Saul and Jolene talk about Ghosting in RPGs. So what is ghosting and where does this term come from. Saul listens to many podcasts and it was a term used on another gaming podcast called "Gaming and BS". In it a host talks about ghosting. Saul had never heard of the term and asked Jolene what it was about. Saul and Jolene discussed and laughed about this subject and decided to record and episode about this strange way of dealing with a problem player or group in RPGs. Why to gamers Ghost games o...
Jul 14, 2019•34 min•Ep. 81
In this episode Saul and Jolene talk about the Barbarian class in Dungeons and Dragons. From the first time Saul saw the optional class in 1985 in issue 63 of The Dragon magazine. The Barbarian has become known as the quintessential "tank" in D&D. Though Saul doesn't like the use of the term tank for the Barbarian class it really does fit. With the high hit points, damage resistance, high physical damage potential the Barbarian is a great class to play in combat situations. Saul and Jolene a...
Jul 06, 2019•27 min•Ep. 80
Saul and Jolene discuss the buying of new RPGs. Why do people continue to buy new RPGs? If players and GMs like a particular RPG why would you buy new ones. What makes gamers continue to guy games even as their collection grows to the point they won't be able to play all of them? It is an interesting question which Saul and Jolene dive into. As Jolene marvels at the number of different RPGs on her shelves she knows that Saul will continue to look at and buy new RPGs. Saul says because he likes c...
Jun 30, 2019•39 min•Ep. 79
Today Saul and Jolene talk about Cathartic Gaming. In previous episodes this subject has been mentioned from time to time , but we thought it deserved its own episode. Saul gives the definition of the word cathartic and catharsis and then Saul and Jolene relate it to RPGs. The idea that all games are cathartic in one form or another the main difference is in scale. From simple diversion as one can have in reading a book or watching a movie or tv show, to a full cathartic moment where you release...
Jun 23, 2019•41 min•Ep. 78
In this episode Saul and Jolene tackle the sensitive subject of feedback in your RPG game. Most GM's want to get information on how their games went and what they can do to improve on their game. The problem is, getting good feedback or constructive criticism. Saul and Jolene discuss ways of getting good feedback and lower the chances of feedback that just upsets you as a GM. Jolene reminds Saul of when criticism wasn't asked for and it upset him quite a bit and affected his gaming. Saul and Jol...
Jun 16, 2019•31 min•Ep. 77
In this episode we interview Brandon Raasch of Bard Games. Saul first met Brandon a few years ago when he played in his Monterey Dresden game at DunDracon, a local N. Cal, gaming convention. Brandon was such a great player that after that Saul always said hi and talked to him at all the local cons we attend. Saul realized Bradon is a game publisher and has a game on Kickstarter. The game is called Fickle and the Kickstarter ends in a few days. So we wanted to get him on the microphone and talk t...
Jun 15, 2019•53 min•Ep. 76
Today we have Sean Nittner the person that puts on BigBadCon in the Bay Area. We wanted to get Sean to talk to us because BigBadCon is not a typical game con. It has a different heart that other cons. They all have their own character and BigBadCon is known for the great RPGs and LARPs. In the last few years they have added Boardgames, and Panels to BigBadCon. Though most of the people that attend are from the San Francisco Bay Area there are quite a few that come from all over the U.S. to atten...
Jun 11, 2019•48 min•Ep. 75
In this Episode Saul and Jolene talk about one of the oldest RPG's Traveller. Traveller is a science fiction rpg that continues to be published to this day. First published in 1977 Traveller consisted of a small format box set, similar to the box set of Original D&D. The box set contained 3 little black books which split the rules into Book 1 Characters and Combat, Book 2 Starships, Book 3 Worlds and Adventures. Saul talks why he didn't like Traveller, but now feels he may have been overly c...
Jun 09, 2019•34 min•Ep. 74
Well, we are almost at Episode 52, which makes it a year of our podcasts. We missed a week due to going to Kublacon over Memorial Day weekend. But we did publish two bonus episodes that we recorded at Kublacon on Friday and Saturday of the con. We had a great time and were very busy the whole weekend. So in this episode Saul and Jolene talk about Rules As Written(RAW) over Story. No game is all of one or the other in Roleplaying games. At times a GM will have to make a decision that may or may n...
Jun 02, 2019•35 min•Ep. 73
This Bonus Episode was recorded on Saturday at Kublacon. A little tired we got to our spot at 9am and began recording shortly there after. Here is some notes about this show. At 1 minute Kevin a Lifetime Kublacon badge holder joins us right away. We talk to him from a variety of topics. Thursday night Kubla, playing online, RPGs in prison, kids affecting your gaming. 21:00 Our friend's son joins us, 15 year old Alan M. Gives us his first Kublacon memory and it includes a hot tub. Games he has pl...
