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Music: Can’t Judge a Book by Robin Sylar
Promos: Bearswarm Podcast, Nuketown Radio and the Game Traveler

Hosted by Ross Payton and Tom Church

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Synopsis:
Gamers should broaden their horizons on occasion. To that end, we each picked five books or types of printed media that can do just that and we discuss how to implement each title’s content. These apply to both player and GM, as a clever player can get great character concept ideas or tactics for the game while GMs get a treasure trove of game material. ‘

Tom has updated the classic poem “Casey at Bat” with the Palladium RPG, Rifts, in mind. Plus, shout outs and an anecdote. Find out the conclusion of an 8 month WW2 GURPS campaign where I was a player for once!

My Top Five

  1. Storyteller by Kate Wilhelm
  2. Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker
  3. Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzales
  4. Mythologies by Roland Barthes
  5. How to Make War by James Dunnigan / Howdunit by Lee Lofland / Bulfinch’s Mythology by Thomas Bulfinch

Tom’s Top Five

  1. Newspapers
  2. Punisher Comics – current MAX run by Garth Ennis
  3. City Tour Guides
  4. Zoology Books
  5. Janes Military Guides

Shout Outs
Mount & Blade: An excellent indie PC game of medieval combat and adventure. Players create an adventurer, raise an army of soldiers and rampage across the country side, battling whatever foes stand in your way. Virtually no plot, minimal RPG character development, but great action and it’s tremendously fun to run down dozens of peasants with a heavily armed knight on horseback.

Wrongside: A comic of politics, intrigue, genocide, and fashion right out of the Final Fantasy school of design. Also, furries.

Dwarf Fortress: An ASCII graphic strategy/simulation game that puts you in control of seven dwarves and a wagon in a randomly generated world. The object being of course, to build a fortress. Of course, dwarves are strange little creatures and subject to strange whims and bad luck. That and Dwarf Fortress is a staggeringly complex game that keeps track of every dwarf’s emotional state, fluid mechanics and erosion, among other things. It is in fact, INSANE. Play it…if you dare.

BOATMURDERED: The saga of a Dwarf Fortress run by a succession of emperors. Marvel at the cleverness of Project DOOM (it involves channeling magma), tremble at the exploits of murderous legendary elephants and weep at the sad fate that befalls the inhabitants of BOATMURDERED. BOATMURDERED is, was and ever shall be the most brutal of all fortresses in all of fantasy.

F-117 Flight Simulator: A DOS era flight simulator. Tom really really really hates Saddam era Iraq and likes to blow it up. So, uh, there you go.

Oh and Iron Man. The movie. I’m not going to link it. Fuck that noise. It’s a fun movie but come on. It’s got like a 50 million dollar advertising budget.

Read below the fold for Tom’s entire Casey at Bat
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:17:36 — 45.8MB)

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Song: Just Like Bruce Campbell Did by Joe Hero
Promo: Sinister Adventures

Hosted by Ross Payton and Tom Church
Special Guest: Aaron Carsten

Check out our new Forums and Twitter Feed!

Synopsis:
After discussing some listener feedback, with a special defense of the Sluggy Freelance web comic by Aaron Carstein, we decided to challenge each other’s game design skills with a 24 hour contest, similar to Game Chef. Each of us came up with 7 game elements that the other host would have to come up with a game or scenario that would incorporate all seven elements. As our game ‘ingredients’ ranged from the Ural Mountains to pacifism, we both came up with some twisted stuff. Take a listen and voice your opinion on the superior creation with our brand new forums! No letter from Tom this week due to a hard drive failure but we got a good anecdote and of course, shout outs.

Shout Outs:

  • Darken: A D&D web comic of a group of evil adventurers being, well, evil. Not stereotypical ‘I am going to tie this woman to the railroad tracks’ but more of a ‘I am a selfish bastard who really only cares about himself and I will do whatever it takes to survive.’ A breath of fresh air when compared to the typical goody-good heroic adventures that populate D&D themed works.
  • Minus: A brilliant fantasy web comic of a little girl with godlike powers who uses them for her own amusement. A modern day Little Nemo in Wonderland with a touch of the Twilight Zone.
  • Wonderella: Superhero themed comedy doesn’t get much better than Wonderella.
  • The Secret Life of Elevators: A man gets stuck in an elevator for 41 hours. No, it’s not a joke. It’s an essay on elevators, life, and the existential dread that hangs over our heads. A great read.
  • F-22 Raptor: A flight sim where you can drop a nuclear bomb on a city. This is a good thing.
  • Lichcraft: An Oblivion mod adding new adventures and the ability to become a lich. If you play Oblivion on the PC, you should get it.
  • Pyramid Head: Another Oblivion mod. Put Pyramid Head in the game. Because you know, those other demons and monsters in the game? Total pussies. You want Pyramid Head. You NEED Pyramid Head.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:17 — 34.6MB)

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Opening music: I’m Dungeons You’re Dragons by the Alligators

Hosted by Ross Payton and Tom Church

Promos: Rpgpodcasts.com and The Tome Podcast

Brand new: Join the RPPR Facebook group!

Synopsis:
Sooner or later, your favorite game is going to become old and tired. The players will read every sourcebook, the GM will run every written adventure for it and what was once new and exciting becomes cliched and tired. How do you make an old game that everyone knows new? We discuss several ways to freshen things up and what to avoid when remixing the game.

Shout Outs:
Viking Fighting: A viking martial arts school. Tactical warhammer classes, anyone?
The Abominable Charles Christopher: A brilliantly drawn and written web comic following the adventures of a simple minded yeti and the other inhabitants of the forest. A must read.
Sluggy Freelance: A mediocre web comic with generic art, below average writing, static characters that haven’t changed in over 10 years and an overly convoluted plot that requires reading the entire 10 year backstory to make sense.

Click below to see Tom meeting Henry Rollins
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 54:58 — 39.5MB)

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