We answer questions from listeners and fans of the podcast.
Knights of the Night
KOTN Actual Play Podcast 101: "Round Table Discussion"
(upbeat rock music) - Hello, and welcome tonight to the night and actual play podcast. This is a special round table edition in which we answer questions from listeners and fans of the podcast. And now, please enjoy episode 101 round table discussion. (upbeat rock music) - All right, before we get into the listeners questions, we have a little bit of additional feedback on episode 99. On Facebook, we had a message from Mr. Rocket. We said, "Cheers to the entire effort." I must say, I did not see some of the curveballs coming, but the story was awesome. The role playing was excellent and true to character. The sledge of justice and the warden had a conversation worthy of Batman and Superman. Good job, guys. London is not happy. I talked to him briefly what would be the Marvel equivalent of Batman and Superman. And the assumption is that Mike Allen is Superman. - Has everyone read the Frank Miller, the Dark Knight Returns? - I have. - Let me finish though. - Oh, I've heard Roberto is Batman. - Well, there's not many options left. - No, there wasn't, but I didn't finish. - Sorry, just if you haven't read it, how they portray Superman and Batman in that series, it really-- - It's her cynical. - It rejuvenated the entire franchise and set a tone that hadn't been existed before, which was the whole kind of really dark, brutal, almost just as pathologically crazy as the people he's fighting. - Both of them are just Batman and Batman. - But Superman as-- - Well, he isn't all that sunshine either. - He's an asshole. - Yeah. - It's really interesting that here's a person who has this phenomenal power that is, you know, like I said, virtually a demi-god and how he really views people, especially when he finally gets to-- - And who's that in our story, Allen? - I'm just saying. So there's a great scene where Batman and Superman fight and it's very well done. - Thank you for the feedback, we really appreciate it. I'm glad you enjoyed the story. - I'm glad I'm Batman. Batman doesn't kill anyone, even Vince. - Yeah, you're not really Batman. - I thought it was better when I asked him the Marvel equivalent and I suggested Captain America, Captain America for Mike and-- - Oh yeah. - And the Punisher was the best that we'd come up with for Roberto, the Punisher, you know, just-- - That's the way that I'm along. - It actually is a pretty decent ally. - Judge, right. 'Cause while Batman doesn't kill anyone, he still matches you and his cynicalness compared to-- - Superman. - Yeah. - But Punisher, he just kills the villains. The best way to handle him is kill him. - I can't disagree with him then. - See, that's why it works. - And he's still comic book character. He fails all the damn time. King Pins-- - No, that's a kind. There's the dark neighbor turns. I think he'd really like it. - There's different versions of Punisher and sometimes he don't fail so much. - Well, the ultimate version of the Punisher, which is the one who probably succeeds-- - That was the most great story. - He's fucked up. - Yeah, but that was a great story. - You shot Spider-Man. I can't appreciate it. - What? - In any way whatsoever. - Yeah, Spider-Sense means that he doesn't get fit. - That's great. - He doesn't get fit. - Or someone else. I think he was captain of Mark. - Oh, if he's doing it on purpose, I'll take it. Okay, then I'm okay with it. - He's a middle-range superhero, but one of his things is it gets Spider-Sense, which means you can never surprise a Spider. I stepped on one the other day. - I'm not saying it can be impossible. - He's just impressive. He didn't, he's just like, this is whatever. - He's just who is the title of Spider-Man. - Oh, here it comes. Thank God. It's ethnic. Here comes the great mood of justice. - More. - All right, let's-- - Okay, yes. - We also have some, we'll move on. We also have some feedback on our KOTN blog. Unfortunately, this is rather older because I don't get a notification when people post comments on there. So I just tend to check the most recent ones. And if someone adds one that's farther back, I wouldn't know unless I go through every single post that we have, which I do know. - Why do I keep a note of whether you're out or not? - That too, because-- - How did you figure it out? - By doing just that, by going back through every post and I looked and I was like, there's three comments on here and I don't remember there being any. But actually, I do remember one of the comments. So I'm not gonna read that. This was from episode 93. Scott posted, "Huh, I've commented a few times before "and gone back and they seem to be missing." I think Mike deleted, I'm not blaming Mike. Must be something I'm doing on my end. Anyways, I love your pod, I love your play style and the work you're putting in to make a great podcast for us. I will be very sad to see Judson go. - This won't take on-- - Sorry, we missed him. - I don't think sorry that that post was two months ago, Scott, we finally got her out of reading it. - We don't delete anything. - No, no, he's saying that he thought it was on-- - I'm really careful. - Is this gonna be the new thing now? - Yes, it is the best joke. - Well, you gotta have that like dripping contempt. - Right. - I think if you look back, I think you'll find that it was-- - First of all, this guy's name was Scott. - Okay. - I could have deleted it just on that one. - Just on principle. - Right. (laughing) - I might have a filter set up. - Sorry about that, Judson. (laughing) - I think I have a filter set up, maybe you're right. - After that, nearly a month later, Chris Ergo also posted under the same one, saying, "Good evening, KOTNers." I just finished listening to this episode. This was episode 93. Again, sorry for the-- - Was the title? - The title was, it's all coming together. - Okay. - You were discussing a plan and it was a-- Nearly the finalize version. I just finished listening to this episode and never before have I wanted to shout so much with the players as I did while listening to this episode. Constant Rockefeller, while not created as the Big Bad of Cleveland has through the evolution of play become, there is well, Big Bad. Alan, what are you doing? You've got a black court vampire who's stealing kids and taking their very souls. Throw on your white cloak, dry your sword and smite this witch. Roberto, you're supposed to be the guardian of Cleveland and the gold king. Guard Cleveland, defend your turf by giving the ghouls vampires to eat. I think you lived up to that by the way. - I did. - Yeah, okay. - Well, thereby implying I didn't, I know I can continue. - I'll continue. - Let's see, what did you do to cloak? You wrapped a baby in it and then, no, okay, let me finish the-- - Wow. - That's right, oh. - GM. - Shadowski. - Impartial. - Shadowski. This is the person responsible for the death of your mother and who will not rest until you're dissected on a table. Slay her. Maxwell, your law enforcement. Protect and serve up some shotgun justice. And London, um, yeah. - I got nothing. - Exactly. - You got a reason to stay on the sidelines, I guess. But seriously, guys, summon up the allies and go all justice league on this vamp. Use Donovan's death curse to tap down her magic and have Abigail whip up some portable sunlight and send the ghouls up from the sewers and kick some ass. Thanks for the enjoyable performance and memorable story line. I'm loving it and can't wait to see what happened. - So two out of three of those things. - Many of those things happened, so hopefully you weren't disappointed. - Some of these almost happened. - I like this dissection of the character. - And London. - Yeah. - Whatever. - Just do what you do, London. - 'Cause you have absolutely no reason to be here on the internet. - No new Amazon buying. It's only been a week, but use the link from our KIT on site and we'll briefly go over the votes. Edward's sitting at eight. Maxwell at 16, Alan at 21. I don't think there's any change there. And for a brief moment, it was tied 31 to 31. Roberto and London, when someone who voted for London changed their mind and it is now 30 London and 32. - Oh! - Oh! - Oh! - The trail! The trail! - Wow! - And I was like, how fitting that it should untied? Oh wait, no. - Correct. - A day later, not so much. - And perfect that I would be betrayed at the end. - Yes. - Yeah. - By Roberto. - Back off. - Why are we gonna close this poll? - Well people, we're still listening. - I don't know. - But he wants to end it down. - We have more episode that's feedback. - The episode following this will be all of the answer. To the questions that were sent in for the 100th episode. And the reason I did that I explained at the end of the 100th episode is because that alone is an hour and 45 minutes or something and the additional answering of the questions was another hour plus and I wasn't going to release a three hour episode when our normal routine is to release an hour or under. So I could see going over on two of them for an hour and a half roughly, but I can't see going three hours. - So how many people ready to blah, blah, blah? - Next one. - And I'm fine with it. We have the option to wait until the next episode comes out when we reintroduce world of darkness. All right. And with that, thank you everyone for the feedback and we shall get on to the questions from the fans and listeners. Well, with the discussion of the actual adventure over, we will then go into the feedback from our fans. Another bit of feedback we got from Facebook was from DJ Allen who asked, "Did any one of the players learn something about themselves, they're playing themselves during delivering?" And he meant specifically the newer players, this being their first adventure. Did you guys learn anything about how you like to play and your styles that you're going to change in the future, that type of thing? - I wasn't sure I was prepared to act out the fun and morality details for a baritone. They didn't all come across. I need more time to do that, but I just went with it instead of creating a new character. I was thinking of ditching him for a while, but I stuck with him and it was okay. It worked out fine, I think. - Did you feel like he grew as a player from the first session to the last session? - There was definitely a lot more active toward the end. - Right, quieter in the beginning and then, like, did you feel more comfortable because you've been playing for a long time with the same group as well, yeah? - As well as getting in touch with who Roberto really was and what he did. - Something like that. - Yeah. - Thomas? - Next one. - Thomas who played next one? - I really don't know. - Well, you said originally that you actually had trouble playing your character, that you had trouble getting in the mindset of playing someone else. Is that still an issue or is it something you think you've overcome? - The only time it came to an issue was towards the end when I had no idea what my character would be doing and try to have no idea sometimes what Maxwell would do because I am very much not him. I'm sure I could figure it out with further play, but... - So do you think you picked a character concept that was a little too far away from yourself to be able to, at this time, at this experience level of role-playing because you're young yet? You think you should have picked one maybe a little closer to who you are to make it easier or did you like the challenge of trying to be somebody different? - Well, I do think I chose a little too far away from myself and just to start off with. I've never really gotten into the role-playing aspect of the character before. I was always a hack and slash guy and this was my funnest venture out into actually playing as the character. And while, like I said, I do think I chose a little too far away