May 30, 2019•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 72
First of all I want to apologize for the lateness of this episode. Technical difficulties prevented us from post these right after recording. And even before we left for Kublacon our podcast computer died. What I thought was a bad or corrupted boot file was worse. So it taken a bit longer to get these episodes published. We also recorded longer than our normal 30 minutes and the episodes area about an hour and a half long. So I will be including a bit more detailed show notes. 1-13 minutes Saul ...
May 29, 2019•1 hr 24 min•Ep. 71
What happens when your game goes a direction that you had not thought it would? This happens to every GM. Whether your a railroady type of GM or a more improve type sometimes your players really throw you for a loop. You don't know what to do. Saul and Jolene discuss the idea of having one or two encounters that you can fit into almost any situation. Something that you can slide in to help get the players back on track or just to tide you over until the next session where you can figure out what...
May 19, 2019•27 min•Ep. 70
Saul and Jolene talk about Off Game Table Discussions. What happens when you don't have enough time at the game table to Roleplay as much as you wanted during a game session? The reasons why you don't have enough time is varied but sometimes as adults we only have a few precious hours to play. And at times to be able to move the story forward you can't RP as much as you like. Or there are elements about your character that you don't want to hog up all the time talking about your character motiva...
May 12, 2019•32 min•Ep. 69
Mike Eckert, the Executive Producer, of Kublacon is back with our third interview 14 Days before Kublacon. Saul and Jolene get a bit of his time to talk about Kublacon which is only 14 days away. Mike is super busy getting ready to put on one of the biggest gaming conventions on the West Coast and it right here in the San Francisco Bay Area. We have been attending Kublacon from the very beginning and it was Augustin's ,Saul and Jolene's son, first game convention at the tender age of 6 months. A...
May 11, 2019•53 min•Ep. 68
Kublacon is only a couple weeks away and we have another interview with a Kublacon staff member. This time Becky Thomas the Coordinator of Kublacon Youth Program joins us on the microphone. Me and Jolene have known Becky since Augustin was a baby going into Kublacon's then Kids Room, where Becky was in charge. She ran a very busy and growing population of kid gamers at Kublacon. Now the Kid's Room is split into two separate rooms one for younger children and teens. It has been amazing to see the...
May 10, 2019•53 min•Ep. 67
Ever gamer has a special relationship with dice. And table top gamers are no different or possibly more fervent with their dice. Usually they can never have enough or couple always use another set. Saul and Jolene talk about their dice. Are all superstitious? Probably. They go on to discuss dice trays and dice towers, and it seems that most gamers have strong opinions as to whether they like these dice accessories. Saul and Jolene give some reasons why dice trays and towers might be good to have...
May 05, 2019•29 min•Ep. 66
Continuing our Pre-Kublacon interviews, we got Vern R. to join us this time. Vern is the RPG Coordinator for Kublacon and Pacificon. He is a LONG time gamer and has played with many excellent gamers from the SF Bay Area. A local kid Vern grew up in the heart of what would become Silicon Valley. His gamer story is filled with long treks to hobby game stores and was even impacted by the Satanic Panic of the late 80's and 90's . He is a tireless worker at Kublacon, as I see him working and playing ...
May 01, 2019•56 min•Ep. 65
This is a bonus special announcement episode by Mark S. of DunDraCon. In Feb. 14-17th, 2020 DDC will be at the San Ramon Marriot where it has been for the last 28 years. But in 2021 DunDraCon is moving to the Santa Clara Marriot in Santa Clara. We wanted to put this news out as quickly as possible so we give you the interview announcement without editing. Mark shares with us the big news and other changes that he is planning on making starting in 2020 at DDC and then the "Big Change" in 2021 to ...
Apr 30, 2019•1 hr•Ep. 64
In this episode we discuss our play test of John Carter of Mars rpg. It is published by Modiphius and uses the 2D20 system. This is a "streamlined" version of the 2D20 system used in Mutant Chronicles 3rd Edition, Conan RPG, Star Trek Adventures and the Infinity RPG. Saul and Jolene played this with their friend Steve and our collective kids. Saul gave a quick introduction to the setting, rules and we were off to a fantastic adventure on Barsoom. Thank you all for listening and all we ask is tha...
Apr 26, 2019•35 min•Ep. 63
This week Saul and Jolene talk about the four letter word in some RPG circles, Metagaming. In this episode both Saul and Jolene give their definition of what metagaming is. Is metagaming terrible? It is just bad? Or is it a legitimate way of playing rpgs? Saul and Jolene tackle this topic though it is a very subjective one. Give it a listen and see what is too much metagaming for Saul and what he tries to do to mitigate what he thinks is too much metagaming at his game table. As always thanks fo...
