

1. Table Topic # 1 – Savage worlds review/discussion; 6:00 – 32:30

2. Table Topic # 2 – Roleplaying in a way that harms the party: 32:30 – 44:50

3. Mailbag – we answer a question sent in from Christian concerning a Music Based Puzzle. (If you want to give your thoughts, visit our Podcast question thread on RPG Crosstalk Forums):  44:50 – 57:45

4. House rules – a first for a new segment where we will discuss the pro’s/con’s of adding a new rule into our DnD Games. This week’s rule is ‘exploding dice’ from savage worlds – essentially if you roll the max number on a damage die, you keep rolling and adding. (if you want to give your thoughts, visit our House rule thread on RPG Crosstalk Forums). 57:45 – 1:06:30

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 17 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode The PC’s continue to nurse Quarian back to health only to learn that he is being hunted by Sand Demon’s because of the Crystal Collar that he wears. We also finally answer the burning question: Is Grexil bigger than a Sand Demon

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 19 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.   I would call this a ‘lite’ episode. We spend the majority of the time discussing the outrage over a recent episode of the Big Bang Theory Televsion show. We then talk some about Gencon. Then we finally get to our regular stuff and cover a mailbag and deadlands and finally have another round of Synergy with a pack of Dragon Maze cards.  I’m including the time segments incase you want to jump around, over or through some of those topics.

Here are this week’s segment topics:

1. Current Events: The Big Bang Theory and Nerd Rage collide over an Episode where the characters play D&D; Thru 19:23

2. GenCon: We discuss in general our excitement and frustrations of the Wish list of Gencon: 19:23 – 27:22

3. Mailbag – We answer a question sent in by VanRPL; how to you balance wanting to be a Party leader vs. taking over a game. 27:23 – 38:21

4. Table topics  1 – Deadlands: We discuss the new Deadlands game we are playing and some of our thoughts about it and the Savage Worlds game system.  38:21 – 50:51

5. Synergy – Evan forgot his pack of cards so we ended up opening one pack of Dragon Maze MTG cards and working together to come up with a story idea. 50:51 – 58:06

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.
Comments and Feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 16 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode The PC’s go off-script in a beautiful way and finally take charge of their circumstances. We also introduce a new player/PC. Travis, just back from a tour in Afghanistan joins our table again and plays Quarian an Elf, unlike any the Pc’s have ever known.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 18 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.   We had Niko and Rob joining us tonight. We have moved back to recording my house again and there’s a little background noise to deal with. We’ve actually invested in some higher-end recording equipment which should drastically improve our ability to mitigate that backgroud noise, so hopefully this will be the last DT with those problems (we’re still backlogged on Made Men Podcasts by about 8 or 9 episodes before the new ones will start).

Here are this week’s segment topics:

1. Next News: We review the current Death and Dying rules in DnDNext.

2. Table Topics 1 – we transition into dealing with a PC’s death. Evan (as a DM) had his first PC death (Niko’s Rouge Flynn) in our last game. How it happened and how to move on.

3. Mailbag – We cover a couple different techniques for keeping up with various and multiple status effects that might be on a PC at a given time.

4. Table topics  2 –  We go back to the one we missed last week and talk about understanding that DM’s and Players generally have a different level of investment in a game and how to maximize the Players investment.

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy.

Comments and Feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!
~Michael
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Hello all,

Here is Episode 15 of our DnDNext Actual Play podcast. In this Episode Zaine meets with the Elven Chief and learns more about his Father’s last days before disappearing.  The sound quality of this episode was very up and down. I spent way too much time trying to equalize the highs and lows.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 17 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.   When ran a little long this week because of a new segment we tried, so we don’t quite get to all our the Topics we said we would. Thought both our Table Topics intertwined quite a bit so most of it came out in one form or another.

Here are this week’s segment topics:

1. Table topics  1 – Changing your presentation style as a DM, based on Player’s reactions.

2. Mailbag – Barriers from becoming a DM/GM

3. Syngergy – Evan and I open a pack of Magic cards and create a campaign/session starter.

4. Table topics  2 –  we didn’t get to it this week.

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 14 of our DnD Next Actual Play Podcast. In the last Episode, the PC’s entered the Wastelands and headed toward the Old Stone Fort Tower.

In this Episode we pick up right as the PC’s enter the tower as the entire Elven Nation sits and watches.

From a technical standpoint, I was able to figure out NOISE REDUCTION in Audacity and fixed the major issue of the last episode which had a terrible amount of background noise in it. This one sounds much much better.