from myself. I'd rather try to understand the character and play a little bit more of him than just ditch him and start a new one, at least for now, we'll see later on in a minute. - How did you enjoy the role-playing aspect of it? Like, since you were a hack and slash guy, could you actually enjoy the moments? I know you're probably frustrating at being in tune with them, but did you enjoy them overall? - It was definitely fun. I enjoyed myself with this group and the role-playing in particular was new, but still fun and I know I can get used to it eventually. - One particular time you hijacked the vampires and drove away in a car, I threw a share on the back of your head. - That was fun. - And you seemed to enjoy that. - So that worked out fine. - Yeah. - Mm-hmm. - Where's that? - But then you knew your motive. - But then you knew your motive. - And later... - Not so much. Like, in the finale, what's your interest in that? - I was very in tune with my character for that choice because I found absolutely no reason to kill him. - Yeah. - It's important that they're probably eating people and I was like, "Well, shit, why do I think of that then?" But at the time, it seemed perfectly logical, so I didn't really have any stretch of the imagination of playing the character for that choice. - But I don't think anyone comes out the first time with the character and nails it, you know? - Mm-hmm. - No, definitely. - I don't think even... I didn't get a feel for London until about fourth, but maybe a quarter way in. I kind of felt like I knew him a little at that point, but the question obviously is for the younger ones, mostly for this one. - When we were playing World of Darkness, I struggled with Jay at first, because I was trying to go for somebody that was a little bit different than what I normally play. I'm farther from myself and it took me a while to find what that was. - Yeah, it's the way it was with Edmund. I started out with what I thought he was going to be like, and I realized that the way the skills were set and the way the character was made, it wasn't really where I wanted our thought he was going to be. So then I just kind of had to adjust to the way it was and what it could and couldn't do. - Yeah, I felt more comfortable, maybe about halfway through the game as to here's what he is, here's what he can do, and the kind of person he is, and then you have more fun. - When we started World of Darkness, you were having trouble with two. - Yeah, just when I started liking them, you guys killed them. - We didn't feel like we were going to stay there and trying to defuse the bomb. - I think that's what happens when the World of Darkness took me. You had to get used to the system a little bit more, a little bit more familiar with the system to feel comfortable with the character delivery. Same thing with Dresden where about halfway through I realized that he was unbalanced towards combat in a way because that wasn't clear or as familiar with the system. - System, right. I think you definitely made a glass can and you had very few hit points, but you were powerful. - Good question. - Good question. Thank you guys. DJ Allen had a second one which was, does anyone in the group not want to play in other systems, even if the group remains at least largely the same? - Yeah, I think he means, we're so involved with Dresden that we don't want to play other systems anymore. Essentially. - D20 is right out. No one in wants to do D20 again. - I wouldn't say never. - You guys were pretty adamant that last time you actually talked about it. - Tom might have been a little vehement, but I'm not sure what were to use there. - It was just, let's trust with them. - They have a med day? - Yeah, they have a med day. - But I'd be willing to try a dad 20, a dad only 5v comes out. - I have so long to get you guys to try Fiasco, but you won't do it. - No, no, no. - These guys won't do it. - I hate it. - I'm up for playing anything. I really don't care. - I think we've proven through our decades of playing that were, well, a part of this group of decades of playing, that we're willing to try just about anything. - You guys, you're taken up? - I thought it was directed at us because the group's not changing much, but would you want to try a world of darkness? - Yeah. - I did in the first. - Mm-hmm. - Because I wasn't sure I could come up with another character I'd be interested in. And I'm still not. Let's see how that goes. - I'm still not sure you got your character that you're interested in. That was, I know you're a huge dressed in fan. - Oh yeah. - You're like the fan system. - I love the fan system. Honestly, as much as I'm unsure about the world of darkness system, now that I've gotten into the characterization, it seems like something I could enjoy. But at first I was a little on fence, but I was on the fence about switching systems, but I wasn't on the fence about whether or not I wanted to stay. I definitely like playing with this group a lot. - I joked, but you guys don't want to play Fiasco, Thomas and John, and the reason you don't is because it's way too storytellery for you. There's not enough crunch in there. And, which is legitimate, I mean Fiasco is a very light system. - Right. - It's all about the storytelling, and there's very, very little mechanics. But as a one-nighter, and some night when some people are missing, I thought it would be something we could do that can do. But anyways, we'll see how that works out. We have a message from Tom Rocket who said, "What did you like about the storyteller?" Or the setting that you could recommend to other players, talking about dressing and the delivery. - The in-depth character creation. I felt, and I think I answered this a little bit in a previous answer, but it helped me find out who London was, which made role-playing him once I got comfortable with the fate system, which it was bumpy for the first couple of weeks, which was new with a new system that's going to happen. And the character development was so integral, I've never created a character who was as fleshed out as London, and who I knew as well as London going into an adventure. - But I think we've also talked about that, and you've got the other side of the coin, which is you don't like how overpowering the characters are, and they're not in a situation where they're in danger, and they're under a percent. - Right. - But, so that's what I'm saying too. - Yeah, but I think what he was saying, I thought the question was, what do you want to carry, what would you recommend to carry to a new system? - What do you like about the story or setting that you would recommend to other players? - Oh. - It is like, and I would say yes. - Yeah. - I would, personally, I would house rule the, what do you call it, the shifts of power to be different names? - No, to be true. - You guys seem to have a problem with it being an epic one. - With, yeah. Too often. - Instead of like 1, 2, 3, 4, it'd be 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, you know, and I'd cut it in half basically. - And you're just reducing names, you're not really-- - Yeah, but it just felt like, like I said, achieving epic results was either too easy or the effects of an epic result or didn't really feel like it was epic. - Right. - But is this a disadvantage? - He's talking about advantages. - If you hit a guy on the street with an epic spell, he'd be given the wall. - You're gonna toast him. - You guys are fighting some powerful characters. - I think it was the power level we were at. - If we were a power level lower, we couldn't have handled constants. - But then I asked-- - We could have drummed up enough support to make us a fighter. - See, I also acknowledge that is also, and maybe that's more of an example of my character being unbalanced, and I was able to achieve those results when I had that sword in my hand, then if I had had it balanced with any amount of investigation or other skills other than combat, then maybe I wouldn't feel that. - But back to the point of the actual question, which was, what do you like about the story or setting that you would recommend to other players? - I like that we put a lot of personality in Christy Bruce, he survived. If you mess with an NPC a lot and you just kinda fuck him up and you want him to be around to mock him or-- - That's a definite trouble with him. Talk to the GM about it. - Right, the definite thing that GM should learn is if the characters invest in an NPC a lot, they suddenly become a much more important NPC that will be focusing around the story. That's what they're having fun with, go with it. - Take any NPC and just, yeah, make him into a main character, just out of nowhere. - The old romantic-- - At age, when you can, say yes. - Right. - Absolutely. - Tyler Houdak said, "For the GM, did the story go as you planned and what surprising twist did you not expect the PCs to throw at you?" - Virtually everything, because the plan wasn't a plan. I really didn't have a plan. I set up a sandbox and let you guys plan it. There was a general timeline, but the story could have went absolutely any way you guys wanted it to go. Now, was I surprised by some things? Yes. I had no clue that that was even a possibility, and when he went with it and suggested it, I didn't just give it to him, I made him work for it, but I didn't try to cock-lock him and say, "No, this isn't something that doesn't matter in my game," you know, and let it happen. No. Totally threw me for a twist. I thought it was a brilliant idea and London did that to me twice, once in Hannah Theater with the lights and the cop car. And then-- - No, once with-- - Oh, okay, 30 times. But luckily I was able to spin back on the cop car and get him back a little bit, because you got me off guard with this turning into a cop car and pulling him over, and then I was like, "Well, what do I always see when a cop car pulls over? Is another cop car pulling up? You guys need a hand?" - All right. - The thing's so sorry. Fuck you right back at you, buddy. - Tugei. - And then the finale of the game was a double twist, which I didn't see either of those coming. I had no preconceived ideas, though, like I said. I had no idea what way you guys were gonna go. And London blew me out of the water with the mother thing, and then Roberto blew that out of the water and surprised me by-- - Well, actually, it probably shouldn't. Oh, this is going to be released after. Okay, sorry. - Absolutely caught me by surprise there. So there was quite a lot that you guys did that constantly surprised me, snapping necks and stealing cars full of zombies and all right. - And sticking your fingers around-- - Can I think of those eyeballs? - The rules there. - I wish you could use those eyeballs and, you know-- - None of it was-- - The rule there is, for any aspiring or even established GM, just roll with it. You know, go with the flow, take a five-minute break, think through it, take the players to the side. If you need to, take the player to the side, talk about it real quick. I don't think John's enjoyment, or my enjoyment, was less than Denny because we talked to you a little bit about, like, I had a conversation with you right before the twist. - Yes, not sure, but I think we're going to release that. You started explaining what you want to do with the twist, but you were trying to keep it back to yourself and what the secret was going to be. It finally came out and told you, I said, "What is your intent here? What is it you want to do?" Because I don't want to get in your way, and if I know what you're going to try to do, then-- - Yeah, it works. - It works. - That's fine, we'll make it work. Because the mechanics shouldn't get in the way of the fun. So that's another hint I would give GMs, is always be prepared to just ask the player, "What is it you're trying to do?" Because they might not be explaining it well