Side Passages

With help from the Lair community, we collected eight house rules for Shadowdark. On this episode, we run through them, offering our thoughts on how they might impact the game (most of these are not rules we've tried ourselves, so we'd love some more field reports!) Leave them in the comments, or email us at [email protected].

Want more ShadowDark? We've got more ShadowDark!

d8 ShadowDark Mistakes We Made (S4E19)

d12 Ways ShadowDark is Awesome! (S4E15)

Shadowdark Impressions (Campaigns & Coffee)

Unboxing Cursed Scrolls 3: Midnight Sun for ShadowDark

Chapters

00:00 Introduction00:54 Monster 2403:02 VALHOLL!04:21 Shadowfinder Complete Bestiary05:24 Creating and Adapting Monsters for ShadowDark14:16 The Monster Overhaul15:12 Ruincairn Bestiary17:20 ShadowDark Monster Tools19:34 Conclusion and Future Discussions

Listen to the Episode

Watch to the Episode

Watch d8 ShadowDark Monster Resources on YouTube.

Show Notes

ShadowDark specific Monster Resources

Monster 24

Cost: $2 (pay what you want)

250 monsters by Tom Phillips, who spent 2024 creating monsters and publishing them to Reddit. This compiles his various critters into one document. Includes gaggles of hags (forest hags, tomb hags, venom hags), plenty of plants (carnivorous cave moss, blood orchid, vampire grass), and oodles of oozes and slimes (chaos pudding, green slime, umber jelly)

VALHOLL! Nashcraeft #1

Cost: $6.99

A fanzine that builds on Cursed Scrolls #3: Midnight Sun. Introduces a bunch of monsters as well as a “lot system” as alternative to carousing, new magic items, new blessings, and 4 classes.

Shadowfinder Complete Bestiary

Cost: $25 (PDF) $29 (POD+PDF) as part of the Kickstarter

Every PF 1E bestiary, #1-6, converted for Shadowdark RPG. The kickstarter is over; hopefully they’ll release this for sale when the Kickstarter-created book releases in October 2025.

Creating and Adapting Monsters for ShadowDark

Cost: $5 (pay what you want)

Very handy, fan-created rules for making your own monsters (or converting them from other systems).

Advice on creating monsters including “VIBES OVER COMPLEXITY”, “USE NATURAL LANGUAGE”, “MONSTER SPELLS ARE WEIRD”, and “RULES ARE MEANT TO BE BROKEN”

Options include:

BUILD BY EQUIVALENTS

If your monster is like a knight, bugbear, or zombie … just use the stat block as is.

BUILD BY ADAPTATION

Say you want to recreate the 5e Bandit Captain, you take the ShadowDark bandit, and beef it up. 

BUILD BY BENCHMARK

E.g. converting Yakfolk warrior. Look at the CR (in this case, CR 3, compare it to CR3 monsters in ShadowDark, and start building.

It has a talent bank describing all kinds of monster capabilities and a big list of monster spells.

 It includes a bunch of horrors as well, including blink dogs, ettins, pseudodragons, unique horrors like the  “Eyeball Wall”, and a number of NPCs (pyromancer, cultist, etc.).

ShadowDark adjacent Resources

Runecairn Bestiary

Cost: $13.49

100 Norse-inspired monsters for Runecairn, an Old School Renaissance RPG. The OSR stat blocks are close enough to ShadowDark to make conversion pretty easy. Includes sabertooth cats, grave newts, ogres, and giant octopi.

The Monster Overhaul

Cost: $30.00 (PDF) $60 (PDF+Print)

Come for the 200+ monsters, stay for the ecology and random table pieces. Uniformly praised online. It’s got entries for NPCs (adventurers, barbarians) each with d100 names and character traits. For monsters, it delves beyond the stat block.

Goblins get the same d100 names and traits PLUS physical descriptions, motivations, mounts, elite weapons, and loot. 

Plus there are random tables like “50 mercenary jobs” and generic maps of locations like a wizard tower and a village.

ShadowDark Monster Tools

ShadowDark Tools: Monster Reference

Filter monsters from the ShadowDark core rules + the first three Cursed Scrolls. Criteria include monster level, environment, type (e.g. angel, aberration), movement type (burrow, climb, fly), attack (blood drain, petrify, venom), effect (blindness, charm), and trait (corrosive, damage reduction, immune non-silvered weapons)

Ken the DM’s Shadowdark RPG Monsters By Level

A PDF index of ShadowDark core monsters by level. It includes each monster's special abilities and its page number.

