The Indie Game Talk Club

Episode Synopsis Paul and Dusey ask and answer: is player agency always sacrosanct? Should every new roleplayer start in a dungeon? Did Tolkien know how to name women and did he care? And why everything in every game, table and session is a trade-off. Plus talk about The Slow Knife and Urban Shadows. Weird Terminology and Acronyms Bleed: The spillover of emotions between character and player. DungeonTube: The ecosystem of YouTube creators who make videos about D&D and other RPGs. Flags/Flagging: An indication of a player’s interests, or disinterests, at the table. An explicit character motivation or goal, a belief, a very high skill, a character class, really anything at all that tells the table “I want this” or, perhaps “I do not want this.” LARP: Live Action Role Play. Once again we direct you toward Wikipedia for more information. It’s an incredibly rich, complex body of work! IGRC is far more interested in the Nordic larp tradition than other forms.  OSR: Old School Revolution/Revival/Renaissance. Our definition will probably start fights, so go to Wikipedia for a hopefully more neutral take. PbtA: Powered by the Apocalypse, the meta-platform pseudo-concept not-a-license game design framework that arose with the publication of Apocalypse World. Player agency: A player’s authority over their character’s actions and feelings at the table. Trad: A conventional RPG with a central facilitator with control over the world, players with control over their characters, resolution systems mostly concerned with material outcomes, frequently focused on tactical combat. Modern Mythology has a good article that differs from this a little but is still worth reading. X-Card/Safety: You don’t know everything about everyone at the table, and sometimes subject matter or play style can be upsetting in a way the participants did not opt in for. John Stavropolous created the X-Card, one of the first explicit safety tools. The Indie Game Reading Club has also covered safety. Games and RPG products referred to in this episode.  These are affiliate links to DriveThruRPG, where hopefully we can earn enough pennies to defray the cost of acquiring these games. The Indie Game Reading Club does not accept free or promotional copies of games! If it’s not available in PDF from DriveThruRPG, we link to the publishers or retailers where the games are available. Apocalypse World Avatar Legends Blades in the Dark Cowboy Bebop Dragonbane Escape the Dark Castle Fire in the Lake (COIN) John Company Masks: A New Generation Monsterhearts Mothership Mutant: Year Zero Stonetop Tenra Bansho Zero The Burning Wheel The Slow Knife Torchbearer Urban Shadows Wanderhome Zombie World Contact Us As always: If you have questions, comments, ideas or complaints, email us at [email protected]!

Episode Synopsis Paul and Dusey talk about onboarding new roleplayers, monetizing your hobbies, priming a table for optimal play, and the power and limits of genre. Content warning: D&D is mentioned! Weird Terminology and Acronyms Apophenia: the brain’s natural tendency to create patterns from inputs, whether there are intentional patterns there or not. Wikipedia has a whole lot more information! Genre: one of those wide-open words folks can get lost in the weeds defining and defending. In this episode, we mean subject matter, theme, setting, and expectations. For example, the zombie survival genre as defined by work like The Walking Dead, The Last of Us, or 28 Days Later. There are dangerous beings that used to be living humans, those beings might not be the most dangerous thing about the world, the world order has collapsed after the arrival of these beings, and we expect our protagonists to be faced with high-stakes choices as they try to survive. In game talk, “genre” can mean a lot of other things as well! Trope: A “rule” of a genre, a recognizable moment, theme, or other element. In the zombie survival genre, for example: roving gangs of survivors, living villains who are more dangerous than the zombies because of understandable motivations, hiding the fact that you’ve been bitten and endangering everyone around you.  LARP: Live Action Role Play. Once again we direct you toward Wikipedia for more information. It’s an incredibly rich, complex body of work! IGRC is far more interested in the Nordic larp tradition than other forms.  Flags: In rpg talk, signals between players pointing toward interests, preferences, or no-go areas. Choosing a warrior-type character might be a flag pointing toward an interest in violence and fighting, or it might be a flag pointing toward themes of regret and the cost of violence. Some games have explicit flags, such as stated goals or personality traits, while others offer only implicit flags, such as skill or class choices. Troy Costick has a nice blog entry about flags. X-Card/Safety: You don’t know everything about everyone at the table, and sometimes subject matter or play style can be upsetting in a way the participants did not opt in for. John Stavropolous created the X-Card, one of the first explicit safety tools. The Indie Game Reading Club has also covered safety. PbtA: Powered by the Apocalypse, the meta-platform pseudo-concept not-a-license game design framework that arose with the publication of Apocalypse World. Distributed Authority/GMful: Both phrases point toward roleplaying games in which duties typically enshrined in a single player at the table are spread among multiple players. These games typically feel much different at the table because there isn’t a central authority (GM/DM/facilitator) with final say on all non-character matters. Games and RPG products referred to in this episode.  These are affiliate links to DriveThruRPG, where hopefully we can earn enough pennies to defray the cost of acquiring these games. The Indie Game Reading Club does not accept free or promotional copies of games! Dragon Town Birthright King Arthur Pendragon Dark Sun Ghosts of Saltmarsh Dragonlance Zombie World Desperation Noteboard Dragonbane Mutants & Masterminds Fiasco Call of Cthulhu Basic Role Playing (BRP) Dungeon World Apocalypse World Monsterhearts The Slow Knife — Project information For The Queen Dragon Braggin’ The Quiet Year A Complicated Profession Trouble For Hire Stewpot Daggerheart After The War Songfall Survivors Breathless Substratum Protocol The Facility Invisible Sun Impulse Drive Coriolis: The Great Dark The Burning Wheel Contact Us As always: If you have questions, comments, ideas or complaints, email us at [email protected]!