enough, and you might perfectly agree with what they were trying to do, you're just getting in their way because you don't understand what they're trying to do. - And I think if you have an idea of what's going to happen, especially in a finale, that's good because you should, as a storyteller or as a GM, know what's-- I have an idea of what you want to happen, but then you need to roll with it, and that's a real hard skill to learn. Some people have it, some people don't, some people can learn it. But again, if you need to take a five or ten minute break, maybe you should break, and then-- - In truth, I want a constant to get away because I love the thought of reoccurring villains. I want a constant to get away. - Well, I was not going to go and play GM caveats and say, "No, she can't die, you can't kill her." And you guys were mocking her. - I thought it would be cool to see her come back, but not at least-- - It's like smocking her. - Right. - But just a-- - It's like smocking her. - Right. - I want to toe enemy. - Absolutely. - She's death right less than in power, but I like the fact that she escaped and she's still going to be a thorn somewhere out there, and that next episode may be one after that type thing. - Even a different kind of thorn. - Right. - It's kind of cool. So, really good question Tyler, I really appreciated that. Another one was from Mr. Merkte. His question was, "How much in the opinion of the gamers did their knowledge of the campaign building influence their later play?" Because we all sat around and built the environment together, and he asked, "Did they later feel that the world that they built was missing something?" So, all the work we did to put the world together, do you think that influenced-- I think it heavily influenced the game. - Yeah. So, even it influenced me, I think I had an IM session with you where I said, "I really don't want Constance. I don't--" Or maybe it was just a priest, but I would decide when the other guys were away. I don't want her to die, because she's such a huge, she was such a huge part of what we built into the city that incapacitated, lessened in power, whatever the case might be. I really want to see her survive, which I would have had no preconception of wanting her to survive, had we not went through that, again, exhausting, horrendous, but yet valuable city building experience. So it influenced my role-playing, even in the last scene. - Right. Pretty much all of us would have to agree that the city building part of it was a huge part of both your character, construction, and the adventure, obviously, that was more me choosing those building blocks to build the adventure. But then when you guys were dealing in the city, you had things that you could go. Some of it never got used. - Well, you know what? - That is a great example. - Yeah, like the ghost in the-- - I'm sorry, some of it. - Yeah, like the ghost in the-- - Yeah, like the ghost in the-- - Yeah, like the ghost in the-- - Yeah, like the ghost in the-- - Oh, yeah, yeah. - The right side was at least mentioned offhand in the adventure, but the other one is soldiers monument, yeah, the way he was-- - And another thing is, even in the middle of the end of the adventure, our idea, I'm not sure if it was mine or if it was somebody else's, to bring Constance's sister as a counterweight against her. If we were playing this adventure without any city building whatsoever, we wouldn't even know to ask the question, does she have a sister who's incredibly powerful, who works at university, hospital, and stuff, you know, none of that would have came up, so it was definitely valuable although time consuming. - I always love-- I mean, we've done this in D&D where we've built a city for our world together as a group, and I think without a doubt gets a player as much more invested in the campaign than if the GM just makes it all up or they pull it out of a book or something. It is time consuming, and like we've said before, let's just sessions with headaches, from the stress and-- - The city building-- - I mean, it really works. - Yeah. - I'm curious of that. - Well, I think maybe if we could somehow make it a little bit more organic where you fill out what you need to fill out for the first few chapters, and then have it evolve, but then it may work-- - Yeah, I think-- - But then, yeah, exactly. There is a benefit to sessions of having-- - We did a bit separate in that we created the city and then we started creating the characters, and my guy was, like, from a bad neighborhood, but we never made the neighborhood a location. - Right, well, no. - It's like a garden of X or whatever. - Well, let's change that. - Our guardian of Cleveland instead. - Right. - That would have been nice, which would have been nice, which would have a location that was tied to me. - I could see, like, anything that was missed, you'd want to flesh it out more. - Yeah. - Before you play again. - And I can see us do that, doing that in a preamble before the story starts, I need one evening. What about this idea? What about that idea? And just kind of flushing it out a little bit more, and then going into the story again without, obviously, the-- - I think if we were to do it again and create a new city-- - Scratch. - From scratch, I don't want to do that, by the way. - Yeah. - Never. - Well, I think we would do it quicker, and it would be easier, but I still think it would be painful. - It would be. - Because you have so many different ideas. - The reason I don't want to do it is not because it would be painful or difficult, but with that, I much more enjoy a continual story and it gets an evolving city and evolving characters. - Like a lot of people said, it took a while, a couple rounds of play before people got used to the city, got used to their characters, started having a little bit more fun and loosened up a bit about what they were doing, and to start all over again would just start that all over again, too. Now that people know the city, they know their character is a little bit better. I think it's easier to step back in and into that same thing, it's like reading a sequel to a book. - Right. And you know the characters, you know, the setting is much more enjoyable. - Okay, Ari had a question for us and you said considering the game system, do you think there will be some take away from the fate game, something that you might incorporate into, say, the world of darkness game? - I really enjoyed the aspects. And so what I was thinking of doing, the next world darkness story is actually, it's a relatively limited story, it's a bridge from one part of the storyline to the next, just because I wanted to explore quickly, but it ends up being a little bit longer because of, anyways, none of that makes any difference. Well, we've long story short, I'm thinking about potentially adding some aspects and possibly tying them into willpower use, so that if somebody wants to tap some willpower, and in the game right now you could use willpower, whatever you want, or you could risk willpower once a scene, perhaps if you tie into an aspect, you can get the risk benefits? - Yeah, get the risk benefits, or I'm still playing with some ideas, but I think it risks twice. - I think possibly. I think that it might help the newer players find their characters a little quicker. Again, I mean, the bridge story is the bridge story, and it's called chagrin, and it's not really meant to be a character piece, it's one hour long. - Encouraging hell, yeah, it's just one hour long snapshot in these characters' lives. Nothing more than that, so I think that's one hour in real life, I mean, in game life, not in real life. - Yeah, in turn it's three seconds, so that's a lot of turns. - Oh, yeah. - I really want to give the new guys a chance to find themselves, and I think the world of darkness, I think it's kind of hard, especially for a newer role, not a newer role of players, but newer role players to the system, to find their way. So to make a long story, a long explanation, that much longer, I think I would just like to maybe incorporate some of the aspects somehow into the world of darkness. I think it really helps flesh out a character. - They do help to find them, I would add that. - In a big way, and I think it would be especially useful for the two newer players, but I think it'd even be useful for all the players, although I think that at this point, Jonathan, Michael Clay, and Sister Katie have a pretty good idea of who they are, but it doesn't hurt. - I think you mentioned before that you wanted to, after playing the Fate, allow characters a little bit more freedom as to turn the story or try to do things that you normally would say you can't do that, it really doesn't make sense. - That's right. - You can say, well, you know, maybe we can make that work. - Yeah, if nothing more than you guys feeling comfortable, and I would certainly like the players to feel the ability to say, I'm gonna change this up, or, you know, I'm gonna do something that I think you guys have to some extent in the story, but yeah, I certainly want the characters to feel more open like they're not being bottled up just because I wrote a scene to be a certain way, I always try to be flexible with it, or even discard it entirely if it ends up being useless. And then the social combat side of things, I think, I was really impressed with Fate's social combat, and there is a social combat in the vampire chroniclers guide that I thought was pretty interesting, and I'd like to incorporate into some of our future somewhere. It's not as cool as Fate, I don't think, but I think it wouldn't be like some patched on thing, like if you try to add Fate to social combat, I think it's a pretty cool solution, but it's never gonna be as good as a Fate-based social combat, in my opinion, unless the players are really on that night, and the storytellers are really on that night. So those are three things I take from it, is aspects, giving the players more freedom, maybe, or at least letting them know they have that freedom, I always try to be someone who lets them do that, because shit luck didn't turn out anything, like it was supposed to, but, and then the third thing being the social combat, go ahead, Jon, you were gonna say something? Will these aspects stick around, or are they just a crutch for the newer guys? No, I think I'd like to build it into the system a little bit, it's not just a crutch for you guys, but I think it would help, obviously, because it helped me develop London. I think I'd like to keep them, and certainly it can be swapped out and changed as your character goes through his arc, or her arc as a case, maybe Jim, but I'd like to build it, maybe, since it's built into Fate points in the Fate-based system, the only thing that's even close to representing that, in my opinion, is real power, somewhere in the world of darkness, so I may house rule that at some point, which may cause some people to, you know, groan, some world of darkness people, you know, to groan or not like it, but I think it might actually fit our group pretty well, because we enjoy those aspects of, you know, no pun is that a storytelling system, so if they can't deal with that, you think that they would be able to, right? So, yeah, I think those are, who's that question from? It was from Ari. Ari, I think those are the three things I really took from the last story, and I think it really helped improve my storytelling in the future. As a player in the world of darkness, I think some of us are gonna also pull things from Drosan and not know we're doing it, like it is, is that we are getting used to having a little more power in the game to make, to help describe a scene by adding things. Absolutely, the one of the first scenes in the chagrin through something my character wouldn't have accomplished it. I would have had no problem with it. One of them described