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A list of monster stat blocks generated using ShadowDark Tools.

The edgerunners finally flipped the switch at the bottom of Elysium HQ's subbasements.

As the power surged back, a wrathful AI queen named Hera burst to life, proclaiming her refusal to serve any false gods or corporate masters. She sees to draw the crew — APT, Angry Bob, Omen, and Atlas — into her web of revenge against Jason Antilles, a tech bro CIO who escaped Earth’s devastation for an orbital Olympus.

Get more Cyberpunk RED:

Cyberpunk RED Actual Play @ Lair of Secrets

Cyberpunk RED Role-Playing Game Resources

Cyberpunk RED Frequently Asked Questions

Cyberpunk RED Screamsheets

Chapters

00:00 Intro1:04 Recap of the last mission2:27 Hera awakens, demands loyalty5:00 Digging into Antilles’ backstory7:15 The Wrathful Queen’s digital gifts10:00 Team heals up in eerie med-labs15:00 Planning escape routes, avoiding turrets20:00 Discussing Erebus, Cerberus, and past scars25:00 Moral debates and fixer mysteries30:00 Stepping back into the hot zone35:00 Prepping next moves and research42:00 Outro and episode wrap-up

Listen to the Episode

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Watch Cyberpunk RED Chapter 10: Hera's Wrath on YouTube.

Show Notes

Recap of the team’s mission: descend into Elysium HQ, flip the switch, collect payday

Activation of Hera, an AI queen filled with rage against Hercules Corp and Jason Antilles

Team dialogue with Hera: pledging loyalty (for now) to survive, receiving cryptic gifts (golden apple, pomegranate, persimmon)

Background on Antilles, Olympus orbital, and corporate lore

Tension builds over the meaning of Hera’s demands and the risks of unleashing AI beyond the Blackwall

Characters reflect on past wounds (both physical and emotional) while healing in futuristic med bays

Planning next steps: research Hera, investigate who hired them, understand the nature of the gifts, and strategize upcoming infiltrations

Banter and camaraderie among players, with moral dilemmas surfacing

Cliffhanger: the team escapes the ruins, heading into Night City’s dangerous streets on foot, fruits and fate in tow

Featured Image Meta

A marble bust of the Greek goddess Hera.

Grab your coffee and join the Lair crew as we unpack the challenge of fostering player agency in tabletop RPGs. We explore how to spark proactive decisions, avoid the paralysis of infinite choice, and leverage mechanics that reward bold, cinematic play.

Chapters

0:00 Intro1:00 Star Wars Sparks and hesitant players3:00 Fear of splitting the party and analysis paralysis6:30 Encouraging proactive play and giving permission10:00 Using patrons and clear motivations14:00 Narrative hooks and inciting actions17:00 Video game parallels and open-world stress20:00 Mechanics: fate points, plot points, and inspiration24:00 Player chaos: volunteering as hostages26:00 Minion promotions and closing comments

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Watch Player Agency on YouTube.

Show Notes

Erin’s Star Wars SPARKS games: hesitant players and dusty Star Destroyers

Fear of splitting the party and the paralysis of choice

Giving players permission to act and making decisions cinematic

Narrative hooks: long-lost brothers, ticking clocks, and patrons

Game mechanics fueling agency: Fate Core, Cortex, Savage Worlds, inspiration points

Stories from the table: defeating big bads too quickly, volunteering as hostages, “Benny from The Mummy” moments

The balance between modules and improvisation

Open-world video game parallels (No Man’s Sky, Red Dead Redemption, Skyrim)

The episode’s closing: minion questions, potential promotions, and how to connect with the show

Featured Image Meta

A collection of twenty-sided dice.

With the first arc of our Fallout 2d20 campaign completed, we sit down with some coffee to reflect on the game.

We talk about the 2d20 system's strengths, campaign story arcs, funky dice, perk cards, and immersive mechanics. Looking ahead, we think about future campaign goals, new characters, and deeper dives into Fallout-style survival gameplay.

