* (0:24) A joke to an AI becomes a show topic.



* (2:48) Characters born in a cursed forest, without sunlight.



* (7:48) Characters who compulsively collect…feathers…?



* (13:18) Characters who accidentally caused a rebellion.



* (19:29) Characters with an unusual knowledge of fungi.



* (25:03) Characters who cannot stand the sight of open water.



Hosts: Dan, Julia, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Switching to a bucket list of what we want to play.



* (1:30) Wayne wants to play Dresden Files.



* (4:13) Dan still wants to play an Injustice game.



* (6:11) Mary wants to play a necromancer.



* (9:05) Doug wants to play Stargate (or something like it).



* (10:18) Wayne wants a settlement building game. Rebuild 3 demands FTB-9000 compliance!



* (14:38) Dan wants to play ourselves. The End of the World.



* (18:08) Mary wants to play multiple characters.



* (22:25) Doug wants to play Greek mythology.



* (26:00) Wayne wants to play a Sliders game with plenty of alternate history.



* (28:50) Dan wants to play Battletech (plus Mechwarrior).



* (30:17) Mary wants to play a group of paladins (with strong nods to David Eddings’ The Elenium).



* (35:37) Doug wants to play assistants to Cold War spies.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) The bucket list of games we want to run.



* (1:31) Doug’s long-term campaign.



* (3:10) Wayne’s Fallout: St. Louis game.



* (7:03) Dan’s Battletech: Silver Scorpions game. A Fabian war.



* (9:37) Mary’s Castle Ravenloft / Curse of Strahd game.



* (12:41) Doug’s western game.



* (14:58) Wayne’s campaign based on The Quiet Year. Decuma and Home.



* (18:57) Dan’s Hunter game. Dayshift, watchable on Netflix. Judgment: Apocalypse Survival Simulation.



* (22:39) Mary’s Mummy game. Spirit of the Century.



* (25:40) Doug’s Midgard campaign.



* (26:51) Whatever Wayne backed last on Kickstarter. Right now, that’s Planet of the Apes.



* (29:47) Dan’s Battletech: Solaris VII game.



* (33:36) Mary’s Oregon Trail (with dragons).



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:30) An old Apple //c computer and early computer RPGs.



* (4:16) Transitioning from video games into tabletop RPGs.



* (9:44) The expectations players bring from a video game to pen-and-paper games.



* (12:41) The tyranny of choice brought on by a lack of a character-driven path.



* (18:05) A lack of clear and connected outcomes.



* (19:50) Mixing new and veteran players.



* (26:13) Expanding intra-party roleplaying.



* (28:39) Asking why someone wanted to make the jump.



* (35:06) Trying to translate one medium into another.



Hosts: Caleb, Dan, Doug, Mary

* (0:29) What is your goal for the first session of a game?



* (2:10) Who are these characters really?



* (6:08) When the person you wanted to be isn’t who you became.



* (11:34) A buffet of NPCs.



* (16:14) Keeping the first session low pressure and shorter length.



* (20:33) The social leader of the group.



* (25:30) The flexibility in session one. Using the first game as a test of session zero.



* (33:43) Testing the waters as the Game Master.



* (37:09) Using rules and rolls a bit more than you otherwise would.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:23) Prompts and prepositions. The clockwork circus is coming to town!



* (1:40) Wayne’s circus in space.



* (4:13) Mary’s circus on the frontier.



* (7:53) Doug’s carnival of nightmares.



* (8:41) Dan’s carnival of hope.



* (13:10) Celestial crystals that grant power.



* (14:05) Mary’s crystal preppers.



* (16:08) Dan’s crystal entanglement.



* (19:45) Wayne’s crystal invasion.



* (24:57) Doug’s crystal gift.



* (27:05) A whole lot of tests, quandaries, and Faustian deals.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Fear the Con has funded and the sign-up site is live! We hope to see you Thursday, June 20th to Saturday, June 22nd.



* (1:58) Getting back to what you love, inspired by Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing.



* (5:16) The tyranny of compromise.



* (9:54) Wanting the GM to build the world instead of “yes-and” player input.



* (15:43) Why Wayne discarded some ideas he was excited about.



* (19:06) The passion for sharing stories.



* (22:06) Watching players engage with obstacles and NPCs.



* (26:06) Hopeful or despondent?



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Wayne has a problem: the Wardens from Dresden Files. Coming up with too many excuses for why powerful organizations don’t care about the characters’ problems.



* (7:14) Session Zero can help…or maybe not.



* (10:29) There’s always someone bigger, and maybe your allies lack what you need.



* (14:42) What if the characters are the backup? Or maybe they’re starting to get a reputation.



* (17:41) Not letting it become a chip on the GM’s shoulder. Players that hamstring themselves.



* (23:45) The assistance not being what the players expected.



* (27:54) Falling back to the mature answer.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:30) What steps do we take to bring a character to life?



* (1:49) Ask what’s important.



* (6:53) Seeing the good and bad in a single trait.



* (8:06) Doug’s personality triangle model.



* (10:54) Demonstrating character quirks.



* (16:34) Making characters that both have and express personal growth.



* (18:57) Taking a hobby, off-topic skill, or development path. Keeping your character in continuity.



* (23:11) Practicing a character.



* (29:43) Developing your idea in other creative media, but consider leaving a gap before the game begins.