As always, thanks for listening.

Comments and Feedback are always appreciated.

Until next time . . .

Thanks!!

Michael

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Hello all,

Well as promised a while ago, here is Episode # 1 of our new Podcast: Show & Tell. Essentially this is our take of the How Did This Get Made Podcast (of which, I am a huge fan) where we will be watching D&D or RPG related movies and then discussing them afterwards.

Our first movie was, of course, Dungeons & Dragons the Movie.

We hope this will become a regular podcast, but that doesn’t mean it will be on a time schedule. Only that we want to do it again. Our next feature will be Dungeons & Dragons: Wrath of the Dragon God.

Hope you enjoy!

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 16 of  Dungeon Talk; our General advice/discussion podcast.   The big news this week is that one of frequent commentors and Twitter Followers; @vanRPL,  has given us an intro upgrade!   So, if you normally skip over the music intro, please go back and give this one a listen –  Ryan also submitted this week’s Mailbag question and is now entered into our SWAG drawing, so a big thank you, again, to Ryan.   Here are this week’s segment topics:

1. Table topics  1 – Session Balance; combining the elements of your game to the best result.

2. Mailbag – Using “Lucky” Numbers or Crit tables in a game: Pro’s and Con’s.

3. Next News: New Exploration Rules.

4. Table topics  2 – Adding Players to an established group.

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

So, here is Episode 13 of our DnDNext Playtest game.  In this Episode the PC’s brave out into the Wastelands in an effort to reach the Old Stone Fort Tower.

As I cover in my Intro; this was the first game I ran since having my surgery and I was definitely a little off my game.

Our most recent game we started recording at Evan’s house. He has a better set up and less kids so the quality should be better once we get to those games.

As always, thanks for listening and please take a moment to rate us on Itunes. The more ratings (and the better the ratings) we get helps us stay on the top of lists and searches so more people can find us.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 15 of our Dungeon Talk Podcast. We kept to the segments again, but we added some special guests;  Niko, who you may know as Grexil, and Jared, who played Wang for a few sessions on the the Made Men Podcast, joined us for Ep 15.

Segments

1. Table topics  1 – Giving your players their “MOMENT” in a game.

2. Mailbag – If you use battle maps, which is better; pre-published or hand drawn?

3. Table topics  2 – Changing an encounter on the fly

4. Next news – We discuss the current chatter about the Warlord Class

As always, thanks for listening and comments/feedback are welcomeThanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 12 of our Made Men DnDnext actual play podcast.

Had a return of a few technical glitches this episode. Lots of background noise and pops and clicks. Also, in two different places there are side conversations going on that muddle the sound pretty badly. Luckily both times it is pretty brief, but I will make a point going forward of having the side conversations wait for a pause. In both cases it’s good stuff happening,just bad timing.

As always, comments and feedback is welcome and thanks for listening!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 14 of Dugeon Talk.  Evan and I are still experimenting with the format and in this Episode we tried out a more formalized format with specialized segments. We liked it a lot. Hope you do too.

Segments:

1. Tabletopics – Setting tone in your RPG game.  We had a session where it just didn’t work.

2. Message for you Sir – we answer an E-mail question sent in on our podcast(at)dndacademy.com e-mail. Our question this time was about any food rituals our group has.

3.Tabletopics – Ret Con and it’s place in our game and yours

4. Next news – we discus the current version of the DnDNext Fighter class.

As always, thanks for listening. Comments and feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 11 of our DnDNext actual play podcast. I recorded a live intro for this one so no text one here. (I would love some feedback if you prefer live one or text one . . .)

Not much technical or spoiler-y things in this episode.

As always, feedback and comments are welcome and thanks for listening!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

During a recent recording Evan and I found ourselves on about a 15 minute tangent. We decided to start over, but thought it might be funny to hear how easily we drifted off the tracks.

So here’s a short outtake.

Hope you enjoy.

Thanks!!

MIchael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 13 of Dungeon Talk. In this Episode Evan and I touch on or discuss the following topics.  This is the general order that we go in, but we do jump back and forth a bit as well.

1.  Wanting to change up and play a non-fantasy RPG

2.   Game rotation. Losing a player for a while we swtiched to having Evan run a game again

3.   Evan discusses his comfort level running this game vs. his 1st one.

4.   Character Backgrounds: Keep them in their place

5.   Rewarding effort.

6.   Humor in the game

7.   Giving a player their moment in a game.  Building trust between player/DM

8.   Evan is not defining our PC’s by their classes.  He’s not really even sure what classes we are.

9.   Not all backgrounds are created equal.  Strong silent type is hard to play.

10.  Team work takes work

As always, thanks for listening.