something that didn't exist. I would have just said this is what I wanna do, Fate and Fate point, it would have been done, but it didn't work out the way I thought it was gonna work out, and it was a little frustrating just 'cause I had to get back into the rhythm of a different game game. That's a really good point, like failure, and not that that's a good or bad thing, it's just... Yeah, a force failure that you can't affect. Yeah. I could fail. Guess what? You gotta have to fail. You gotta have to fail. Right, and it's not that hard. You could throw a couple at it. Right. No, I didn't fail. I had succeeded at a cost. Always at a cost. Always at a cost, but there's definitely a difference in the world of darkness where you do not get to, I mean, you could throw a willpower at it, but if the dice aren't your friend... It's more just in a storytelling aspect where previously we were kind of passive and that we would sit back and... What the story would describe to us the way things were. And now we're a little more aggressive where we can describe the car, where it has no meaning on how the system works, but we're more likely to add stuff like that, where we weren't in the past, and we might do it without even thinking. Well, the thing about the world of darkness that I've never liked is... Just the... Just the... Yeah, no, no, no. It's the basic conceit of world of darkness. Is that you are, from minute one, you're outmatched. Even with the hunters, even though we felt like, "Oh, at least we can do something," that's still more of an illusion. Whereas the dress and... You're a bit more of a... Well, I guess it's not that maybe it's a different aspect of horror, or maybe like you said, it's more of a mystery. Well, no, it's definitely the game. The central conceit of the game is you have a morality scale and you're going to go down that morality scale. It's not a question of whether you're going to go insane, it's just when. Right. When are you going to go insane? And then, you know, that's kind of... And when are you going to start? I mean, it's a game of grey, and where is the line? What will you do to protect your loved ones, your city, your sanity, your ideals? What will you do? And that's the whole conceit of the game. And I don't think that appeals to you on a level. There's a level of despair to it that is just, I feel it work on me, where I'm like, "Well, yeah, what is the fucking point I'm writing?" Right. We are going to lose. So, I'd rather go home and play Skyrim or the character in the game, like, I'd rather not fight against the darkness and get my nuts hit every, you know, what's the point? It's like, totally play Skyrim. Right. He should have really good. The guys should have done his PC's like, "Fuck my character, I'm so fast." So I say... I think I like it, to his credit, though, not being your assistant. And you still find a way to role play it well. Michael claims it was a very... Yeah, don't let me say that I don't enjoy the game. It's just, it's a quality about it that it's... It's not going to be your favorite. It's never going to be your favorite. I don't think... I'm not describing it that way. Oh, okay. It's an aspect of the game, the mechanic where D&D was, you're going to succeed despite a thousand orcs that you're fighting. Right. You know, and it's... It's heroic. It's heroic fantasy. Yes. Darkness is a... The best-case scenario you survive, maybe as mentally and emotionally stable as you were at the start of the thing. Maybe. Right. Well, let's be honest. Let's be honest. I mean, part of an oxide. A bomb. And snipers. All right. There's a little action for it because... There's a little action for it because... Oh, where will Finn be? That's right. Remember that day? Remember that day? Remember that night? Well, sure. Friends. Nothing else. See? And that's... Right now? That I'm not playing. I'm going up against your character. What? That's in a group conflict there? Well, that was a major group conflict for the last story. I kind of rate where we're... Actually, if you go back and listen to it, it's exactly what you did with Constance. And here we have a werewolf and I'm like, "Why the fuck are we not killing this part?" There's a big difference here. I'm in charge. No. Mike was supposed to be in charge. And did I? Or did I not listen to you? That's not a difference. You did. All right, then. Well, the difference is that... Yeah, that's true. I've seen Oliver again with Sister Kate, I think I might have changed her mind and have a kid. If your character was a Roberta type, he would have knocked this werewolf ahead. Well, there's... The Aegis Kaiduro specifically has a thing against werewolves. Yeah. So, that was like, I'm kind of there. But the point is... You follow the door? I almost fucking created it. I did follow orders. Yeah, you get to think about the point is... There are a person she knew and her dog in... I'd say probably not. It's not a human. It's not... It's an evil beast in the city that's dangerous. Who would have been stuck with that? She had chunky bits of our friend in his belly when we were talking to him. Yeah. Well, hell... I think we're a little off-topic on R.E.'s. I'm sorry. What were we asking? Yeah, what was... What are we going to bring to world of darkness? What are we going to cover? Yes, we did cover it. We did cover it. There's three aspects or three... Not three aspects. There are three points I want to carry over and I think that I will hopefully in the future be a better storyteller because of my experience in the state. Well, we all hope that we get better at this. Yeah. That's so tough. We're going to run Burning Wheel. There are other systems I'd like to try. Luckily, you got to try Dragon Age at home. If I'm ever going to play a fantasy role-playing game like D&D, Fourth Edition, or Dragon Age... That's Dragon Age? I'd go to Dragon Age. Okay. Just because I thought the game system was much more dynamic and... Do you give it all a CDF on it? It just still has problems. Oh, yes. I do have CDF for that, but I also have the books. It's like three-five with better combat mechanics, not better combat overall. Honestly, the book's like this decade. It's like maybe 30 pages. And really, really shallow. Rolling. There's a bit of that. Like 30 pages is the rolebook. It's a very roles light game. Our next question is from James York who asked, "This is a more rulesy dressing question." You guys never seem to use declarations much, which I think is a really powerful option open to the players. Was this just one of the features that kind of slipped to the cracks in play? We've been asked this question before. It was during feedback on a much farther back episode that we totally didn't know about declarations. And it was never explained to the players. And since then, we still don't use it. We use it very limitedly. If a player says, "Do I have a certain type of bullets?" We roll versus the gun skill. If they don't make that roll, they can still spend a fake point. Part of the problem is that still got issues with the fate mechanics and economics of the fate system. And I don't give out enough faith points. But you guys treat them as if they're gold, which they are. So you are very reluctant to make that declaration. And you're more likely to argue that something should exist? That it's something that should exist and give examples why, which I'm likely to agree. What is the time? Is it your fault because you wrote the story so well, we don't see any reason to change it? Well, there you go. I think I tried this class. That's a classic one as well. But we're aware of it. The sword had like holy power, didn't I try that one? Well, I think you did. You tried too. And then the GM was like, "We have used it for not that often." Right. A declaration is more, you know, you're on the street corner, "Oh, well, I brought my car when you started before." And I'd still go to the driving roll rather than cross to a fate point for it. So I guess I don't see the need for it and you guys haven't either, that you ever had to go there. Well, the trick is the story. In terms of the story, I guess do you really want to, in a way, we're talking about pacing before, do you want to slow down the pace, the debate whether you brought a car or not? Right. If you're saying, "I need this thing for this story to continue," I'm going to say, "Fuck it or whatever." Yes, you have it. Why would I make you spend a fate point for it in my opinion? But if I'm in a firefight and like, I think I brought the extra clip of ammo. You're like, "Well, wait a second." Did I bring my gun with me? That was an interesting one. Oh, we're fighting. And then our fire gun. Did I bring the cold steel sword, which the cold steel bullets for my gosh should have been a declaration. I should have been able to say, "I did." You absolutely could say. I should have. But there is a cold steel sword here. I give a fate point. You could have done that. I see missed opportunity. Well, there's two months now. You got one, whatever. Well, just keep reminding you, and I'll bring it up next time we play, that those rules exist. I think, again, we're an old group who's played together a lot of times, and we have our set ways that we're still fighting to get out of, and that's another power that the players have that we just haven't got used to using. We're not used to using. We just like them. All right. Emily. We don't have any women listeners. We do have women listeners. And Emily is the first, in a long time, to give us feedback. We had someone else. Mystery. Mystery. Mystery. Mystery. We just appeared. Hopefully, she's still listening. Hello there. But Emily had some questions. She said, "Hey, guys. Awesome podcast." I truly wish that I could play a session or 12 with you guys. You seem like such an awesome group. I spoke with Emily on Facebook and chat, and it turns out she lives not far from my daughter in college. She's also going to college, and I told her, you know, "Yeah, we're in there in Ohio." How are you? All right. The question that she had for our 100th episode- You might not imagine that she could join us because then you'll have some other- Right. Just a little- What about me? Be cut. I just had a moment of winning a date with Roberto. A question for your 100th episode, Fiesta. I know you guys have been playing together for a long time. Too long. God, thanks. I hate these people. But what made you decide to do an actual play podcast, and how do you keep yourself going and want to be an intense project like this week after week? Easy for me. Really? Yeah. I pretend it doesn't exist. And then we just talk about cool stuff? It's easy. I just let Tom do our game. Yeah. I started recording. The reason I started recording was for my youngest son, who was 10 at the time when I was 11, who wanted to know what his older brothers and father were going off to do each. I mean, he knew about role playing, but he knew he wanted to know specifically what the story was about. And we talk about Ryan Fucking Nelson, Ryan Fucking Nelson, Ryan Fucking Nelson. Yeah. And we can't really show him. And it, and it, and it, and it, and it, I mean, that's what your dad probably knows. Yeah, that's what he would have to do to show him. Mark anything. So the original attempt was that, and then as the story got better, we had a lot of it. Already recorded. It was like 23 episodes in. You said, "Hey, you know what we can do? Let's look at the financial cost and how much?" To be fair, there was a, there was a fair degree of resistance and reluctance to, because honestly in the beginning, I said, I am not releasing these to anybody in the public. Right. Some people didn't want their voice. They didn't want to hear their voice. Some people, they thought it would change the way we role played, which it has. I still don't want to hear my voice. So I'm saying go find themselves uncomfortable