Want more Fallout 2d20? Check out:

Post: Fallout 2d20 Campaign & RPG Resources

Podcast: Gore and Lore in Fallout – Campaigns & Coffee

Podcast: Fallout Zones

Chapters

0:00 Intro & Fallout Campaign Overview1:17 First Impressions of the Fallout 2D20 System3:38 Luck as a Game-Breaking Stat?6:05 Perks, PDFs, and the Art of Scavenging8:22 Critiques: Special Dice, Proprietary Components10:23 What Didn't Work—Or We Didn't Use13:40 Cheat Sheets and GM Tools14:44 Favorite In-Game Moments16:42 Character Growth and Future Arcs20:15 Would You Play It Again?21:56 Combat Mechanics and Cover23:04 Planning the Next Arc: Session Zero Redux24:56 Minion Mailbag: Dungeon Guard Duty Snacks26:10 Outro

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Watch Fallout 2d20 Wrap-up (Campaigns & Coffee) on YouTube.

Show Notes

Fallout 2D20 system wrap-up after six sessions

Reflections on long break and return to post-apocalyptic play

Mechanics discussion: perks, action points, special dice, and the role of luck

Praise and critiques: rulebook usability, proprietary materials, and gameplay smoothness

Favorite moments: Pip-Boy puzzles, Nurse 17’s goldfish crusade, and ghoul roleplay

Hopes for future arcs: deeper scavenging, zone maps, and expanded character growth

Josh contemplating retiring "Lucky Buck"

Session Zero for planning future campaign direction

Bonus question: Best snack for dungeon guard duty

Featured Image

The door from Vault 81 in Fallout 4.

Join us for the Lair of Secrets' annual summer reading list! We run down a few of the books on our respective lists, but we're always looking for more!

Featured in this episode are:

Red Sonja Consumed by Gail Simone

When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi

Cold Eternity by S.A. Barnes

Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente

Infinite Archive (The Midsolar Murders #3) by Mur Lafferty

Vicious by V.E. Schwab

As well as side quests to talk about Iain Banks' The Culture series, Terry Prachett's Discworld, and Neal Stephenson's Seveneves.

Suggest your own book ideas in the comments!

Chapters

0:00 Intro & Rocket Misfires0:40 Red Sonja: Sword & Sorcery Revival1:45 Moon Cheese Madness: Scalzi’s Absurd Apocalypse3:10 Seveneves vs. Moon Made of Cheese4:20 Ghosts in Cryo: Cold Eternity Breakdown5:35 Space Opera and the Glam-paign Idea6:50 Infinite Archive: Murder, She Wrote in Space8:00 Vicious by V.E. Schwab: Superpowered Rivalry9:10 The Overflowing To-Read Pile10:20 Pratchett’s Final Discworld Reflections11:20 Saying Goodbye to The Culture Series12:00 More Books, More Time: Summer Reading Goals13:10 Share Your Book Picks!14:00 Outro & Call to Action

Listen to the Episode

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Watch Summer Reading List 2025 (S4E24) on YouTube.

Show Notes

Red Sonja Consumed by Gail Simone (Ken) - I got this as a Christmas present, and I’m looking forward to Gail’s take on Red Sonja in novel form (I already read the comic book series she wrote; it was great).

From the book blurb:

The gutsy, wild, tortured free spirit, forged in pain yet unafraid of life or death, Red Sonja, the famous, fiery She-Devil and barbarian of Hyrkania has never concerned herself with the consequences of her actions. She’s taken what she wanted, from treasure to drink to the companionship of bedfellows. She’s fought who deserved it (and sometimes those who didn’t). And she’s never looked back. But when rumors start bubbling up from her homeland—rumors of unknown horrors emerging from the ground and pulling their unsuspecting victims to their deaths—and a strange voice begins whispering to her in her sleep, she realizes she may have to return to the country that abandoned her. And finally do the only thing that has ever scared her: confront her past.

When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi (David) - I’ve been a fan of most of Scalzi’s books. This is one of his more humorous books like Starter Villain and Kaiju Preservation Society. I’m looking forward to it. It’s also going to hold me over until the next Old Man’s War book comes out.

The moon has turned into cheese.

Now humanity has to deal with it.

For some it’s an opportunity. For others it’s a moment to question their faith: In God, in science, in everything. Still others try to keep the world running in the face of absurdity and uncertainty. And then there are the billions looking to the sky and wondering how a thing that was always just there is now... something absolutely impossible.

Astronauts and billionaires, comedians and bank executives, professors and presidents, teenagers and terminal patients at the end of their lives -- over the length of an entire lunar cycle, each get their moment in the moonlight. To panic, to plan, to wonder and to pray, to laugh and to grieve. All in a kaleidoscopic novel that goes all the places you’d expect, and then to so many places you wouldn’t.