Comments and feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 10 of our Made Men Actual Play Podcast.  One more time: sorry about Episode 9.

In this Episode we pick up right after Grexil has returned to the group after his secret meeting with The Silent Sisters.  The majority of the episode is spent in a role play heavy scene. The PC’s are at a turning point and they spend a lot of time trying to get everyone on board for what happens next.

The Wang situation is resolved in this episode and it ends on a cliffhanger of sorts.  I hope you guys enjoy.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Well here isn’t Episode 9. This is just me explaining what you would be hearing in Episode 9 if I hadn’t somehow lost it.

After the session that we lost, we recorded a long Dungeon Talk which was posted as episode 9.0 and 9.1. If you go back and listen to those podcasts you might get a bit more out of what I posted here.

Very sorry!  Episode 10 should be up soon.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

**************************SPOILERS*********************************

The reason I’ve been posting these spoiler sections are just to give some insight as to how I run my games and do the things I do.  My original idea for doing the Actual Play Podcasts was to start each episode with me and maybe Evan doing an intro about the game you would hear and then at the end, do a recap where I would explain the same things i’ve been tying here.  Despite my good intentions, it was readily apparent that wouldn’t happen.  So, my compromise is to post a few DM trade secrets in this section.

The Shit Demon encounter was designed to separate one PC and add some tension (it worked).

I’m still not sure who the GHOST is. I have a couple prime suspects but it could go either way. The PC’s don’t know that and that’s okay.

The whole point of the GHOST in this session was so the PC’s would find the bodies of the woman and hopefully piece together that whomever killed the princess has been practicing. The runes on the bodies are for a magical spell (remember that in this world Magic doesn’t really exist so no one can ready magical writing). The spell is designed to open a gateway allowing demon’s into this world.  This aspect of the game will come out dramatically in the next few sessions (the ones we haven’t played yet, not the ones I’ve yet to post).

if you have any questions about any of the things happening in the game or the spoiler section, let me know.

Michael

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Hello all,

Here is our newest Dungeon Talk Episode. In this one we have a special guest. Rob, one of my very good friends from my old gaming group in Cleveland joins us. We had set up a SKYPE session but it didn’t work out well so we ended up just putting him on speaker phone (thus the title).  The quality of this is not great, you can definately tell that he’s on a phone, but the volume and quality of his voice is good enough for you to hear and understand what he says (when Evan isn’t talking over him! 🙂

****If anyone out there knows a better a way to do internet or phone interviews for podcasts, please let us know ***

On this Episode we discuss conflicts in game and out of game.  What causes them, and what you can/should do about them. We also cover some events that happened recently in the new Game that Evan is running and discuss ways to improve.

As always, we hope you enjoy and look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 8 of our Made Men DnDNext Play test game.

In the last episode most of the time was spent bringing the party together. Eventually everyone met up at Yomi’s apartment.  The fact that Yomi had a Rex addiction was already beginning to surface, but it hit the fan when he had an overdose.   In this Episode the Party tries to keep Yomi alive despite some challenges (many of them self-inflicted).

We are also introduced to the Silent Sisters, a gang of female assassins. For more on them, see the spoiler section below.

As always, comments and feedback (both here and on iTunes) are appreciated.

**************SPOILERS************

**************You may want to listen to the episode before you read below here************

A couple things happened this game I’d like to comment on from a DM’s perspective.

One of the things we’ve commented on this site and podcast multiple times is the fact that the PC’s never do what you think they will.  Rob, who plays Yomi, and I had a conversation about his Rexan addiction. I think it was his idea for him to OD, but I took the idea and ran with it. Certainly Pulp Fiction was used a creative springboard (I do think the scene played out very much like the movie – to an extent, anyway).  I had assumed that since Yomi lived over a herbalist shop that it would be fairly easy to get him the antidote and then pave the way for some cool role play as they do an intervention and he went through detox/withdrawl.  However, Niko as Grexil, had killed two guards earlier so when he went down stairs (because he thought he was protecting Zaine) it created a new set of problems that made it more difficult for them to get the antidote.  I could have just caved as the shopkeeper and given them the antidote, but in the moment it felt right to be an Ass to him since he was being an Ass to me (though in hindsight, I doubt the shopkeeper would have really reacted that way to the 8′ tall mutant killing machine!).