hearing your voice. I think at least three of the, John's way, the third person. I hate it. That's why I don't. It's not really a podcast. I am actually used to hearing my own voice, and it doesn't bother me. I mean, were you before you started editing? I don't know. Probably hated it, just like everyone else. I think my voice isn't incredibly nasally or high-pitched now. The most annoying thing about my voice is it's not loud, and I can't hear my own voice when I'm listening to the podcast back at the time. I think one of the neat things was that we were scared that it would, or worried that it would affect our role playing. And it has. In a way that's made it a more enjoyable experience for everyone around the table, which we stay more focused on. That's connected. I think from a lot of us, we allow other people to talk, without talking over them, right? Not a whole lot of conversations, while other conversations are happening. I miss that sometimes. Yeah, I want to explain a role or something to Thomas, and I can't do that, but you guys are avid note-passers. That's the only thing I can do. No, I mean that in a good way, like, you know what I'm saying, like you've found a way to still do it without interfering with the podcast. It's a text message. It's just, I've described it before, I don't know if I ever did it on the podcast, but when you're in a party, there could be 27 conversations going on, and there's no problem focusing on just the one person you're talking to, sometimes it's a bit of a problem, but you could still do it. In a recording, it takes all of those and kind of makes just an indecipherable mush. I would also submit that if we didn't get the number of downloads and fans that are communicating with us, and they were seeing. I was going to go to that as the last part of the question was what makes you keep doing it? Well, that's it. Because I would have lost a bet saying that we would get more than 2,000 downloads in a year. Right, yeah. And then when we started, I remember the days where it was like, you know, we can count them in the tens of downloads, and then sing, and build, and build, and build. We are currently, and I don't know how, because it compares to other podcasts, and it's not something where we're waving around. No. Oh. Look up, but we get roughly 150 downloads a day. Right. It's pennies in the middle, isn't it? Yeah. It's not a huge one. But it's when you look at the total of what we've produced, and we're about, like I said, a hundredth episodes, which is pretty cool. It also turned it into a little bit of a pricing in Utah, and we're the one who does the lion share, if not almost entirely everything, especially helping the game with the sound effects, the music, and all that other stuff. And the payoff is the fans. Yeah, absolutely. The feedback that we get, the reviews that we get. I mean, that's like, okay, if there's somebody out there listening, then it's worth doing. Right. Right. And things purchase stuff. The Amazon link. Oh, there you go. That's an actual financial game, which is really working out. It's like, wait, I plug a job. I have to buy a laser printer, so I wanted to try to buy it through the Amazon link. If you want to buy a big screen television, too, I'm trying to put all my things in there. Anyways. Thanks for the question, Emily. Amazon. Like a Friday. Yeah. Yeah, you're Christmas shopping. There's a link. Christmas is coming up. Use that Amazon link. And only for the questions. And the conversation on Facebook, she's a very nice and a nice conversation. We had some questions from the RPG crosstalk unbound book. That right pisses me off. Yes. And Mike hates it. Mike hates it. He likes his books to be pristine. You know what? Unbound book. You know, you're making me out to be this anal retentive. Am I telling you, are we like you like you? Do you like books? Yes. I think it's a crime against man and guy to crack the spine of a book. Now, in your defense, I think the greatest invention of mankind was the library, where you can go and get free books. So I agree. Books are a great, great thing. You would think that Mike would think the PDF would be the greatest thing, greatest invention of mankind, because you just can't mess it up. It's needed to be real. I mean, right. You can just walk into the library and get virtually any book. The Cleveland Library either has the book there, they have a wonderful system in Cleveland, by the way. The Remain Library is fantastic. The RPG section is lacking. You can get, you can order books and send them in, you know, it's just wonderful. It's just so great about you. So when he hears Unbound book, like this feedback is from Unbound book. Well, how does it make you feel? What's that? I'm thankful that they submitted a question. There you go. Okay. Then Unbound book said, "Hi, time. Congratulations on you." Episode number 100. Where's the hot glue? You can't let go. I told you. You know, I've been keen to hear a roundtable discussion with the players of both games about their favorite scene from the two scenarios. I'd be interested to know what they think worked and what didn't during play. In any case, I'm really looking forward to the return of the World of Darkness setting. As well, I enjoy the Dresden Files books. I'm not a big fan of the Fate System. Looking forward to 100 more episodes. Marcus. That's his acronym. Thanks, Marcus. Yes. Do you know that you're insulting in whole countries by naming the Dresden Files scenario full Ryan Nelson? Although, you might be surprised, and he could be much more powerful and cunning than he currently seems to be in episode 91. But here in New Zealand, Ryan Nelson is a well-loved captain of our national football team. You should use D.R.I.L. Nelson as your character in the game, too. When we go to inevitably dies, I will play Ryan Nelson. Maybe he could be your dad. Then he'd put up a blue link in there. I would love to. I would love to. And one of the few New Zealanders to make good in the English Premier League. Huh? Look at that. I would love to go to New Zealand. I don't even know what that means. It's a good friend. It is supposed to be beautiful. Plus, they filmed the water rings there. So, you probably won't know that, too. I'm the biggest habit there is. I know you are. Well, we should probably answer his question. Best scene. David's scene. Wait, wait, wait. First of all, I had no idea. I was actually, what I do before I prepped for a game is create a huge list of random names, and since we're playing in the city of Cleveland, they're pretty much just normal names. And... You look at the... Actually, I found a site. Yeah. And I think it was pulling information from a census somewhere. You know, I've just said, "Give me 100 names," and I went through and said, "Dye, nah, nah, nah." And threw him into an Excel spreadsheet, so I had a list of people, and as they came up and you guys wanted to find out, "Well, what about? What's the Realtor's name?" Check the list. Write down next to it, Realtor's name, so that I don't have to make up a name on the spot. Ryan Nelson was some other Ryan Nelson in the United States that were making fun of. Not necessarily. I'd like to be the first to apologize. I love it. Captain of New Zealand. Ryan Nelson. There he is. He does not look anything like Ryan Nelson. No. The face went to the website. He would see. That's his brother. That's his brother. KOTN website, though. Yeah. It's KOTN website. No. All right. The two new players, John and Thomas, don't know the world of darkness. But for the present files, what would be your favorite scene? You like the what? When I flashed a black, when I blew up the vampires and the ghouls all in one thing. Yeah. That's the end of the story. Thomas? That would be when you were talking to interrogating crispy booze, right? I wasn't allowed to pluck down his eye on this. Speaking of that, my second favorite scene. Man, it's hard to pick just a certain scene. A lot of it was excellent and most of my favorite parts were just the-- They don't have to be what your character is. My favorite scene with your character is when he barged out of the coffee or-- How many shots? How many? How many shots? Oh, there you go. That was definitely my funnest moment in the entire world. My favorite adventure, where it was just funny. Mike's shaking his head. Mike's shaking his head. Mike's shaking his head. We had to say fuck the rest of the group. Yeah. Everyone said it once. If we had something like hooked up to Mike's like a heart monitor, then Mike, as soon as that's mentioned, his heart rate just spiked about 20 points. Yeah, as he was talking, folks, you could see Mike just shaking his head. Sorry. Sign, Ellie. Mike, what was your favorite part? When you walked into Cleveland for the first time and didn't meet any of these y'all. I would say my favorite scene for Dresden was the scene where I invoked the accords. That was brilliant. Powerful. Powerful stuff. And then where I had to decide whether to kill Donovan, or I was going to kill Donovan, but then I thought of something at the last second. And it was-- Put it off to later. Yeah. Well, hold on. It was pivotal. It was the resolution of the entire-- But the feeling, the emotion, and the-- talk about being in the zone, role-playing, I felt it there. That was pretty cool. And I hadn't felt that. The second scene would go back to the world of darkness where Heart Cook's brain talks to Michael Clay for the first time, and, well, there's so many different moments, but that was the one where just trying to understand what a storyteller was doing to my character. So yeah, those are, I guess, the two highlights for me. It's a little different for me because I was storyteller in one game and the player, and the next, but-- Just want to go with Dresden, that's fine. From Dresden since it's the most recent, I would have to say there was a lot-- I really enjoyed being a player in this adventure. So it's first among equals. The first twist to the end of the story, when I came up with a way to get Constance to calm down and seemingly resolve the major issue of us dying. So that would be my favorite scene is a player, but again, there were so many of them, even lots that didn't involve London, as a storyteller for World of Darkness. I would have to say that my favorite scene, I choose combat with Tammy who ended up, well, you know, that was huge and Big Mama Hopson was just a fun scene to role play. The scene where you guys interrogated Billy after he'd just killed John Beamer and realized what he was dealing with and who he was and showing mercy to us was really huge, but maybe my favorite action-packed moment, I think it was my favorite because it was maybe action-packed because there was so much great role-playing going on, but was just the whole ambush in your apartments above the wine bar? That's going to say it's my favorite scene. Yeah, I mean, you had-- I'm not going to end it with my character getting taken out, I actually like this one. That whole battle, you woke up to carbon monoxide, then there's an ambush, then there's a bomb rigged in the bottom of the building. And again, if you had a heart monitor hooked up to mic right now, the shape is that you guys escape and then decide to go back into it, or at least one of you does, to try to diffuse it, then the bomb goes off, so more people don't even know if he's dead or alive and go back in the building. There's ladders, the walkways, the metal walkways, you go up a building. Most things are falling apart, the fire escapes. Chew and Michael Clay were trying to find out. Trying to get up there and you were diving across and grabbing on for your lives, why they went and why-- Well, the doctor and the doctor went to an extra person, not an artifact, but we see where the priorities are there. That could be-- Yes, and I didn't know that he was dead, how could I have a priority