It’s a wild moonage daydream. Ride this rocket.

Cold Eternity by S.A. Barnes (Ken) – Barnes’ third sci-fi/horror/ghost story novel is out. I loved the creepy atmosphere of the first two, which makes this one an easy pick.

Halley is on the run from an interplanetary political scandal that has put a huge target on her back. She heads for what seems like the perfect place to lay low: a gigantic space barge storing the cryogenically frozen bodies of Earth’s most fortunate citizens from more than a century ago…

The cryo program, created by trillionaire tech genius Zale Winfeld, is long defunct, and the AI hologram "hosts," ghoulishly created in the likeness of Winfeld’s three adult children, are glitchy. The ship feels like a crypt, and the isolation gets to Halley almost immediately. She starts to see figures crawling in the hallways, and there’s a constant scraping, slithering, and rattling echoing in the vents.

It’s not long before Halley realizes she may have gotten herself trapped in an even more dangerous situation than the one she was running from….

Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente - This one has been on my Kindle for way too long. It’s about time I ready what is described as “The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy meets the joy and glamour of Eurovision”. It may also feed into my vision of creating a Glampaign game.

A century ago, the Sentience Wars tore the galaxy apart and nearly ended the entire concept of intelligent space-faring life. In the aftermath, a curious tradition was invented—something to cheer up everyone who was left and bring the shattered worlds together in the spirit of peace, unity, and understanding.

Once every cycle, the great galactic civilizations gather for the Metagalactic Grand Prix—part gladiatorial contest, part beauty pageant, part concert extravaganza, and part continuation of the wars of the past. Species far and wide compete in feats of song, dance and/or whatever facsimile of these can be performed by various creatures who may or may not possess, in the traditional sense, feet, mouths, larynxes, or faces. And if a new species should wish to be counted among the high and the mighty, if a new planet has produced some savage group of animals, machines, or algae that claim to be, against all odds, sentient? Well, then they will have to compete. And if they fail? Sudden extermination for their entire species.

This year, though, humankind has discovered the enormous universe. And while they expected to discover a grand drama of diplomacy, gunships, wormholes, and stoic councils of aliens, they have instead found glitter, lipstick, and electric guitars. Mankind will not get to fight for its destiny—they must sing.

Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes have been chosen to represent their planet on the greatest stage in the galaxy. And the fate of Earth lies in their ability to rock.

Infinite Archive (The Midsolar Murders #3) by Mur Laffery (Ken) – The third book in Mur’s space murder whodunnit series comes out July 1st, 2025, which means it's definitely going to be on my vacation reading list. Who doesn’t want to take a cozy sci fi murder mystery book to the beach?

 Amateur sleuth Mallory Viridian has just about got her bearings aboard the space station she calls home, but now the physical embodiment of the Internet is on its way, and it's bringing murder with it.

Mallory Viridian has had a quiet few months. Even with the increased influx of humans visiting Station Eternity, she hasn’t seen so much as a bar brawl. Used to people dying left and right around her, the lack of murders to solve has left her unexpectedly . . . bored.

But humanity's favorite way to waste time is on its way to her sector of the galaxy. A giant, one-of-a-kind data ship called Metis is bringing the entire Internet from Earth—as well as a mystery fan convention. On top of that, Mallory's literary agent is aboard, and he tells Mallory that she's the keynote speaker.

It's almost a relief when a killer decides to strike at the convention. When Mallory finds her agent dead, she knows she has to work fast to find the murderer. With a strange new alien with unknown motives, a ship with impossible abilities, a lonely living, comprehensive Internet, and a deadly crime to solve, Mallory has her work cut out for her ....

Vicious by V.E. Schwab - Erin gave this to me as a gift longer than I would like to think about. It’s time to read it.

Victor and Eli started out as college roommates—brilliant, arrogant, lonely boys who recognized the same sharpness and ambition in each other. In their senior year, a shared research interest in adrenaline, near-death experiences, and seemingly supernatural events reveals an intriguing possibility: that under the right conditions, someone could develop extraordinary abilities. But when their thesis moves from the academic to the experimental, things go horribly wrong.