So, instead of this being a quick little moment it turned into a very tense scene.  Grexil and Wang got to have some battle that night. Once Zaine and Yomi were running I decided to bring in the Silent Sisters.  I had decided they would attack the party at some point, but it seemed like the dramatically appropriate time to do it when the party was separated (we spent almost the entire last episode separated, then right when they get together they split again!!).

This was the first contact this party had had with the Silent Sisters (though the PC’s would have known about them), but the players had fought them before. If you are keeping score you know that this game was originally designed as a one-shot in the same world as my previous game. In the original game the PC’s were attacked by the Silent Sisters while visiting the Dwarven City of Thronhold (this city will likely become important in the current game soon).  The Silent Sisters use weapons from left over Ghiss technology (essentially hand guns and shot guns). They also have access to devices that create a bubble of silence (similar to the spell Silence).  These devices, however, absorb the sound and eventually will overload and explode.  In this game after the Sisters are defeated Alicia takes this devices and runs away with it.  Not sure the Players caught on, but this was me telling them that she knew what the device was.

One of the other points I wanted to make was about the Silent Sister battle.  An observant listener might notice that the very first attack on Zaine by the Silent Sisters did over 20 points of damage to him, which was over 50% of his total HP.  There was never an attack of that magnitude again. I’ll admit it, I fudged the dice a little in his favor. I wanted the scene to be tense, but I didn’t want to kill two characters (if Zaine had gone down, Yomi would have died too). The reason I want to talk about this is because I feel that it is very important that Players know their PC’s can and will die.  Once the game looses that risk of failure and PC’s can just re-spawn like in Halo then I think the Players react differently. It’s like playing poker for no money. Everyone is going to go all-in and call because there’s no reason not too.

Having said that I choose to make sure Zaine didn’t die in that battle for a couple reasons.

1. I didn’t think it would be fair for Yomi to die without having any chance to fight back himself. I’m a stickler for the story to run organically and i’d rather fudge a die roll here and there than to destroy continuity and have Assassin’s choose not to kill the guys they were sent to kill for no reason.

2. I wanted to show the players that there was more to Alicia than meets the eye (no, she’s not a Transformer!) but from the beginning I’ve had in mind that she had some big secrets, more than even Grexil knew.  I did not know that Zaine would take Yomi to her, but it worked so well I couldn’t resist using her as the Deus Ex Machina in this battle and allow her to save the day.  I think that reveal overshadowed the fact that Zaine was spared. At least for me, it worked out and I’m happy with it.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 7 of our Made Men DnDNext Play test game. In the last Episode the original group of PC’s (Zaine, Grexil and Yomi) met up with Jared’s new PC (Wang).  In this session the group manages to stay apart just as long as possible. Wang learns he’s not the craziest member of the group, the gang learns about the Bounty on Zaine’s head and one of Yomi’s secrets comes out in an almost tragic way.

Enjoy!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

**********************Technical Stuff*************************

I had originally planned on recording myself doing an intro and doing a brief recap of the last podcast (since there is often days or weeks in-between them being posted but only seconds in-game terms), but right now I have a cold and sound terrible. Look for that change up next time.

Recently we started using a Mic stand to keep our microphone off the table as we play. I think this will reduced the odd (and annoying) wub, wub, wub sounds that I keep hearing. As always I try to edit out as many as I can, but in some cases the dialogue behind them is too important.

I’ve been very happy with the set up we have using a single Blue Yeti microphone but in this Episode more than the others so far I got frustrated with the limitations. There were often side-converstations going on. If each Player had their own Mic I would have greater flexibility in turning those side conversations down, allowing for the main ones to be heard more clearly. In some cases those side conversations were in character role-play and there’s some good stuff there, but it’s hard to hear.  I may experiment a little further in getting multiple mic’s but i’m just not sure how practical that would be, or relevant until we get a studio room.  There’s still so much ambient noise from my basement i’m note sure it matters yet.

Anyway, please enjoy. if you have any questions or comments about the game or how we set up to record and/or edit, please let me know.

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Hey all, so here is our first dungeon talk for 2013.  We took a break for a couple months for Michael to have a surgery, which he discusses.  We really talk a lot about what happened in our game this week which was the first game Michael has run in a couple months.  We are a little rusty and just needed to record something to knock off the cob webs, enjoy!  Oh, and Happy New Year!

