We’re back from the best four days of gaming! We talk about everything from the new games premiering at Gencon to the awesome people we met to the games we played or ran. It was a blast and we look forward to next year. Some of the highlights this year include meeting Dave Arneson and getting a first edition of Blackmoor autographed, interviewing quite a few game designers and writers, playtesting a new Call of Cthulhu scenario from Pagan Press (which we recorded and will post to the podcast! stay tuned for that) hanging out with gamers and podcasters, sleeping very little and eating less and running Monsters and Other Childish Things. We will post our interviews on a regular basis for the next month or so.

Games and books mentioned:

Music: The Sword of Fire by Studiomig.

We’ve finally gotten around to looking at the monster RPG of the summer, the fourth edition of Dungeons and Dragons.  We cover the good, the bad and the ugly of the system. Special thanks to the Bear Swarm podcast for joining in on our first game of 4E. We also talk about Gencon, scuba diving and of course, a very entertaining letter from Tom.

Song: Journey by Excellent Adventure

Shout Outs:

“Just being in here is a humbling experience for me, because you’re looking through all these records and it’s sort of like a big pile of broken dreams…Whether you want to admit it or not, 10 years down the line you’ll be in here. So keep that in mind when you start thinking like, ‘I’m invincible and I’m the world’s best,’ or whatever. Because that’s what all these cats thought.” DJ Shadow

In this episode, we focus on looting the pile of broken dreams that is the bargain bin of your friendly local game store. Many times you can find a hidden diamond in the rough or at least something you can exploit for a game in the system of your choice. By going over some of the bargain we’ve enjoyed like Little Fears, Waste World, Mutazoid, Teenagers from Outer Space, and Hunter the Reckoning, you can begin to see what lurks in the used game shelf. Plus, a letter from Tom and anecdotes! Oh and you must watch Common Law Wife. As always, post your comments on our forum and we appreciate donations. Also, if you are an artist, Tom wants a werewolf drawing or something like that. I think. He’ll pay like five bucks for it. Listen to the episode if you want the details. Also, this thread in the Something Awful forums is hilarious and disturbing.

NEWS: Some of our listeners love the actual play sessions. Some don’t. IF you do NOT want to get Actual Play sessions in your RSS feed, then please switch your feed to this new one. https://slangdesign.com/rppr/feed?cat=-12 It has everything EXCEPT Actual Play sessions. The main feed still has everything. If you like the Actual Play sessions you are fine. Nothing needs to be changed.

Shout Outs:

  • Wushu: A free and open RPG of fast action-Great for a one shot game when you have no time to prep.
  • Operation Darkness: A crazy alternate history WW2 RPG for the Xbox 360 where you fight Nazi vampires with Allied Werewolves. Seriously.
  • George Carlin: All My Stuff. A big ole collection of Carlin’s work. If you’re a fan, you need this box set. Well, you don’t but it is a goddamn lot of stuff.
  • The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra: If you like Mystery Science Theater 3000, cheesy movies from the 50s and 60s or B movies in general, then you must watch this movie. Tom used the Skeleton as a villain in a Mutants and Masterminds game because his players demanded it after seeing the movie.

Music: Nuclear War by Los Podankos – a Russian street punk band with no homepage and this is all I could find. Oi!