Ten years later, Victor breaks out of prison, determined to catch up to his old friend (now foe), aided by a young girl whose reserved nature obscures a stunning ability. Meanwhile, Eli is on a mission to eradicate every other super-powered person that he can find—aside from his sidekick, an enigmatic woman with an unbreakable will. Armed with terrible power on both sides, driven by the memory of betrayal and loss, the archnemeses have set a course for revenge—but who will be left alive at the end?

In Vicious, V. E. Schwab brings to life a gritty comic-book-style world in vivid prose: a world where gaining superpowers doesn't automatically lead to heroism, and a time when allegiances are called into question.

Featured Image Meta

Seven President's Beach in Long Branch, NJ. Photo by Ken.

The crew infiltrates a raider lair to rescue a kidnapped girl, navigating irradiated sewers, sentry turrets, and a heavily armed Thriftway gang. Steve NuGunnar faces off against his nemesis Thriftway in a brutal final encounter to reclaim his prized NuRay 3000.

Fallout 2d20 Campaign Page: An overview of the campaign, plus links to episodes and related game resources.

Fallout 2d20 Resources: Links to community forums, wikis, rules, podcasts, and cheat sheets.

Chapters

0:00 Intro & Recap2:10 Turret Ambush!4:59 Raider Chase Begins7:35 Ghoulardi Loots, Team Pushes Forward14:00 Echoes and Radiation20:00 The Showdown Chamber28:00 Frag Grenade Chicken Toss36:00 Raider Meltdown in the Water45:00 Lucky Buck and the Leg Blasts54:00 Ghoulardi's Sniper Shot1:03:00 Nuka Cherry Rage Shotgun1:12:00 Raider Wrath and Ramming Speed1:20:00 The Last Shot at Thriftway1:27:00 Terminal Hacking Mini-Game1:39:00 Brotherhood Logs & Power Armor1:41:00 Cliffhanger Ending

Listen to the Episode

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Watch Fallout 2d20 Chapter 5: Thriftway Throwdown on YouTube.

Show Notes

Recap of the mission: tracking the kidnapped girl from Covenant

Opening battle: turret gun ambush and team tactics

Nurse 17 charges into the fray armed with teddy bears and tea party rage

Lucky Buck's accidental luck-fueled sharpshooting streak

Ghoulardi’s chicken-stuffed frag grenade attack

Steve NuGunnar confronts Thriftway for the NuRay 3000

Girl rescued from a makeshift cage by Nurse 17

Fallout-style terminal hacking minigame live!

Discovery of Brotherhood T-60 power armor and terminal logs

Time freezes, leaving the team mid-victory…

Featured Image

A view of sewers from Fallout 4.

On this episode, Ken recaps running ShadowDark, Mothership, and Gaslands Refueled at a local RPG convention. We also delve into how to support your local conventions (MEPACon in the Pennsylvania, and Who's Yer Con? in Indiana).

Chapters

0:00 Intro & MEPACon Setup2:10 Venue Upgrade & Con History4:00 ShadowDark: Morka Norden Recap7:00 Learning from Live Play & Light Mechanics9:30 Mothership Funnel: Decanted Breakdown13:00 Emergency Decanting & Medical Mishaps17:00 Engineering, Design Tweaks, & Player Strategy22:00 Gaslands: Straight to Hell Tutorial26:00 Concrete Jungle & Advanced Play Challenges30:00 Why Local Cons Matter & Final Reflections

Listen to the Episode

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Watch Support your Local Convention (S4E22) on YouTube.

Show Notes

MEPACon RECAP

What is MEPACon?

MEPACon stands for "Mid-Eastern Pennsylvania Gaming Convention"

Located near Allentown, PA

About 30 minutes from Ken’s house. 

Held every six month, in spring and fall

Not sure on the exact head count, but Ken's thinking 150 people. Probably more.

Moved to Delta Hotels by Marriott, which is a MUCH better hotel than the previous one (which is being torn down)

Ken ran four games:

Decanted: A Mothership funnel … that failed at being a funnel. Except, maybe not?

Morka Nordan: A ShadowDark adventure ripped from Ken’s lunchtime adventure

Got used to the digital tabletop handling all the light stuff. It's harder to do in the real world.

This is the game where Ken realized just how many ShadowDark mistakes he'd made with his lunch time game.

Two Gaslands Refueled games

Straight to Hell: A 2-hour intro game

Concrete Jungle: A 2-hour race/battle royal game that probably needs to be 4 hours. And maybe I just need to run three 2-hour slot tutorials during the weekend to build up a base of experienced players.