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Hello all,

Here is Episode 6 of our Made Men DnDNext Play test game. This is our first session after our initial all-day Saturday game. To recap, the PC’s were told by Gradon that if they hunted down and killed the 4 NPC’s (the Players previous PC’s) who were thought to be responsible for the Princess and Sir Acues deaths that all would be forgiven.  Since Jared (the Player) had missed out on the Saturday Game he did not yet have a PC in this game. Now, I could have simply added him in and waved the Magic DM hand and said, “His PC was there the whole time,” and that would be that. I don’t like to do that, though. Never had. In this case, I wish I had gone against my usual predilections and just did the hand wave. Jared the Player and his PC Wang, had a hard time fitting into this game. We discussed this somewhat in some of the Dungeon Talk Podcast that happened after this game (I think 9 and 9.1). There was also some confusion about Wang. Jared thought he was a Bounty Hunter, but we (over e-mail) had decided to make him a Hit Man. This was to keep from stepping on Rob’s (as Yomi) toes, since he was already a Bounty Hunter.  Also, Jared decided to make his PC crazy, actually bat-shit insane. I really didn’t get that, which meant my vision of his PC and his vision of his PC were not the same.

As a general rule, I don’t think playing a truly insane PC is a good idea. Unless you are a very skilled player and the DM is very skilled it can cause problems the same way playing a loner, or a secretly evil PC can ruin a game.

Stay tuned for how things turn out.

*******Technical stuff*************

This was the first game in our regular venue of my basement. I don’t have all the audio equipment Evan has, so instead of each of us having our own microphone, we used a single Blue Yeti microphone in the center of the table. In some cases this turned out better, in some cases not.  You also get some additional background noise from my wife and kids upstairs. As always I tried to cut out as much of it as possible, but in some cases I would have lost important dialogue so I left it in.

I added in the intro we use for our Dungeon Talk podcasts. Evan, uses Studio Pro for editing where I use the free version of Audcacity. I am not nearly as experienced as he is, so while it may be a matter of tools available, it’s more likely that I just don’t know what I’m doing yet, so the intro doesn’t fade out the same way, and I can’t figure out why.

Also, I included the outtro Evan did as well, that too isn’t mixed the same way. I’ll keep working on it and maybe by Episode 7 i’ll have it worked out.

Thanks!!
Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello All,

Here is Episode 5 of Made Men. Full Circle. This is the last 50 minutes or so of our initial Saturday, All-day, gaming session which was originally supposed to be a one-shot DnDNext Play test. As we’ve already discussed, the game was a hit, so much so, that we decided to scrap the original story line and continue on using these characters.  As was also covered in the last episode, despite the fact we were having so much fun, as the game drew on, we got tired and the game got sloppy.  This last bit really, really shows that. I had to cut out a lot of side conversations, as well as more of that odd “who’s moving the Micro-phone” sound.

********************SPOILERS******************* I suggest you listen before you read below!!************************

My original intent with this game was to give the PC’s (Marcus, Rook, Sampson and Jared) a glimpse of the City they were headed too. Eventually I wanted to the two groups to meet up. I thought that would be a fantastic Role-Play situation (or *COULD* be), so my goal was to wrap up the night with the Players (not the PC’s) knowing that their original characters would be targeted by the Play test characters.

So, at the end of the session when Gradon tells Zaine that he can come back into the good Graces of the Crimson Claw Crime Syndicate and all transgressions will be forgotten, and all he has to do is track down the killers of the Princess and Sir Acues, that was designed to tell the Players that their characters had been framed for murders (i’m sure they assumed I didn’t actually have their PC’s kill those NPC’s) and that Zaine, Yomi and Grexxil would be after them.

In-game I don’t think it had the affect I wanted, looking back at it, that is likely because none of the Players had any where near the attachment to their old characters that they had to their new ones. They weren’t afraid that their old PC’s would have to face their new ones and might not survive (The new play test PC’s were a level higher and overall tougher).

I’ll most likely go back and do a regular post about why I think that is, going into some detail, but the short version is that I was trying so hard to keep the original story’s big mystery a mystery (that the PC’s had traveled ahead in time about 1,000 years) that I had to keep them from knowing too much about *WHERE* they were as well as *WHEN* they were and that kept them from becoming attached to the story or their characters. In a story, I think the reader would be able to think back and go “Ahhhh, that’s what that was?” but as Players, it put up a barrier between them and their characters.  I tell myself all the time, “A good story and a good game are not the same thing,” but it’s still hard to separate the two.

I’m going to start work on editing episode 6 and hope to have posted next week.

As always, thanks for listening. We always appreciate feedback and opinions.

Thanks!!
Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello All,

Here is Episode 4 of our D&D Next Playtest campaign. This was an interesting episode to go back and listen too and edit.  By this point we had been playing for several hours and despite the fact that we were having a lot of fun with the game, I can tell people were getting tired. Side conversations kept popping up and we were getting easily distracted. I edited out as much of that as I could, which may cause for some strange, choppy cuts. There are a few things I wanted to comment on, about the game, though.

