Good GMs Podcast

Welcome to another episode of the Good GMs Podcast! Your hosts, James Currie and Chuckie Tee, are joined by a legendary figure from their gaming past: screenwriter and long-time DM, James Gordon Ross. We’re putting aside the usual notes to talk about the evolution of the hobby and a revolutionary new system currently in the works.

• The $10 Dungeon Master: James Gordon Ross shares a formative memory from 1992 involving a university student who actually charged for sessions. It wasn't a con though! It was a masterclass in atmosphere, featuring four Discmans for theme music and a completely diceless session of Mage that melted his 14-year-old, combat-heavy brain.
• The "Seven Session" Problem: We discuss the reality of modern gaming, where the average group only meets seven times. James Gordon Ross explains why he’s designing a system specifically to support those massive, 120-session campaigns where characters actually have time for arcs, growth, and redemption.
• Bleed Through: A New System:                            
  • The Locution Engine: Instead of standard stats, players form "sentences" to take actions, choosing from three adverbs (Physically, Mentally, Socially), three verbs (Overpower, Manipulate, Endure), and three nouns.
  • Dice and Fracture: A roll-low system using a dice pool where ones are great, but rolling a four gives the GM "fracture" points to use against you later.
  • Genre Mashups: The system is designed for "Bleed Through," where characters from different genres—like a cowboy whose gun doesn't kill people versus one whose gun does—can exist in the same party, each governed by the "media rules" of their own home world. 

     What do you think of a system where you build sentences instead of adding modifiers? Could your group survive 120 sessions?
   

• James Gordon Ross: Check out his films Poor Agnes and Happy Fucking Sunshine.
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Welcome to the second episode of the Good GMs Podcast! Today, Chuck and James are diving into the messy, sometimes stressful, but always essential world of game prepping. Whether you’re a "read every page" kind of GM or more of a "wing it and hope for the best" type, we’re talking about what works, what doesn't, and how to survive when your players decide to set your notes on fire.

• Recent Games: James is running Masks of Nyarlathotep and Kids on Bikes in Pine Hollow, while Chuck plays modern Call of Cthulhu in Las Vegas.
• Prepping vs. Playing: We compare campaign and one-shot prep, emphasizing the need to know your material.
• The Railroading Trap: James shares how a Rippers session thrived after he ditched his notes for a player-led hook.
• Improv Balance: Discussing when to provide structure and when to follow the players.

✨Pro-Tips✨

1. Index Cards: Use Rob’s method for quick NPC and location tracking.
2. Player Delegation: Let players help with minor world-building details.
3. Visuals: Comparing physical props to digital tools like Roll20 or Kanka.

Thanks for listening, and remember—you're all good GMs!

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Get Good! Welcome to the first episode of Good GMs, a podcast for game masters and tabletop gaming storylikers. We’re James and Chuck, lifelong Game Masters who can’t stop thinking about role-playing games. We’ve spent years running sessions, building worlds, and discovering stories we never planned. Sometimes things work perfectly, and sometimes we screw up spectacularly, but we always learn, laugh, and lean on each other’s experience to make the next game even better.

✨Pro-Tips✨

• Support Good GMs on Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/GoodGMsPodcast
• Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@GoodGMsPodcast 
• Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3XSYh258bxrIjYuZpmdw2R
• Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-gms-podcast/id1851312721 
• Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goodgmspod/