* (35:35) The last few days of the Fear the Con 2024 Kickstarter!



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

Today’s ingredient: The dead are consuming the living. Why and how? Let’s find out!



Fear the Con 2024’s Kickstarter can be found here.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) In defense of technology at the gaming table. Caleb’s setup with Owlbear Rodeo.



* (5:13) Dan’s Lion King sing-a-long and Wayne’s Ghostbusters game.



* (6:27) The deeper pool of online players, including AIs. Remoting in a missing player for an in-person game.



* (14:04) Working distance and distraction into the game.



* (17:54) Digital storage and organization. The wonder of CTRL-F.



* (25:21) Minimalization of the gaming experience.



* (30:01) Dodging some issues by allowing only one person to have technology. The visual obstruction created by laptops and such.



* (41:01) Getting digital audio to work for you.



* (45:00) Balancing it all out. Advantages, disadvantages, familiarity, and the passage of time.



Hosts: Caleb, Dan, Mary, Wayne

I decided to skip over the Iron GM and go for a Tungsten GM. The ingredient? All broadcasts cease because something won’t let them get through. What’s the game plot?



Also, the Fear the Con 2024 Kickstarter is now live here!



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:30) Dan runs a game a bit too literally.



* (4:12) The intersection of technology and roleplaying in a way that isn’t required by the game.



* (7:32) Why multimedia doesn’t pay-off the way it does in other forms of storytelling.



* (13:36) The prep time technology adds, and the stability it takes away.



* (15:59) The time spent digging up the right asset on-the-spot.



* (20:52) The physical space taken up by technology. Playing “follow the leader” at a subconscious level.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Why talk about intelligence? The Why Files episode about Cicada 3301.



* (9:24) A game takes an unhelpfully long break, only to be replaced by another RPG.



* (12:44) The lack of a bottomless “buffet of ideas” in a closed setting.



* (14:24) Use minimal starting information to give you room to work.



* (18:12) How to run a school (everyone go play Persona 5).



* (24:48) Create a wide variety of NPCs and give them their own lives.



* (30:38) Keeping the party together, even if it doesn’t quite make sense.



* (31:57) PC-specific NPCs, so you know the players are bought it.



Hosts: Dan, Mary, Wayne

* (0:22) Picking out the point we became curmudgeons and what exactly that means.



* (4:48) Being too set in our ways.



* (11:19) The self-destruction that comes with stagnation.



* (21:32) Wii have a solution.



* (24:32) Ducking new games while at a convention. Playing The Quiet Year on an airplane.



* (32:57) The role of pragmatism. Why expand your horizons when no one lets you go there, anyway?



* (38:43) There’s always going to be something wrong.



* (41:09) A lesson learned from The Why Files.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Wayne

* (0:29) Reintroducing Julia’s husband, Mike.



* (2:24) Lowered expectations, inspired by a post-pandemic world.



* (7:25) Being a bit more experimental.



* (13:18) Playing online instead of returning to the table.



* (19:18) Returning to the table instead of playing online.



* (23:58) The commonality of not being able to find an active gaming group.



* (31:54) Not lower expectations—just different ones.



Hosts: Dan, Mary, Mike, Wayne

* (0:29) Thanks to Eric Van Note for Swole Mole!



* (3:15) The value of terrible GMing.



* (8:42) Everyone is their own most inept critic. Sojourn Volume 2.



* (15:28) The worst possible outcome: something being forgettable.



* (22:20) Asking Doug to grade his own game.



* (25:35) The value of creating art, simply for the act of creation.



* (37:04) A few too many contacts in someone’s eyes.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Mary, Wayne

* (0:29) Dan prefers affiliated groups, Wayne does not.



* (2:15) Cohesion, identity, and help.



* (9:35) Affiliations you start with as opposed to those you pick up along the way.



* (11:56) The party’s direction and motivation. Affiliating with an ideal.



* (20:23) Affiliations create an obvious pool of NPC relationships.



* (25:40) External versus internal affiliations, and how they’re not mutually exclusive.



* (32:06) Taking extreme positions just to highlight the topic.



Hosts: Dan, Doug, Julia, Wayne

* (0:28) An update on the Actual Play.



* (4:48) The InSpectres RPG (at least temporarily back in print!) and our AP interlude using its rules.



* (8:09) Why play InSpectres as an interlude to the main campaign? Apparently only Dan has heard of Michelle Jenneke.



* (12:58) Plus an extra player.



* (16:10) The, “yes and,” style of gaming.



* (21:31) Assisting new players when they’re stuck.



* (26:24) Seeing roleplaying games as a starting point, not a finished product.



* (33:43) It’s not just a game; it’s on the mics.



* (39:19) No takebacks!



Hosts: Dan, Mary, Wayne

* (0:28) Things are getting set for Fear the Con! An intro to RPGs game is available for newcomers.



* (2:03) A shared Minecraft server. You can find more information on Discord.



* (5:52) Realigning your game with a mid-campaign session zero. Special thanks to Gaming with Gage.



* (8:46) Making the case to have one.



* (12:59) Remembering the times we did this during the Skies of Glass campaign.



* (16:38) Reusing or reviewing the exact same work you did in session zero.



* (23:15) Being too specific or too general.



Hosts: Dan, Mary, Wayne