*************SPOILERS*************** I suggest listening to the podcast before you read this!!***********************

1. This was originaly designed to be a one-shot. As such, I gave each of the Pc’s some secrets that related to other PC’s or NPCs that might cause conflict. As the game progressed I tried to get these to start to come out and kept pushing the action as new thing after new thing kept happening.

2. There were *A LOT* of notes being passed from the Players to me. Mostly because of those secrets. I tried to cut out a lot of the dead air that these notes created, but from an in-game persepective they were very effective and helping keep the game moving, just not good for listening.

3. One of Yomi’s secrets is that he had hired Stannis to get the drugs that he never paid for. Yomi is a Rexan Addict and wanted to keep it from the other PC’s (you may recall that Yomi was trying to be insistent that he could handle the Stannis situation – now you know why!)

4. Yomi’s other secret is that he is also sleeping with Grexi’s girlfriend Alishia.  Niko as a player knew this, but supposedly Grexil does not (Actually though, Grexil does know. One of his secrets is that he is actually working for a rival gang: The Silent Sisters and Alishia is his contact. To keep up his ‘too dumb to worry about status’ Alisha and he worked out an arrangement where she slept with Yomi to make him look clueless).

5. As I’ve mentioned before: no matter how much planning you do, the Players will always do something you don’t expect. I never would have guessed that the Players would have decided to open the box of Rexan they had picked up. I guess as a DM I was trying to push the action as the game drew long – the Players were doing the same.

6. A lot of notes were being passed during that scene, because both Grexil and Yomi were taking baggies of drugs without letting anyone one else notice – this casued some confusion in and out of game later – but was awesome!

7. The Shaugin encounter was supposed to be the second fight of the session, but because the Players decided to avoid it, I allowed them too. I wanted another fight just to try out the mechanic’s but the character’s actions were so much more fitting I thought it worked out best (Yomi especially!)

8. My biggest mistake in this session was glossing over the Shaugin attack. Again, trying to push the action I wanted to get to the Princesses murder – which was one of the key-stone events. I wanted to make that such a big-deal  by making the Shaugin attack so minor in comparison, but listening back the Players didn’t see it that way and I should have handled it better (if I knew we were going to keep playing I would have waited a few ‘days’ before that murder happened.

9. At several points during this episode there was some weird ambient noise. Sounded like we were moving the microphones a lot. I did my best to cut it out, but there are times when the conversation couldn’t be skipped. Sorry about that!!

I hope you continue to listen. We have one episode left from the original one-shot sessions and then we continue the game in our regular bi-weekly sessions. The group is still having a blast with the game and many of the secrets are being revealed and keeping the players on their toes. I have a couple big-reveals coming up with Gradon, Zaine’s handler that will hopefully propel the game into new territory.

As always, thanks for listening and comments and feedback are always welcome.
Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello All,

So, apparently Evan and I messed up. The podcast posted as episode 2 was actually episode 3. I’ve changed the posting title, but the recording is the same. If you are interested in episode 2 you can find posted as Dungeon Talk: Episode 8.1 The Battle.  It was originally posted as part of our DndNext Playtest discussion.

In this episode, the Pc’s finish up their first mission of getting protection money from the shops along West Market Street. They go back to meet Gradon who doesn’t seem to happy with how things played out. He then gives them a couple more jobs to do; One of which is to meet up with Sir Acues head of the Royal Guard for his quarterly bribe.

As has quickly become the norm, things do not go as planned.

Comments and feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello All,

Here is Dungeon Talk: Episode 10.  The title comes from the fact that we started twice before we were actually recording (once for about 45 minutes . . .) and then on take 3 we started laughing at ourselves and had to start over again.

We had a couple suggestions for topics from Twitterer @Berliad; Running a game in an official setting (Eberron, Dragonlance, Greyhaw, Forgotten Realms, etc . . .,) vs Homebrew and then running a module vs. a homebrew adventure.  We had covered it twice before we recorded so I’m not sure we had it in us to give the topic justice that third time.

We also covered group size and when should a player or DM cancel a game.

Please stick around till the end. Evan recorded a new outtro piece that is awesome!

As always, thanks for listening and feedback/comments are welcomed.

Also, here are the game notes that Niko was talking about for when he writes up adventures for him to run.

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Here is the second half of Dungeon Talk Episode 9. Enjoy!

