Ah, I love it when a plan comes together!

Especially when the plan is checking on the FTB main-site to see if a new episode sneaked past my rss-feed and the coming together is finding out that it did and, subsequently, loading that precious morsel DOWN unto my harddrive for later consumption…
(Sorry, but it’s like, crazy late in my corner of the Earth.)

Timestamps?! What level of organisation is this?

I love it when you guys argue in a group. Chad is a great mass debater.

Regarding the timestamps, I can’t guarantee they’ll be there for every episode. Sometimes we start, stop, and intermix topics in really messy ways. This episode just so happened to be cleanly divided, so I decided to give the timestamps a try and see if anyone found them useful.

Oh, yeah. Regarding the episode, I agree with the idea of using a module (to a certain degree). It gives a balanced (combat-wise) group of encounters that allows a beginning GM and beginning players to get used to the rules. The RP will usually eventually follow. My experience is that people who start playing table-top RPG’s begin with some interest in characterization, more in plot, and even more interest in kicking butt. At least at first. The RP comes when players begin to look at the plots and stories as empty if the only thing they do is fight. I agree that a mentor is a BEST-OF-ALL-POSSIBLE-WORLDS scenario for beginning GMs, however that is not always possible. If you are by yourself and starting out then a module is a good starting point. Start with this developed story and plot and flesh it out a bit. Then, once you’ve kind of got your sea legs, as it were, start a new adventure on whatever plot occurs to you as you play through the module (and it will).

I will also agree with using a module for beginning DMs, specifically because the module gives the DM all of the rules and math stuff done up up front so that the DM can then work on the story and RP aspect.

The way I got started with D&D specifically and RPGs generally was back in the 2nd Edition days when TSR published the First Quest boxed set, which was a set that included four premade adventures, a(n incredibly spare) village, maps, and prefab characters of the four major classes (Rogue, Fighter, Cleric, Wizard) with a smaller, simplified version of the rules. The four adventures then proceeded to increase in complexity and, with that, DM-freedom.

For example, the first two adventures came with a prefab map and even a CD that included voice tracks for the characters and NPCs (of course, these covered only a small number of basic options, and were generally terribly voice acted). The first adventure covered only the basics of combat and could be finished in one, maybe two, depending on your players’ approach, sessions of play, and was a pretty straightforward, by the numbers dungeon crawl. The second adventure introduced some more advanced combat mechanics (turning undead, special monster abilities and defenses), and a little more RP and on-the-fly thinking on the part of the DM (it was still dungeon-crawley, but it was a haunted house, and encouraged more DM trickery). The third adventure no longer held the DM’s hand in terms of the roleplaying (lacking the CD tracks, the DM was left to fend for himself in terms of NPC reactions), and introduced a whole weirdness of setting (it was, regrettably, a Spelljammer adventure – notably, I only ran that particular adventure the one time, having recycled all others for various other newbie groups). And the fourth adventure required the DM to draw their own maps, come up with their own encounter areas, traps, and overall story for the PCs being in the dungeon in the first place.

That learning of the rules first and how to structure adventures gave me the tools, freedom, and – most important in a new DM – confidence that I required in order to then go on to run an epic five year game that was entirely story based. (I even managed to link up those off beat adventures into the overall plot way down the line, albeit we agreed that the Spelljammer adventure would officially be deemed a bad acid trip on the part of the characters.)

That being said, if you’re doing a crunchy game, I agree it’s a bad idea to just hand someone the Core Books and say “have at it.” Game companies should introduce beginner versions of rules (like Battletech’s Quick Start rules, for example) which new DMs can pick up easily and, having gotten used to the basics, move on to the more complex tools available to them.

I do have to agree that movie theater is going to die a slow death. Who wants to go see a movie any more. My home system is quite good and getting better, much cheaper and don’t have to deal with people talking in the background and I STILL have to watch freaking commercials. Seriously who likes going to the movies anymore.

but the price point for an instant watch new release at $50 may be. Consider a married couple who wants to go out 2 people movie tickets $10. Food at theater easily $10. If they have kids babysitting even more money. So for a couple with kids $50 may be a money savings.