against it? You went for the item, like, just go with it. Yeah, but I didn't know-- I didn't know his character was-- You didn't go to check, though, did you? No. He said he had it. I got it. And blew off. So I don't think he had it. I think that a whole spring of events, that was right about the middle of the story, and to me-- He got it right in the face. And then it also-- that was part of the theme, is when you lost your first home, which, again, the whole theme of that story was about-- Actually, it wasn't the second-- that was the second safe house-- No, that was the first place. You guys lived above the wine bar, remember? Oh, that's right. That's right. Right. So then you ended up in the small, safe house that-- Safe house in quotes. Safe house in quotes. Safe house was breached by Billy, and then you ended up-- That's right. Even I-- Mr. Five Scenes installed gyms. I didn't mean to steal gyms. I was happy to throw that in there. It's funny that my favorite scenes are the ones that cause character to the most frustration. Right. Like the last scene, I think. Well, it was tense, too. You know? I mean, the climax was done just so well, and how-- Oh, there was a comment? I like getting thrown for a loop and having to do something-- think out of the box and do something different. And just when you think it's over and things are settled down, all right, things get thrown in and mixed. No. And I like that change, and I like that change up. And I think it's fun and interesting, as much as it strikes some people crazy. That's much, sorry. I think as far as the world of darkness, I would say that the most enjoyable in that entire scenario had to be in Bob's "No Means No Woman" episode where he was in the hospital off on his own, just exhausted, falling asleep on a couch, goes through a dream, wakes up, in the middle of a nightmare, actually. The reality is worse than his dream type of situation. And how well Bob played that was just phenomenal. All the ways. He's not here, so I'll represent him with that request. Right. That was good. I do think you and I had some great role playing. Very similar to Mike and I when we did the scene in Constance's Office with The Mentor, in which you and I as Jay talking to Winston-- Hey. Yeah, talking to Winston Tate was just very-- I thought well played out in a very emotional, as far as role-playing with it, roles go. As far as the Dresden final, yeah, I would have to start going through a litany of-- It's hard. It's hard to list out as a GM, because I enjoy-- When your storyteller GM, it's hard. I enjoyed virtually everything that happened in that one. The things I have to point out is John's coming up with taking over the Gold Lords position and having that as your disposal was never accounted for as GM, never saw that coming, never thought of that. I was a little disappointed that I wasn't able to play enough with his demon, but I did hold back on that because Mike's character had a voice in his head and I thought two of them. I didn't want to take the shadow. I think it was a wise choice because there's other stories there. Right. And I think that's definitely going to be a bigger part of the second story because John has fallen a bit down the slope. And so the demon's like, oh, OK, there's room here to play. OK. Can I ask a question about the demon in his head? Of me or? Your character. Yeah. Is that something like it is with the Faye, where the more power you get from it, the more you lose control of your character, the more powers it gives you, the more it takes away your fate points that you want. Definitely the more powers it gives you, it takes away fate points because you have to pay for those. It's granting you that and giving you that and you lose a little-- Going right off the bat gave me inhuman strength and inhuman recovery, which are minus four fate points. But did you take like-- Yeah, when he took out fire, I lost all of it. Yeah, it took him down to virtually no fate. So-- But was that a temporary thing or a permanent temporary job? That's pretty much the right thing. So I was also thinking where my character is, is that he always thought that he had total control over the powers he got, which he does. But maybe he might start finding out that he can use more power, but at the cost-- Right. He could use humanity. Which is not a bad, bad way to go, so I'll definitely consider that. It's a great way to go. It's just-- Everybody's doing it. The way we finished it, there's big glowing arrows pointing to what's got to be addressed next. All right. And that involves these two, the Ward and Allen, and there's a big, big rift between those guys. And I'd be remiss not to mention that the final scene. I mean I threw in a twist or two because they had to be there for plot reasons and to give you guys something. But you guys, again, totally surprised me with the ending. I did not. Wow. I did not. With our own dark twist. With your own twist. Yeah. Not only one, but then followed by another. And then, okay, time to think quickly on your feet. What happens next, Mr. Jim? So I think that was a wonderful question by Marcus. Thank you for your question. The next one we have is from MedMulner on the RPG podcast website. I have an account because I take care of all the posts there. Just a back story. And yes, because underneath it, I have a quote that gets printed every time I post and it's a quote from Terry Pratchett. Mm-hmm. From there? His... Good box, folks. Yes, they are good books. I'm trying to remember it off the top of my head, but it's something like give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life. Right. Something similar to that. Right. Yeah, I know. He's in such a... He's gonna be a loner. I haven't seen a Pratchett quote in a while and it brings a smile to my face. A smile to my face. Point. But I... He's not in Australia! And it brings a smile to my face. Anywho, the topic you might like to discuss is one. What house rules use or would like to use in both systems that you broadcast or from other popular systems? Which we kind of covered what we want to pull from fate into world of darkness and maybe... I do use something where if you roll more than one die and they come up once, it's a dramatic failure because there's just not enough opportunity sometimes in a game to dull out dramatic failures and your universe is a dark and scary place. So I do like to do that, that's one I can think to add, but I don't have a ton of house rules because I think really we're just getting used to these systems after being a long time what we played a lot of systems, but D&D recently for a long period of time, I think you have to really be familiar with the system before you can start changing it. The only thing I changed in the chosen files was not really a change per se, but abstracting out his ghouls. I mean... That was a nice change. It was a fact that it was a rule on the fly rather than anything brought in from another game. Alright, question number two. What gaming system is everyone's favorite and why? Again, don't confine yourself to the two that you've played. Go! John! What's your favorite? It's faking. Yeah, it is. It's faking. Well, it's fake because it's the most entertaining one I've played so far. Traveler. Traveler has just got a warm spot in my heart, but I was playing that as a teenager. You can die in character creation, he complains about the darkness of world of darkness. Not in the new version. You can't play! Sorry! Your character died during character creation. You can sit in the corner while we all have fun at it. The world of darkness, won't you scare me? Your character died in the world. Seriously. You know, D&D, is that just because of the longevity we've played it for a long time? We've played that for a long time. Almost three decades. Well, you can't just say D&D. No. You can say D&D. But which version? Three, five, three, four. Oh, I would say three, five. Four was shiny and new and kind of made me happy at first. So you're saying if we finish the next adventure and we can play any game we want you would want to be in three, five, three, two? I don't know. Maybe? I feel a lot too. Well, no, but it feels like Sky was saying before. It feels like whether it's the podcast or whatever, how we play and how we experience the game is a lot different. And I don't know how three, five would work again. I'd be interested to explore that. But I would almost want to almost house rule it where you play it more as a storytelling adventure and less about a miniature battle game. But then are you able to make that switch? Are you really playing three, five? Or is that really, you want to play Dragon's Age where it's still-- Thomas is shaking his head and John's only with his hand. So I don't think we enjoyed it as much as I did. I mean, I don't know. I haven't experienced it. My problem with Dragon Age is that as a cleric in three, five, I had some bitching spells. I was a cleric of Morden. I could sculpt stone and do some bitching things with it. But there are like 12 spells in Dragon Age. It is extremely limited. Like I said, it's a rule. Shallow. Yeah. Which is supposed to-- because in the first game, you only go up to level five. Unless we start making bullshit, I think it's too shallow for me to enjoy. I would be-- I think it would be really neat to somehow make a storytelling version of three, five and using the faith system for the social-- Do you want to make up your own game? --almost have a hybrid of the things I like best. Right, but that wasn't a question. I know. [LAUGHTER] Playwise, I think, Dresden has been pretty cool. All things considered. Yeah. With the exception of just the spare, the world of darkness has been pretty cool as far as the storytelling aspect, because that really kind of changed. Changed what? It changed how we-- I looked at the role-playing games, because it was such a change from what it had been. I was pretty profound. I didn't think that's where you're going, so that was pretty cool. But I just wish we had a chance to win. Right. Well, you did win. Scott. We survived. You did take out the B-queen. You survived the B-queen. Well, positive change. The spirit took me over in the B-queen. I don't know. Right. You didn't feel like he-- It's almost kind of ironic. I would say if I had to play a game right now, I'd probably play World of Darkness. I like fate a lot. I like a lot of aspects of the fate. I really liked a lot of things about the fate. The reason I wouldn't go back to playing 3/5 or any version of D&D is just because it-- as Mike said, I think even when I played D&D and I was the GM, or the DM actually, right? I think I was still playing a social version of whatever I was playing. If we were playing D&D, it wasn't-- let's go storm the council and be like, there was all these shades of gray and all these moral dilemmas built into-- Ninja Cobalt. Yeah. Ninja Cobalt. You know what I mean? It was never-- The wagonload of kids that we were being killed because we couldn't get to them fast enough. That was very great. All right. You got extra experience for each one you say. That sounds terrible. It was so-- It was horrible. Really? It's so-- It's so appeal to rescue one, it got like-- Oh, it was horrible. Yeah. It was a dragon. I mean, there was a caravan being raided and their job was to protect all the children. They could make decisions on who they're going to protect and who they're going to kill. But I always played a version of a game with deeper-- it was always a mystery game. Whether it was a mystery taking place in the middle ages or in the dragon ages or it was a mystery taking place somewhere else. I think I always liked this particular genre. So I had to say that fate's a lot closer to world darkness than I was going to give it credit for going into. If the combat system was a little less mushy and if I felt a little bit more fear in the game. I'll