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Tonights podcast is just a little different.  We played our usual weekly game, and when it was over at around 10 pm, we decided to stay at Michael’s house and record an episode of Dungeon Talk.  Niko and Jared were able to stick around and join us which was fun because I always think the conversation is better when there’s more than just me and Michael.  The quality is a not as good since it was in Michael’s basement and the sound really echoes down there.  Also sometimes you will be able to here the furnace running in the background, hahaha.   If i didn’t think the conversation was that great I probably would have opted to scrap it and just record another one, but I thought there was some really good back and forth going on and good questions too.

Some topics we talked about were:

What made us want to switch from playing characters and be a DM.

Of course we talk about DnD Next and how great we think it is, although Jared offers us some reasons why he enjoys 3.5 more.

The differences between building and developing characters in DnD Next compared to past games.

Michael asked what advice I might give to someone who was thinking of DMing for the first time.

Hope you enjoy, and as always please leave us some comments and suggestions for topics.

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Hello All,

Here is the inaugural episode of our new The Campaigns series of podcasts. These are actual play sessions of our current D&D Next Games.

In this episode we meet the main characters (all except Wang, who is Jared’s character and did not come in until the following session. You should meet him around episode 4) Zaine, played by Evan, is a Human Rogue with the Scavenger background (home-brewed) and Survivor Specialty.  Yomi, played by Rob is a Halfing Rogue with the Bounty Hunter Background and Archer specialty.  Grexil, played by Niko, is a Mutant (home-brewed) Fighter with the Spy background and 2-handed weapon specialty (home-brewed).

Please take a listen as our Hero’s, um . . . PC’s come to life at the table and experience their adventures with them.

Comments and feedback are always welcome.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Hello all,

Here is the back half of the recap/discussion we had after our DnD Next Playtest.

Thanks!!
Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Here is a slightly edited version of the battle I ran during the DnD Next Playtest.  This battle was all Theater of the Mind; no mini’s, no grid.

Please look over Evan’s sniffles . . .

Thanks!!
Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Last Saturday, I ran a DnD Next Playtest for my regular gaming group. We had been running a 3.5 game and because we had 3 out of 4 PC’s that were non-core classes it would be difficult to switch over. So I decided to run a alternate game that ran side by side of the  regular game.

The Players were given pre-gen characters. Each were essentially low-level gangsters; Part of the Crimson Claw Crime Syndicate. This session occurred in the city that the PC’s were currently heading toward.

Zaine, played by Evan, was the crew leader. A human Rogue with a Scavenger Background (House Ruled, as he worked to find lost artifacts in the wasteland north of the city) and the Survivor Speciality.

Grexil, played by Niko, was the muscle. A muttant (long story, but my game includes an alien race that took over the world and then left ) fighter with Slayer background and 2-handed weapon specialist (House Rule).

Yomi, played by Rob, was a Halfing Rogue with the Bounty Hunter Background and Archer Specialty.

The play test went over great. All the players did a fantastic job and wanted to drop the original game and switch over (which makes me happy and sad at the same time).

Here is the discussion Evan and I had about this play test the following day.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Hello all,

Evan and I decided beforehand that we would devote this entire episode to building a Sand-Box game, which is something I am struggling with right now in my game. Somehow, after talking for nearly 2 hours (only about 1 hour made the podcast), we NEVER got to that topic. Despite that, I think this may be my favorite episode yet.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I do and please leave us some comments/feedback.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles

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Dungeon Talk: Episode 6 – The College Years

Hello all,

In this week’s Dungeon Talk Podcast, Evan, after remember to turn on the recorder (after we had been talking for half an hour!) discuss some of my all time favorite Dungeons and Dragons memories.  We tried to separate what made those games so special and memorable from being in College at the same time.  We then got into a really good discussion about the amount of verbal description I use in my games. As a bit of DM therapy we covered the fact that although I jokingly call myself Mumbles on this site it is tied to the fact I know that I have an accent (I’m from South Eastern Kentucky originally) I tend to talk fast and I do on occasion get tongue tied and mumble.  To overcome this when I give presentations at work and when I DM I tend to practice in my head what I’m going to say.  I think I’m really good at improvising on the fly but there is a substantial difference in how I describe scenes i’ve practice vs. the one’s I’m making up as I go.

I’ve been listening to a couple live-play D&D podcasts and it’s been a tremendous help to me as a DM. I pick out things I like (and steal, story wise) and then the things I think the DM could do better. I’m hoping to be able to record and post our Live Play D&D Podcast soon and then after each session post a dissection of it; what’s good and what’s not.

