RPG Lessons Learned

Dusty and Tanner return to Rokugan with Legend of the Five Rings! They talk about their latest session, including "mythology episodes", introducing supernatural elements into grounded games, GM backseat driving, dilemmas that end up having clear answers, campaign villains, how often to engage with the game's core mechanic, D1 glazing, relationship building with NPCs, the best way to study for a setting, and players controlling NPCs.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Tanner talks with Dusty about the mixed conclusion to his homebrew OSR sandbox game. Topics of conversation include how to conclude an open-ended story, Macguffins that don't work, how random encounters can generate plot, the dedication of players, GM ego, magic item design, and how (mostly) awesome The Monster Overhaul is.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

The Legend of the Five Rings mini-campaign continues! Dusty and Tanner talk about the second session, including an unexpected story climax, themes in RPG stories, misalignment driving storytelling, player monologues, reining in GMPCs, what prep looks like for a narrative game, and GM vs player obligations in play.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Tanner runs L5R 5E for Dusty as a start of a new campaign! They chat about telegraphing and predicting story moments, giving a player character a sidekick, making complex characters, role-playing in-character, how game settings and systems can influence role-playing choices, transitioning from pre-published to homebrewed adventures, pulling punches as a GM, when to house rule or let the system roll, rolling dice on your own vs publicly, tailoring a story to your players, and structuring a campaign.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Dusty and Tanner check out the G.I. Joe RPG! Topics include setting the tone before the game, adapting a group-focused game to 1 player, system cheat sheets, pre-made adventure structures, how an adventure teaches you a system, adventures that are too easy, games that make themselves a pain to play digitally, wrestling with Fantasy Grounds, and the idea of too much new-ness.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Dusty and Tanner conclude their trip through Closed Shell Castle in L5R 5E. They talk goal-oriented gaming, expectations of role-playing in the world of Rokugan, scene-based games with no procedure, role-playing character disadvantages, stories with three-act structures, setting driving a narrative, the GM as a director, player knowledge vs character knowledge and dramatic tension, long-term and short-term character goals, and continuing Kindun's adventures.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Tanner runs L5R 5E for Dusty! It's maybe his favorite roleplaying game? They discuss the tendency of players to not do homework, the self-consciousness of playing Eastern fantasy, the game of twenty questions and lifepath character creation, embodying a fictional character, playing with funny narrative dice, comfort zone gaming, losing control of your character, and open-mindedness.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Dusty runs 5E for the first time in ten years... let's see how it went. Topics include running a game for a system you don't even like, bad early 90s movies, techno-vampires, the power of re-skinning stat blocks and entire adventures, running 5E combat, and the generosity of RPG communities.

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Dusty tells Tanner about Martin's latest campaign in a Wild West Call of Cthulhu! They talk the appeal of d100 systems, Japanese COC adventures, realism in historical settings, appropriate contents for horror games, high lethality gaming, getting inspiration for player characters from other media, and ending a campaign in a "failure."

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!

Tanner talks about tying together multiple dungeons into one overarching campaign for his home group! (Note: Tanner's mic sounds a little bit hot, but the issues clear up about 9 minutes in. Sorry!!!!). They chat about survival and inventory mechanics, hex crawling and dungeon crawling, revisiting Abberant Reflections, the magic of random encounters, when to metagame and not to metagame, placing dungeons in a homebrew wilderness setting, writing good hex features, verisimilitude (or the lack thereof), and much more!

Intro / Outro Music: Mirror Image by BernardW100!