Supporting Your Local Conventions

Importance of local conventions for playtesting, community, and outreach

Thoughts on prepping for Who’s Yer Con and leveraging past games

Reflections on building in-person player communities post-pandemic

Featured Image Meta

An old-time ariel map of Allentown, PA.

After some bartering in Covenant, the Wastelanders continue their quest to hunt down Thriftway's raiders. The Wastelanders' goal? Recover Steve NuGunner's NuRay 3000. Oh, and a girl who was kidnapped from Covenant by the raiders.

Fallout 2d20 Campaign Page: An overview of the campaign, plus links to episodes and related game resources.

Fallout 2d20 Resources: Links to community forums, wikis, rules, podcasts, and cheatsheets.

Chapters

0:00 Intro & Wasteland Recap5:15 Covenant Refuge and Raider Fallout13:10 Upgrades, Bartering & Lars’ Plea20:40 Junkyard Clues & Mole Rat Mayhem31:25 Tracking Raiders & Teddy Bear Prep40:10 Ambush in the Wastes: Sneak or Shoot52:45 Sewer Entrance & Guard Elimination1:00:50 Shotgun Justice & Laser Luck1:17:35 Sewer Showdown & Whip Disarm1:33:55 The Turret Twist & Fallout Cliffhanger

Listen to the Episode

Watch to the Episode

Watch Fallout 2d20 Chapter 4: Shotgun Justice on YouTube.

Show Notes

The wasteland adventurers delve deeper into the irradiated heart of the wasteland as Steve NuGunner, Lucky Buck, Goulardi, and Nurse 17 arrive at the battered settlement of Covenant. After narrowly fending off raiders, they resupply, regroup, and are thrust into a high-stakes mission: rescue a kidnapped girl taken by Thriftway’s Enclave-aligned raiders.

Nurse 17 gets upgraded with stealth and speed, becoming a teddy bear-draped death machine, while Steve is laser-focused on retrieving his beloved NuRay 3000. Following tracks to a junkyard-turned-camp, the group uncovers clues leading them to an ominous sewer entrance.

Their infiltration escalates quickly as stealth gives way to gunfire and buzzsaws. From sneak attacks to shotgun justice, the team cuts through the raiders, pushing deeper and deeper into the base. Along the way, they interrogate a survivor, sprint into potential traps, and navigate the green-tinged threat of an oncoming radiation storm. The episode crescendos with a chase into the sewer depths—just in time for the hum of an auto-turret coming online.

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A man aims a shotgun in a screenshot from Fallout 4.

Ken and David explore Moonbeam.stream, a streaming platform made for tabletop gamers and creatives, while sharing their live-streaming experiments and future content plans.

They also dive into their respective ShadowDark campaigns, filled with dungeon chefs, dagger-bound skeletons, and low-level party drama. Ken preps for his return to Philmont, while David tempts fate with yet another enticing Kickstarter.

Moonbeam sites

Moonbeam.streaming

The Lair's Realm on Moonbeam

Chapters

0:09 What Is Moonbeam.stream?1:19 Streaming Past and Present2:48 Live Streaming Experiments3:28 Ken's OBS Trials & Switch Bridge Setup4:50 Drawing Dungeons and Mothership Maps5:46 Streaming One-Shots and Actual Plays6:07 The DIE: Die Improvement Environment7:24 Portal Vibes & Co-Working Streams9:29 Scheduling & Chaos Coordination14:21 Ken’s Training for Philmont18:18 Altitude, Monsoons, and Backpack Logistics25:04 Cooking in the Dungeon: ShadowDark Update28:24 Party Health Woes and Lucky Rolls30:55 Skeletons, Dire Rats & Goblin Politics33:49 ShadowDark Western Reaches Kickstarter35:13 Alien RPG Evolved Temptation35:55 Wrap-Up and Community Links

Listen to the Episode

Watch to the Episode

Watch Moonbeam Chasing (S4E20) on YouTube.

Show Notes

What is Moonbeam?

Not a crypto-currency. Ok, it is, but we’re not talking about THAT Moonbeam.

It’s a streaming platform, currently in beta, that’s meant to have better moderation capabilities and a more creator-friendly pay structure.

What are we doing with Moonbeam?

Game Prep

Campaign Notes

Map Prep

FoundryVTT exploration

Random experiments

Video Games?

Maybe. 

Ken’s thinking about a Switch bridge.