Please listen and we’ve appreciate any feedback you have.

Table Topic # 1 –  Discussion of my game experiences while in College  00:00 – 30:26

Table Topic # 2 – Underselling a moment  / taking time to describe in detail    31:25 – 53:39

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Michael and I took vacations and just got back this week so we recorded and will resume our weekly game this Monday.  We had another guest with us this week.  His name is Jared and he recently joined our weekly game.  He has been playing for many years and has a lot of DM xp. He’s not experienced with DnD Next so we start of discussing the play test process / materials.

Table Topic # 1 – The Five Minute Workday                  7:45 – 23:23

Table Topic # 2 – Setting a campaign length                 23:37 – 36:52

Table Topic # 3 – A look at what is Role-playing           37:00 – 46:08

Table Topic # 4 –  Rolling stats vs. standard array        46:10 – 47:00

Table Topic # 5 – DM ‘Cheating’                                        47:00 – 56:33

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Well here we are at our new home.  The first 9 or 10 minutes is Michael discussing what happened with the old website and why we decided to move.  The first topic begins after that.  We also have a guest with us, his name is Rob and he plays in our current weekly game.

Table Topic # 1 – In game rewards    9:53 – 33:30

a.  Magic items

b.  Hero Point systems

Table Topic # 2 – Playing yourself as a PC      33:36 – 45:25

Table Topic # 3 –  When a Player is cheating    45:30 – 58:00

Table Topic # 4 – 5 Minute work day   58:18 – 58:41

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Dungeon Talk: Episode 3 – An Editing Adventure

Happy to bring to you episode 3!  We had a lot of fun recording this one, probably too much since we finished with about an hour and a half of recording.  I had to cut it down significantly to upload.

If you don’t want to hear Michael and I discuss his phobia of microphones then skip to about 2 minutes in.  It’s funny, but maybe vulgar for kids (or immature adults).

Table Topic # 1 – Pulled a few big moments from  Evan’s last game  1:10 – 12:30

a. Not having a PC roll for some actions

b.  My view of what was going to happen vs. what Evan saw happening

c.  How this game compares to Blazing Saddles

d.  Giving items to players that they don’t know what they do.

e.  Asking players for feedback.

Table Topic # 2 –  Having a distracted / distracting player  12:30 – 24:39

Table Topic # 3 –  Giving players/PC’s rewards.   24:40 – 40:00

a.  Experience and leveling rate

b.  Michael’s aversion to Magic items

Table topic # 4- Discussing Michael’s new campaign: The Lost City   40:15 – 58:00

a. Different ideas of how to start the game

b. having the DM create the PC’s for the players or not

As always comments are appreciated, thanks for listening, and send us some topics to cover.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Dungeon Talk: Episode 2 – The Saga Continues

We changed the intro a little this time, the old intro was too long before we started talking.

Table Topic # 1 – Update on Evan’s game  00:24 – 15:00

Table Topic # 2 – We discuss me taking over Evan’s game  or starting my own   15:00 – 26:00

Table Topic # 3 – Rotating DM structure and my party getting killed while I wasn’t there 26:30 – 40:00

Table Topic # 4 – We briefly discuss encounter building theory in different editions  40:00 – 46:45

Table Topic # 5 – some PC’s don’t understand what a Sphere of Annihilation is.  46:50  – 51:11

As always comments are appreciated, thanks for listening, and send us some topics to cover.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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Dungeon Talk: Episode 1 – The Beginning

Well this is the first true episode of Dungeon Talk.  We call it # 2 in the beginning, but that’s because we had an Episode 0 for a while.  We chose a couple topics brought about by our game this past Monday.

We begin with some things about the website and Michael and I’s progress on learning how to do this.

Topic 1 – 8:15 – 18:30  Evan’s  experience so far with being a first time DM.  How the game is going, and how his planning leading up to games has changed.

Topic 2-  18:30 – 36:30  Setting DC’s in the game.

Topic 3 – 36:30 – 46:30  How a game can be affected by one player interacting with the DM for too long.  We talk about a specific instance from our most recent game where a decision Michael made lead to a long drawn out role play between him and myself.  We talk about whether we thought it was a good thing, or could have been dealt with in a different way in order to keep the other players involved in the game.

Topic 4 – 43:30  –  51:05   We discuss a couple quick battles we did with no map or mini’s

We start out by discussing the development of the website – which is still on-going. If you want to skip over all that jump to the 8:15 mark.

Thanks!!

Michael – AKA Mumbles.

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