I think that a module is a good place to start, especially if, like me, you are (were) a relatively new player and are thinking about running your first game (in my case 3.5). I wanted to pick up a module or two, not to actually run them, but rather just to read through them and get a better perspective on how a whole campaign arc is composed. To see how someone besides my current GM would put together all this information and maybe to get a better idea of how to organize the thoughts I was having for the story I wanted to run. (Clearly I hadn’t yet discovered this podcast.) It also helped to get a feel for how many NPCs were personalized and just how far they were stated out. Also a great resource for pre-stated NPCs: take the stats, add your own personalities.

All in all, it helped me to put together a more cohesive and successful first game and I do believe that they are a good place to go if you don’t have someone who has the time to sit down and mentor you.

Also, I love the timestamps. I listen on my iPhone at work and sometimes it simply looses connection and stops playing without saving my place. The timestamps let me reload the page and find my place within a few minutes, instead of scanning through the whole thing tying desperately to remember what time it was when I started listening.

Man, to have been a fly on the mics for this show. My introduction to RPGs was to be the DM for my group of friends. Our game? D&D 3.5.

I’ll admit there’s that intimidation when you first sit down and start reading the books. It’s a lot of information to absorb. If you’re going to DM, though, you really have to be versed in the rules. Even if it’s your first time, you still need to know enough about the system to know where to get answers to questions. I spent most of my weekends reading for almost a month before I felt ready to lead my group.

I started off very simple: I wrote up a simple little adventure for my guys with a few obvious solutions to their obstacles and bad guys who would have fallen to a wet breeze. I largely wanted to get us comfortable with the mechanics: When to use spells, when to use skills, the flow of combat, playing as the characters, interacting with the world, etc. Granted, I still ended up nearly killing them, but the slow start was definitely the way to go.

For my campaign, I’ll admit that I didn’t write my own. I actually ripped off the campaign that Shamus Young has on his website (even got a nice blog link out of it). This was really helpful, as I had enough of a time just figuring out how to structure everything. That where most of my blunders as a GM came in; I knew the encounters I wanted them to have, I knew where I wanted the story to go, but setting everything up appropriately? That was where I learned from trial and error.

That’s probably the thing I would offer up to a new GM; they should start with a definite framework for their game, but not the detailed specifics that a module offers. There’s a lot to be said for learning how to set-up an encounter, detail an NPC, or design a dungeon. Yeah, modules have that professional shine, but that will never replace the personal touch that comes from content you know your GM created himself.

I completely regret that I didn’t keep more of my childhood toys. Some I wish I still had. The rest I could sell for a lot of money. :)

Movie theatres will be ok as long as they are ahead of the curve. They are doing record business, but attendance is down and has had a downward trend since the inception of TV. The business right now comes at least partly from 3D. If that proves to be a fad or home theatres are able to provide the same immersion, that will spell the doom of theatres. Of course other innovations might help theatres, but in the end they will lose.

People are mostly interested in comfort and ease-of-use. This is why CDs managed to dominate the market for about two decades despite better options available. Those better options just weren’t that much better from the UI viewpoint. Small steps don’t impress people, huge leaps do. Telling them that they should come to the theater because they will get so-and-so many more pixels won’t sway anyone.

Right now theatres need to make huge investments just to keep up with home systems. How long will they be able to spend that kind of money?

I think your allergy against modules is due to the games you’ve played. You’re using the word module, that means your standard is D&D. Now I have played a lot of Warhammer Fantasy RP and Call of Cthulhu. They don’t have modules, they have adventures or scenarios. This is not just semantics. When they’re good and well written, these scenarios present great story ideas, excellent NPCs and antagonists, a whole lot of setting and background in digestable chunks, and most of all lots of advice for the gamemaster on how to adapt the ideas presented to their group of players and their style of playing.
In those to games, I am convinced that it wasn’t the core rulebooks that shaped the way the games were played and made them classics to this day, but some of the published campaigns, such as The Enemy Within or Horror on the Orient-Express.
When they’re good (and even more so when they’re bad), scenarios can also teach you how to come up with your own stuff, because you’ll soon begin to see the structure behind a well-planned game.
So I think, if you have good material, a pre-written scenario is an excellent resource for a new GM.

Thank you, Thank you, thank you for the time stamps!!!!

I just recently started to listen to your podcast, but I was getting ready to give up because the advertised topic of discussion always comes late in the show. With all due respect, I have limited time for listening and, as entertaining as you all are, I usually want to go right the topic of interest.

So, even if they are approximate, I would greatly appreciate having those time stamps on future episodes.

Thanks for the great show.