show you fear. I'm sure you will. No. This is scary thing for a player to say, you know. I think it's a nice change of pace not to have that much of it. And maybe that's the good thing is we just rotate back and forth between couple systems we at least can tolerate or enjoy playing. I mean, that's the difference is you enjoy the world of darkness and that is the aspect that you enjoy most about it and you want that in the game when you're the player but the rest of the players like to reprieve the darkness currently I like the bolt systems are playing now. They're both good but to show how once go the other if I go back and play something just for the fun of it, it wouldn't be D&D D&D was okay but it wasn't great. If I can go back and play another system there's two systems I'd like to play again when one were kind of playing now, which is Call of Cthulhu and I had fun playing that back in the day. Right. And the other opposite and of that I'd like to play paranoia again because it's fun and it's totally lighthearted. You really don't care if you care if your dad dies and you're sitting wrong if you care if you don't die. Because in the whole paranoia of it it's a lot of fun. And this is a funny because Jim because I was actually two systems I was going to briefly bring up as things I'd like to try again if we ever tried them was both paranoia and Cthulhu. I was just looking it up on my phone. I've got it's a series of games I'd like to play. Paranoia XP. Oh really? One of our listeners mentioned paranoia XP. Yes. In 2004 and so maybe we give it a try some two or three or four weeks span when we're just feeling like doing something very light hearted because the darkness is too depressing. The story blinds are too heavy or whatever we're doing. Thomas your favorite game. I have to say fate. I'm enjoying it a lot lately and it's wonderfully adaptable. I mean I ran a bulldog's game. A lot of the skills and everything are saying but obviously sci-fi so you've got to have something different than Dresden and I'm building something new me and John with fate and it works marvelously for that. It's just so building block you can choose to keep what you feel like because the game doesn't change too much when you leave one thing out. Yeah I think it's what GURPS wanted to be but does it better if you ask me. Fate. Fate. Fate does it in a way that they make the game so simple that you could do anything with it. GURPS wanted to make it in a way that they could produce so many books with so many new rules for each system that they could charge for. I think I'd have to say right now the game I'm enjoying playing most would be fate even though I'm a gem. I just enjoy what it brings out in you guys as far as role players and a lot of the game is just about the story. I do have the same concerns that some of you do about the combat system and the magic scene. It seems like if we could merge the world of darkness with fate we would have the system that at least three of us mentioned maybe four actually mentioned that we like the combat aspect. Darkness has just enough combat where it has just enough rules to make it solid and interesting and grounded without needing tactical maps. I mean I like fate has the fantastic social system and right I like the I mean the combat and the Dresden system the only thing that bothers me about it is the all of the different it seems to take a long time to take somebody out you've got to hit them over all the consequences over it. Yes. So all the consequences are just time consuming and you have to name them and it could be that as a gem I haven't been giving you the right kind of opponents to go up to make the combat go quicker and I've been throwing some pretty powerful creatures against you especially the end and you're going to see that start to get drawn out and take a little learn. But there are other additional systems I wouldn't mind trying like I've mentioned before a burning wheel is just one that I know it's more old school but it seems to me that it has a lot of the things that we have looked at the past but I don't know if we've all grown almost type things. When you have a certain skill and you use it you keep track of it it's a lot of bookkeeping but when you use the skill it gets better advancement in the game is based on what you do. What's the genre of burning wheel? Burning wheel is there's a couple different offshoots of it but the main branch is fantasy. Right. Like I said you know there's fiasco and there's others but the question was the favor and the poor Pathfinder potentially for the 3.5 junkies who really want to you know I think if we can't do it with 3.5 we couldn't deal with Pathfinder I don't think it's enough different. Okay the next question that we have from Mad Mjolnir was other AP podcast you listened to. Have a look at Mike because nobody listens to them other than Mike and I. I was listening to the AP podcast of the people who were doing the changeling one burning so far. I fell up there and I discovered non-AP podcasts that I got stuck in anything done by a podcast or a winner. I will say that I listened to our podcast and I feel like I am I know I was I've listened to myself and I'm like I don't remember that and it's so I'm I'm really an active listener to our own podcast and I'm surprised sometimes. Did the quiz get you by surprise? Well yeah I'm like I'm like I'm really like David I was there how do I not remember that this is how it went down then it's all through editing and you you weed out all the stuff that distracted us and is really good about focusing on what the story line. But back on the point AP podcasts that I listened to got our Skype they actually took a really long hiatus but they're back. What kind of they play all different kinds of play Diosco and they play all different kinds but they do it over Skype so they're in different places which is it's actually harder to do. The Walking Eye is another podcast and they do really just one shots and they have an interesting format. Similar to what we do is that they play one or two episodes that they play and then they'll sit around and discuss it and then they'll have the person who wrote the game come on the show and they'll talk to them. Oh they got crud so they can get the approval and they probably have more listeners and I listened to a ton of podcasts but not a ton of actual play and there's a show it's not really an actual play but it's kind of like a performance that they put out and they started listening to it because of my youngest as a zombie fan and it's called We're Alive and it's a zombie podcast not appropriate for a ten year old but the production quality is outstanding. I mean it's a radio play they do for sound effects they're full actors there's no people talking about playing characters they're actors playing the part right I can play a game where they just radio I think it's just a strip that they're doing it it's pretty much a radio show and it's definitely kind of interesting but anyways what's it called world of life a zombie story I don't remember a zombie love story yeah there you go two more questions alright from Mad Mjolnir and one of them is what game you might be playing post World of Darkness take two so after your World of Darkness where are we going we're definitely going back to draws in at some point right absolutely we might throw in some one shots on occasion where somebody doesn't show up and then I now have fiasco in my car so that if we ever have a time problem as some of the players don't enjoy that but if we are over time we're down to three or four players and give it a shot Mike I know is interested in running traveler possibly possibly so a bunch of things that we think we might work in like the one's mentioned before burning whale we still need to get a paranoia Bob and no no and the last question is a shameless tech question what's your recording set up that you use these days and by quality you've moved up from the iPhone in the center of table which we have and our recording is now just a different device run in the middle of the table it's the h1 zoom which is actually kind of old they have a at least two if not three version of the same thing but it works pretty damn well for us and I would add that you have the microphone but you also have a little mic stand yes and then we put it on the towel to fix up any vibrations any sounds but as far as after you record it what do you do after I report it yes I throw it through a level later which is a program that takes and tries to take up Jim's soft spoken voice and Scott's lot's spoken voice the same level unfortunately you get bad things being leveled later as well so in moments of silence you hear a hiss because the background noise is brought up so I tend to try to cut that out this silence all right the last question we have is from DJ Allen what have each of your players learned through playing a brand new system Drosa what have I learned what have you learned if you're playing a brand new system system of Drosa and I think we kind of just covered this before a bit but it's a little bit different if you guys want to jump in there with anything feel free the only thing I learned is that there's a lot to learn yeah we're pretty old to find that we we're still learning a way of playing role playing system I think I learned that there's really good ways to kill us no there's really good ways to to be able to set up your characters personality then just writing a couple paragraphs about them or thinking about it in your head before you play the aspects were a bit of a revelation for me in a sense that it and I've said it before but just that it really helps me play my character it really helped me not play my character but really helped me get a feel for what London was about their great shorthand bullet points to encapsulate your character very quickly you can write a three page story on what your character is but it's not the same as having some bullet points it's also something that is beyond your attributes beyond your equipment oh it's a mechanism in the game it's not only like a story you wrote to describe your character but there is actual benefits and reasons right to use those in a game and it's just that's different yeah I think I learned that was probably the biggest thing I learned from playing the fate pay system for the first time well I had a good idea who I was gonna play I could not get seven aspects I was okay with well I had like four or five five above five and then during the course of playing I picked up new ones that replaced ones who were kind of crappy and I felt that that was a better way to write my character that my character would change during the game and that if I couldn't come up with seven good ones that's okay because you feel flush out during play like my daughter right DJ Allen continues why are the non-humans considered the bad guys by the players in the world of darkness I think well-designed Shanghai it's werewolf dumb or vampirism would be a lovely little twist and I can help Scott if he would like some diabolical plot for such an evil little adventure I can honestly say DJ Allen that turning Michael Clay into a werewolf has absolutely entered my mind there is it would be such sweet sweet justice but I think obviously in hunter justice oh justice not the right word i would say that he's right in the way but you as Jay Tom I'm hunters didn't of course not humans are bad guys right but you didn't treat the werewolf not with the same different must die attitude and as Michael's character did and again Michael role-playing his character is not I mean we poke find what you're really role-playing your character I mean and I'd like to point out that is the letter the law for that character in that group specifically targeting werewolves so it's kind of like right if you're playing a each I know a new agent they are by