Actual Play

RPGs

The Die Improvement Environment or D.I.E.

Helping rehabilitate those recalcitrant dice.

Stuff we like so far

Co-working Streams

Random folks playing video games

Haven’t watched an RPG session yet (probably should)

Stuff we probably need to figure out

A recording schedule?

Posting?

Figuring out how Realms work. (We’ve got a Lair of Secrets realm, but how does it interact with other realms?)

Featured Image Meta

A black and white image of the moon over Lake Champlain. Photo by Ken.

On this episode, we talk about the top mistakes we made running ShadowDark (aka "how Ken accidentally enabled hard mode for his campaign").

Our mistakes include "overly complicate torch management", "create deadlier rat diseases", "don't use Luck points", and more!

Looking for more ShadowDark content? Check out these Lair episodes:

d12 Ways ShadowDark is Awesome! (S4E15)

Shadowdark Impressions (Campaigns & Coffee)

Chapters

Listen to the Episode

Watch to the Episode

Watch d8 ShadowDark Mistakes We Made on YouTube.

Show Notes

1. Overcomplicate Torch Management

You don't need to do torch gymnastics to light a new one. If your old one is burning down, and the players want to start a new torch, they do it. The timer is reset to 60 minutes, and the old torch is discarded.

Keeping fractional torches around ("But we had 15 minutes left on this torch!") is a natural impulse given the importances (and potential scarcity) of light, but fractional torches make things complicated. And the mechanic isn't meant to be complicated.

A reasonable house rule I've seen for torches that go out less than halfway through their burn cycle is to round down to 30 minutes. Keeping track of "half torches" is still work, but less work than breaking it down further.

That said, if you’re under threat, then yes, there are torch gymnastics. There’s a DC 12 Dexterity check to ignite a torch under such conditions. - If it’s dark, same DC, but with disadvantage. We’ll talk more about that in our ShadowDark house rules episode coming up. (Sly Flourish - https://slyflourish.com/shadowdark_house_rules.html)

2. Create even deadlier rat diseases

The common rat in ShadowDark is infected with a fast acting disease that immediately saps the adventurer's Constitution. Depending on how you interpret the rule, it either prevents all healing until the adventurer makes a saving throw OR the adventure can't recover their lost Con until they make a saving throw.

Ken chose the latter.

3.  Don't use luck points

For Ken’s first few games, he didn’t use Luck points at all. Which, given how deadly ShadowDark is, can be a pretty big difficulty upgrade for players.

Running the same scenario at a convention (and swapping in a Seer character from Cursed Scrolls #3) revealed just how helpful Luck tokens are (the seer being able to create Luck tokens 3x per day).

4. Get Spell Mishaps Wrong

Ken’s game made spell failure MUCH more dangerous by rolling on the mishap chart whenever a spell casting attempt failed (and not just on critical fumbles, as per the rules).

This makes it much more likely your 1st level character is going to get killed when failing to cast a spell.

5. Don't Plan for Carousing

Carousing is a big part of the game. During downtime, players can spend gold to have adventures in town, earning XP, acquiring allies (and maybe an enemy). But to do it, they need gold … so it helps to make sure that they’ll actually have that gold when they got home. 

Also, read the carousing and “learn skills” downtime activities before you start the adventure, so you know what the players can do at the end. 

6. Get Stuck in D&D 5e Mode

ShadowDark is a cousin of D&D 5e … and 5e has a rule for everything. It’s easy to bring in default 5e assumptions (I’m looking at you, opportunity attacks) rather than looking for the ShadowDark equivalent. 

7. Stress about when to level up

Do you level up at session's end or in the middle of the session? This is more a preference than a mistake (though your mileage may vary). Leveling up is super easy in ShadowDark, but it does slow things down a bit.

8 Wasting time looking up rules that don't exist

ShadowDark is a rules-light game. D&D or Pathfinder fans may come in looking for detailed rules for, well, just about everything.

Most of the time, ShadowDark doesn’t have them. Like “Learning” during downtime. The book provides some guidelines for what they can’t do (learn another class’s or ancestries’ unique talents) and two examples of what they can (a new language, how to ride a sandworm using a harness). There’s no big list of skills (but though you could steal from backgrounds).

Don’t worry. Just roll with it.

Featured Image Meta

The background image is the map from Lost Citadel of the Scarlet Minotaur, featured in the ShadowDark quick-start rules.