We’ve been threatening to do a podcast for years. That time has finally come. Let us know what you think: email us at [email protected]. Meet your hosts, Paul Beakley and Dusey. Paul Beakley Dusey Van Dusen Huge, huge thanks to our friend Tim Denee for our swanky logo. Go buy his games! Introduction to Paul and Dusey, what our goals for the podcast are, running games for money, and what even is “indie” these days? Episode 1 Show Notes Weird Terminology and Acronyms LDS: The Church of Latter-Day Saints, ie Mormonism OGL: the Open Game License created by Wizards of the Coast in 2000 that led to an explosion of D20-compatible games. PBTA: Powered by the Apocalypse, the meta-platform pseudo-concept not-a-license game design framework that arose with the publication of Apocalypse World.  GNS: Gamism, Narrativism, Simulationism. A version of the “Three Fold Theory” of roleplaying. Big Box Model: A theory of gameplay and game design formed by Ron Edwards and others on The Forge Fruitful Void: A Forge-era concept that says systems frame and outline the central concept, idea, premise, whatever of a game but do not directly mechanize it.  OSR: Old School Renaissance/Revolution/Revival (depends on who you ask), a game design, play and publishing movement that formed around resurrecting the very oldest functional rules of Dungeons & Dragons. Trad: Short for traditional roleplaying. Usually means party-based, GM-facilitated, one player per character, system rooted in mostly physical, literal concerns. Indie: Short for independent. The core question of the Indie Game Talk/Reading Club! Trindie: Portmanteau of traditional and indie. Games that incorporate strengths from both trad and indie gameplay and design. Still have questions? Email us and we’ll add more notes! Games and RPG products referred to in this episode.  These are affiliate links to DriveThruRPG, where hopefully we can earn enough pennies to defray the cost of acquiring these games. The Indie Game Reading Club does not accept free or promotional copies of games! AD&D B/X D&D D&D Beyond D20 Modern Star Wars D20 Shadowrun GURPS Tiny Dungeon Dungeon World Top Secret Warhammer Traveller Deadlands Deadlands: Hell on Earth Savage Worlds Mutant Chronicles RPG Kult Burning Empires Exalted The Burning Wheel Fading Suns Zombie World Dragon Town Pathfinder Call of Cthulhu Avatar Legends Tales From The Loop The Electric State Alien Dune: Adventures In The Imperium John Carter of Mars Beyond the Pale Urban Shadows For The Queen The Quiet Year Still Life Contact Us As always: If you have questions, comments, ideas or complaints, email us at [email protected]!