default werewolf hunters and against werewolves and that's how your character is going to start now whether a couple stories into the arc whether you still feel the same way whether you've evolved whether you still feel even maybe even more passionately against werewolves when you eat somebody else new group something along those lines but no I think that they actually the first story I think that yes there was a they're different than us and they must be eliminated but I think they were looking for a solution to a dilemma of 12 missing agents and that's why the female be had to die and I think you guys made choices based on your hat yeah I don't know if he's actually I mean he says world of darkness but I mean even if he's referring to dress and because that's the most current one vampires are more or less bad guys I mean they're painted that way intentionally there is no we don't do the glittery vampires right and but you I mean world of darkness there's an entirely different book that focuses on being a vampire and you're not the bad guy per se but even within Dresden we had Jim who is more or less a blackcore vampire who's not bad crispy Bruce and Megan sorry to kill them but yeah yeah I mean well I don't think I was really stick to the mold they're so considered predators right they're absolutely many so yes they it's kind of a lot but and they are classified I would go after a serial killer too I mean and neither of our stories were they totally black and white no any of them and I think that at least as far as I'm going storyteller wise I try to again paint those shades gray and I'm sure you'll do something similar where if you could put the players in situation occasionally not every time but in situations occasionally where gosh which we really kill them I mean isn't he doing more good than harm right now and shouldn't we perhaps spare the sword at this point I think you could put characters in dilemmas like that you're doing your job as a story horror is difficult to play because the players we're not scared right to get the characters to be scared is impossible so often one of the tricks you use is a GM is just take something that's normal and twist it a little bit make it just a little bit different so you've got the warden who's supposed to be the good guy in town and he's not quite he's doing bad things just to give an uneasy subtle unsettling feeling to the to the players right what where where do I stand this is where I should be but this isn't right something's a little off I think it's easier to do in world of darkness it is easier to do in world of darkness and I felt that the situation once the werewolf had killed John Beamer and there was no doubt about it you guys knew he just ate your I don't know if he called John Beamer a friend at that point he was your team member of your task force I thought I never liked him so it was okay to the know I thought that when the situation was broke I thought it was actually a pretty powerful scene in its own right when Billy was saying well I think it was the correct characters in him and yeah I mean people if people like he had werewolf claws actually John Beamer so so werewolf had its arms chopped off or his hands chopped off to power up this hunter so it was just interesting I thought it was a real good moral dilemma so I think DJ Allen's probably referring to some moments in stories when it is more black and white but I think we've also gone out of our way as storytellers Tom and I to make those shades of gray All right two more questions for Mr. Allen this one's for Scott because I mean it means nothing to me I mean I don't understand the question hopefully he will. Would you all consider running a scenario where solo adventuring happens out of session i.e. actually mean blue booking audio style as world of darkness puts it? I wonder if he's saying would we run one on one? Yeah side adventure right now like kind of what I was guessing yeah I'm guessing that that's what he's referring to like have an adventure that's all happening at the same time but everybody's going there different ways in different paths right like one person comes over a night you know like pretty crazy yeah something along those lines there's something in the blue book that he could be referring to called well it's really all the books called a prelude basically you know if you're going to play vampire and we're going to try to maintain our humanity while being monsters because that's the that's the concept of what are the premise of vampire you're trying to maintain what little humanity that you have while it's this evil beast inside of you trying to tell you to feed feed feed until that you drain the blood out of people anyways they do a prelude which is your story like hey how am I even walking down the street you know like just like your normal life and then you get turned into a vampire that's how I want to do every day and so he couldn't be referring to preludes right like what brought you guys to the point in the world doctors or he might be just talking about us solo sessions where you and I go one-on-one for a start of the story and I don't see that happening simply because there's that means your time would be 6 sold and used up if D.J. Allen would like to call my wife and explain to her how I'm going to run six sessions a week and that's not going to happen not going to but I think that there certainly I think his point or maybe his point is is that boy those one-on-one sessions can be really cool like when you get someone one-on-one and you do some role-playing you can really make some amazing things happen but I think the best we're going to happen is going to be like little side there's two or three player well as I say two or three players show up for a night the rest don't you do a flashback you do something along those lines we have a smaller group or like Jim said where somebody gets a shine for maybe 45 minutes or an hour during one episode but probably the best we can do. D.J. Allen has his own podcast and he does a lot of stuff over Skype and over G+ like the group. Right so maybe he was assuming you could do it from home in the evening when oh right I like getting together I mean I love the social idea. Absolutely and I think we get a cleaner recording than we would ever over microphones that we own. I mean let's try to do Skype too. Well you have Skype didn't once but that exactly feeds into his last question was which is one of you guys in the lobby played via the internet and we have had Mike call in once and the problem we ran into was terrible lag yeah but I think that's always a problem when dealing with someone playing over the internet and when you're dealing with him in Skype and and it's just I talk there's a delay he talked there's a delay then we're talking over each other and then it's never clear and you got an entire room of people who are here and some people that aren't here and you're going to have that happen a lot and yeah being able to look around the table and see who's talking who's not and when they are when they're not when someone puts a glass down and yeah it's not when it's a good to talk and not to talk it's hard to do over yeah I would say that if anything it would be a video feed where they could see it's a way it's a way issue but yeah yeah it would be the only way that would ever work and maybe on our kickstart or someday well we'll have the biggest the biggest donor will get to know you have a category donate 5,000 and you get to play with the Knights yeah okay all right boy that was full of proper would it all right we spent half the night my utterly disappointing for our fans yeah it's really had somebody skyping money for that thinking of somebody skyping they could play one of the bad guys for a night yeah well we'll keep it under consideration I don't know going back to a right DJ Ellen's earlier question I was thinking that in the Dresden verse the character of Thomas is a yeah a way to yeah he's trying to get good out of his uh no if not good then definitely not evil right for his character who's he's still a vampire that hasn't demonated trust me that is the end of the questions from our fans we want to thank them very much for all of the effort they put forth yes sending those questions in and hopefully we didn't board the answer I really look forward each each session to the questions that came in during the week the votes that they take the time to put on the um KOTN podcast website yeah all that I mean it's great having listeners who um who give active feedback I know for a player and a storyteller it really makes the most enjoyment we get obviously is around the table right we're playing with this group of people that I'm blessed to be able to roleplay with it and truthfully we would roleplay obviously if no one was listening to us so without a doubt right just wouldn't be recording it could record it potentially but I wouldn't go through the trouble of editing it if the majority of our fans are smiling and we didn't hear anything from anything right it's just it is a lot of work so if you're an episode you like and you haven't posted or or posted in a while definitely give us a shout let us know I would be pretty like what you don't and what you have questions on we definitely want to hear it that's right I would be interested to hear what fan favorites are I mean maybe we can make a poll but I'd rather have them type in what their favorite episodes were set their scenes maybe that's a better way maybe that's a better way it was all is limited by what we put out there yeah we've only put so many and yeah how about we go around and ask if we have any questions for our fans how did you find us or what made them keep listening there you go what means you look us up what was the reason was the reason why you looked up our podcast to begin with anyone kept you because honestly listening to the first couple episodes right you have to be a die-hard fan of quality heads for us ones are pretty rough yeah I would like to dress in books the first the earlier yeah it's not that great experience that's for damn sure I want to know those people that dislike fate or world darkness or whatever what they hate about the system or dislike about the system or refuse those to do it for a reason how long have you people been playing and what have you been playing mm-hmm what what style did they like to play you know are they strategic war gamers are they are they storytellers I mean you've assumed that if they're listening to us that they're probably of a storytelling bent but maybe not or if they're game designers so this is your stuff and maybe we'll play test it here mm-hmm because we just discussed how many thousands of things we want to play now I got a really important question that listeners that don't listen anymore why'd you stop listening oh shit okay here it's gonna be a tough one okay that wraps up all the questions from everybody and our discussion of the trust and file story delivery so thank you all for your questions thank you all players for your participation in the question answering I know there's a lot of them and hopefully you guys will enjoy the world of darkness story in the return of past worksigner thanks for listening to the nights of the night actual play podcast visit kotnpodcast.com for more information on this and other adventures where you will find character stats photos storytelling props and even a forum for comments and suggestions or you could email us directly at feedback at kotnpodcast.com or contact us via twitter or leave a message on facebook all music for this podcast was created and performed by zen audio smith if you'd like custom professional music created for your podcast or business please visit zenaudio smith.com and please join us next episode for more mystery and adventure music. 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