Apr 21, 2019•32 min•Ep. 62
In this Episode we continue the Pre-Kublacon interviews, this one is with Alicia H. She is a long time gamer, gaming from back when she was a kid and starting RPGs when she was in Jr. High School. Saul saw her for many years but only thought that she played boardgames since that is all that he saw her play. But it turns out she is a RPG gamer from a young age. So in this episode Saul finds out that Alicia isn't a Latina, plays rpgs and is running her first rpg game at a game con at Kublacon. She...
Apr 16, 2019•39 min•Ep. 61
Another episode in our Pre-Kublacon interview series we talk to Wendy-Ann and John who are in charge of Pathfinder Society for the Bay Area. Wendy-Ann and John do an amazing job being representatives for Paizo organized play. They are the Venture Captains for the South Bay. Wendy-Ann and John are the people in charge of Organized play at Kublacon. They do an amazing job by running over a hundred tables of Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society organized play at Kublacon. In our interview they...
Apr 14, 2019•40 min•Ep. 60
In this Episode Saul and Jolene talk about knowing the rules for a rpg game. How important is it, how necessary is it for a GM to know the all the rules? What about the players? Saul and Jolene talk about their trials and tribulations of knowing the rules to rpgs they have run in the past. They talk about running new Role Playing Games at your home game and at game conventions. They discuss what can happen when a GM is not as knowledgeable of the rules as their players. This could make the game ...
Apr 14, 2019•33 min•Ep. 59
When you interview someone that has been around hobby gaming longer than you been alive you never know what you going to get. We did know we were going to get a wealth of information about local gaming conventions. We discover why Mark is one if not the only person that GM's Arduin at Dundracon, because of his special connection to that classic rpg. Also as the event planner for DDC, Mark also gives us an inside peek of cons that we as attendees don't usually see. Add a very frank conversation a...
Apr 10, 2019•48 min•Ep. 58
Another bonus interview episode this time is with Kublacon GM Mike G. He has been running games at local cons for many years and he is one GM that is not afraid to play new or different games. We learn about his early intro into rpgs and why he likes to play rpgs that are a bit off the beaten path. Mike also shares with us how his gaming con experience has changed for the better because of a different way of looking at attending gaming conventions. This interview gives great insight into a reall...
Apr 10, 2019•45 min•Ep. 57
In this episode Saul and Jolene talk about Shadowrun 5th Edition. Saul started running Shadowrun back in the early 1990's. He ran a campaign that lasted a couple summers. He loved the setting which was a mix of William Gibson's Neuromancer and the magical world of Tolkien. Jolene discovered Shadowrun last year at a Gaming Flea market where she encountered a few Shadowrun books and asked me if I had ever heard of it. She had bought me four or five supplements. She was enticed by the art and the s...
Apr 07, 2019•41 min•Ep. 56
In this Episode Saul and Jolene talk about a "Bad GM". They discuss things you should do as a player when you have this problem in a RPG. First is identify the problem. Then get consensus with your fellow players. Then once the problem in confirmed then its time to be an adult, and have that kind of conversation. This is much more complicated issue so Saul and Jolene discuss the many different aspects of this problem. Of course Saul has to digress a couple of times to share a stories that may or...
Mar 31, 2019•38 min•Ep. 55
Matt joins us on our 2nd Pre-Kublacon interview. It is strange to think that over the last 35 years Saul and Matt had crossed paths many times but only really got to know each other by going to local game cons in Bay Area. Matt shares with Saul and Jolene quite a bit of his history and how a kid from North Dakota came to the Golden State and settled in the Bay Area. Matt is a popular GM at game conventions. Matt tells us why Kublacon is very special to him. We apologize for the wonky audio but i...
Mar 27, 2019•40 min•Ep. 54
Kublacon the convention that takes place here in the Bay Area in Northern California over the Memorial Day Weekend is the biggest game con on the West Coast. Saul and Jolene decided to ask GM, Con-attendees why they like gaming cons and Kublacon specifically. The first one to be interviewed was Honda C., she started playing while in Jr High School but stopped in High School as her gaming friends found other "cooler" things to do. We learn why she likes game cons and why Kublacon is such a good c...
Mar 27, 2019•34 min•Ep. 53
In this week's podcast, Saul and Jolene talk about Deadlands. A classic rpg by Pinnacle. Deadlands: The Weird West Roleplaying game was first published in 1996. It is a world that diverges from our own at the Battle of Gettysburg. Soldiers killed in that battle rose from the dead. Also a huge Earthquake caused most of California to collaspe into the Pacific Ocean. Raven a Native American shaman let loose spirits let back into the world. This is the world of Deadlands . A fantastic setting of six...
Mar 24, 2019•32 min•Ep. 52
