What does religious faith look like in your games? Do you encourage your players to make religious faith a key part of their PCs, whether or not their character class is mechanically built around it? Andy and Chris discuss–but not before a few detours into the Dune setting, Tolkien (again), and more.

Is tabletop roleplaying “just” an escapist diversion? How and why do we approach a hobby like gaming when news and politics and life in general are so heavy and overwhelming? Chris and Andy talk about the value of creative action in times of stress.

Andy and Chris recap the build-a-dungeon/play-a-dungeon and then talk about their gaming plans for 2025. Andy wonders aloud about whether to “just” play D&D or to keep chasing his white whales.

It’s our annual holiday tradition–a TTRPG actual play in which we run the roleplaying scenario that we designed in the last episode! Join Chris and he GMs a motley band of heroes try to save Christmas. The game system we’re using is Caltrop Core (https://caltropcore.com/), adapted for this holiday-cheer-filled scenario!

It’s that time of year again! Join Chris and Andy with special guests, John Corey and Kyle Latino, as they build a dungeon live on air! This is part 1 of 2. In the next episode Chris will run the dungeon for a bunch of lovely folks.

Andy and Chris talk about the feelings they have about different methods of getting a random number. Rolling a die is great; drawing a chit from a bag is bad.

Andy and Chris talk about Baldur’s Gate 3 for too long and then Chris surprises everyone by having done a small amount of research before they discuss money in games.

Have you thought about running an epic RPG campaign–perhaps a complex published campaign like Curse of Strahd or Masks of Nyarlathotep–but find yourself unsure how to start preparing? In this episode, Andy talks with Matt Wilson, a GM who has run several large, complex campaigns to learn some tips and tricks for preparing to run …

Continue reading "Episode 154 – How Do You Prepare to Run an Epic Campaign? (with Matt Wilson)"

Andy and Chris talk about running games on holidays and what exactly makes it so compelling. They also talk about the upcoming D&D DMG, Alien tie-in novels, and The Left Hand of Darkness.

Have you ever used a mini-game in a tabletop RPG–a game that steps completely outside the official rules of your RPG to resolve a particular situation? We discuss Chris’ experimental one-shot in which he tried out some fun mini-games. Also discussed: Chris’ experience reading The Silmarillion.